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All The Wild World Is Beautiful, And It Matters But Little Where We Go, To Highlands Or Lowlands, Woods Or Plains, On The Sea Or Land Or Down Among The Crystals Of Waves Or High In A Balloon In The Sky; Through All The Climates, Hot Or Cold, Storms And Calms, Everywhere And Always We Are In God's Eternal Beauty And Love. So Universally True Is This, The Spot Where We Chance To Be Always Seems The Best.

-John Muir

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All The Wild World

John Muir

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All The Wild World Is Beautiful, And It Matters But Little Where We Go, To Highlands Or Lowlands, Woods Or Plains, On The Sea Or Land Or Down Among The Crystals Of Waves Or High In A Balloon In The Sky; Through All The Climates, Hot Or Cold, Storms And Calms, Everywhere And Always We Are In God's Eternal Beauty And Love. So Universally True Is This, The Spot Where We Chance To Be Always Seems The Best.

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The Gross Heathenism Of Civilization Has Generally Destroyed Nature, And Poetry, And All That Is Spiritual.

The Last Days Of This Glacial Winter Are Not Yet Past; We Live In 'creation's Dawn.' The Morning Stars Still Sing Together, And The World, Though Made, Is Still Being Made And Becoming More Beautiful Every Day.

No Temple Made With Hands Can Compare With Yosemite. Every Rock In Its Walls Seems To Glow With Life. Some Lean Back In Majestic Repose; Others, Absolutely Sheer Or Nearly So For Thousands Of Feet, Advance Beyond Their Companions In Thoughtful Attitudes, Giving Welcome To Storms And Calms Alike, Seemingly Aware, Yet Heedless, Of Everything Going On About Them.

Hiking - I Don't Like Either The Word Or The Thing. People Ought To Saunter In The Mountains - Not Hike! Do You Know The Origin Of That Word 'saunter?' It's A Beautiful Word. Away Back In The Middle Ages People Used To Go On Pilgrimages To The Holy Land, And When People In The Villages Through Which They Passed Asked Where They Were Going, They Would Reply, "a La Sainte Terre,' 'to The Holy Land.' And So They Became Known As Sainte-terre-ers Or Saunterers. Now These Mountains Are Our Holy Land, And We Ought To Saunter Through Them Reverently, Not 'hike' Through Them."

I Don't Agree With You In Saying That In All Human Minds There Is Poetry. Man As He Came From The Hand Of His Maker Was Poetic In Both Mind And Body, But The Gross Heathenism Of Civilization Has Generally Destroyed Nature, And Poetry, And All That Is Spiritual.

The Big Tree Is Nature's Forest Masterpiece, And So Far As I Know, The Greatest Of Living Things.

How Lavish Is Nature Building, Pulling Down, Creating, Destroying, Chasing Every Material Particle From Form To Form, Ever Changing, Ever Beautiful.

Wander Here A Whole Summer, If You Can ... Thousands Of Wild Blessings Will Search You And Soak You As If You Were A Sponge, And The Big Days Will Go By Uncounted

What Wonders Lie In Every Mountain Day!

Another Glorious Day, The Air As Delicious To The Lungs As Nectar To The Tongue.

Gigantic Second And Third Growth Trees Are Found In The Redwoods, Forming Magnificent Temple-like Circles Around Charred Ruins More Than A Thousand Years Old.

To Ask Me Whether I Could Endure To Live Without Friends Is Absurd. It Is Easy Enough To Live Out Of Material Sight Of Friends, But To Live Without Human Love Is Impossible.

It May Not Be Easy, Life Isn't Easy, But Dreams Keep You Alive.

No Dogma Taught By The Present Civilization Seems To Form So Insuperable An Obstacle In A Way Of A Right Understanding Of The Relations Which Culture Sustains As To Wilderness, As That Which Declares That The World Was Made Especially For The Uses Of Men. Every Animal, Plant, And Crystal Controverts It In The Plainest Terms. Yet It Is Taught From Century To Century As Something Ever New And Precious, And In The Resulting Darkness The Enormous Conceit Is Allowed To Go Unchallenged.

There Is That In The Glance Of A Flower Which May At Times Control The Greatest Of Creation's Braggart Lords.

In The Woods Is Perpetual Youth.

Wildness Was Ever Sounding In Our Ears, And Nature Saw To It That Besides School Lessons Some Of Her Own Lessons Should Be Learned, Perhaps With A View To The Time When We Should Be Called To Wander In Wildness To Our Heart’s Content.

As Long As I Live, I'll Hear Waterfalls And Birds And Winds Sing.

The Most Distinctive, And Perhaps The Most Impressive, Characteristic Of American Scenery Is Its Wilderness.

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I Never Have Held Death In Contempt, Though In The Course Of My Explorations I Have Oftentimes Felt That To Meet One's Fate On A Noble Mountain, Or In The Heart Of A Glacier, Would Be Blessed As Compared With Death From Disease, Or From Some Shabby Lowland Accident. But The Best Death, Quick And Crystal-pure, Set So Glaringly Open Before Us, Is Hard Enough To Face, Even Though We Feel Gratefully Sure That We Have Already Had Happiness Enough For A Dozen Lives.

Tug On Anything In Nature And You Will Find It Connected To Everything Else.

Lie Down Among The Pines For A While, Then Get To Plain Pure White Love-work ... To Help Humanity And Other Mortals And The Lord.

Happy Will Be The Men Who, Having The Power And The Love And The Benevolent Forecast To [create A Park], Will Do It. They Will Not Be Forgotten. The Trees And Their Lovers Will Sing Their Praises, And Generations Yet Unborn Will Rise Up And Call Them Blessed.

One Is Constantly Reminded Of The Infinite Lavishness And Fertility Of Nature-inexhaustible Abundance Amid What Seems Enormous Waste. And Yet When We Look Into Any Of Her Operations That Lie Within Reach Of Our Minds, We Learn That No Particle Of Her Material Is Wasted Or Worn Out. It Is Eternally Flowing From Use To Use, Beauty To Yet Higher Beauty; And We Soon Cease To Lament Waste And Death, And Rather Rejoice And Exult In The Imperishable, Unspendable Wealth Of The Universe.

The Water In Music The Oar Forsakes. The Air In Music The Wing Forsakes. All Things In Move In Music And Write It. The Mouse, Lizard, And Grasshopper Sing Together On The Turlock Sands, Sing With The Morning Stars.

He Had Gone To The Higher Sierras... [about Ralph Waldo Emerson's Death]

When We Contemplate The Whole Globe As One Great Dewdrop, Striped And Dotted With Continents And Islands, Flying Through Space With Other Stars All Singing And Shining Together As One, The Whole Universe Appears As An Infinite Storm Of Beauty.

There Is Not A Fragment In All Nature, For Every Relative Fragment Of One Thing Is A Full Harmonious Unit In Itself.

A Few Minutes Ago Every Tree Was Excited, Bowing To The Roaring Storm, Waving, Swirling, Tossing Their Branches In Glorious Enthusiasm Like Worship. But Though To The Outer Ear These Trees Are Now Silent, Their Songs Never Cease. Every Hidden Cell Is Throbbing With Music And Life, Every Fiber Thrilling Like Harp Strings, While Incense Is Ever Flowing From The Balsam Bells And Leaves. No Wonder The Hills And Groves Were God's First Temples, And The More They Are Cut Down And Hewn Into Cathedrals And Churches, The Farther Off And Dimmer Seems The Lord Himself.

No Synonym For God Is So Perfect As Beauty.

The Mountains Are Calling And I Must Go.

What Is Worthwhile In Life? I Think It Is Worth Living And Dreaming. If You Don't You May Be Dead Anyhow - Inside.

I Am Hopelessly And Forever A Mountaineer.

Over The Summit, I Saw The So-called Mono Desert Lying Dreamily Silent In The Thick, Purple Light -- A Desert Of Heavy Sun-glare Beheld From A Desert Of Ice-burnished Granite.

No Temple Made With Hands Can Compare With Yosemite.

Books Are But Stepping Stones To Show You Where Other Minds Have Been.

Hiking. I Don't Like Either The Word Or The Thing. People Ought To Saunter In The Mountains...the Se Mountains Are Our Holy Land, And We Ought To Saunter Through Them Reverently, Not 'hike' Through Them.

Take A Course In Good Water And Air; And In The Eternal Youth Of Nature You May Renew Your Own. Go Quietly, Alone; No Harm Will Befall You.

Everybody Needs Beauty As Well As Bread, Places To Play In And Pray In, Where Nature May Heal And Cheer And Give Strength To Body And Soul Alike. This Natural Beauty-hunger Is Made Manifest In The Little Window-sill Gardens Of The Poor, Though Perhaps Only A Geranium Slip In A Broken Cup, As Well As In The Carefully Tended Rose And Lily Gardens Of The Rich, The Thousands Of Spacious City Parks And Botanical Gardens, And In Our Magnificent National Parks — The Yellowstone, Yosemite, Sequoia, Etc. — Nature's Sublime Wonderlands, The Admiration And Joy Of The World.

But No Temple Made With Hands Can Compare With Yosemite. Every Rock In Its Walls Seems To Glow With Life...as If Into This One Mountain Mansion Nature Had Gathered Her Choicest Treasures.

Do Behold The King In His Glory, King Sequoia. Behold! Behold! Seems All I Can Say.... Well May I Fast, Not From Bread But From Business, Bookmaking, Duty Doing & Other Trifles.... I’m In The Woods Woods Woods, & They Are In Mee-ee-ee.... I Wish I Were Wilder & So Bless Sequoia I Will Be.

When I Discovered A New Plant, I Sat Down Beside It For A Minute Or A Day, To Make Its Acquaintance And Hear What It Had To Tell... I Asked The Boulders I Met, Whence They Came And Whither They Were Going.

I Wandered Away On A Glorious Botanical And Geological Excursion, Which Has Lasted Nearly Fifty Years And Is Not Yet Completed, Always Happy And Free, Poor And Rich, Without Thought Of A Diploma Or Of Making A Name, Urged On And On Through Endless, Inspiring Godful Beauty.

I Am Losing Precious Days. I Am Degenerating Into A Machine For Making Money. I Am Learning Nothing In This Trivial World Of Men. I Must Break Away And Get Out Into The Mountains To Learn The News

In The Eternal Youth Of Nature, You May Renew Your Own.

Divine Love Is The Sublime Boss Of The Universe.

My Meals Were Easily Made, For They Were All Alike And Simple, Only A Cupful Of Tea And Bread.

John Muir, Earth-planet, Universe.

I Have Enjoyed The Trees & Scenery Of Ky Exceedingly. How Shall I Ever Tell Of The Miles & Miles Of Beauty That Have Been Flowing Into Me In Such Measure?

The Blessings Of One Mountain Day, Whatever His Fate, Long Life, Short Life, Stormy Or Calm, He Is Rich Forever.

All Nature's Wildness Tells The Same Story: The Shocks And Outbursts Of Earthquakes, Volcanoes, Geysers, Roaring, Thundering Waves And Floods, The Silent Uprush Of Sap In Plants, Storms Of Every Sort, Each And All, Are The Orderly, Beauty-making Love-beats Of Nature's Heart.

Large Flocks Of Butterflies, All Kinds Of Happy Insects, Seem To Be In A Perfect Fever Of Joy And Sportive Gladness.

Any Glimpse Into The Life Of An Animal Quickens Our Own And Makes It So Much The Larger And Better In Every Way.

None Of Nature's Landscapes Are Ugly So Long As They Are Wild.

When You Tug At A Single Thing In The Universe, You'll Find Its Attached To Everything Else.

Indians Walk Softly And Hurt The Landscape Hardly More Than The Birds And Squirrels, And Their Brush And Bark Huts Last Hardly Longer Than Those Of Wood Rats, While Their More Enduring Monuments, Excepting Those Wrought On The Forests By The Fires They Made To Improve Their Hunting Grounds, Vanish In A Few Centuries.

Who Reports The Works And Ways Of The Clouds, Those Wondrous Creations Coming Into Being Every Day Like Freshly Upheaved Mountains?

Wherever We Go In The Mountains, We Find More Than We Seek.

Anyhow We Never Know Where We Must Go, Nor What Guides We Are To Get - -people,storms, Guardian Angels, Or Sheep.

Nature Has Always Something Rare To Show Us... And The Danger To Life And Limb Is Hardly Greater Than One Would Experience Crouching Deprecatingly Beneath A Roof.

No Wonder The Hills And Groves Were God's First Temples, And The More They Are Cut Down And Hewn Into Cathedrals And Churches, The Farther Off And Dimmer Seems The Lord Himself.

I Am Often Asked If I Am Not Lonely On My Solitary Excursions. It Seems So Self-evident That One Cannot Be Lonesome Where Everything Is Wild And Beautiful And Busy And Steeped With God That The Question Is Hard To Answer.

A Few Minutes Ago Every Tree Was Excited, Bowing To The Roaring Storm, Waving, Swirling, Tossing Their Branches In Glorious Enthusiasm Like Worship. But Though To The Outer Ear These Trees Are Now Silent, Their Songs Never Cease.

Many Of Nature's Finest Lessons Are To Be Found In Her Storms, And If Careful To Keep In Right Relations With Them, We May Go Safely Abroad With Them, Rejoicing In The Grandeur And Beauty Of Their Works And Ways.

Any Glimpse Into The Life Of An Animal Quickens Our Own And Makes It So Much The Larger And Better In Every Way." ... "surely A Better Time Must Be Drawing Nigh When Godlike Human Beings Will Become Truly Humane, And Learn To Put Their Animal Fellow Mortals In Their Hearts Instead Of On Their Backs Or In Their Dinners.

I Was A Few Miles South Of Louisville When I Planned My Journey. I Spread Out My Map Under A Tree And Made Up My Mind To Go Through Kentucky, Tennessee, And Georgia To Florida, Thence To Cuba, Thence To Some Part Of South America; But It Will Be Only A Hasty Walk. I Am Thankful, However, For So Much.

At The Touch Of This Divine Light, The Mountains Seemed To Kindle To A Rapt, Religious Consciousness, And Stood Hushed Like Devout Worshippers Waiting To Be Blessed.

Most People Are On The World, Not In It-- Having No Conscious Sympathy Or Relationship To Anything About Them-- Undiffused Seporate, And Rigidly Alone Like Marbles Of Polished Stone, Touching But Seporate.

One Should Go To The Woods For Safety, If For Nothing Else.

To Lovers Of The Wild, These Mountains Are Not A Hundred Miles Away. Their Spiritual Power And The Goodness Of The Sky Make Them Near, As A Circle Of Friends. ... You Cannot Feel Yourself Out Of Doors; Plain, Sky, And Mountains Ray Beauty Which You Feel. You Bathe In These Spirit-beams, Turning Round And Round, As If Warming At A Camp-fire. Presently You Lose Consciousness Of Your Own Separate Existence: You Blend With The Landscape, And Become Part And Parcel Of Nature.

Heaven Knows That John The Baptist Was Not More Eager To Get All His Fellow Sinners Into The Jordan Than I To Baptize All Of Mine In The Beauty Of God's Mountains.

If I Should Be Fated To Walk No More With Nature, Be Compelled To Leave All I Most Devoutly Love In The Wilderness, Return To Civilization And Be Twisted Into The Characterless Cable Of Society, Then These Sweet, Free, Cumberless Rovings Will Be As Chinks And Slits On Life's Horizon, Through Which I May Obtain Glimpses Of The Treasures That Lie In God's Wilds Beyond My Reach.

Tell Me What You Will Of The Benefactions Of City Civilization, Of The Sweet Security Of Streets-all As Part Of The Natural Upgrowth Of Man Towards The High Destiny We Hear So Much Of. I Know That Our Bodies Were Made To Thrive Only In Pure Air, And The Scenes In Which Pure Air Is Found. If The Death Exhalations That Brood The Broad Towns In Which We So Fondly Compact Ourselves Were Made Visible, We Should Flee As From A Plague. All Are More Or Less Sick; There Is Not A Perfectly Sane Man In San Francisco.

No Words Will Ever Describe The Exquisite Beauty And Charm Of This Mountain Park – Nature’s Landscape Garden At Once Tenderly Beautiful And Sublime. No Wonder It Draws Nature-lovers From All Over The World.

A Man, In His Books, May Be Said To Walk The Earth A Long Time After He Is Gone.

The Groves And Thickets Of Smaller Trees Are Full Of Blooming Evergreen Vines. These Vines Are Not Arranged In Separate Groups, Or In Delicate Wreaths, But In Bossy Walls And Heavy, Mound-like Heaps And Banks. Am Made To Feel That I Am Now In A Strange Land. I Know Hardly Any Of The Plants, But Few Of The Birds, And I Am Unable To See The Country For The Solemn, Dark, Mysterious Cypress Woods Which Cover Everything.

Trees Go Wandering Forth In All Directions With Every Wind, Going And Coming Like Ourselves, Traveling With Us Around The Sun Two Million Miles A Day, And Through Space Heaven Knows How Fast And Far!

To Sit In Solitude, To Think In Solitude With Only The Music Of The Stream And The Cedar To Break The Flow Of Silence, There Lies The Value Of Wilderness.

Climb The Mountains And Get Their Good Tidings. Nature's Peace Will Flow Into You As Sunshine Flows Into Trees.

Nature Is Ever At Work Building And Pulling Down, Creating And Destroying, Keeping Everything Whirling And Flowing, Allowing No Rest But In Rhythmical Motion, Chasing Everything In Endless Song Out Of One Beautiful Form Into Another.

I Should Study Nature's Laws In All Their Crossings And Unions; I Should Follow Magnetic Streams To Their Source And Follow The Shores Of Our Magnetic Oceans. I Should Go Among The Rays Of The Aurora, And Follow Them To Their Beginnings, And Study Their Dealings And Communications With Other Powers And Expressions Of Matter.

God Cannot Save Them From Fools.

Only By Going Alone In Silence, Without Baggage, Can One Truly Get Into The Heart Of The Wilderness. All Other Travel Is Mere Dust And Hotels And Baggage And Chatter.

How Many Hearts With Warm, Red Blood In Them Are Beating Under Cover Of The Woods, And How Many Teeth And Eyes Are Shining? A Multitude Of Animal People, Intimately Related To Us, But Of Whose Lives We Know Almost Nothing, Are As Busy About Their Own Affairs As We Are About Ours.

Only Spread A Fern-frond Over A Man's Head And Worldly Cares Are Cast Out, And Freedom And Beauty And Peace Come In.

Galen Clark Was The Best Mountaineer I Ever Met, And One Of The Kindest And Most Amiable Of All My Mountain Friends.

None May Wholly Escape The Good Of Nature, However Imperfectly Exposed To Her Blessings. The Minister Will Not Preach A Perfectly Flat And Sedimentary Sermon After Climbing A Snowy Peak; And The Fair Play And Tremendous Impartiality Of Nature, So Tellingly Displayed, Will Surely Affect The After Pleadings Of The Lawyer. Fresh Air At Least Will Get Into Everybody, And The Cares Of Mere Business Will Be Quenched Like The Fires Of A Sinking Ship.

Come To The Woods, For Here Is Rest.

Nothing Can Be Done Well At A Speed Of Forty Miles A Day. The Multitude Of Mixed, Novel Impressions Rapidly Piled On One Another Make Only A Dreamy, Bewildering, Swirling Blur, Most Of Which Is Unrememberable.

Word Lessons, In Particular The Wouldst Couldst Shouldst Have Loved Kind, Were Kept Up, With Much Warlike Thrashing, Until I Had Committed The Whole Of French, Latin, And English Grammars To Memory.

English Grammar

We Live With Our Heels As Well As Head And Most Of Our Pleasure Comes In That Way.

It Is A Vast Wilderness Of Rocks In A Sea Of Light, Colored And Glowing Like Oak And Maple In Autumn, When The Sun Gold Is Richest

Men Use Care In Purchasing A Horse, And Are Neglectful In Choosing Friends.

Come To The Woods, For Here Is Rest. There Is No Repose Like That Of The Green Deep Woods.

When One Tugs At A Single Thing In Nature; He Finds It Attached To The Rest Of The World. Variant - When We Try To Pick Out Anything By Itself, We Find It Hitched To Everything Else In The Universe. Variant - Tug On Anything At All And You'll Find It Connected To Everything Else In The Universe.

...therefore All Childish Fear Must Be Put Away.

Long, Blue, Spiky-edged Shadows Crept Out Across The Snow-fields, While A Rosy Glow, At First Scarce Discernible, Gradually Deepened And Suffused Every Mountain-top, Flushing The Glaciers And The Harsh Crags Above Them. This Was The Alpenglow, To Me The Most Impressive Of All The Terrestrial Manifestations Of God. At The Touch Of This Divine Light, The Mountains Seemed To Kindle To A Rapt, Religious Consciousness, And Stood Hushed Like Devout Worshippers Waiting To Be Blessed.

Every Atom In Creation May Be Said To Be Acquainted With And Married To Every Other, But With Universal Union There Is A Division Sufficient In Degree For The Purposes Of The Most Intense Individuality.

Strange The Faithless Fuss Made About Taking A Walk In The Safest And Pleasantest Of All Places, A Wilderness.

I Have A Low Opinion Of Books: They Are Piles Of Stones Set Up To Show Coming Travelers Where Other Minds Have Been, Or At Best Signal Smokes To Call Attention.

The Battle We Have Fought, And Are Still Fighting For The Forests Is A Part Of The Eternal Conflict Between Right And Wrong, And We Cannot Expect To See The End Of It. …so We Must Count On Watching And Striving For These Trees, And Should Always Be Glad To Find Anything So Surely Good And Noble To Strive For.

No Sierra Landscape That I Have Seen Holds Anything Truly Dead Or Dull, Or Any Trace Of What In Manufactories Is Called Rubbish Or Waste; Everything Is Perfectly Clean And Pure And Full Of Divine Lessons.

The Battle For Conservation Will Go On Endlessly. It Is Part Of The Universal Battle Between Right And Wrong.

C. Albus...i Think The Very Loveliest Of All The Lily Family - A Spotless Soul, Plant Saint, That Every One Must Love And So Be Made Better. It Puts The Wildest Mountaineer On His Good Behavior. With This Plant The Whole World Would Seem Rich Though Non Other Existed.

One Can Make A Day Of Any Size And Regulate The Rising And Setting Of His Own Sun And The Brightness Of Its Shining.

How Narrow We Selfish Conceited Creatures Are In Our Sympathies! How Blind To The Rights Of All The Rest Of Creation!

God Has Cared For These Trees, Saved Them From Drought, Disease, Avalanches, And A Thousand Tempests And Floods. But He Cannot Save Them From Fools.

I Used To Envy The Father Of Our Race, Dwelling As He Did In Contact With The New-made Fields And Plants Of Eden; But I Do So No More, Because I Have Discovered That I Also Live In "creation's Dawn." The Morning Stars Still Sing Together, And The World, Not Yet Half Made, Becomes More Beautiful Every Day.

I Care To Live Only To Entice People To Look At Nature’s Loveliness.

No Right Way Is Easy In This Rough World. We Must Risk Our Lives To Save Them.

Every Good Thing Great And Small Needs Defense

I Ran Home In The Moonlight With Firm Strides; For The Sun-love Made Me Strong.

Walk Away Quietly In Any Direction And Taste The Freedom Of The Mountaineer.

Fresh Beauty Opens One's Eyes Wherever It Is Really Seen, But The Very Abundance And Completeness Of The Common Beauty That Besets Our Steps Prevents Its Being Absorbed And Appreciated. It Is A Good Thing, Therefore, To Make Short Excursions Now And Then To The Bottom Of The Sea Among Dulse And Coral, Or Up Among The Clouds On Mountain-tops, Or In Balloons, Or Even To Creep Like Worms Into Dark Holes And Caverns Underground, Not Only To Learn Something Of What Is Going On In Those Out-of-the-way Places, But To See Better What The Sun Sees On Our Return To Common Every-day Beauty.

Handle A Book As A Bee Does A Flower, Extract Its Sweetness But Do Not Damage It.

I’d Rather Be In The Mountains Thinking Of God, Than In Church Thinking About The Mountains.

When One Tugs At A Single Thing In Nature, He Finds It Attached To The Rest Of The World.

Better To Toil Blindly, Beating Every Stone In Turn For Grains Of Gold, Whether They Contain Any Or Not, Than Lie Down In Apathetic Decay.

Nature In Her Green, Tranquil Woods Heals And Soothes All Afflictions.

I Was Awakened By A Tremendous Earthquake, And Though I Hadn Ever Before Enjoyed A Storm Of This Sort, The Strange Thrilling Motion Could Not Be Mistaken, And I Ran Out Of My Cabin, Both Glad And Frightened, Shouting, "a Noble Earthquake! A Noble Earthquake" Feeling Sure I Was Going To Learn Something.

By Forces Seemingly Antagonistic And Destructive Nature Accomplishes Her Beneficent Designs - Now A Flood Of Fire, Now A Flood Of Ice, Now A Flood Of Water; And Again In The Fullness Of Time An Outburst Of Organic Life.

Nature As A Poet, An Enthusiastic Workingman, Becomes More And More Visible The Farther And Higher We Go; For The Mountains Are Fountains – Beginning Places, However Related To Sources Beyond Mortal Ken.

I Am Very Blessed. The Valley Is Full Of People, But They Do Not Annoy Me. I Revolve In Pathless Places And In Higher Rocks Than The World And His Ribbony Wife Can Reach.

The Mountains Are Fountains Not Only Of Rivers And Fertile Soil, But Of Men.

The Sun Shines Not On Us But In Us. The Rivers Flow Not Past, But Through Us. Thrilling, Tingling, Vibrating Every Fiber And Cell Of The Substance Of Our Bodies, Making Them Glide And Sing. The Trees Wave And The Flowers Bloom In Our Bodies As Well As Our Souls, And Every Bird Song, Wind Song, And Tremendous Storm Song Of The Rocks In The Heart Of The Mountains Is Our Song, Our Very Own, And Sings Our Love.

In The Beauty And Grandeur Of Individual Trees, And In Number And Variety Of Species, The Sierra Forests Surpass All Others

Winds Are Advertisements Of All They Touch, However Much Or Little We May Be Able To Read Them; Telling Their Wanderings Even By Their Scents Alone.

Keep In View The Common Good Of The People For All Time.

The Moon Is Looking Down Into The Canyon, And How Marvelously The Great Rocks Kindle To Her Light! Every Dome, And Brow, And Swelling Boss Touched By Her White Rays, Glows As If Lighted With Snow.

[concerning The Water Ouzel, Now Called American Dipper:] In A General Way His Music Is That Of The Streams Refined And Spiritualized. The Deep Booming Notes Of The Falls Are In It, The Trills Of Rapids, The Gurgling Of Margin Eddies, The Low Whispering Of Level Reaches, And The Sweet Tinkle Of Separate Drops Oozing From The Ends Of Mosses And Falling Into Tranquil Pools.

In Every Country The Mountains Are Fountains, Not Only Of Rivers But Of Men. Therefore We All Are Born Mountaineers, The Offspring Of Rock And Sunshine.

When We Try To Pick Out Anything By Itself, We Find It Hitched To Everything Else In The Universe.

Raindrops Blossom Brilliantly In The Rainbow, And Change To Flowers In The Sod, But Snow Comes In Full Flower Direct From The Dark, Frozen Sky.

The Substance Of The Winds Is Too Thin For Human Eyes, Their Written Language Is Too Difficult For Human Minds, And Their Spoken Language Mostly Too Faint For The Ears.

...every Sight And Sound Inspiring, Leading One Far Out Of Himself, Yet Feeding And Building Up His Individuality.

The Sun Shines Not On Us But In Us.

In Drying Plants, Botanists Often Dry Themselves. Dry Words And Dry Facts Will Not Fire Hearts.

I Must Return To The Mountains-to Yosemite. I Am Told That The Winter Storms There Will Not Be Easily Borne, But I Am Bewitched, Enchanted, And Tomorrow I Must Start For The Great Temple To Listen To The Winter Songs And Sermons Preached And Sung Only There.

In Every Walk With Nature One Receives Far More Than He Seeks.

Any Fool Can Destroy Trees, They Cannot Run Away.

Man Is Always And Everywhere A Blight On The Landscape.

Every Hidden Cell Is Throbbing With Music And Life, Every Fiber Thrilling Like Harp Strings.

Everybody Needs Beauty As Well As Bread, Places To Play In And Pray In, Where Nature May Heal And Give Strength To Body And Soul.

Although I Was Four Years At The University [of Wisconsin], I Did Not Take The Regular Course Of Studies, But Instead Picked Out What I Thought Would Be Most Useful To Me, Particularly Chemistry, Which Opened A New World, Mathematics And Physics, A Little Greek And Latin, Botany And And Geology. I Was Far From Satisfied With What I Had Learned, And Should Have Stayed Longer.

There Are No Accidents In Nature.

We All Flow From One Fountain.

I Have Seen Oaks Of Many Species In Many Kinds Of Exposure And Soil, But Those Of Kentucky Excel In Grandeur All I Had Ever Before Beheld. They Are Broad And Dense And Bright Green. In The Leafy Bowers And Caves Of Their Long Branches Dwell Magnificent Avenues Of Shade, And Every Tree Seems To Be Blessed With A Double Portion Of Strong Exulting Life.

Nature Had Gathered Her Choicest Treasures , To Draw Her Lovers Into Close And Confiding Communion With Her

The Great Wilds Of Our Country, Once Held To Be Boundless And Inexhaustible, Are Being Rapidly Invaded And Overrun In Every Direction, And Everything Destructible In Them Is Being Destroyed. How Far Destruction May Go It Is Not Easy To Guess. Every Landscape, Low And High, Seems Doomed To Be Trampled And Harried. Even The Sky Is Not Safe From Scath-blurred And Blackened Whole Summers Together With The Smoke Of Fires That Devour The Woods.

I've Had A Great Time In South America And South Africa. Indeed It Now Seems That On This Pair Of Wild Hot Continents I've Enjoyed The Most Fruitful Year Of My Life.

Go Quietly Alone, No Harm Will Befall You.

Look Up And Down And Round About You.!

Listen To Them! How Wholly Infused With God Is This One Big Word Of Love That We Call The World!

I Always Befriended Animals And Have Said Many A Good Word For Them. Even To The Least-loved Mosquitoes I Gave Many A Meal, And Told Them To Go In Peace.

Between Every Two Pine Trees There Is A Door Leading To A New Way Of Life.

We Are In The Mountains And They Are In Us, Kindling Enthusiasm, Making Every Nerve Quiver, Filling Every Pore And Cell Of Us....how Glorious A Conversion, So Complete And Wholesome It Is, Scarce Memory Enough Of Old Bondage Days Left As A Standpoint To View It From! In This Newness Of Life We Seem To Have Been So Always

We All Travel The Milky Way Together, Trees And Men; But It Never Occurred To Me Until This Storm-day, While Swinging In The Wind, That Trees Are Travelers In The Ordinary Sense. They Make Many Journeys, Not Extensive Ones, It Is True; But Our Own Little Journeys, Away And Back Again, Are Only Little More Than Tree-wavings - Many Of Them Not So Much.

Of All The Paths You Take In Life, Make Sure A Few Of Them Are Dirt.

What A Psalm The Storm Was Singing, And How Fresh The Smell Of The Washed Earth And Leaves, And How Sweet The Still Small Voices Of The Storm!

Our Lives Are Rounded With A Sleep.

Going Into The Woods, Is Going Home

Climb The Mountains And Get Their Good Tidings.

We All Flow From One Fountain- Soul. All Are Expressions Of One Love.

There Is A Love Of Wild Nature In Everybody, An Ancient Mother-love Showing Itself Whether Recognized Or No, And However Covered By Cares And Duties

Any Fool Can Destroy Trees. They Cannot Run Away; And If They Could, They Would Still Be Destroyed,-chased And Hunted Down As Long As Fun Or A Dollar Could Be Got Out Of Their Bark Hides, Branching Horns, Or Magnificent Bole Backbones. Few That Fell Trees Plant Them; Nor Would Planting Avail Much Towards Getting Back Anything Like The Noble Primeval Forests. During A Man's Life Only Saplings Can Be Grown, In The Place Of The Old Trees-tens Of Centuries Old-that Have Been Destroyed.

How Glorious A Greeting The Sun Gives The Mountains!

One Learns That The World, Though Made, Is Yet Being Made; That This Is Still The Morning Of Creation; That Mountains Long Conceived Are Now Being Born, Channels Traced For Coming Rivers, Basins Hollowed For Lakes.

Wander A Whole Summer If You Can. Thousands Of God's Blessings Will Search You And Soak You As If You Were A Sponge, And The Big Days Will Go By Uncounted. If You Are Business-tangled And So Burdened By Duty That Only Weeks Can Be Got Out Of The Heavy Laden Year, Give A Month At Least. The Time Will Not Be Taken From The Sum Of Life. Instead Of Shortening, It Will Indefinitely Lengthen It And Make You Truly Immortal.

Lizards Of Every Temper, Style, And Color Dwell Here, Seemingly As Happy And Companionable As The Birds And Squirrels.

Earth Has No Sorrow That Earth Can Not Heal.

The Radiance In Some Places Is So Great As To Be Fairly Dazzling... Every Crystal, Every Flower A Window Opening Into Heaven, A Mirror Reflecting The Creator.

All Wilderness Seems To Be Full Of Tricks And Plans To Drive And Draw Us Up Into God's Light.

Any Fool Can Destroy Trees. They Cannot Run Away; And If They Could, They Would Still Be Destroyed-chased And Hunted Down As Long As Fun Or A Dollar Could Be Got Of Their Bark Hides.

Man Has Injured Every Animal He Has Touched.

To Myself, Mountains Are The Beginning And The End Of All Natural Scenery; In Them, And In The Forms Of Inferior Landscape That Lead To Them, My Affections Are Wholly Bound Up.

Let Children Walk With Nature, Let Them See The Beautiful Blendings And Communions Of Death And Life, Their Joyous Inseparable Unity, As Taught In Woods And Meadows, Plains And Mountains And Streams Of Our Blessed Star, And They Will Learn That Death Is Stingless Indeed, And As Beautiful As Life.

Memories May Escape The Action Of The Will, May Sleep A Long Time, But When Stirred By The Right Influence, Though That Influence Be Light As A Shadow, They Flash Into Full Stature And Life With Everything In Place

Oh, These Vast, Calm, Measureless Mountain Days, Inciting At Once To Work And Rest! Days In Whose Light Everything Seems Equally Divine, Opening A Thousand Windows To Show Us God. Nevermore, However Weary, Should One Faint By The Way Who Gains The Blessings Of One Mountain Day; Whatever His Fate, Long Life, Short Life, Stormy Or Calm, He Is Rich Forever.

I...am Always Glad To Touch The Living Rock Again And Dip My Hand In The High Mountain Air.

In Studying The Fate Of Our Forest King, We Have Thus Far Considered The Action Of Purely Natural Causes Only; But, Unfortunately, Man Is In The Woods, And Waste And Pure Destruction Are Making Rapid Headway. If The Importance Of The Forests Were Even Vaguely Understood, Even From An Economic Standpoint, Their Preservation Would Call Forth The Most Watchful Attention Of Government

Hidden In The Glorious Wildness Like Unmined Gold.

Society Speaks And All Men Listen, Mountains Speak And Wise Men Listen

Few Are Altogether Deaf To The Preaching Of Pine Trees. Their Sermons On The Mountains Go To Our Hearts . . .

I Might Have Become A Millionaire, But I Chose To Become A Tramp.

Nothing Truly Wild Is Unclean.

In God's Wildness Lies The Hope Of The World-the Great Fresh Unblighted, Unredeemed Wilderness. The Galling Harness Of Civilization Drops Off, And Wounds Heal Ere We Are Aware.

Wander A Whole Summer If You Can. Time Will Not Be Taken From The Sum Of Life. Instead Of Shortening, It Will Definitely Lengthen It And Make You Truly Immortal.

Who Wouldn't Be A Mountaineer! Up Here All The World's Prizes Seem Nothing

Yosemite Park... None Can Escape Its Charms. Its Natural Beauty Cleans And Warms Like A Fire, And You Will Be Willing To Stay Forever In One Place Like A Tree.

To The Sane And Free It Will Hardly Seem Necessary To Cross The Continent In Search Of Wild Beauty, However Easy The Way, For They Find It In Abundance Wherever They Chance To Be.

Writing Is Like The Life Of A Glacier; One Eternal Grind.

As Long As I Live, I'll Hear Waterfalls And Birds And Winds Sing. I'll Interpret The Rocks, Learn The Language Of Flood, Storm, And The Avalanche. I'll Acquaint Myself With The Glaciers And Wild Gardens, And Get As Near The Heart Of The World As I Can".

Walk Away Quietly In Any Direction And Taste The Freedom Of The Mountaineer. Camp Out Among The Grasses And Gentians Of Glacial Meadows, In Craggy Garden Nooks Full Of Nature's Darlings.

Most People Who Travel Look Only At What They Are Directed To Look At. Great Is The Power Of The Guidebook Maker, However Ignorant.

The Battle We Have Fought, And Are Still Fighting, For The Forests Is A Part Of The Eternal Conflict Between Right And Wrong.

I Always Enjoyed The Hearty Society Of A Snowstorm.

Society Doesn't Need That Everybody Is Behaving In The Full Normal Way... Like People In A Buddhist Monastery... But Eccentricity May Also Connect With The Irrational.

The Wrongs Done To Trees, Wrongs Of Every Sort, Are Done In The Darkness Of Ignorance And Unbelief, For When The Light Comes, The Heart Of The People Is Always Right.

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