Quotable Quotes (31 page)

 

L
EAVE A LANDSCAPE AS IT WAS 
. . .

 

There is nothing in which the birds differ more from man than the way in which they can build and yet leave a landscape as it was before.

—
R
OBERT
L
YND

The Blue Lion and Other Essays

 

Don't blow it—good planets are hard to find.

—Quoted in
Time

 

What is the use of a house if you haven't got a tolerable planet to put it on?

—
H
ENRY
D
AVID
T
HOREAU

 

It is horrifying that we have to fight our own government to save the environment.

—A
NSEL
A
DAMS

 

Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.

—
E
DWARD
A
BBEY

 

Progress might have been all right once, but it's gone on too long.

—
O
GDEN
N
ASH

 

Progress is man's ability to complicate simplicity.

—
T
HOR
H
EYERDAHL

Fatu-Hiva

 

You can tell all you need to about a society from how it treats animals and beaches.

—
F
RANK
D
E
F
ORD

in
Sports Illustrated

 

Since the beginning each generation has fought nature. Now, in the life-span of a single generation, we must turn around 180 degrees and become the protector of nature.

—
J
ACQUES-
Y
VES
C
OUSTEAU

 

We haven't got too much time left to ensure that government of the earth, by the earth, for the earth, shall not perish from the people.

—
C
.
P
.
S
NOW

 

The activist is not the man who says the river is dirty. The activist is the man who cleans up the river.

—
R
OSS
P
EROT

 

I think God's going to come down and pull civilization over for speeding.

—
S
TEVEN
W
RIGHT

 

Civilization no longer needs to open up wilderness; it needs wilderness to open up the still largely unexplored human mind.

—
D
AVID
R
AINS
W
ALLACE

The Dark Range

 

If we do not permit the earth to produce beauty and joy, it will in the end not produce food either.

—
J
OSEPH
W
OOD
K
RUTCH

 

We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.

—
A
LDO
L
EOPOLD

A Sand County Almanac

 

A true conservationist is a man who knows that the world is not given by his fathers but borrowed from his children.

—
Audubon

 

The other planets may not be able to support life, but it isn't easy on this one either.

—
Banking

 

T
HERE'S NO DEALING WITH A CAT 
. . .

 

There's no dealing with a cat who knows you're awake.

—
B
RAD
S
OLOMON

The Open Shadow

 

The only mystery about the cat is why it ever decided to become a domestic animal.

—
C
OMPTON
M
AC
K
ENZIE

Cats' Company

 

The cat could very well be man's best friend but would never stoop to admitting it.

—
D
OUG
L
ARSON

 

Cats have it all—admiration and an endless sleep and company only when they want it.

—
R
OD
M
C
K
UEN

Book of Days

 

Cats don't caress us—they caress themselves on us.

—
R
IVAROL

 

When dogs leap onto your bed, it's because they adore being with you. When cats leap onto your bed, it's because they adore your bed.

—
A
LISHA
E
VERETT

 

You can keep a dog; but it is the cat who keeps people because cats find humans useful domestic animals. A dog will flatter you but you have to flatter a cat. A dog is an employee; the cat is a freelance.

—
G
EORGE
M
IKES

How to Be Decadent

 

When I play with my cat, who knows if I am not more of a pastime to her than she is to me?

—
M
ONTAIGNE

 

Ignorant people think it's the noise which fighting cats make that is so aggravating, but it ain't so; it's the sickening grammar they use.

—
M
ARK
T
WAIN

 

No matter how much cats fight, there always seem to be plenty of kittens.

—
A
BRAHAM
L
INCOLN

 

It is impossible to keep a straight face in the presence of one or more kittens.

—
C
YNTHIA
E
.
V
ARNADO

 

You can't look at a sleeping cat and be tense.

—J
ANE
P
AULEY

 

The idea of calm exists in a sitting cat.

—
J
ULES
R
ENARD

 

Cats seem to go on the principle that it never does any harm to ask for what you want.

—
J
OSEPH
W
OOD
K
RUTCH

The Twelve Seasons

 

Never try to outstubborn a cat.

—R
OBERT
A. H
EINLEIN

The Notebooks of Lazarus Long

 

I
F DOGS COULD TALK 
. . .

 

If dogs could talk, it would take a lot of fun out of owning one.

—A
NDREW
A. R
OONEY

Not That You Asked . . .

 

One reason a dog can be such a comfort when you're feeling blue is that he doesn't try to find out why.

—
National Enquirer

 

There is no psychiatrist in the world like a puppy licking your face.

—
B
ERN
W
ILLIAMS

 

To his dog, every man is Napoleon; hence the popularity of dogs.

—
A
LDOUS
H
UXLEY

 

The great pleasure of a dog is that you may make a fool of yourself with him and not only will he not scold you, but he will make a fool of himself too.

—
S
AMUEL
B
UTLER

 

The dog has got more fun out of Man than Man has got out of the dog, for the clearly demonstrable reason that Man is the more laughable of the two animals.

—
J
AMES
T
HURBER

Thurber's Dogs

 

Dogs laugh, but they laugh with their tails.

—
M
AX
E
ASTMAN

Enjoyment of Laughter

 

A dog wags its tail with its heart.

—
M
ARTIN
B
UXBAUM

IN
Table Talk

 

A dog teaches a boy fidelity, perseverance, and to turn around three times before lying down.

—
R
OBERT
B
ENCHLEY

 

Home computers are being called upon to perform many new functions, including the consumption of homework formerly eaten by the dog.

—
D
OUG
L
ARSON

 

If you think dogs can't count, try putting three dog biscuits in your pocket and then giving Fido only two of them.

—
P
HIL
P
ASTORET

 

Any time you think you have influence, try ordering around someone else's dog.

—
The Cockle Bur

 

Door: What a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of.

—
O
GDEN
N
ASH

 

We give them the love we can spare, the time we can spare. In return dogs have given us their absolute all. It is without a doubt the best deal man has ever made.

—
R
OGER
C
ARAS

A Celebration of Dogs

T
HE
A
MERICAN DREAM IS NOT OVER . . .

 

The American dream is not over. America is an adventure.

—
T
HEODORE
W
HITE

 

There are those who will say that the liberation of humanity, the freedom of man and mind, is nothing but a dream. They are right. It is the American dream.

—
A
RCHIBALD
M
AC
L
EISH

A Continuing Journey

 

It is a part of the American character to consider nothing as desperate.

—
T
HOMAS
J
EFFERSON

 

What is the essence of America? Finding and maintaining that perfect, delicate balance between freedom “to” and freedom “from.”

—
M
ARILYN VOS
S
AVANT

in
Parade

 

The saving grace of America lies in the fact that the overwhelming majority of Americans are possessed of two great qualities—a sense of humor and a sense of proportion.

—
F
RANKLIN
D
ELANO
R
OOSEVELT

 

America is a religious nation, but only because it is religiously tolerant and lets every citizen pray, or not pray, in his own way.

—From an editorial in
The New York Times

 

America is a place where Jewish merchants sell Zen love beads to agnostics for Christmas.

—
J
OHN
B
URTON
B
RIMER

 

America is great because America is good, and if America ever ceases to be good, America will cease to be great.

—
A
LEXIS DE
T
OCQUEVILLE

 

The things that have made America great are being subverted for the things that make Americans rich.

—
L
OU
E
RICKSON

 

How often we fail to realize our good fortune in living in a country where happiness is more than a lack of tragedy.

—
P
AUL
S
WEENEY

 

America did not invent human rights. In a very real sense, it is the other way around. Human rights invented America.

—
J
IMMY
C
ARTER

 

What the people want is very simple—they want an America as good as its promise.

—
B
ARBARA
J
ORDAN

 

Being American is not a matter of birth. We must practice it every day, lest we become something else.

—
M
ALCOLM
W
ALLOP

in
Imprimis

 

What's right with America is a willingness to discuss what's wrong with America.

—
H
ARRY
C
.
B
AUER

 

America is not like a blanket—one piece of unbroken cloth. America is more like a quilt—many patches, many pieces, many colors, many sizes, all woven together by a common thread.

—
R
EV.
J
ESSE
L
.
J
ACKSON

 

America is a tune. It must be sung together.

—
G
ERALD
S
TANLEY
L
EE

Crowds

 

In America nobody says you have to keep the circumstances somebody else gives you.

—
A
MY
T
AN

The Joy Luck Club

 

One of the fondest expressions around is that we can't be the world's policeman. But guess who gets called when suddenly someone needs a cop.

—
G
EN.
C
OLIN
P
OWELL

 

I thank God that I live in a country where dreams can come true, where failure sometimes is the first step to success and where success is only another form of failure if we forget what our priorities should be.

—
H
ARRY
L
LOYD

 

Americans are optimists. They hope they'll be wealthy someday—and they're positive they can get one more brushful of paint out of an empty can.

—
B
ERN
W
ILLIAMS

 

Give the American people a good cause, and there's nothing they can't lick.

—
J
OHN
W
AYNE

 

The business of America is not business. Neither is it war. The business of America is justice and securing the blessings of liberty.

—
G
EORGE
F
.
W
ILL

in
Newsweek

 

If the American Revolution had produced nothing but the Declaration of Independence, it would have been worthwhile.

—
S
AMUEL
E
LIOT
M
ORISON

The Oxford History of the American People

 

Whoever wants to know the heart and mind of America had better learn baseball.

—
J
ACQUES
B
ARZUN

God's Country and Mine

 

Highways have made tangible the conviction that the truth about America, its heart and soul, is always to be found somewhere just over the horizon, somewhere around the next bend.

—
P
HIL
P
ATTON

Open Road

 

A frontier is never a place; it is a time and a way of life. Frontiers pass, but they endure in their people.

—
H
AL
B
ORLAND

High, Wide and Lonesome

 

T
HE REAL ESSENCE OF
C
ANADA 
. . .

 

To agree to disagree, to harness diversity, to respect dissent; perhaps this is the real essence of Canada.

—
R
OBERT
L
.
P
ERRY

Peter's Quotations

 

The soul of Canada is a dual personality, and must remain only half-revealed to those who know only one language.

—
F
RANK
O
LIVER
C
ALL

Canadian Quotations and Phrases

 

A Canadian is someone who drinks Brazilian coffee from an English teacup, and munches a French pastry while sitting on his Danish furniture, having just come home from an Italian movie in his German car. He picks up his Japanese pen and writes to his MP to complain about the American takeover of the Canadian publishing business.

—
C
AMPBELL
H
UGHES

in
Time

 

“Liberty” sounds awkward on the Canadian tongue; we use “freedom,” a more passive-sounding word. When I was a soldier applying for a three-day pass, I asked for “leave,” a word that suggests permission. United States G.I.'s were granted “liberty,” a word that implies escape.

—
P
IERRE
B
ERTON

Why We Act Like Canadians

 

Freedom is to you, what the sun was for us. You take it for granted.

—
M
OHAMED
M
AGHJI

Vancouver Sun

 

Such a land [British Columbia] is good for an energetic man. It is also not so bad for the loafer.

—
R
UDYARD
K
IPLING

 

L
IBERTY IS ALWAYS DANGEROUS 
. . .

 

Liberty is always dangerous—but it is the safest thing we have.

—
H
ARRY
E
MERSON
F
OSDICK

 

Liberty, when it begins to take root, is a plant of rapid growth.

—
G
EORGE
W
ASHINGTON

 

Let freedom reign. The sun never set on so glorious a human achievement.

—
N
ELSON
M
ANDELA

 

Free is not the same as free and easy.

—
L
ARRY
E
ISENBERG

 

Every generation of Americans needs to know that freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.

—
P
OPE
J
OHN
P
AUL
II

 

The cause of freedom, of the defense of man's conscience, is indivisible. By defending it in one country, we defend it everywhere in the world.

—
V
LADIMIR
B
UKOVSKY

 

Freedom is the right to be wrong, not the right to do wrong.

—
J
OHN
G
.
D
IEFENBAKER

 

There are two freedoms: the false where a man is free to do what he likes; the true where a man is free to do what he ought.

—
C
HARLES
K
INGSLEY

 

Your liberty to swing your arms ends where my nose begins.

—Quoted by S
TUART
C
HASE

 

The right to do something does not mean that doing it is right.

—
W
ILLIAM
S
AFIRE

in
The New York Times

 

My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular.

—
A
DLAI
E
.
S
TEVENSON

 

Many politicians of our time are in the habit of laying down as self-evident the proposition that no people ought to be free until they are fit to use their freedom. The maxim is worthy of the fool in the old story, who had resolved not to go in the water until he had learnt to swim. If men are to wait for liberty until they become wise and good in slavery, they may indeed wait for ever.

—
T
HOMAS
B
ABINGTON
M
ACAULAY, 1825

 

Liberty is the only thing you cannot have unless you are willing to give it to others.

—
W
ILLIAM
A
LLEN
W
HITE

 

Freedom is a powerful animal that fights the barriers, and sometimes makes people wish for higher fences.

—
L
ANCE
M
ORROW

in
Time

 

The function of freedom is to free somebody else.

—
T
ONI
M
ORRISON

 

It is easy to take liberty for granted, when you have never had it taken from you.

—
D
ICK
C
HENEY

 

Those who expect to reap the blessings of freedom must undergo the fatigue of supporting it.

—
T
HOMAS
P
AINE

 

Those who profess to favor freedom and yet depreciate agitation are men who want rain without thunder and lightning.

—
F
REDERICK
D
OUGLASS

 

Freedom never yet was given to nations as a gift, but only as a reward, bravely earned by one's own exertions.

—
L
AJOS
K
OSSUTH

 

The history of liberty is a history of the limitation of government power.

—
W
OODROW
W
ILSON

 

They have rights who dare defend them.

—
R
OGER
B
ALDWIN

 

The love of liberty is the love of others. The love of power is the love of ourselves.

—
W
ILLIAM
H
AZLITT

 

Freedom is nothing else but a chance to be better.

—
A
LBERT
C
AMUS

Resistance, Rebellion and Death

 

Freedom is the right to choose the habits that bind you.

—
R
ENATE
R
UBENSTEIN

Liefst Verliefd

 

If a nation values anything more than freedom, it will lose its freedom; and the irony of it is that if it is comfort or money that it values more, it will lose that too.

—
W
.
S
OMERSET
M
AUGHAM,

Strictly Personal

 

A country free enough to examine its own conscience is a land worth living in, a nation to be envied.

—
P
RINCE
C
HARLES

 

The clash of ideas is the sound of freedom.

—
Graffiti

 

Where opinions, morals and politics are concerned, there is no such thing as objectivity. The best we can hope for is that freedom will enable subjective points of view to meet and complement each other.

—
J
EAN
D
'
O
RMESSON