Civilization has so cluttered this elemental man-earth relationship with gadgets and middlemen that awareness of it is growing dim. We fancy that industry supports us, forgetting what supports industry.

Our remnants of wilderness will yield bigger values to the nation's character and health than they will to its pocketbook, and to destroy them will be to admit that the latter are the only values that interest us.

It is, by common consent, a good thing for people to get back to nature.

Land is not merely soil, it is a fountain of energy flowing through a circuit of soils, plants and animals.

The rich diversity of the world's cultures reflects a corresponding diversity in the wilds that gave them birth.

Patriotism requires less and less of making the eagle scream, but more and more of making him think.

The last word in ignorance is the man who says of an animal or plant, "What good is it?" If the land mechanism as a whole is good, then every part is good, whether we understand it or not. If the biota, in the course of aeons, has built something we like but do not understand, then who but a fool would discard seemingly useless parts? To keep every cog and wheel is the first precaution of intelligent tinkering.