"And now that all his successive meetings with various ships contrastingly concurred to show the demoniac indifference with which the white whale tore his hunters, whether sinning or sinned against; now it was that there lurked a something in the old man’s eyes, which it was hardly sufferable for feeble souls to see."
Musing: It seems the central theme of the book evolves here - did the whale take Ahab's leg on purpose or not? Is it worse to sin, or be sinned against? The language in this book is often spellbinding - the "demonic indifference" of a tragedy is just that, really. Don't we want everything to mean something? Isn't there a reason we suffer? I think Moby-Dick is hard to read for the same reason Melville says it is hard to look into Ahab's eyes.