The hope of the future lies not in curbing the influence of human occupancy - it is already too late for that - but in creating a better understanding of the extent of that influence and a new ethic for its governance. Aldo Leopold More Quotes by Aldo Leopold More Quotes From Aldo Leopold When we see land as a community to which we belong, Aldo Leopold wild-and-free community land Agricultural science is largely a race between the emergence of new pests and the emergence of new techniques for their control. Aldo Leopold pests technique race I am asserting that those who love the wilderness should not be wholly deprived of it, that while the reduction of the wilderness has been a good thing, its extermination would be a very bad one, and that the conservation of wilderness is the most urgent and difficult of all the tasks that confront us, because there are no economic laws to help and many to hinder its accomplishment. Aldo Leopold accomplishment tasks law There is time not only to see who has done what, but to speculate why. Aldo Leopold done time Wilderness is the raw material out of which man has hammered the artifact called civilization. Wilderness was never a homogenous raw material. It was very diverse. The differences in the product are known as cultures. The rich diversity of the worlds cultures reflects a corresponding diversity. In the wilds that gave them birth. Aldo Leopold differences men civilization It is, by common consent, a good thing for people to get back to nature. Aldo Leopold nature common people A conservationist is one who is humbly aware that with each stroke [of the axe] he is writing his signature on the face of his land. Aldo Leopold signatures land writing Only the mountain has lived long enough to listen objectively to the howl of the wolf. Aldo Leopold conservation mountain long No matter how intently one studies the hundred little dramas of the woods and meadows, one can never learn all the salient facts about any one of them. Aldo Leopold nature littles drama . . . perhaps our grandsons, having never seen a wild river, will never miss the chance to set a canoe in singing waters . . . glad I shall never be young without wild country to be young in. Aldo Leopold rivers water country I am glad I will not be young in a future without wilderness. Aldo Leopold wilderness environmental nature There is value in any experience that exercises those ethical restraints collectively called sportsmanship. Aldo Leopold sportsmanship hunting exercise Conservation is getting nowhere because it is incompatible with our Abrahamic concept of land. 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. There is no other way for land to survive the impact of mechanized man, nor for us to reap from it the aesthetic harvest it is capable, under science, of contributing to culture Aldo Leopold impact land men Our remnants of wilderness will yield bigger values to the nation's character and health than they will to its pocketbook, and to destroy them will be to admit that the latter are the only values that interest us. Aldo Leopold wilderness yield character An Ecologist lives in a world of wounds. Aldo Leopold wounds world But wherever the truth may lie, this much is crystal-clear: our bigger-and-better society is now like a hypochondriac, so obsessed with its own economic health as to have lost the capacity to remain healthy. . . . Nothing could be more salutary at this stage than a little healthy contempt for a plethora of material blessings. Aldo Leopold healthy blessing lying Education, I fear, is learning to see one thing by going blind to another. Aldo Leopold one-thing blind Acts of creation are ordinarily reserved for gods and poets, but humbler folk may circumvent this restriction if they know how. To plant a pine, for example, one need be neither god nor poet; one need only own a shovel. Aldo Leopold garden nature tree All conservation of wildness is self-defeating, for to cherish we must see and fondle, and when enough have seen and fondled, there is no wilderness left to cherish. Aldo Leopold wilderness cherish self No farmer-sportsman group is stronger than the ties of mutual confidence and enthusiasm which bind its members. Aldo Leopold stronger groups ties
