Nature, in her blind thirst for life has filled every possible cranny of the rotting earth with some sort of fantastic creature. Joseph Wood Krutch More Quotes by Joseph Wood Krutch More Quotes From Joseph Wood Krutch Is it wholly fantastic to admit the possibility that Nature herself strove toward what we call beauty? Face to face with any one of the elaborate flowers which man's cultivation has had nothing to do with, it does not seem fantastic to me. We put survival first. But when we have a margin of safety left over, we expend it in the search for the beautiful. Who can say that Nature does not do the same? Joseph Wood Krutch flower beautiful beauty A humanist is anyone who rejects the attempt to describe or account for man wholly on the basis of physics, chemistry or animal behaviour. Joseph Wood Krutch humanity animal men The rare moment is not the moment when there is something worth looking at, but the moment when we are capable of seeing. Joseph Wood Krutch rare-moments self-esteem attitude Though many have tried, no one has ever yet explained away the decisive fact that science, which can do so much, cannot decide what it ought to do. Joseph Wood Krutch atheism can-do facts And the thing which is missing is love, some feeling for, as well as some understanding of, the inclusive community of rocks and soils, plants and animals, of which we are a part. Joseph Wood Krutch rocks missing animal February... Now more than ever one must remind oneself that it is wasteful folly to wish that time would pass, or - as the puritanical old saying used to have it - to kill time until it kills you. Joseph Wood Krutch february used wish There are some optimists who search eagerly for the skunk cabbage which in February sometimes pushes itself up through the ice, and who call it a sign of spring. I wish that I could feel that way about it, but I do not. The truth of the matter, to me, is simply that skunk cabbage blooms in the winter time. Joseph Wood Krutch ice winter spring If we are deprived of hope as well as fear, we are compensated by being given an almost endless patience for enduring or simply for waiting. Joseph Wood Krutch endless given waiting Electronic calculators can solve problems which the man who made them cannot solve; but no government-subsidized commission of engineers and physicists could create a worm. Joseph Wood Krutch technology men science In our hearts those of us who know anything worth knowing know that in March a new year begins, and if we plan any new leaves, it will be when the rest of Nature is planning them too. Joseph Wood Krutch new-year heart years Two-legged creatures we are supposed to love as we love ourselves. The four-legged, also, can come to seem pretty important. But six legs are too many from the human standpoint. Joseph Wood Krutch pet animal two August creates as she slumbers, replete and satisfied. Joseph Wood Krutch months august summer Poetry, mythology, and religion represent the world as man would like to have it, while science represents the world as he gradually comes to discover it. Joseph Wood Krutch men science religion The advertiser is the overrewarded court jester and court pander at the democratic court. Joseph Wood Krutch advertising court democratic When, in the present world, men behave well, that is no doubt sometimes because they are creatures of habit as well as, sometimes, because they are reasonable. Joseph Wood Krutch doubt men world There is no conceivable human action which custom has not at one time justified and at another condemned. Joseph Wood Krutch justified humans action The impulse to mar and to destroy is as ancient and almost as nearly universal as the impulse to create. The one is an easier way than the other of demonstrating power. Joseph Wood Krutch mars ancient way True tragedy may be defined as a dramatic work in which the outward failure of the principal personage is compensated for by the dignity and greatness of his character. Joseph Wood Krutch greatness character drama In history as it comes to be written, there is usually some Spirit of the Age which historians can define, but the shape of things is seldom so clear to those who live them. To most thoughtful men it has generally seemed that theirs was an Age of Confusion. Joseph Wood Krutch thoughtful confusion men Though we face the facts of sex we are more reluctant than ever to face the fact of death or the crueler facts of life, either biological or social. Joseph Wood Krutch faces sex facts
