laughs and smiles, contrasted

C.   "....Strange, that laughter, man's lowest attribute, is distinctive; while the smile, which seems borrowed from Heaven, and which can confer rapturous joy, if not happiness, is shared, I think, in a slight degree by brutes." 
(Scenes Beyond the Western Border, Southern Literary Messenger, June 1852); and
Scenes and Adventures in the Army

"True, it is said that a man may smile, and smile, and smile, and be a villain; but it is not said that a man may laugh, and laugh, and laugh, and be one, is it, Charlie?"

"Ha, ha, ha!—no no, no no."  (The Confidence-Man)

double-refined

I. F. "Nay, Friend, I belong to earth—from thy flight descend not lower:  as your old fashioned friend, I feel interested in your surface wanderings; but let your double-refined poetry and romance go 'to the D—.'"  (Scenes Beyond the Western Border, December 1851)

 Revised in the 1857 book as follows:

Friend. — Nay, stick to the surface now; only "to the d — l" with your double-refined poetry and romance.  (Scenes and Adventures in the Army)

  

I. F.  "There are noble minds, who would pronounce much of that extravagant—
too double-refined for any application."  (June 1852)

"Drop Tacitus. His subtlety is falsity, To him, in his double-refined anatomy of human nature, is well applied the Scripture saying--'There is a subtle man, and the same is deceived.' Drop Tacitus. Come, now, let me throw the book overboard."  (The Confidence-Man)

like knights of old

"... but would you, like the knights of old, convert love into worship; do you advocate the blind devotion which led to violence and bloodshed?"  

C.  "No: you mistake a concomitant for a cause; the redeeming virtue of those ages was this romantic devotion, but tinctured of course, with prevailing rudeness and crime. Love, always powerful, was ennobled and purified by martial Romance; and thus allied, was successful against barbarism. Worn out by change, Romance is gone; but Poetry, its vital element, is left; and its refined spirit alone can save love from materialism and degradation, and elevate its objects, so that man can bow with respectful devotion."

(Scenes Beyond the Western Border; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army)

"... each mate or headsman, like a Gothic Knight of old, is always accompanied by his boat-steerer or harpooneer,  (Moby-Dick)

OF THE CRUSADERS

When sighting first the towers afar
Which girt the object of the war
And votive march—the Saviour's Tomb,
What made the red-cross knights so shy?
And wherefore did they doff the plume
And baldrick, kneel in dust, and sigh?

Hardly it serves to quote Voltaire
And say they were freebooters—hence,
Incapable of awe or sense
Pathetic; no, for man is heir
To complex moods; and in that age
Belief devout and bandit rage
Frequent were joined; and e'en to-day
At shrines on the Calabrian steep—
Not insincere while feelings sway—
The brigand halts to adore, to weep.
Grant then the worst—is all romance
Which claims that the crusader's glance
Was blurred by tears?

(Clarel 1.4)

moods and tenses

"Candid! Would you prefer discussing 'sacred fountains and groves?' "

Friend.—That, ingrate, was only to flatter a little, for once, your humor, your "mood,"—which, in all its tenses, I should call the doubtful.
(Scenes and Adventures in the Army)

"In the Missionary College at Lahainaluna, on Maui, one of the Sandwich Islands, I saw a tabular exhibition of a Hawaiian verb, conjugated through all its moods and tenses. It covered the side of a considerable apartment, and I doubt whether Sir William Jones himself would not have despaired of mastering it."  (Typee)

"Each conjugation will I curb,
All moods and tenses of the verb...."  (Clarel 2.3)

quirk of repeating speech

Yow! Here we see how a peculiar habit of Britspeak was cleverly identified in a prairie critique of The False Heir by G.P.R. James, then subsequently exploited by Melville in "Israel Potter" (1854) as a characteristic mannerism in the speeches of King George III:

I[maginary]. F[riend].—"James has an extraordinary habit of making his spokesmen repeat the first sentence of their speeches, thus—I don't know, sir; I don't know, sir,— That's a pity—that's a pity!' Since I have noticed it, it always makes me nervous!"
-- Scenes Beyond the Western Border in the Southern Literary Messenger Volume 18, January 1852; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army.

Waiting a moment, till the man was out of hearing, the king again turned upon Israel.

"Were you at Bunker Hill?—that bloody Bunker Hill —eh, eh?"

"Yes, sir."

"Fought like a devil—like a very devil, I suppose?”

"Yes, sir."

"Helped flog—helped flog my soldiers?”

"Yes, sir; but very sorry to do it."

"Eh?—eh?—how's that?"

"I took it to be my sad duty, sir."

"Very much mistaken—very much mistaken, indeed. Why do ye sir me?—eh? I'm your king—your king."

"Sir," said Israel firmly, but with deep respect, "I have no king."

-- "Israel Potter" in Putnam's Monthly Magazine for August, 1854.

respect for women the test of nobility

I[maginary]. F[riend]. “All must observe that the noblest, and in general the most eminent men, evince the highest regard for women; that a profound and deferential respect for them is the first characteristic of a perfect gentleman.”
(Scenes Beyond the Western Border; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army)

“… and if the degree of consideration in which the ever-adorable sex is held by the men be—as the philosophers affirm—a just criterion of the degree of refinement among a people, then I may truly pronounce the Typees to be as polished a community as ever the sun shone upon. … Nowhere are the ladies more assiduously courted; nowhere are they better appreciated as the contributors to our highest enjoyments; and nowhere are they more sensible of their power.”  (Typee)

UPDATE:  For the whole prairie dialogue on social injustices to women, see here.  For another instance in Melville's writings of the same theme, check out the pseudo-biographical sketch of the "Marquis de Grandvin" from the so-called "Burgundy Club" manuscript:

Not invariably running the risk of incurring dark clouds from their lords, the dames and sisters of the Benedicks of the clubs, at their balls and parties, cast upon the Marquis that kindled merry glance which, according to the old French epic whose theme is Roncesvalles, the ladies bestowed upon Roland; not alone smitten by the fame and taken with the person of that noble accredited nephew of Charlemagne, but rightly inferring him to be not more of a David against the Saracen than a champion against still more flagitious infidels, impugners of the sex.
(The Marquis de Grandvin)

 * * *

“How generally in society, with the audacious, but seldom denied claim to civilization, do men, (alas! uneducated,) like savages, look upon them and treat them as drudges; laborers in their service and ministers to their pleasure."
(Scenes Beyond the Western Border; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army)

“Far different from their condition among many rude nations, where the women are made to perform all the work while their ungallant lords and masters lie buried in sloth….” (Typee)

against dogmas

The North Fork, Glacier National Park
(David Restivo, NPS)

"And it is this free desert air alone, that emboldens me in the search, to question the dogmas which society holds so precious."  (Scenes Beyond the Western Border; and Scenes and Adventures in the Army)

"No; the superstitions and dogmas concerning Sin had not laid their withering maxims upon our hearts."  (White-Jacket)

" 'In respect of the universe, mankind is but a sect,' saith Diloro; 'and first principles but dogmas.'"  (Mardi)

"A dogma! truly, which should be thrown to the dogs...."  (Mardi)