"Whatever I am offered in devotion with a pure heart - a leaf, a flower, fruit, or water - I accept with joy."
- Bhagavad Gita (Sanskrit text, date unknown - likely between the 5th and 2nd centuries, B.C.)

Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Gratitude, Happiness and Joy, Heart, Nature, Water

"Man has been endowed with reason, with the power to create, so that he can add to what he's been given. But up to now, he hasn't been a creator, only a destroyer. Forests keep disappearing, rivers dry up, wild life's become extinct, the climate's ruined and the land grows poorer and uglier every day."
- from Uncle Vanya (1900)

- Anton Pavlovich Chekhov (Russian author and playwright, b. 1860 - d. 1904)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings:
Animals and Wildlife, Conservation, Ecology, Environment, Forestry, Land, Literature, Natural Resources, Nature, Power and Control, Rivers and Streams, Trees, Water, Weather and Climate, Wisdom and Reason

"The farmer times himself to Nature, and acquires that livelong patience that belongs to her."
- from 'Farming', chapter VI in Society and Solitude (1870)

- Ralph Waldo Emerson (American essayist, philosopher, and poet; b. 1803 - d. 1882)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings:
Agriculture and Farming, Nature, Patience, Philosophy

"Then the beauty of Nature, the tranquility and innocence of the countryman, his independence and his pleasing arts, - the care of bees, of poultry, of sheep, of cows, the dairy, the care of hay, of fruits, of orchards and forests, and the reaction of these on the workingman, in giving him a strength and plain dignity like the face and manners of Nature, - all men acknowledge."
- from 'Farming', chapter VI in Society and Solitude (1870)

- Ralph Waldo Emerson (American essayist, philosopher, and poet; b. 1803 - d. 1882)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings:
Agriculture and Farming, Animals, Dignity, Forestry, Labor and Work, Liberty and Independence, Nature, Philosophy, Strength

"The glory of the farmer is that, in the division of labors, it is his part to create. All trade rests at last on his primitive activity. He stands close to Nature; he obtains from the earth the bread and the meat. The food which was not, he causes to be."
- from 'Farming', chapter VI in Society and Solitude (1870)

- Ralph Waldo Emerson (American essayist, philosopher, and poet; b. 1803 - d. 1882)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings:
Agriculture and Farming, Business and Commerce, Food, Labor, Nature, Philosophy

"You cannot step twice into the same river, for other waters are continually flowing on."

- Heraclitus, Greek philosopher, b. 540 B.C. - d. 480 B.C.)

Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Change, Destiny, Natural Resources, Nature, Philosophy, Rivers and Streams, Water

"Hoc erat in votis: modus agri non ita magnus,
Hortus ubi et tecto vicinus iugis aquae fons
Et paulum silvae super his foret."

This was one of my prayers: for a parcel of land not so very large,
Which should have a garden and a spring of ever-flowing water near the house,
And a bit of woodland as well as these.
-from Liber Secundis, Satire VI   (c. 29 B.C.)

-Horace (Quintus Horatius Flaccus) [Roman poet, b. 65 B.C. - d. 8 B.C.]


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Agriculture and Gardening, Desire and Hope, House and Home, Land, Nature, Natural Resources, Property and Possessions, Real Estate, Rivers and Springs, Trees, Water

All the flowers of tomorrow are in the seeds of today.
- Indian proverb

Proverbs, Quotations, Phrases, & Sayings: Farms & Agriculture, Change & Transformation, Destiny & Fate, Gardens & Gardening, Growth & Development, Nature

"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."
- from A Sand County Almanac   (1949)

- Aldo Leopold (American ecologist, forester, and conservationist; b. 1887 - d. 1948)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Business and Commerce, Conservation, Ecology, Environment, Ethics and Principles, Land, Natural Resources, Nature, Philosophy, Property and Possessions, Real Estate

"The weakest living creature, by concentrating his powers on a single object, can accomplish good results while the strongest, by dispersing his effort over many chores, may fail to accomplish anything. Drops of water, by continually falling, hone their passage through the hardest of rocks but the hasty torrent rushes over it with hideous uproar and leaves no trace behind."

- Augustine "Og" Mandino (Italian/American author, b. 1923 - d. 1996)


Quotations, Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Change and Transformation, Concentration, Ecology, Impatience and Haste, Life, Natural Resources, Nature, Persistence, Science, Success and Accomplishment, Water

"Happiness is the light on the water. The water is cold and dark and deep."

- William Maxwell (Scottish nobleman, 5th Earl of Nithsdale; b. 1676 - d. 1744)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Happiness and Joy, Natural Resources, Nature, Water

"We do not inherit the land from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children."
- Native American proverb

Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Conservation, Ecology, Environment, Ethics, Land, Legacy, Natural Resources, Nature, Real Estate

"True, too that the Bigtree lives longer, but Redwoods live long enough to awe the mind. A Redwood has a normal life expectancy of 1000 to 1500 years. The oldest specimen whose rings have been counted is estimated to be 2200 years old... So that tree began to grow when Hannibal was taking his elephants over the Alps; it was more than 200 years old at the birth of Jesus."
- from A Natural History of Western Trees  (1950)

- Donald Culross Peattie (American author, botanist, and naturalist; b. 1898 - d. 1964)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Age, Conservation, Ecology, Forestry, Life, Natural Resources, Nature, Religion, Science, Trees

"The kingdom of plants has a king, the Giant Sequoia or California Bigtree. It is, as a race, the oldest and mightiest of living things. Not even in past geologic times, apparently, were greater trees than Sequoia gigantea. Only the Bigtree's closest of kin, the Redwood of the California coast, approaches it in longevity and girth. In grace and height, indeed, the Coast Redwood, Sequoia sempervirens, is a queen among trees, a fit mate for the craggier grandeur of the Bigtree of the Sierra Nevada."
- from A Natural History of Western Trees  (1950)

- Donald Culross Peattie (American author, botanist, and naturalist; b. 1898 - d. 1964)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Conservation, Ecology, Forestry, Grace, Science, Strength, Life, Natural Resources, Nature, Trees

"The Redwood, the ever-living Sequoia, sempervirens, is the tallest tree in the world. Not just occasionally taller, in individual specimens growing under unprecedentedly favorable conditions, but taller as a whole, as a race, a titan race. Also it produces logs with the greatest diameter amongst all timber trees. Only the Redwood's big brother, the California Bigtree, Sequoia gigantea of the Sierra Nevada is ever greater in girth, but Gigantea is not today in the class of prime timber tree."
- from A Natural History of Western Trees   (1950)

- Donald Culross Peattie (American author, botanist, and naturalist; b. 1898 - d. 1964)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Science, Age, Conservation, Ecology, Forestry, Life, Natural Resources, Nature, Trees

"How can you buy or sell the sky, the warmth of the land? The idea is strange to us. If we do not own the freshness of the air and the sparkle of the water, how can you buy them? Every part of the earth is sacred to my people."
- from Home   (1972)

- Ted Perry (American screenwriter and film scholar)

Note: This quote is often mistakenly attributed to Chief Seattle, a Native American leader of the Suquamish and Duwamish tribes. It was actually part of a speech written by Perry for the 1972 documentary Home, the producers of which allegedly misrepresented the source of the quote in the film's credits.


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Conservation, Ecology, Environment, Ethics and Principles, Land, Natural Resources, Nature, Philosophy, Property and Possessions, Real Estate, Water

"For water continually dropping will wear hard rocks hollow."
- from 'A Discourse Touching the Training of Children' from Plutarch's Morals  (translated and published 1870)

- Plutarch (Lucius Mestrius Plutarchus), Greek-Roman historian, biographer, essayist, and philosopher; b. circa 46 - d. circa 120)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Change and Transformation, Natural Resources, Nature, Persistence, Philosophy, Water

"Smooth runs the water where the brook is deep."
- from King Henry VI, Part II.

- William Shakespeare (English author, poet, and and playwright; b. 1564 - d. 1616)


Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Disposition and Personality, Literature, Natural Resources, Nature, Rivers and Streams, Silence, Water

"From snow, whether baked or boiled, you will get nothing but water."
- Spanish proverb

Glossary of Quotations (Quotes), Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Change, Natural Resources, Nature, Science, Snow and Ice, Water

"Water is life's mater and matrix, mother and medium. There is no life without water."
- from Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, Winter 1971

- Albert von Szent-Gyorgyi (Hungarian biochemist and Nobel Prize recipient, b. 1893 – d. 1986)


Quotations: Ecology, Life, Natural Resources, Nature, Science, Water

"I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a-glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
I hear it in the deep heart's core."
-from 'The Lake Isle of Innisfree' in The Rose (1893)

- William Butler (W.B.) Yeats (Irish poet, b. 1865 - d. 1939)

Quotations, Proverbs, Phrases, and Sayings: Age and Time; Farms & Agriculture; Gardens & Gardening; Animals and Wildlife; Heart; House and Home; Lakes and Ponds; Nature; Peace, Tranquility, and Calm; Steam and Mist; Trees and Forests; Water