Rachel Carson Quotes
The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction.
Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts.
In every outthrust headland, in every curving beach, in every grain of sand there is the story of the earth.
The love for all living creatures is the most noble attribute of man.
The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction.
We stand now where two roads diverge. But unlike the roads in Robert Frost’s familiar poem, they are not equally fair. The road we have long been traveling is deceptively easy, a smooth superhighway on which we progress with great speed, but at its end lies disaster. The other fork of the road—the one ‘less traveled by’—offers our last, our only chance to reach a destination that assures the preservation of the earth.
Conservation is a cause that has no end. There is no point at which we will say our work is finished.
The human race has been tampering with nature for far too long. It is time for us to respect and protect the delicate balance of our planet.
The seas ran high that night, for all across the Atlantic, on ships of every size and shape, men listened gravely to the gale’s song.
It seems reasonable to envision, for a time 10 or 15 years hence, a ‘thinking center’ that will incorporate the functions of present-day libraries together with anticipated advances in information storage and retrieval.
All ethics so far evolved rest upon a single premise: that the individual is a member of a community of interdependent parts.
The control of nature is a phrase conceived in arrogance, born of the Neanderthal age of biology and philosophy, when it was supposed that nature exists for the convenience of man.
Conservation is a positive exercise of skill and insight, not merely a negative exercise of abstinence and caution.
In nature, nothing exists alone.
A child’s world is fresh and new and beautiful, full of wonder and excitement.
In nature nothing exists alone.
The ‘control of nature’ is a phrase conceived in arrogance, born of the Neanderthal age of biology and philosophy, when it was supposed that nature exists for the convenience of man.
In nature nothing exists alone.
The real wealth of the Nation lies in the resources of the earth – soil, water, forests, minerals, and wildlife.
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.
Like the resource it seeks to protect, wildlife conservation must be dynamic, changing as conditions change, seeking always to become more effective.
A few irresponsible oil men, aided and abetted by a few irresponsible scientists, can wreak havoc on civilization.
As crude a weapon as the cave man’s club, the chemical barrage has been hurled against the fabric of life.
Birds are indicators of the environment. If they are in trouble, we know we’ll soon be in trouble.
Only within the moment of time represented by the present century has one species — man — acquired significant power to alter the nature of the world.
It is one of the ironies of our time that, while concentrating on the defense of our country against enemies from without, we should be so heedless of those who would destroy it from within.
Mankind has gone very far into an artificial world of his own creation. He has sought to insulate himself, with steel and concrete, from the realities of earth, air, and water.
One way to open your eyes is to ask yourself, ‘What if I had never seen this before? What if I knew I would never see it again?’
The beauty of the living world I was trying to save has always been uppermost in my mind.
On the bones of the living and dead, on bare fields long sterile under the incessant bickering of chemicals, I raise another voice for another dreamer standing at the edge of the forest where the great ferns and the palms grow, there where colors fade from one into another.
The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction.
It is not half so important to know as to feel when introducing a young child to the natural world.
At times I feel as if I am spread out over the landscape and inside things, and am myself living in every tree, in the splashing of the waves, in the clouds and the animals that come and go, in the procession of seasons.
Law and order exist for the purpose of establishing justice and when they fail in this purpose they become the dangerously structured dams that block the flow of social progress.
Our origins are of the earth. And so, there is in us a deeply seated response to the natural universe, which is part of our humanity.
Perhaps if I could teach my students to look at nature and the marvels of life, they might feel a more intense joy and refreshed spirit in themselves.
There is no substitute for an understanding of and a love for scientific knowledge in our increasingly technology-dependent world.
Man has become the greatest threat to the health of our planet.
A child’s world is fresh and new and beautiful, full or wonder and excitement.
A world without huge regions of total wilderness would be a cage; a world without animals roaming freely would be—more to the point—a zoo.
In an age when man has forgotten his origins and is blind even to his most essential needs for survival, water along with other resources has become the victim of his indifference.
How could intelligent beings seek to control a few unwanted species by a method that contaminated the entire environment and brought the threat of disease and death even to their own kind?
We must be willing to accept that science and technology cannot provide all the answers to our environmental problems.
The ‘control of nature’ is a phrase conceived in arrogance, born of the Neanderthal age of biology and philosophy, when it was supposed that nature exists for the convenience of man.
Man’s attitude towards nature is today critically important simply because we have now acquired a fateful power to alter and destroy nature.
If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over the christening of all children, I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life.
It is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties to know of wonder and humility.
We cannot have peace among men whose hearts find delight in killing any living creature.
The rhetoric of manhood has been gauged to keep animal food on the table, whatever the cost in suffering.
Conservation is a winning cause that transcends political boundaries and speaks to the needs of every living being on Earth.