We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children. ~American Indian Proverb
There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth. We are all crew. ~Marshall McLuhan, 1964
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Thank God men cannot fly, and lay waste the sky as well as the earth. ~Henry David Thoreau
There's so much pollution in the air now that if it weren't for our lungs there'd be no place to put it all. ~Robert Orben
I'm not an environmentalist. I'm an Earth warrior. ~Darryl Cherney, quoted in Smithsonian, April 1990
Suburbia is where the developer bulldozes out the trees, then names the streets after them. ~Bill Vaughn, quoted in Jon Winokur, The Portable Curmudgeon, 1987
For 200 years we've been conquering Nature. Now we're beating it to death. ~Tom McMillan, quoted in Francesca Lyman, The Greenhouse Trap, 1990
I only went out for a walk, and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in. ~John Muir, 1913, in Linnie Marsh Wolfe, ed., John of the Mountains: The Unpublished Journals of John Muir
I would feel more optimistic about a bright future for man if he spent less time proving that he can outwit Nature and more time tasting her sweetness and respecting her seniority. ~Elwyn Brooks White, Essays of E.B. White, 1977
A living planet is a much more complex metaphor for deity than just a bigger father with a bigger fist. If an omniscient, all-powerful Dad ignores your prayers, it's taken personally. Hear only silence long enough, and you start wondering about his power. His fairness. His very existence. But if a world mother doesn't reply, Her excuse is simple. She never claimed conceited omnipotence. She has countless others clinging to her apron strings, including myriad species unable to speak for themselves. To Her elder offspring She says - go raid the fridge. Go play outside. Go get a job. Or, better yet, lend me a hand. I have no time for idle whining. ~David Brin
Till now man has been up against Nature; from now on he will be up against his own nature. ~Dennis Gabor, Inventing the Future, 1963
Take nothing but pictures.
Leave nothing but footprints.
Kill nothing but time.
~Motto of the Baltimore Grotto, a caving society
Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect. ~Chief Seattle, 1855
Man must feel the earth to know himself and recognize his values.... God made life simple. It is man who complicates it. ~Charles A. Lindbergh, Reader's Digest, July 1972
My troubles, although some arise from inside,
Are mostly from parasites perched on my hide,
Who squabble and bicker and kick up a din,
Or fire off their pop-guns and pepper my skin,
Or yelp at each other and threaten to fight;
My life very often has been far from bright,
But all things considered my chances are fair,
To see many happy returns of the year.
~Kenneth Alfred Evelyn Alexander (c.1890–1953), "The Old Identity," in The New Zealand Railways Magazine, 1930 January 1st [says Old Father Earth —tεᖇᖇ¡·g]
After a visit to the beach, it's hard to believe that we live in a material world. ~Pam Shaw
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 off like autumn leaves. ~John Muir
Oh Beautiful for smoggy skies, insecticided grain,
For strip-mined mountain's majesty above the asphalt plain.
America, America, man sheds his waste on thee,
And hides the pines with billboard signs, from sea to oily sea.
~George Carlin
Environmentalists have long been fond of saying that the sun is the only safe nuclear reactor, situated as it is some ninety-three million miles away. ~Stephanie Mills, ed., In Praise of Nature, 1990
Humanity is on the march, earth itself is left behind. ~David Ehrenfeld, The Arrogance of Humanism, 1978
It is the safest of times, it is the riskiest of times.... What the Dickens is going on here? ~Denton Morrison, on chemicals, technology, and risk, quoted in National Academy of Sciences, Improving Risk Communication, 1989
Never does nature say one thing and wisdom another. ~Juvenal, Satires
