Seas and Oceans: an endless source of inspiration for quotes and sayings | Photo: Oliver Clarke/Creative Commons

The seas of the world have a profound effect on our lives. Discover the most beautiful sea and ocean quotes ever.

Planet Earth has five great oceans and 113 seas. They represent 72 percent of the surface of the globe, and together, they've been an endless source of inspiration for humankind.

The oceans and seas have been changing lives since the dawn of time. Saline water is part of who we are, even when it claims souls and dreams.

Humans have always experienced an intense relationship with the oceans. Pouring feelings into the seas is an ancient practice.

We've done it through philosophical thoughts, inspiring speeches, self-analysis, confessional quotes, and universal sayings.

To put it simply, we have been in love with the ocean since we saw it for the first time.

Surfers are deeply connected with that giant interconnected mass of saltwater, but they are not alone.

The Pacific, Atlantic, Indian, Antarctic, and Arctic oceans touch everyone, and that's precisely when inspiring words are said and written.

Let's take a deep breath and dive into the magnificent collection of unforgettable sea quotes. What is your favorite drop?


"You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty."
Mahatma Gandhi

"We are tied to the ocean. And when we go back to the sea, whether it is to sail or to watch - we are going back from whence we came."
John F. Kennedy

"If you live a life of make-believe, your life isn't worth anything until you do something that does challenge your reality. And to me, sailing the open ocean is a real challenge because it's life or death."
Morgan Freeman

"A beach is not only a sweep of sand but shells of sea creatures, the sea glass, the seaweed, the incongruous objects washed up by the ocean."
Henry Grunwald

"Being out there in the ocean - God's creation - it's like a gift he has given us to enjoy."
Bethany Hamilton

"Ocean is more ancient than the mountains and freighted with the memories and the dreams of Time."
H. P. Lovecraft

"Why is it that scuba divers and surfers are some of the strongest advocates of ocean conservation? Because they've spent time in and around the ocean, and they've personally seen the beauty, the fragility, and even the degradation of our planet's blue heart."
Sylvia Earle

"There's nothing more beautiful than the way the ocean refuses to stop kissing the shoreline, no matter how many times it's sent away."
Sarah Kay

"Ocean: A body of water occupying two-thirds of a world made for man - who has no gills."
Ambrose Bierce

"How inappropriate to call this planet Earth when it is clearly Ocean."
Arthur C. Clarke

"The ocean stirs the heart, inspires the imagination, and brings eternal joy to the soul."
Robert Wyland

"The cure for anything is salt water: sweat, tears, or the sea."
Isak Dinesen

"So that the monotonous fall of the waves on the beach, which for the most part beat a measured and soothing tattoo to her thoughts, seemed consolingly to repeat over and over again."
Virginia Woolf

"In one drop of water are found all the secrets of all the oceans."
Kahlil Gibran

"Even the upper end of the river believes in the ocean."
William Stafford

"The three great elemental sounds in nature are the sound of rain, the sound of wind in a primeval wood, and the sound of outer ocean on a beach."
Henry Beston

"We ourselves feel that what we are doing is just a drop in the ocean. But the ocean would be less because of that missing drop."
Mother Teresa

"Our memories of the ocean will linger on, long after our footprints in the sand are gone."
Unknown Author

"The sea, once it casts its spell, holds one in its net of wonder forever."
Jacques Cousteau

"A pool just isn't the same as the ocean. It has no energy. No life."
Linda Gerber

"The ocean is a place of skin, rich outer membranes hiding thick juicy insides, laden with the soup of being."
Vera Nazarian

"When anxious, uneasy, and bad thoughts come, I go to the sea, and the sea drowns them out with its great wide sounds, cleanses me with its noise, and imposes a rhythm upon everything in me that is bewildered and confused."
Rainer Maria Rilke

"The sea does not reward those who are too anxious, too greedy, or too impatient. One should lie empty, open, choiceless as a beach - waiting for a gift from the sea."
Anne Morrow Lindbergh

"Why do we love the sea? It is because it has some potent power to make us think things we like to think."
Robert Henri

"The voice of the sea speaks to the soul. The touch of the sea is sensuous, enfolding the body in its soft, close embrace."
Kate Chopin

"The great sea makes one a great skeptic."
Richard Jefferies

"The sea is as near as we come to another world."
Anne Stevenson

"He that will learn to pray, let him go to sea."
George Herbert

"To me, the sea is a continual miracle; the fishes that swim, the rocks, the motion of the waves, the ships with men in them. What stranger miracles are there?"
Walt Whitman

"The ocean is a central image. It is the symbolism of a great journey."
Enya

"For whatever we lose (like a you or a me), it's always ourselves we find in the sea."
E. E. Cummings

"The sea! The sea! The open sea! The blue, the fresh, the ever free!"
Bryan W. Procter

"Eternity begins and ends with the ocean's tides."
Unknown Author

"The sea lives in every one of us."
Robert Wyland

"Even castles made from sand fall to the ocean."
Jimi Hendrix

"A lot of people attack the sea. I make love to it."
Jacques Cousteau

"The sea complains upon a thousand shores."
Alexander Smith


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