Wilderness is a resource which can shrink but not grow.

There are idle spots on every farm, and every highway is bordered by an idle strip as long as it is; keep cow, plow, and mower out of these idle spots, and the full native flora, plus dozens of interesting stowaways from foreign parts, could be part of the normal environment of every citizen.

Agricultural science is largely a race between the emergence of new pests and the emergence of new techniques for their control.

Do we realize that industry, which has been our good servant, might make a poor master?

My dog does not care where heat comes from, but he cares that it comes, and soon. Indeed he considers my ability to make it come as something magical, for when I rise in the coal black pre-dawn and kneel by the hearth to make a fire, he pushes himself blandly between me and the kindling splits I have laid in the ashes, and I must touch a match to them by poking it between his legs. Such faith , I suppose, is the kind that moves mountains.

Too much safety seems to yield only danger in the long run.

To those who know the speech of hills and rivers straightening a stream is like shipping vagrants—a very successful method of passing trouble from one place to the next. It solves nothing in any collective sense.