A leader leads from in front, by the power of example. A ruler pushes from behind, by means of the club, the whip, the power of fear.

God bless America. Let's try to save some of it.

Government should be weak, amateurish and ridiculous. At present, it fulfills only a third of the role.

This world may be only illusion -- but it's the only illusion we've got.

All dams are ugly, but the Glen Canyon Dam is sinful ugly.

How strange and wonderful is our home, our earth, with its swirling vaporous atmosphere, its flowing and frozen liquids, its trembling plants, its creeping, crawling, climbing creatures, the croaking things with wings that hang on rocks and soar through the fog, the furry grass, the scaly seas.

The fire. The odor of burning juniper is the sweetest fragrance on the face of the earth, in my honest judgment; I doubt if all the smoking censers of Dante's paradise could equal it. One breath of juniper smoke, like the perfume of sagebrush after rain, evokes in magical catalysis, like certain music, the space and light and clarity and piercing strangeness of the American West. Long may it burn.