As a people, we have the problem of making our forests outlast this generation, or iron outlast this century, and our coal the next; not merely as a matter of convenience or comfort, but as a matter of stern necessity.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of sustainable resource management for future generations.
William Howard Taft highlights the critical challenge society faces in ensuring that natural resources like forests, iron, and coal endure beyond our current generation. He argues that this is not just an issue of convenience, but a pressing necessity for the survival and well-being of future populations, urging collective responsibility toward environmental stewardship.
In practice
In a speech about climate change, I quoted William Howard Taft to emphasize the need for sustainable practices.
The President can exercise no power which cannot be fairly and reasonably traced to some specific grant of power in the Federal Constitution or in an act of Congress passed in pursuance thereof. There is no undefined residuum of power which he can exercise because it seems to him to be in the public interest.
The secret of Masonry, like the secret of life, can be known only by those who seek it, serve it, live it. It cannot be uttered; it can only be felt and acted. It is, in fact, an open secret, and each man knows it according to his quest and capacity. Like all things worth knowing, no one can know it for another and no man can know it alone.
The intoxication of power rapidly sobers off in the knowledge of its restrictions and under the prompt reminder of an ever-present and not always considerate press, as well as the kindly suggestions that not infrequently come from Congress.
We must dare to be great; and we must realize that greatness is the fruit of toil and sacrifice and high courage.
I think his greatest fault is his failure to accord credit to anyone for what he may have done. This is a great weakness in any man.
There is nothing so despicable as a secret society that is based upon religious prejudice and that will attempt to defeat a man because of his religious beliefs. Such a society is like a cockroach - it thrives in the dark. So do those who combine for such an end.
We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation.
Never say there is nothing beautiful in the world anymore. There is always something to make you wonder in the shape of a tree, the trembling of a leaf.
Nature's not our enemy, it's our sustenance; and we need it - and we need nature healthy for us to be healthy and to survive long term
Each solstice is a domain of experience unto itself. At the Summer Solstice, all is green and growing, potential coming into being, the miracle of manifestation painted large on the canvas of awareness. At the Winter Solstice, the wind is cold, trees are bare and all lies in stillness beneath blankets of snow.
This because it is never really very cold in England. It is drizzly, and the wind will blow; hail happens, and there is a breed of Tuesday in January in which time creeps and no light comes and the air is full of water and nobody really loves anybody, but still a decent jumper and a waxen jacket lined with wool is sufficient for every weather England's got to give.
I go to the Himalayas after every film. I go alone. I go to the interiors, to the villages. Being there itself is like meditation.
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