Touch the earth, love the earth, honour the earth, her plains, her valleys, her hills, and her seas; rest your spirit in her solitary places.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes the importance of appreciating and respecting the natural world around us.
Henry Beston's quote encourages a deep connection and reverence for the Earth and its diverse landscapes. It suggests that by engaging with and loving nature—its plains, valleys, hills, and seas—we can find peace and solace, allowing our spirits to rest in the beauty of solitude offered by the natural world. This connection fosters a sense of responsibility for preserving the environment and appreciating its gifts.
In practice
This quote can be shared during Earth Day celebrations to inspire appreciation for the planet.
If there is one thing clear about the centuries dominated by the factory and the wheel, it is that although the machine can make everything from a spoon to a landing-craft, a natural joy in earthly living is something it never has and never will be able to manufacture.
Learn to reverence night and to put away the vulgar fear of it, for, with the banishment of night from the experience of man, there vanishes as well a religious emotion, a poetic mood, which gives depth to the adventure of humanity.
The leaves fall, the wind blows, and the farm country slowly changes from the summer cottons into its winter woods.
Our fantastic civilization has fallen out of touch with many aspects of nature, and with none more completely than with night.
When the Pleiades and the wind in the grass are no longer a part of the human spirit, a part of very flesh and bone, man becomes, as it were, a kind of cosmic outlaw, having neither the completeness nor integrity of the animal nor the birthright of a true humanity.
Learn to reverence night and to put away the vulgar fear of it.
Nature is not a place to visit. It is home.
Nature can't evolve a species that hasn't the will to survive. Individuals might be bred to sacrifice themselves, but the race as a whole can never cease to exist.
Healthy feet can feel the very heart of Mother Earth.
Every twenty minutes on the Appalachian Trail, Katz and I walked farther than the average American walks in a week. For 93 percent of all trips outside the home, for whatever distance or whatever purpose, Americans now get in a car. On average the total walking of an American these days - that's walking of all types: from car to office, from office to car, around the supermarket and shopping malls - adds up to 1.4 miles a week, barely 350 yards a day.
Nature has neither kernel Nor shell
Animal agriculture makes a 40% greater contribution to global warming than all transportation in the world combined; it is the number one cause of climate change.
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