All governments need enemies. How else to justify their existence? Edward Abbey More Quotes by Edward Abbey More Quotes From Edward Abbey A leader leads from in front, by the power of example. A ruler pushes from behind, by means of the club, the whip, the power of fear. Edward Abbey leaderexamplemean Representative government has broken down. Our politicians represent not the people who vote for them but the commercial interests who finance their election campaigns. We have the best politicians that money can buy. Edward Abbey governmentbrokenpeople Only the half-mad are wholly alive. Edward Abbey madalivehalf The purpose of love, sex, and marriage is the production and raising of children. But look about you: Most people have no business having children. They are unqualified, either genetically or culturally or both, to reproduce such sorry specimens as themselves. Of all our privileges, the license to breed is the one most grossly abused. Edward Abbey sorrychildrensex In the American Southwest, I began a lifelong love affair with a pile of rock. Edward Abbey climbingrockshiking Truth is always the enemy of power. And power the enemy of truth. Edward Abbey truth-isenemy The idea of wilderness needs no defense, it only needs defenders. Edward Abbey environmentalideasneeds The most common form of terrorism in the U.S.A. is that carried on by bulldozers and chain saws. Edward Abbey sawsterrorismcommon How to Overthrow the System: brew your own beer; kick in your Tee Vee; kill your own beef; build your own cabin and piss off the front porch whenever you bloody well feel like it. Edward Abbey cabinsbeefbeer When a man must be afraid to drink freely from his country's river and streams that country is no longer fit to live in. Edward Abbey riversmencountry How strange and wonderful is our home, our earth, with its swirling vaporous atmosphere, its flowing and frozen liquids, its trembling plants, its creeping, crawling, climbing creatures, the croaking things with wings that hang on rocks and soar through the fog, the furry grass, the scaly seas. Edward Abbey fogrockshome I’m tired of doing what I don’t want to do to live the way I don’t want to live. Edward Abbey tiredwantway Taxation: how the sheep are shorn. Edward Abbey taxestaxationsheep May your trails be dim, lonesome, stony, narrow, winding and only slightly uphill. May the wind bring rain for the slickrock potholes fourteen miles on the other side of yonder blue ridge. May God's dog serenade your campfire, may the rattlesnake and the screech owl amuse your reverie, may the Great Sun dazzle your eyes by day and the Great Bear watch over you by night. Edward Abbey eyedograin A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. Edward Abbey freedominspirationalcountry Night and day the river flows. If time is the mind of space, the River is the soul of the desert. Brave boatmen come, they go, they die, the voyage flows on forever. We are all canyoneers. We are all passengers on this little mossy ship, this delicate dory sailing round the sun that humans call the earth. Joy, shipmates, joy. Edward Abbey spaceriversnight Let us hope our weapons are never needed - but do not forget what the common people of this nation knew when they demanded the Bill of Rights: An armed citizenry is the first defense, the best defense, and the final defense against tyranny. Edward Abbey gunmilitaryrights The real work of men was hunting meat. The invention of agriculture was a giant step in the wrong direction, leading to serfdom, cities, and empire. From a race of hunters, artists, warriors, and tamers of horses, we degraded ourselves to what we are now: clerks, functionaries, laborers, entertainers, processors of information. Edward Abbey warriorhorsereal It is not enough to understand the natural world; the point is to defend and Edward Abbey natureenoughworld Strolling on, it seems to me that the strangeness and wonder of existence are emphasized here, in the desert, by the comparative sparsity of the flora and fauna: life not crowded upon life as in other places but scattered abroad in spareness and simplicity, with a generous gift of space for each herb and bush and tree, each stem of grass, so that the living organism stands out bold and brave and vivid against the lifeless sand and barren rock. The extreme clarity of the desert light is equaled by the extreme individuation of desert life-forms. Love flowers best in openness and freedom. Edward Abbey spacelightflower
