J. R. R. Tolkien Quotes

It drives me crazy to see so much of this planet's life so casually endangered. The first steps are so easy (drive smaller cars, for instance) that it's very hard to understand why we haven't taken them. But I know that this is the issue our generation will be judged by.

I'd like to think that the actions we take today will allow others in the future to discover the wonders of landscapes we helped protect but never had the chance to enjoy ourselves.

A man doesn't plant a tree for himself. He plants it for posterity.

From a very early age, I had imbibed the opinion that it was every man's duty to do all that lay in his power to leave the country as good as he had found it.

We need a philosophy for humans and nature to live together.

We have a responsibility to protect the rights of generations, of all species, that cannot speak for themselves today. The global challenge of climate change requires that we ask no less of our leaders, or ourselves.

War and, apparently, hurricanes are very good for the oil business. But I've got to believe at a certain point, as a nation, we're going to go in a different direction toward an increased sense of personal responsibility, a lowering of each individual's carbon footprint and a real collaborative effort to help sustain our planet.

Many of the earth's habitats, animals, plants, insects and even micro-organisms that we know to be rare may not be known at all by future generations. We have the capability and the responsibility to act; we must do so before it is too late.

My environmentalism reared its head around the age of ten when I inexplicably become obsessed with littering. For some reason I considered it my personal responsibility to pick up litter wherever I found it and yell at anyone I saw contributing to the problem (much to the horror of my mother). I was a ten-year-old on a mission to clean up the streets! But it was years later when I became a mother myself that concern for my kids' future really ignited my passion and set me on my course. Once I started reading and educating myself, there was no turning back.

I'm a parent. I have kids, and what's happening with our waters, and our oceans, and what's happening with deforestation, and all these things that human beings are having negative impacts on at this time, are concerning to me. I wanted to do whatever I could to be a part of the solution and not just be a part of the problem.

I've always been very involved with environmental issues. I was fortunate to be one of the speakers at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janiero some years back, and Bruce Johnson and I served on the board of the Surfrider Foundation here at home. Locally and globally, we need to be doing everything we can to help Mother Earth.

As a Green, my goal is to put a smile on the face of the coming generations.

I would like to ask all those who have positions of responsibility in economic, political and social life, and all men and women of goodwill: let us be 'protectors' of creation, protectors of God's plan inscribed in nature, protectors of one another and of the environment.

When it comes to the care of our common home, we are living at a critical moment of history.

[M]y conception of liberty does not permit an individual citizen or a group of citizens to commit acts of depredation against nature in such a way as to harm their neighbors and especially to harm the future generations of Americans. If many years ago we had had the necessary knowledge, and especially the necessary willingness on the part of the Federal Government, we would have saved a sum, a sum of money which has cost the taxpayers of America two billion dollars.

I think everyone should have a personal mission to leave the Earth a better place for them having lived in it and let Earth then take it from there.

The environment is God's gift to everyone, and in our use of it we have a responsibility towards the poor, towards future generations, and towards humanity as a whole.

I think the environmental movement is the biggest people's movement in the world. Unfortunately, our governments and corporations haven't responded accordingly to protect our planet's natural resources.

I only started to understand the concept of "environmental protection" 14 years ago. I was an ambassador for a charity event, and the staff told me that the consumption of disposable chopsticks in China, per year, could result in the devastation of unimaginable acres of forest.

Oh Earth, you gave me all I have, I love you, I love you, - oh what have IThat I can give you in return - Except my body after I die?

We are going to expand enormously -- our economy, our consumption, over the years to come ... But the consequences of that on emissions are going to be severe unless we change direction.

We have an obligation to make things beautiful. Not to leave the world uglier than we found it, not to empty the oceans, not to leave our problems for the next generation.

Hence it is that old men do plant young trees, the fruit whereof another age shall take.

Folks who are alive today need to wake up and do what they can to stop abusing the planet, and find ways to preserve the web of life. That's where the soul is headed. It is time for us to become wounded healers.

Leave the woodpile higher than you found it.