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"
