John Muir Quotes & Sayings
Enjoy the top 100 famous quotes, sayings and quotations by John Muir.
Famous Quotes By John Muir
To ask me whether I could endure to live without friends is absurd. It is easy enough to live out of material sight of friends, but to live without human love is impossible. — John Muir
Every atom in creation may be said to be acquainted with and married to every other, but with universal union there is a division sufficient in degree for the purposes of the most intense individuality. — John Muir
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
The most distinctive, and perhaps the most impressive, characteristic of American scenery is its wilderness. — John Muir
Wildness was ever sounding in our ears, and Nature saw to it that besides school lessons some of her own lessons should be learned, perhaps with a view to the time when we should be called to wander in wildness to our heart's content. — John Muir
The redwood is the glory of the Coast Range. It extends along the western slope, in a nearly continuous belt about ten miles wide, from beyond the Oregon boundary to the south of Santa Cruz, a distance of nearly four hundred miles, and in massive, sustained grandeur and closeness of growth surpasses all the other timber woods of the world. — John Muir
Come to the woods, for here is rest. There is no repose like that of the green deep woods. Sleep in forgetfulness of all ill. — John Muir
Hiking - I don't like either the word or the thing. People ought to saunter in the mountains - not hike! Do you know the origin of that word 'saunter?' It's a beautiful word. Away back in the Middle Ages people used to go on pilgrimages to the Holy Land, and when people in the villages through which they passed asked where they were going, they would reply, "A la sainte terre,' 'To the Holy Land.' And so they became known as sainte-terre-ers or saunterers. Now these mountains are our Holy Land, and we ought to saunter through them reverently, not 'hike' through them." — John Muir
... their eager, childlike attention was refreshing to see as compared with the decent, deathlike apathy of weary civilized people, in whom natural curiosity has been quenched in toil and care and poor, shallow comfort. — John Muir
The axe and saw are insanely busy, chips are flying thick as snowflakes, and every summer thousands of acres of priceless forests, with their underbrush, soil, springs, climate, scenery, and religion, are vanishing away in clouds of smoke, while, except in the national parks, not one forest guard is employed. — John Muir
It is a vast wilderness of rocks in a sea of light, colored and glowing like oak and maple in autumn, when the sun gold is richest — John Muir
You know that I have not lagged behind in the work of exploring our grand wilderness, and in calling everybody to come and enjoy the thousand blessings they have to offer. — John Muir
Over the summit, I saw the so-called Mono desert lying dreamily silent in the thick, purple light
a desert of heavy sun-glare beheld from a desert of ice-burnished granite. — John Muir
Why should man value himself as more than a small part of the one great unit of creation? And what creature of all that the Lord has taken the pains to make is not essential to the completeness of that unit - the cosmos? — John Muir
I care to live only to entice people to look at Nature's loveliness. Heaven knows that John the Baptist was not more eager to get all his fellow sinners into the Jordan than I to baptize all of mine in the beauty of God's mountains. — John Muir
Tell me what you will of the benefactions of city civilization, of the sweet security of streets-all as part of the natural upgrowth of man towards the high destiny we hear so much of. I know that our bodies were made to thrive only in pure air, and the scenes in which pure air is found. If the death exhalations that brood the broad towns in which we so fondly compact ourselves were made visible, we should flee as from a plague. All are more or less sick; there is not a perfectly sane man in San Francisco. — John Muir
The wrongs done to trees, wrongs of every sort, are done in the darkness of ignorance and unbelief, for when the light comes, the heart of the people is always right. — John Muir
The redwood is one of the few conifers that sprout from the stump and roots, and it declares itself willing to begin immediately to repair the damage of the lumberman and also that of the forest-burner. — John Muir
The gross heathenism of civilization has generally destroyed nature, and poetry, and all that is spiritual. — John Muir
Yosemite Park ... None can escape its charms. Its natural beauty cleans and warms like a fire, and you will be willing to stay forever in one place like a tree. — John Muir
God never made an ugly landscape. All that sun shines on is beautiful, so long as it is wild. — John Muir
Memories may escape the action of the will, may sleep a long time, but when stirred by the right influence, though that influence be light as a shadow, they flash into full stature and life with everything in place — John Muir
Going to the woods is going home, for I suppose we came from the woods originally. But in some of nature's forests, the adventurous traveler seems a feeble, unwelcome creature; wild beasts and the weather trying to kill him, the rank, tangled vegetation, armed with spears and stinging needles, barring his way and making life a hard struggle. — John Muir
He had gone to the higher Sierras ... [about Ralph Waldo Emerson's death] — John Muir
Strange the faithless fuss made about taking a walk in the safest and pleasantest of all places, a wilderness. — John Muir
Only by going alone in silence, without baggage, can one truly get into the heart of the wilderness. All other travel is mere dust and hotels and baggage and chatter. — John Muir
I wish I knew where I was going. Doomed to be carried of the spirit into the wilderness, I suppose. I wish I could be more moderate in my desires, but I cannot, and so there is no rest. — John Muir
Wilderness is a necessity ... there must be places for human beings to satisfy their souls ... — John Muir
There are no accidents in Nature. Every motion of the constantly shifting bodies in the world is timed to the occasion for some definite, fore-ordered end. The flowers blossom in obedience to the same law that marks the course of constellations, and the song of a bird is the echo of a universal symphony. Nature is one, and to me the greatest delight of observation and study is to discover new unities in this all-embracing and eternal harmony. — John Muir
Do behold the king in his glory, King Sequoia. Behold! Behold! seems all I can say ... Well may I fast, not from bread but from business, bookmaking, duty doing & other trifles ... I'm in the woods woods woods, & they are in mee-ee-ee ... I wish I were wilder & so bless Sequoia I will be. — John Muir
Society speaks and all men listen, mountains speak and wise men listen — John Muir
The radiance in some places is so great as to be fairly dazzling ... every crystal, every flower a window opening into heaven, a mirror reflecting the Creator. — John Muir
Every morning, arising from the death of sleep, the happy plants and all our fellow animal creatures great and small, and even the rocks, seemed to be shouting, Awake, awake, rejoice, rejoice, come love us and join in our song. Come! Come! — John Muir
Quench love, and what is left of a man's life but the folding of a few jointed bones and square inches of flesh? Who would call that life? — John Muir
All the wild world is beautiful, and it matters but little where we go, to highlands or lowlands, woods or plains, on the sea or land or down among the crystals of waves or high in a balloon in the sky; through all the climates, hot or cold, storms and calms, everywhere and always we are in God's eternal beauty and love. So universally true is this, the spot where we chance to be always seems the best. — John Muir
The soft light of morning falls upon ripening forests of oak and elm, walnut and hickory, and all Nature is thoughtful and calm. — John Muir
Wander a whole summer if you can ... time will not be taken from the sum of your life. Instead of shortening, it will definitely lengthen it and make you truly immortal. — John Muir
We are in the mountains and they are in us, kindling enthusiasm, making every nerve quiver, filling every pore and cell of us ... How glorious a conversion, so complete and wholesome it is, scarce memory enough of old bondage days left as a standpoint to view it from! In this newness of life we seem to have been so always — John Muir
Uncle Sam is not often called a fool in business matters, yet he has sold millions of acres of timber land at two dollars and a half an acre on which a single tree was worth more than a hundred dollars. But this priceless land has been patented, and nothing can be done now about the crazy bargain ... a bad, black business from beginning to end. — John Muir
Never while anything is left of me shall this ... camp be forgotten. It has fairly grown into me, not merely as memory pictures, but as part and parcel of mind and body alike. — John Muir
Between every two pines is a doorway to a new world. — John Muir
Tug on anything in nature and you will find it connected to everything else. — John Muir
It is a fine thing to see people in hot earnest about anything. — John Muir
One is constantly reminded of the infinite lavishness and fertility of Nature-inexhaustible abundance amid what seems enormous waste. And yet when we look into any of her operations that lie within reach of our minds, we learn that no particle of her material is wasted or worn out. It is eternally flowing from use to use, beauty to yet higher beauty; and we soon cease to lament waste and death, and rather rejoice and exult in the imperishable, unspendable wealth of the universe. — John Muir
Lizards of every temper, style, and color dwell here, seemingly as happy and companionable as the birds and squirrels. — John Muir
You bathe in these spirit-beams, turning round and round, as if warming at a camp-fire. Presently you lose consciousness of your own separate existence: you blend with the landscape, and become part and parcel of nature. — John Muir
I am very blessed. The Valley is full of people, but they do not annoy me. I revolve in pathless places and in higher rocks than the world and his ribbony wife can reach. — John Muir
I am losing precious days. I am degenerating into a machine for making money. I am learning nothing in this trivial world of men. I must break away and get out into the mountains to learn the news — John Muir
Men use care in purchasing a horse, and are neglectful in choosing friends. — John Muir
When you tug at a single thing in the universe, you'll find its attached to everything else. — John Muir
How hard to realize that every camp of men or beast has this glorious starry firmament for a roof! In such places standing alone on the mountain-top it is easy to realize that whatever special nests we make - leaves and moss like the marmots and birds, or tents or piled stone - we all dwell in a house of one room - the world with the firmament for its roof - and are sailing the celestial spaces without leaving any track. — John Muir
Perhaps the profession of doing good may be full, but every body should be kind at least to himself. Take a course of good water and air, and in the eternal youth of Nature you may renew your own. Go quietly, alone; no harm will befall you. Some have strange, morbid fears as soon as they find themselves with Nature, even in the kindest and wildest of her solitudes, like very sick children afraid of their mother-as if God were dead and the devil were king. — John Muir
Wherever we go in the mountains, or indeed in any of God's wild fields, we find more than we seek. — John Muir
The sun shines not on us but in us. The rivers flow not past, but through us. Thrilling, tingling, vibrating every fiber and cell of the substance of our bodies, making them glide and sing. The trees wave and the flowers bloom in our bodies as well as our souls, and every bird song, wind song, and tremendous storm song of the rocks in the heart of the mountains is our song, our very own, and sings our love. — John Muir
There are no accidents in Nature, — John Muir
The world's big and I want to have a good look at it before it gets dark. — John Muir
Spring work is going on with joyful enthusiasm. — John Muir
Ihave precious little sympathy for theselfish proprietyof civilized man, and if awarof racesshould occurbetween the wild beasts and Lord Man, I would be tempted to sympathise with the bears. — John Muir
I have a low opinion of books: they are piles of stones set up to show coming travelers where other minds have been, or at best signal smokes to call attention ... — John Muir
Nature is always lovely, invincible, glad, whatever is done and suffered by her creatures. All scars she heals, whether in rocks or water or sky or hearts. — John Muir
The finest of the glacier meadow gardens lie ... imbedded in the upper pine forests like lakes of light. — John Muir
This is Nature's own reservation, and every lover of wildness will rejoice with me that by kindly frost it is so well defended. — John Muir
When I discovered a new plant, I sat down beside it for a minute or a day, to make its acquaintance and hear what it had to tell ... I asked the boulders I met, whence they came and whither they were going. — John Muir
Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul. — John Muir
One day's exposure to mountains is better than a cartload of books. — John Muir
I have seen oaks of many species in many kinds of exposure and soil, but those of Kentucky excel in grandeur all I had ever before beheld. They are broad and dense and bright green. In the leafy bowers and caves of their long branches dwell magnificent avenues of shade, and every tree seems to be blessed with a double portion of strong exulting life. — John Muir
In studying the fate of our forest king, we have thus far considered the action of purely natural causes only; but, unfortunately, man is in the woods, and waste and pure destruction are making rapid headway. If the importance of the forests were even vaguely understood, even from an economic standpoint, their preservation would call forth the most watchful attention of government — John Muir
Look! Nature is overflowing with the grandeur of God! — John Muir
Wander here a whole summer, if you can ... Thousands of wild blessings will search you and soak you as if you were a sponge, and the big days will go by uncounted — John Muir
No traveler, whether a tree lover or not, will ever forget his first walk in a sugar-pine forest. The majestic crowns approaching one another make a glorious canopy, through the feathery arches of which the sunbeams pour, silvering the needles and gilding the stately columns and the ground into a scene of enchantment. — John Muir
None may wholly escape the good of Nature, however imperfectly exposed to her blessings. The minister will not preach a perfectly flat and sedimentary sermon after climbing a snowy peak; and the fair play and tremendous impartiality of Nature, so tellingly displayed, will surely affect the after pleadings of the lawyer. Fresh air at least will get into everybody, and the cares of mere business will be quenched like the fires of a sinking ship. — John Muir
Plants, animals, and stars are all kept in place, bridled along appointed ways, with one another, and through the midst of one another
killing and being killed, eating and being eaten, in harmonious proportions and quantities. — John Muir
I know that our bodies were made to thrive only in pure air, and the scenes in which pure air is found. — John Muir
When a man plants a tree, he plants himself. — John Muir
Of all the paths in life you take, make sure a few of them are dirt — John Muir
We all flow from one fountain. — John Muir
Keep close to Nature's heart ... and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean. — John Muir
Every hidden cell is throbbing with music and life, every fiber thrilling like harp strings. — John Muir
The body seems to feel beauty when exposed to it as it feels the campfire or sunshine, entering not by the eyes alone, but equally through all one's flesh like radiant heat, making a passionate ecstatic pleasure glow not explainable. — John Muir
Our lives are rounded with a sleep. — John Muir
An eagle soaring above a sheer cliff, where I suppose its nest is, makes another striking show of life, and helps to bring to mind the other people of the so-called solitude - deer in the forest caring for their young; the strong, well-clad, well-fed bears; the lively throng of squirrels; the blessed birds, great and small, stirring and sweetening the groves; and the clouds of happy insects filling the sky with joyous hum as part and parcel of the down-pouring sunshine. — John Muir
They tell us that plants are not like man immortal, but are perishable-soul -less. I think that is something that we know exactly nothing about. — John Muir
God has to nearly kill us sometimes, to teach us lessons. — John Muir
Ink cannot tell the glow that lights me at this moment in turning to the mountains. I feel strong [enough] to leap Yosemite walls at a bound. — John Muir
There is no estimating the wit and wisdom concealed and latent in our lower fellow mortals until made manifest by profound experiences; for it is through suffering that dogs as well as saints are developed and made perfect. — John Muir
A lifetime is so little a time that we die before we get ready to live. I should like to study at a college, but then I have to say to myself: "You will die before you can do anything else". — John Muir
Who reports the works and ways of the clouds, those wondrous creations coming into being every day like freshly upheaved mountains? — John Muir
Wilderness is not only a haven for native plants and animals but it is also a refuge from society. Its a place to go to hear the wind and little else, see the stars and the galaxies, smell the pine trees, feel the cold water, touch the sky and the ground at the same time, listen to coyotes, eat the fresh snow, walk across the desert sands, and realize why its good to go outside of the city and the suburbs. Fortunately, there is wilderness just outside the limits of the cities and the suburbs in most of the United States, especially in the West. — John Muir
I should study Nature's laws in all their crossings and unions; I should follow magnetic streams to their source and follow the shores of our magnetic oceans. I should go among the rays of the aurora, and follow them to their beginnings, and study their dealings and communications with other powers and expressions of matter. — John Muir
Large flocks of butterflies, all kinds of happy insects, seem to be in a perfect fever of joy and sportive gladness. — John Muir