Sonya Hartnett Quotes

He chose to be rich by making his wants few, and supplying them himself.

… life in nature, without technology, is wholesale death.

The policy of man consists, at first, in endeavoring to arrive at a state equal to that of animals, whom nature has furnished with food, clothing, and shelter.

At least once every human should have to run for his life, to teach him that milk does not come from supermarkets, that safety does not come from policemen, that 'news' is not something that happens to other people. He might learn how his ancestors lived and that he himself is no different--in the crunch his life depends on his agility, alertness, and personal resourcefulness.

A man in a cave or in a camp, a nomad, will die with no more estate than the wolf or the horse leaves.

I hate the present modes of living and getting a living. Farming and shopkeeping and working at a trade or profession are all odious to me. I should relish getting my living in a simple, primitive fashion.

Even if they don't know it, everyone has the instinct to survive.

I think I'm low-maintenance.

You need a good gardener and a good fisherman. The cook is not required.

If I've got food and water, as long as I can exercise my mind and keep it nimble, then I'll be okay.

I grew up in a house with no running water, 16 miles from the closest place that had a post office. I had a very parochial view of the world.

I don't have much of a bucket list. I don't have a lot of needs and desires.

Already at the origin of the species man was equal to what he was destined to become.

I used to run around barefoot and climb trees and pick fruit and sell it on the side of the road like a real island girl.

The private interest of the individual would not be sufficiently provided for by reasonable and cool self-love alone; therefore the appetites and passions are placed within as a guard and further security, without which it would not be taken due care of.

Human beings will be happier - not when they cure cancer or get to Mars or eliminate racial prejudice or flush Lake Erie but when they find ways to inhabit primitive communities again. That's my utopia.

You can't leave civilization behind entirely.

I don't need that much to live - we don't need that much to have a wonderful life. I learned that from animals.

I know people who have, until recently, lived with dirt floors. There are people who live way back off the grid, without electricity. Not a whole lot, but quite a few. That's a choice for a lot of them. There might be a religious element in their isolation, at least with some of them.

Animals have these advantages over man: they never hear the clock strike, they die without any idea of death, they have no theologians to instruct them, their last moments are not disturbed by unwelcome and unpleasant ceremonies, their funerals cost them nothing, and no one starts lawsuits over their wills.

Part of the beauty of wilderness schooling is that the overheads are very low. You want a classroom? Build a shelter from nature's store. You want to eat? Forage for it.

Surviving is not something you need to learn. You don't need to learn survival skills; you have them already. That's why we're here, all of us, because it's a game of survival anyway.

Life on a small farm might seem primitive, but by living such a life we become able to discover the Great Path. I believe that one who deeply respects his neighborhood and everyday world in which he lives will be shown the greatest of all worlds.

The only help I need to live, is unprofessional. The only wealth I have to give, is not material. And if you need much more than that, I'm not available.

Still we live meanly like ants, though the fable tells us we were long ago changed into men.