Letters to Myself

Against an Analytical Tradition

To analyse it, would seem impossible. Can we, then, by the citation of some of those instances wherein this thing of whiteness -- though for the time either wholly or in great part stripped of all direct associations calculated to impart to it aught fearful, but, nevertheless, is found to exert over us the same sorcery, however modified; -- can we thus hope to light upon some chance clue to conduct us to the hidden cause we seek?
Let us try. But in a matter like this, subtlety appeals to subtlety, and without imagination no man can follow another into these halls.

Melville, Moby Dick, 162.