Better to sleep with a sober cannibal than a drunk Christian.

In Herman Melville’s early novel of seafaring and cross-cultural encounter, the narrator uses this line while weighing the practical risks of sharing close quarters with men of very different backgrounds. The remark arises from a situation in which “civilized” Christian identity is shown to be a poor predictor of safety or decency, especially when alcohol is involved. Melville frames the comparison to puncture complacent assumptions about moral superiority: the supposedly “savage” figure is imagined as more predictable and less dangerous when sober than a fellow Christian rendered reckless by drink. The line reflects the book’s broader interest in how fear and prejudice distort judgment at sea and in unfamiliar societies.

The aphorism is a deliberately shocking reversal: it ranks sobriety and self-control above religious or cultural labels. Melville suggests that conduct matters more than professed creed—“Christian” is not synonymous with virtue, and “cannibal” is not synonymous with menace. By pairing cannibalism (an extreme taboo) with drunkenness (a common vice), he implies that everyday moral failures within “civilization” can be more immediately threatening than exoticized horrors attributed to outsiders. The quote also critiques ethnocentrism: it exposes how easily people excuse the dangers posed by their own group while exaggerating those of the unfamiliar.