All quotes

By space the Universe encompasses and swallows me as an atom, by thought I encompass it.

Sitting down on a block of granite, it was delightful to watch the various insects and birds as they flew past.

Delight itself, however, is a weak term to express the feelings of a naturalist who, for the first time, has wandered by himself in a Brazilian forest.

Moreover, the many dead trunks that stand like skeletons, never fail to give to these primeval woods a character of solemnity, absent in those of countries long civilized.

This west coast makes me remember with pleasure the free, unbounded plains of Patagonia; yet, with the true spirit of contradiction, I cannot forget how sublime is the silence of the forest.

Nature seemed to me benign and good; I thought she loved me, outcast as I was; and I, who from man could anticipate only mistrust, rejection, insult, clung to her with filial fondness.

Real wealth consists in things of utility and beauty, in things that help to create strong, beautiful bodies and surroundings inspiring to live in.

Lastly, and possibly most important, forests make this earth comfortable and beautiful. Next to the soil, they are the most useful and helpful of Nature's agencies.

During this night journey I put myself both in feeling and in fact in a blind man's place—the best lesson I ever had to develop deliberation and keenness of touch.

On this bit of the wild world's stage are theatrical lightning changes of scenes—changes that on most mountains would require ten thousand years or more. It is a place of strange and fleeting landscapes; the earth is ever changing like the sky.

The forest is an eternal mediator between winds and gravity in their never-ending struggle for the possession of the waters.

Have you anything better or greater to see than the sun, the moon, the stars, the whole earth, the sea?

Human effort is not futile, but man fights against the giant forces of Nature in a spirit of humility.

Everything was strange and silent and she seemed to be hundreds of miles away from anyone, but somehow she did not feel lonely at all.

There, too, after a fit of temper, I went to find comfort and to hide my hot face in the cool leaves and grass.

What a joy it is to feel the soft, springy earth under my feet once more, to follow grassy roads that lead to ferny brooks where I can bathe my fingers in a cataract of rippling notes, or to clamber over a stone wall into green fields that tumble and roll and climb in riotous gladness!

My world is built of touch-sensations, devoid of physical colour and sound; but without colour and sound it breathes and throbs with life.

The man who doubts it, can never have watched the first gleams of tenderness dawning in the clear eyes of one who loves; sunrise itself is a lesser marvel.

Every landscape is, as it were, a state of the soul, and whoever penetrates into both is astonished to find how much likeness there is in each detail.

depend upon it, you will love your native hills the better for being separated from them

The dear privacy and retirement and solitude which winter makes possible!

Now at least the moon is full, and I walk alone, which is best by night, if not by day always.

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived

Nature will bear the closest inspection; she invites us to lay our eye level with the smallest leaf, and take an insect view of its plain.

Nature has taken more care than the fondest parent for the education and refinement of her children.