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Some enchanted evening, you may see a strange fin. You may see strange fish, across a re-watered stream.
"We talk about spaceship Earth, but who is monitoring the dials and turning the knobs? No one; there are no dials to watch, only occasional alarms made by people peering out the window, who call to us that they see species disappearing, an ozone hole in the upper atmosphere, the climate change, the coasts of all the world polluted. But because we have never created the system of monitoring our environment or devised the understanding of nature's strange ecological systems, we are still like the passengers in the cabin who think they smell smoke, or, misunderstanding how a plane flies, mistake light turbulence for trouble. We need to instrument the cockpit of the biosphere and to let up the window shade so that we begin to observe nature as it is, not as we imagine it to be."
-Daniel Botkin, Discordant Harmonies, 1990
"The grass is rich and matted, you cannot see the soil. It holds the rain and the mist, and they seep into the ground, feeding the streams in every kloof. It is well-tended, and not too many cattle feed upon it; not too many fires burn it, laying bare the soil. Stand unshod upon it, for the ground is holy, being even as it came from the Creator. Keep it, guard it, care for it, for it keeps men, guards men, cares for men. Destroy it and man is destroyed."
-Alan Paton, From the first chapter of "Cry, the Beloved Country," 1948
"When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find that it is bound fast by a thousand invisible cords that cannot be broken to everything else in the universe. I fancy I can hear a heart beating in every crystal, in every grain of sand and see a wise plan in the making and shaping and placing of every one of them. All seems to be dancing in time to divine music."
-John Muir (1838-1914) Journal, 1869
"Every prophet has to come from civilization, but every prophet has to go into the wilderness. He must have a strong impression of a complex society and all that it has to give, and then he must serve periods of isolation and meditation. This is the process by which psychic dynamite is made."
-Winston Churchill (1874-1965)
