Sunday, November 28, 2010

BEN Special - Environmental Quotes, Passages & Lyrics 2010





Dear Friends:


Back by popular demand, below are some special environmental quotes, passages and lyrics I've collected over the past year.


Best wishes,


Pat Byington

BEN Publisher


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"The ultimate test of man's conscience may be his willingness to sacrifice something today for future generations whose words of thanks will not be heard." ~ Gaylord Nelson, founder of Earth Day


The best remedy for those who are afraid,

lonely or unhappy is to go outside,

somewhere where they can be quiet,

alone with the heavens, nature and God.

Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be

and that God wishes to see people happy,

amidst the simple beauty of nature.

I firmly believe that nature brings solace in all troubles.

~ Anne Frank




"We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature—trees, flowers, grass—grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence... We need silence to be able to touch souls." ~ Mother Teresa


“Our sense of community and compassionate intelligence must be extended to all life forms, plants, animals, rocks, rivers, and human beings. This is the story of our past and it will be the story of our future.” ~ Terry Tempest Williams


[I]f you know wilderness in the way that you know love, you would be unwilling to let it go. We are talking about the body of the beloved, not real estate.” ~ Terry Tempest Williams


"What we do to the land, we do to ourselves." ~Wendell Berry


"The day settled down so softly and lovingly upon the earth, touching everything. The sky visibly came down. you could see it among the trees and between the hills. The sun poured himself into the earth as into a cup, and the atmosphere fairly swam with warmth and light." ~ John Burroughs


"To protect your rivers, protect your mountains." ~Emperor Yu (China)


"Speak to the Earth, and it shall teach thee." Job 12:8


"We simply need that wild country available to us, even if we never do more than drive to its edge and look in. For it can be a means of reassuring ourselves of our sanity as creatures, a part of the geography of hope." ~Wallace Stegner


The activist is not the man who says the river is dirty. The activist is the man who cleans up the river. ~Ross Perot


I love to think of nature as an unlimited broadcasting station, through which God speaks to us every hour, if we will only tune in. ~George Washington Carver


The first law of ecology is that everything is related to everything else. ~ Barry Commoner


"Perhaps reluctantly we come to acknowledge that there are also scars which mark the surface of our Earth—erosion, deforestation, the squandering of the world's mineral and ocean resources in order to fuel an insatiable consumption." ~ Pope Benedict



Nest Eggs


Birds all the sunny day

Flutter and quarrel

Here in the arbour-like

Tent of the laurel.

The brown nest is seated;

Four little blue eggs

The mother keeps heated...

Soon the frail eggs they shall

Chip, and upswinging,

Make all the April woods

Merry with singing.

Younger than we are,

O children, and frailer,

Soon in blue air they'll be

Singer and sailor.


We so much older,

Taller and stronger,

We shall look down on the

Birdies no longer.

They shall go flying

With musical speeches

High overhead in the

Tops of the beeches.

Inspite of our wisdom

And sensible talking,

We on our feet must go

Plodding and walking

- Robert Louis Stevenson


To sail on a dream, on a crystal clear ocean,

To ride on the crest of a wild raging storm;

To work in the service of life and the living

In search of the answers to questions unknown;

To be part of the movement and part of the growing,

Part of beginning to understand . . .

~ John Denver 'Calypso"


"We are letting nature slip through our fingers, and taking ourselves along." ~ E.O. Wilson


Nine planets round the sun

Only one does the sun embrace

Upon this watered one

So much to we take for granted


So let us sleep outside tonight

Lay down in the mother's arms

For here we can rest safely


If green should TURN to grey

Would our hearts still bloody beat

If the mountains crumble away

And the river dry

Would it stop the stepping feet

~ Dave Matthews Band "One Sweet World"


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