Rivers must have been the guides which conducted the footsteps of the first travelers. They are the constant lure, when they flow by our doors, to distant enterprise and adventure, and, by a natural impulse, the dwellers on their banks will at length accompany their currents to the lowlands of the globe, or explore at their invitation the interior of continents.

You may tell by looking at any twig of the forest, ay, at your very wood-pile, whether its winter is past or not.

He listens equally to the prayers of the believer and the unbeliever.

Cold and hunger seem more friendly to my nature than those methods which men have adopted and advise to ward them off.

We are more anxious to speak than to be heard.

Associate reverently, and as much as you can, with your loftiest thoughts.

Is it the lumberman, then, who is the friend and lover of the pine, stands nearest to it, and understands its nature best? Is it the tanner who has barked it, or he who has boxed it for turpentine, whom posterity will fable to have been changed into a pine at last? No! no! it is the poet: he it is who makes the truest use of the pine-who does not fondle it with an axe, nor tickle it with a saw, nor stroke it with a plane. . . .