Mountaintops Quotes & Sayings

In his laborious efforts to attain mountaintops, where the air is lighter and purer, the climber gains new strength of limb. In the endeavor to over come obstacles of the way, the soul trains itself to conquer difficulties; and the spectacle of the vast horizon, which from the highest crest offers itself on all sides to the eyes, raises his spirit to the Divine Author and Soverign of Nature. — Pope Pius XI

I believe in love, but I'm not sitting around waiting for it. I buy houses. I travel. I take jobs on mountaintops in Transylvania ... I know that happiness comes in many ways and if you spend your life hoping to be found by or to find a significant other, you're going to miss out on all that stuff. And that's what makes you special and makes your life rich. — Renee Zellweger

It is estimated that one-third of all reef-building corals, a third of all fresh-water mollusks, a third of sharks and rays, a quarter of all mammals, a fifth of all reptiles, and a sixth of all birds are headed toward oblivion. The losses are occurring all over: in the South Pacific and in the North Atlantic, in the Arctic and the Sahel, in lakes and on islands, on mountaintops and in valleys, — Elizabeth Kolbert

Transformation is a process, and as life happens there are tons of ups and downs. It's a journey of discovery - there are moments on mountaintops and moments in deep valleys of despair. — Rick Warren

Striving to save wildlife species and their dwindling habitats is a noble goal. It takes tremendous persistence in the face of those with money and power who want to expedite their short-range goals regardless of impacts on wildlife and habitat. You have moments on the mountaintops of exhilaration, and moments in the desolate valleys of despair. You have days when the goal you have set out to pursue appears absolutely impossible to achieve. But you must persist. — Bobbie Holaday

Soldiers in the heat of battle; death-row prisoners; explorers stranded in deserts, jungles, on mountaintops; anyone sick or lost or just tired and bewildered: we all wanted our mothers. — Marisa De Los Santos

Mountaintops are for views and inspiration, but fruit is grown in the valleys. — Billy Graham

Mountaintops inspire leaders but valleys mature them. — Winston Churchill

I've had injuries in my life from things beyond my control: runaway horses, helicopters that decide to crash on mountaintops, boating accidents - things that were out of my hands. — Christie Brinkley

He was the sort of person who stood on mountaintops during thunderstorms in wet copper armor shouting All the Gods are bastards! — Terry Pratchett

From the mountain peaks for streams descend and flow near the town; in the cascades the white water is calling, but the mistis do not hear it. On the hillsides, on the plains, on the mountaintops the yellow flowers dance in the wind, but the mistis hardly see them. At dawn, against the cold sky, beyond the edge of the mountains, the sun appears; then the larks and doves sing, fluttering their little wings; the sheep and the colts run to and fro in the grass, while the mistis sleep or watch, calculating the weight of their steers. In the evening Tayta Inti gilds the sk, gilds the earth, but they sneeze, spur their horses on the road, or drink coffee, drink hot pisco.
But in the hearts of the Puquios, the valley is weeping and laughing, in their eyes the sky and the sun are alive; within them the valley sings with the voice of the morning, of the noontide, of the afternoon, of the evening. — Jose Maria Arguedas

Ricki Jo," Momma says, "who's on the phone? Tell them it's past your bedtime."
I cover the receiver and look over my shoulder at my folks. Right. 'Cause a ten o'clock bedtime is something I want to shout from the mountaintops. — Alecia Whitaker

As artist Nature splashes color across the vast canvas of the sky with
the radiance and splendor of sunrise and sunset.
She arches rainbows against the passing storm, creates flowers and foliage,
sets autumn woods on fire with the beauty of turning leaves
and touches mountaintops with snow crystals. — Wilferd Peterson

Night's candles have burned out, and jocund day stands tiptoe on the misty mountaintops. Hope tinged with melancholy - like life. — William Shakespeare

You don't have to shout from the mountaintops. Sometimes power comes in a soft, calm, compassionate way, like a quiet warrior. — Faith Hunter

He who ascends to mountaintops, shall find The loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds and snow; He who surpasses or subdues mankind Must look down on the hate of those below — Barbara Taylor Bradford

Life is not the mountaintops, it's the walking in between. — Ben Rector

I go all the way down to First Avenue ... I realize it's Friday Night all over America, in New York it's just ten o'clock and the fight's started in the Garden and longshoremen in North River bars are all watching the fight and drinking 20 beers apiece, and Sams are sitting in the front row ... while I spent all summer pacing and praying in mountaintops, of rock and snow, of lost birds and bears, these people've been sucking on cigarettes and drinks and pacing and praying in their souls, too, in their own way ... — Jack Kerouac

Some men go through life absolutely miserable because, despite the most enormous achievement, they just didn't do one thing-like the architect who didn't build St Paul's. I didn't quite build St Paul's, but I stood on more mountaintops than possibly I deserved. — Peter Thorneycroft, Baron Thorneycroft

In the evening, the brilliant yellow pumpkin blossoms will close, drunk on sunshine, while the milky white jasmine will open their slender throats and sip the chill Himalayan air.
At night, low hearths will send up wispy curls of smoke fragrant with a dozen dinners, and darkness will clothe the land.
Except on nights when the moon is full. On those nights, the hillside and the valley below are bathed in a magical white light, the glow of the perpetual snows that blanket the mountaintops. On those nights I lie restless in the sleeping loft, wondering what the world is like beyond my mountain home. — Patricia McCormick

One thing that kept me from being unhappy was the mountains, for with mountaintops to see, a body can't quite despair. — Florence Maule Updegraff

I was not a religious man, but if I were, the woods would be my church, the mountaintops my altar. — Tom Ryan

In our time ... a man whose enemies are faceless bureaucrats almost never wins. It is our equivalent to the anger of the gods in ancient times. But those gods you must understand were far more imaginative than our tiny bureaucrats. They spoke from mountaintops not from tiny airless offices. They rode clouds. They were possessed of passion. They had voices and names. Six thousand years of civilization have brought us to this. — Chaim Potok

When they reached the top of the hill they turned and looked down at the valley. Moominhouse was just a blue dot, and the river a narrow ribbon of green: the swing they couldn't see at all. "We've never been such a long way from home before," said Moomintroll, and a little goose-fleshy thrill of excitement came over them at the thought. — Tove Jansson

Everybody wants to be on the mountaintop, but if you'll remember, mountaintops are rocky and cold. There is no growth on the top of a mountain. Sure, the view is great, but what's a view for? A view just gives us a glimpse of our next destination-our next target. But to hit that target, we must come off the mountain, go through the valley, and begin to climb the next slope. It is in the valley that we slog through the lush grass and rich soil, learning and becoming what enables us to summit life's next peak. — Andy Andrews

With all respect to the Buddha and to the early Christian celibates, I sometimes wonder if all this teaching about nonattachment and the spiritual importance of monastic solitude might be denying us something quite vital. Maybe all that renunciation of intimacy denies us the opportunity to ever experience that very earthbound, domesticated, dirt-under-the-fingernails gift of the difficult, long-term, daily forgiveness {...} Maybe creating a big enough space within your consciousness to hold and accept someone's contradictions - someone's idiocies, even - is a kind of divine act. Perhaps transcendence can be found not only on solitary mountaintops or in monastic settings, but also at your own kitchen table, in the daily acceptance of your partner's most tiresome, irritating faults. — Elizabeth Gilbert

Nature, at its strongest, shaved off mountaintops or threw houses into the air, but it couldn't was away pain. Everything had limitations. — Courtney C. Stevens

But overall, Obama's record on the environment has been uninspired - and that's putting it kindly. He hasn't stopped coal companies from blowing up mountaintops and devastating large regions of Appalachia. — Jeff Goodell

God is not attracted to mountaintops or church steeples. God is drawn to suffering, and the dark places it surfaces, which is why sharing pain freely feels very much like love, and may be the same thing. (207) — Keith Ablow

Sam said to me the other day, "I love you like 20 tyrannosauruses on 20 mountaintops," and this is the exact same way in which I love him. — Anne Lamott

At Oreanda they sat on a beach not far from the church, looked down at the sea, and were silent. Yalta was barely visible through the morning mist; white clouds rested motionlessly on the mountaintops. The leaves did not stir on the trees, cicadas twanged, and the monotonous muffled sound of the sea that rose from below spoke of the peace, the eternal sleep awaiting us. So it rumbled below when there was no Yalta, no Oreanda here; so it rumbles now, and it will rumble as indifferently and as hollowly when we are no more. And in this constancy, in this complete indifference to the life and death of each of us, there lies, perhaps, a pledge of our eternal salvation, of the unceasing advance of life upon earth, of unceasing movement towards perfection. — Anton Chekhov

There were human cultures that taught an afterlife of the blessed on mountaintops or in clouds in caverns or oases but she could not recall any in which if you were very very good when you died you went to the beach. — Carl Sagan

I would like a boyfriend. I'm a very happy person and it is the final, final piece of the puzzle. I'm looking for that shout-it-out-from-the-mountaintops, fall-in-love person. — Andy Cohen

Valley's don't last forever ... Neither did mountaintops of life, but if a person just had faith and held on, each valley would eventually end. — Lawana Blackwell

Station Eleven is the size of Earth's moon and was designed to resemble a planet, but it's a planet that can chart a course through galaxies and requires no sun. The station's artificial sky was damaged in the war, however, so on Station Eleven's surface it is always sunset or twilight or night. There was also damage to a number of vital systems involving Station Eleven's ocean levels, and the only land remaining is a series of islands that once were mountaintops. — Emily St. John Mandel

The rains of Life's Blessings cannot gather on mountaintops of pride, but flow easily into valleys of humbleness. — Paramahansa Yogananda

It's not all about mountaintops. Mostly it's about training so that you'll know the mountaintop for what it is when you get there. — Lauren F. Winner

Is a wound we keep tucked in those parts of the country that can't afford to turn it away, who need its jobs or revenue, who must endure the quiet violence of its physical presence - its "Don't Pick Up Hitchhikers" warning signs, its barbed fences - the same way a place must endure the removal of its mountaintops and the plundering of its seams: because a powerful rhetoric insists we can only be delivered from our old scars by tolerating new ones. — Leslie Jamison

Kenneth Tynan once said that the only people who can do Russian drama, outside of the Russians themselves, are the Irish. I presume that's because we are somewhat manic in the mood department. It's no bother to soar from the darkest depths to the mountaintops of delight, with the heart borne by all of that which is alive and singing. It's even less bother to swan-dive into the pits of despair and total hopelessness, with the realization that it's no use being Irish unless you know the world is eventually going to break your heart. — Malachy McCourt

I felt darkness because i had been deep in the hollers, and i knew glory because i had stood on top of the beautiful mountaintops. more mountaintops please. more mountaintops. — Scott McClanahan

He woke up frozen stiff. A cold dawn was lighting up the peaks on the other side of the valley, making them shine like giant lanterns. Above, through the broken bones of the roof, he could see the sky, clear now, a deep violet blue, waiting for the sun to breach the mountaintops. The snow clouds had gone, off to bother someone else. Where he lay was still dark, wrapped in leftover shadows. The wall, so deliciously warm when he'd fallen asleep, was like ice, sucking the heat out of him, but what had woken him were screams. Long piercing screams, over and over. — Stephen Deas

The rocks have a history; gray and weatherworn, they are veterans of many battles; they have most of them marched in the ranks of vast stone brigades during the ice age; they have been torn from the hills, recruited from the mountaintops, and marshaled on the plains and in the valleys; and now the elemental war is over, there they lie waging a gentle but incessant warfare with time and slowly, oh, so slowly, yielding to its attacks! — John Burroughs