NATURE QUOTES
quotations about nature
We do not undertake to quarrel with the laws of nature. Our ignorance oftentimes puts us in opposition to them, and a very expensive position we find it to be, because they never yield, and in the end, of course, we must.
HENRY WHITNEY BELLOWS
Re-statements of Christian Doctrine
Nature has a wonderful power of putting things right, if allowed free play.
JAMES PLATT
Platt's Essays
Nature appears to have been the cruel stepmother rather than the mother of many animals.
LEONARDO DA VINCI
Thoughts on Art and Life
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE
Troilus and Cressida
We cannot command nature except by obeying her.
FRANCIS BACON
Novum Organum
Nature is necessary for our physical and psychological wellbeing. Interacting with nature teaches us to live in relation with the other, not in domination over the other: You don't control the birds flying overhead, or the moon rising, or the bear walking where it would like to walk. In my appraisal, one of the overarching problems of the world today is that we see ourselves living in domination over rather than in relation with other people and with the natural world.
PETER KAHN
"Technology is changing our relationship with nature as we know it", Quartz, August 8, 2017
All the time nature is trying to tell us things and we blur her greatness with our little thoughts, our feebleness and flesh.
JENNETTE LEE
The Symphony Play
Nature flies from the infinite, for the infinite is unending or imperfect, and Nature ever seeks to amend.
ARISTOTLE
On the Generation of Animals
If Nature put not forth her power
About the opening of the flower,
Who is it that could live an hour?
ALFRED TENNYSON
The Two Voices
Nature is but a name for an effect,
Whose cause is God.
WILLIAM COWPER
The Task
[Nature] is all things. She rewards herself and punishes herself; and in herself rejoices and is distressed. She is rough and gentle, loving and terrible, powerless and almighty. In her everything is always present. Past or Future she knows not. The Present is her Eternity.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE
The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe
Nature repeats herself, or almost does: repeat, repeat, repeat, revise, revise, revise.
ELIZABETH BISHOP
North Haven
[Nature] spurts forth her creatures out of nothing, and tells them not whence they come and whither they go. They have only to go their way: she knows the path.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE
The Maxims and Reflections of Goethe
Nature uses only the longest threads to weave her patterns, so that each small piece of her fabric reveals the organization of the entire tapestry.
RICHARD FEYNMAN
The Character of Physical Law
Nature, with its fragile yet resilient magnificence, models for us what aliveness means and reminds us that we are mortal.
MARIA POPOVA
"Poetry as Protest and Sanctuary", brainpickings, April 18, 2017
Nature, to be commanded, must be obeyed.
HENRY ADAMS
The Education of Henry Adams
Never, no, never did Nature say one thing and Wisdom say another.
EDMUND BURKE
Letters on a Regicide Peace
A miracle constantly repeated becomes a process of nature.
LYMAN ABBOTT
Problems of Life: Selections from the Writings of Rev. Lyman Abbott
Human judges can show mercy. But against the laws of nature, there is no appeal.
ARTHUR C. CLARKE
"Maelstrom II"
There is new life in the soil for every man. There is healing in the trees for tired minds and for our overburdened spirits, there is strength in the hills, if only we will lift up our eyes. Remember that nature is your great restorer.
CALVIN COOLIDGE
speech, July 25, 1924