Henry David Thoreau Quotes

Something will have gone out of us as a people if we ever let the remaining wilderness be destroyed ... We simply need that wild country available to us, even if we never do more than drive to its edge and look in.

I think it is very important to conserve and protect the natural world. I’ve just come back from Costa Rica and they are really big on eco tourism. They have lots of reserves, and they are really into protecting wildlife. I visited a reserve called Cabo Blanco. You walk into the reserve and there are capucine monkeys swinging from the trees and sloths. I am big into nature, and seeing animals in their natural habitats. I love it.

There is something basic about protecting land by taking it off the market. People should be able to enjoy where they live while at the same time protect the plants and animals around them.

I'd like more of the world go back to being wild.

We are too quickly losing important landscapes in this country to development - and I worry that if we do not act to protect them now, future generations will grow up in a profoundly different world.

What covers 13 million acres, sleeps 60 million people, and desperately needs money? America's state parks.

I love creating hideaways. My idea is to go to the most beautiful, unspoilt places, buy the land, and make sure it is never damaged. I've always admired John D. Rockefeller, who bought up tracts of land to ensure they were left wild in perpetuity.

We have our work cut out to make sure our outdoors will always remain accessible.

National Parks are the gold standard for conservation.

A grove of giant redwood or sequoias should be kept just as we keep a great and beautiful cathedral.

How much wilderness do the wilderness-lovers want? ask those who would mine and dig and cut and dam in such sanctuary spots as these. The answer is easy: Enough so that there will be in the years ahead a little relief, a little quiet, a little relaxation, for any of our increasing millions who need and want it.

I dream of our vast deserts, of our forests, of all our great wildernesses. We must never forget that it is our duty to protect this environment.

Something will have gone out of us as a people if we ever let the remaining wilderness be destroyed We need wilderness preserved — as much of it as is still left, and as many kinds — because it was the challenge against which our character as a people was formed We simply need that wild country available to us, even if we never do more than drive to its edge and look in. For it can be a means of reassuring ourselves of our sanity as creatures, a part of the geography of hope.

Wilderness and motors are incompatible and the former can best be experienced, understood and enjoyed when the machines are left behind where they belong -- on the superhighways and in the parking lots, on the reservoirs and in the marinas.

The reason to preserve wilderness is that we need it. We need wilderness of all kinds, large and small, public and private. Wee need to go now and again into places where our work is disallowed, where our hopes and plans have no standing. We need to come into the presence of the unqualified and mysterious formality of Creation.

Man always kills the thing he loves, and so we the pioneers have killed our wilderness. Some say we had to. Be that as it may, I am glad I shall never be young without wild country to be young in. Of what avail are forty freedoms without a blank spot on the map?

Sundance started with two acres back in 1963 that I bought from a sheepherder for $500. What has happened, I could see development starting to descend on the state of Utah. I thought I had better acquire more land to protect it. I thought that would probably be my legacy, to protect land.

Our national conservation effort must include the complete spectrum of resources: air, water, and land; fuels, energy, and minerals; soils, forests, and forage; fish and wildlife. Together they make up the world of nature which surrounds us- of the American heritage.

I really think admiration for nature can save us. I mean true admiration, to the point of not letting it be harmed.

We need wilderness preserved-as much of it as is still left, and as many kinds-because it was the challenge against which our character as a people was formed.

Though the word beautification makes the concept sound merely cosmetic, it involves much more: clean water, clean air, clean roadsides, safe waste disposal and preservation of valued old landmarks as well as great parks and wilderness areas. To me … beautification means our total concern for the physical and human quality we pass on to our children and the future.

I see an America whose rivers and valleys and lakes hills and streams and plains the mountains over our land and nature's wealth deep under the earth are protected as the rightful heritage of all the people.

I think anything that gets people outside [is good] - I'm a big supporter of public parks and public spaces.

There can be no greater issue than that of conservation in this country.

It would be worth the while if in each town there were a committee appointed to see that the beauty of the town received no detriment. If we have the largest boulder in the county, then it should not belong to an individual, nor be made into door-steps.