Background Image

...

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.

-John Muir

...

Please Wait....
Translating....

I Never Have Held

John Muir

...

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.

Views: 6

Topic

More From John Muir

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.

Earth Has No Sorrow That Earth Can Not Heal.

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

In This Silent, Serene Wilderness The Weary Can Gain A Heart-bath In Perfect Peace.

Going Into The Woods, Is Going Home

Between Every Two Pines Is A Doorway To A New World.

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.

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.

The Mountains Are Calling And I Must Go.

While Cares Will Drop Off Like Autumn Leaves.

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

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.

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

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

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.

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

I Have Never Yet Happened Upon A Trace Of Evidence... To Show That Any One Animal Was Ever Made For Another As Much As It Was Made For Itself.

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.

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

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

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.

...good Luck And Good Work For The Happy Mountain Raindrops, Each One Of Them A High Waterfall In Itself, Descending From The Cliffs And Hollows Of The Clouds To The Cliffs And Hollows Of The Rocks, Out Of The Sky-thunder Into The Thunder Of The Falling Rivers.

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

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.

John Muir, Earth-planet, Universe.

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.

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

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.

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

I Never Saw A Discontented Tree.

Bread Without Butter Or Coffee Without Milk Is An Awful Calamity, As If Everything Before Being Put In Our Mouth Must First Be Held Under A Cow.

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.

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

Eternal Sunrise, Eternal Sunset, Eternal Dawn And Gloaming, On Seas And Continents And Islands, Each In Its Turn, As The Round Earth Rolls.

God Cannot Save Them From Fools.

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.

When I First Caught Sight Of (mount Shasta) Over The Braided Folds Of The Sacramento Valley I Was Fifty Miles Away And Afoot, Alone And Weary. Yet All My Blood Turned To Wine, And I Have Not Been Weary Since.

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

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.

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.

We Are Now In The Mountains And They Are In Us, Kindling Enthusiasm, Making Every Nerve Quiver, Filling Every Pore And Cell Of Us. Our Flesh-and-bone Tabernacle Seems Transparent As Glass To The Beauty About Us, As If Truly An Inseparable Part Of It, Thrilling With The Air And Trees, Streams And Rocks, In The Waves Of The Sun,-a Part Of All Nature, Neither Old Nor Young, Sick Nor Well, But Immortal.‎

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.

Beside The Grand History Of The Glaciers And Their Own, The Mountain Streams Sing The History Of Every Avalanche Or Earthquake And Of Snow, All Easily Recognized By The Human Ear, And Every Word Evoked By The Falling Leaf And Drinking Deer, Beside A Thousand Other Facts So Small And Spoken By The Stream In So Low A Voice The Human Ear Cannot Hear Them.

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

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.

Some People Miss Flesh As A Drunkard Misses His Dram.

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.

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.

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.

Plants, Animals, And Stars Are All Kept In Place, Bridled Along Appointed Ways, With One Another, And Through The Midst Of One Another -- Killing And Being Killed, Eating And Being Eaten, In Harmonious Proportions And Quantities.

Surely All God's People, However Serious Or Savage, Great Or Small, Like To Play.

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

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.

The Redwood Is One Of The Few Conifers That Sprout From The Stump And Roots, And It Declares Itself Willing To Begin Immediately To Repair The Damage Of The Lumberman And Also That Of The Forest-burner.

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.

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.

The World, We Are Told, Was Made Especially For Man - A Presumption Not Supported By All The Facts... Why Should Man Value Himself As More Than A Small Part Of The One Great Unit Of Creation?

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.

Wilderness Is A Necessity... There Must Be Places For Human Beings To Satisfy Their Souls.

The Axe And Saw Are Insanely Busy, Chips Are Flying Thick As Snowflakes, And Every Summer Thousands Of Acres Of Priceless Forests, With Their Underbrush, Soil, Springs, Climate, Scenery, And Religion, Are Vanishing Away In Clouds Of Smoke, While, Except In The National Parks, Not One Forest Guard Is Employed.

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.

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.

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

We All Travel The Milky Way Together, Trees And Men.

See How God Writes History. No Technical Knowledge Is Required; Only A Calm Day And A Calm Mind.

Technical Knowledge

In God's Wildness Lies The Hope Of The World.

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.

Who Publishes The Sheet-music Of The Winds Or The Music Of Water Written In River-lines?

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.

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.

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.

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.

Look Up And Down And Round About You.!

When We Try To Pick Out Anything By Itself, We Find It Hitched To Everything Else In The Universe. One Fancies A Heart Like Our Own Must Be Beating In Every Crystal And Cell, And We Feel Like Stopping To Speak To The Plants And Animals As Friendly Fellow-mountaineers. Nature As A Poet, An Enthusiastic Workingman, Becomes More And More Visible The Farther And Higher We Go.

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

Most People Are On The World, Not In It.

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.

The United States Government Has Always Been Proud Of The Welcome It Has Extended To Good Men Of Every Nation, Seeking Freedom And Homes And Bread.

Rivers Flow Not Past, But Through Us; Tingling, Vibrating, Exciting Every Cell And Fiber In Our Bodies, Making Them Sing And Glide.

Hidden In The Glorious Wildness Like Unmined Gold.

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.

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.

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.

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.

We All Flow From One Fountain- Soul. All Are Expressions Of One Love. God Does Not Appear, And Flow Out, Only From Narrow Chinks And Round Bored Wells Here And There In Favored Races And Places, But He Flows In Grand Undivided Currents, Shoreless And Boundless Over Creeds And Forms And All Kinds Of Civilizations And Peoples And Beasts, Saturating All And Fountainizing All.

One Can Make A Day Of Any Size

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.

I Wonder If Leaves Feel Lonely When They See Their Neighbors Falling?

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.

To The Lover Of Pure Wildness Alaska Is One Of The Most Wonderful Countries In The World.

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

Doubly Happy, However, Is The Man To Whom Lofty Mountain Tops Are Within Reach.

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.

The Clearest Way Into The Universe Is Through A Forest Wilderness.

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.

Come To The Woods, For Here Is Rest. There Is No Repose Like That Of The Green Deep Woods. Here Grow The Wallflower And The Violet. The Squirrel Will Come And Sit Upon Your Knee, The Logcock Will Wake You In The Morning. Sleep In Forgetfulness Of All Ill. Of All The Upness Accessible To Mortals, There Is No Upness Comparable To The Mountains.

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

Thousands Of Tired, Nerve-shaken, Over-civilized People Are Beginning To Find Out That Going To The Mountains Is Going Home; That Wildness Is A Necessity.

Of All The Fire Mountains Which Like Beacons, Once Blazed Along The Pacific Coast, Mount Rainier Is The Noblest.

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.

A Little Pure Wildness Is The One Great Present Want, Both Of Men And Sheep.

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

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

In Nothing Does Man, With His Grand Notions Of Heaven And Charity, Show Forth His Innate, Low-bred, Wild Animalism More Clearly Than In His Treatment Of His Brother Beasts. From The Shepherd With His Lambs To The Red-handed Hunter, It Is The Same; No Recognition Of Rights - Only Murder In One Form Or Another.

There Are No Accidents In Nature. Every Motion Of The Constantly Shifting Bodies In The World Is Timed To The Occasion For Some Definite, Fore-ordered End. The Flowers Blossom In Obedience To The Same Law That Marks The Course Of Constellations, And The Song Of A Bird Is The Echo Of A Universal Symphony. Nature Is One, And To Me The Greatest Delight Of Observation And Study Is To Discover New Unities In This All-embracing And Eternal Harmony.

What Wonders Lie In Every Mountain Day!

One Day's Exposure To Mountains Is Better Than Cartloads Of Books. See How Willingly Nature Poses Herself Upon Photographers' Plates. No Earthly Chemicals Are So Sensitive As Those Of The Human Soul.

If The Creator Were To Bestow A New Set Of Senses Upon Us, Or Slightly Remodel The Present Ones, Leaving All The Rest Of Nature Unchanged, We Should Never Doubt We Were In Another World, And So In Strict Reality We Should Be, Just As If All The World Besides Our Senses Were Changed.

How Glorious A Greeting The Sun Gives The Mountains!

I Made These Sierra Trips, Carrying Only A Sackful Of Bread With A Little Tea And Sugar, And Was Thus Independent And Free.

There Are No Accidents In Nature.

So Abundant And Novel Are The Objects Of Interest In A Pure Wilderness That Unless You Are Pursuing Special Studies It Matters Little Where You Go, Or How Often To The Same Place. Wherever You Chance To Be Always Seems At The Moment Of All Places The Best; And You Feel That There Can Be No Happiness In This World Or In Any Other For Those Who May Not Be Happy There.

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.

Wherever A Scotsman Goes, Here Goes Burns. His Grand Whole, Catholic Soul Squares With The Good Of All; Therefore We Find Him In Everything, Everywhere.

There Is No Estimating The Wit And Wisdom Concealed And Latent In Our Lower Fellow Mortals Until Made Manifest By Profound Experiences; For It Is Through Suffering That Dogs As Well As Saints Are Developed And Made Perfect.

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.

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

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

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.

It Is Always Interesting To See People In Dead Earnest, From Whatever Cause, And Earthquakes Make Everybody Earnest.

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.

Bears Are Made Of The Same Dust As We, And They Breathe The Same Winds And Drink Of The Same Waters. A Bear's Days Are Warmed By The Same Sun, His Dwellings Are Overdomed By The Same Blue Sky, And His Life Turns And Ebbs With Heart Pulsing Like Ours. He Was Poured From The Same First Fountain. And Whether He At Last Goes To Our Stingy Heaven Or Not, He Has Terrestrial Immortality. His Life, Not Long, Not Short, Knows No Beginning , No Ending. To Him Life Unstinted, Unplanned, Is Above The Accidents Of Time, And His Years, Markless And Boundless, Equal Eternity.

I Am Learning To Live Close To The Lives Of My Friends Without Ever Seeing Them. No Miles Of Any Measurement Can Separate Your Soul From Mine.

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."

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.

They Tell Us That Plants Are Not Like Man Immortal, But Are Perishable-soul -less. I Think That Is Something That We Know Exactly Nothing About.

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

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

Uncle Sam Is Not Often Called A Fool In Business Matters, Yet He Has Sold Millions Of Acres Of Timber Land At Two Dollars And A Half An Acre On Which A Single Tree Was Worth More Than A Hundred Dollars. But This Priceless Land Has Been Patented, And Nothing Can Be Done Now About The Crazy Bargain.... A Bad, Black Business From Beginning To End.

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.

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.

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

Wilderness Is Not Only A Haven For Native Plants And Animals But It Is Also A Refuge From Society. Its A Place To Go To Hear The Wind And Little Else, See The Stars And The Galaxies, Smell The Pine Trees, Feel The Cold Water, Touch The Sky And The Ground At The Same Time, Listen To Coyotes, Eat The Fresh Snow, Walk Across The Desert Sands, And Realize Why Its Good To Go Outside Of The City And The Suburbs. Fortunately, There Is Wilderness Just Outside The Limits Of The Cities And The Suburbs In Most Of The United States, Especially In The West.

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

The Finest Of The Glacier Meadow Gardens Lie ...imbedded In The Upper Pine Forests Like Lakes Of Light.

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.

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.

Few In These Hot, Dim, Strenuous Times Are Quite Sane Or Free; Choked With Care Like Clocks Full Of Dust, Laboriously Doing So Much Good And Making So Much Money - Or So Little, They Are No Longer Good For Themselves.

Few Places In This World Are More Dangerous Than Home. Fear Not, Therefore, To Try The Mountain Passes. They Will Kill Care, Save You From Deadly Apathy, Set You Free, And Call Forth Every Faculty Into Vigorous, Enthusiastic Action.

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

Let Children Walk With Nature, Let Them See The Beautiful Blendings And Communions Of Death And Life, Their Joyous Inseparable Unity.

No Temple Made With Hands Can Compare With Yosemite.

Every Purely Natural Object Is A Conductor Of Divinity, And We Have But To Expose Ourselves In A Clean Condition To Any Of These Conductors, To Be Fed And Nourished By Them. Only In This Way Can We Procure Our Daily Spirit Bread.

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

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

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

In The Woods Is Perpetual Youth.

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

Man And Other Civilized Animals Are The Only Creatures That Ever Become Dirty.

Perhaps The Profession Of Doing Good May Be Full, But Every Body Should Be Kind At Least To Himself. Take A Course Of Good Water And Air, And In The Eternal Youth Of Nature You May Renew Your Own. Go Quietly, Alone; No Harm Will Befall You. Some Have Strange, Morbid Fears As Soon As They Find Themselves With Nature, Even In The Kindest And Wildest Of Her Solitudes, Like Very Sick Children Afraid Of Their Mother-as If God Were Dead And The Devil Were King.

How Infinitely Superior To Our Physical Senses Are Those Of The Mind!

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

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

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.

Nature Is Always Lovely, Invincible, Glad, Whatever Is Done And Suffered By Her Creatures. All Scars She Heals, Whether In Rocks Or Water Or Sky Or Hearts.

These Beautiful Days ... Do Not Exist As Mere Pictures - Maps Hung Upon The Walls Of Memory To Brighten At Times When Touched By Association Or Will ... They Saturate Themselves Into Every Part Of The Body And Live Always.

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!

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.

Thus Godlike Sympathy Grows And Thrives And Spreads Far Beyond The Teachings Of Churches And Schools, Where Too Often The Mean, Blinding, Loveless Doctrine Is Taught That Animals Have No Rights That We Are Bound To Respect, And Were Only Made For Man, To Be Petted, Spoiled, Slaughtered Or Enslaved.

Man Is Always And Everywhere A Blight On The Landscape.

When A Man Plants A Tree, He Plants Himself.

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.

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

Characteristics

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.

The Sun Shines Not On Us But In Us.

I Always Enjoyed The Hearty Society Of A Snowstorm.

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.

Yosemite Park Is A Place Of Rest, A Refuge From The Roar And Dust And Weary, Nervous, Wasting Work Of The Lowlands, In Which One Gains The Advantages Of Both Solitude And Society.

Climb The Mountains And Get Their Good Tidings. Nature's Peace Will Flow Into You As Sunshine Flows Into Trees. The Winds Will Blow Their Own Freshness Into You, And The Storms Their Energy, While Cares Will Drop Away From You Like The Leaves Of Autumn.

Every Good Thing Great And Small Needs Defense

Go Quietly Alone, No Harm Will Befall You.

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

I Have A Low Opinion Of Books; They Are But Piles Of Stones Set Up To Show Coming Travelers Where Other Minds Have Been, Or At Best Signal Smokes To Call Attention. No Amount Of Word-making Will Ever Make A Single Soul To Know These Mountains. As Well Seek To Warm The Naked And Frostbitten By Lectures On Caloric And Pictures Of Flame. One Day's Exposure To Mountains Is Better Than Cartloads Of Books.

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

Few Are Altogether Deaf To The Preaching Of Pine Trees. Their Sermons On The Mountains Go To Our Hearts; And If People In General Could Be Got Into The Woods, Even For Once, To Hear The Trees Speak For Themselves, All Difficulties In The Way Of Forest Preservation Would Vanish.

Government Protection Should Be Thrown Around Every Wild Grove And Forest On The Mountains, As It Is Around Every Private Orchard, And The Trees In Public Parks. To Say Nothing Of Their Value As Fountains Of Timber, They Are Worth Infinitely More Than All The Gardens And Parks Of Towns.

Spring Work Is Going On With Joyful Enthusiasm.

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.

Yet How Hard Most People Work For Mere Dust And Ashes And Care, Taking No Thought Of Growing In Knowledge And Grace, Never Having Time To Get In Sight Of Their Own Ignorance.

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

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

No Synonym For God Is So Perfect As Beauty. Whether As Seen Carving The Lines Of The Mountains With Glaciers, Or Gathering Matter Into Stars, Or Planning The Movements Of Water, Or Gardening - Still All Is Beauty!

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.

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.

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

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.

Man Has Injured Every Animal He Has Touched.

Keep Close To Nature's Heart... And Break Clear Away, Once In Awhile, And Climb A Mountain Or Spend A Week In The Woods. Wash Your Spirit Clean.

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.

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

So Extraordinary Is Nature With Her Choicest Treasures, Spending Plant Beauty As She Spends Sunshine, Pouring It Forth Into Land And Sea, Garden And Desert. And So The Beauty Of Lilies Falls On Angels And Men, Bears And Squirrels, Wolves And Sheep, Birds And Bees.

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

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.

Going To The Mountains Is Going Home.

[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.

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.

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

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!

The World Is Big And I Want To Have A Good Look At It Before It Gets Dark.

Trending Author

Antonio Machado

Haley Joel Osment

Elizabeth Banks

Category