The shoddy work of despair, the pointless work of pride, equally betray Creation. They are wastes of life. Wendell Berry More Quotes by Wendell Berry More Quotes From Wendell Berry How would you describe the difference between modern war and modern industry-between say, bombing and strip mining, or between chemical warfare and chemical manufacturing? The difference seems to be only that in war the victimization of humans is directly intentional and in industry it is "accepted" as a "trade-off." Were the catastrophes of Love Canal, Bhopal, Chernobyl, and the Exxon Valdez episodes of war or of peace? They were in fact, peacetime acts of aggression, intentional to the extent that the risks were known and ignored. Wendell Berry riskdifferenceswar If we are looking for insurance against want and oppression, we will find it only in our neighbors' prosperity and goodwill and, beyond that, in the good health of our worldly places, our homelands. If we were sincerely looking for a place of safety, for real security and success, then we would begin to turn to our communities - and not the communities simply of our human neighbors but also of the water, earth, and air, the plants and animals, all the creatures with whom our local life is shared. (pg. 59, "Racism and the Economy") Wendell Berry realairanimal The economy is still substantially that of the fur trade, still based on the same general kinds of commercial items: technology, weapons, ornaments, novelties, and drugs. The one great difference is that by now the revolution has deprived the mass of consumers of any independent access to the staples of life: clothing, shelter, food, even water. Air access remains the only necessity that the average user can still get for himself, and the revolution has imposed a heavy tax on that by way of pollution. Commercial conquest is far more thorough and final than military defeat. Wendell Berry independenttechnologymilitary It is impossible to prefigure the salvation of the world in the same language by which the world has been dismembered and defaced. Wendell Berry languageimpossibleworld The soil is the great connector of our lives, the source and destination of all. Wendell Berry gardenlandjourney It is no more possible to live in the future than it is to live in the past. If life is not now, it is never. Wendell Berry ifslife-ispast Once plants and animals were raised together on the same farm - which therefore neither produced unmanageable surpluses of manure, to be wasted and to pollute the water supply, nor depended on such quantities of commercial fertilizer. The genius of American farm experts is very well demonstrated here: they can take a solution and divide it neatly into two problems. Wendell Berry animalwatertwo When going back makes sense, you are going ahead. Wendell Berry make-sense For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free. Wendell Berry still-watersgraceworld Never forget: We are alive within mysteries. Wendell Berry never-forgetalivelife If a healthy soil is full of death, it is also full of life: worms, fungi, microorganisms of all kinds ... Given only the health of the soil, nothing that dies is dead for very long. Wendell Berry lifelongdeath Want of imagination makes things unreal enough to be destroyed. By imagination I mean knowledge and love. I mean compassion. People of power kill children, the old send the young to die, because they have no imagination. They have power. Can you have power and imagination at the same time? Can you kill people you don’t know and have compassion for them at the same time? Wendell Berry compassionmeanchildren Let us have the candor to acknowledge that what we call "the economy" or "the free market" is less and less distinguishable from warfare. Wendell Berry candorwarfareeconomy We do need a 'new economy,' but one that is founded on thrift and care, on saving and conserving, not on excess and waste. An economy based on waste is inherently and hopelessly violent, and war is its inevitable by-product. We need a peaceable economy. Wendell Berry simplicitynaturewar Properly speaking, global thinking is not possible... Look at one of those photographs of half the earth taken from outer space, and see if you recognize your neighborhood. The right local questions and answers will be the right global ones. The Amish question, what will this do to our community? tends toward the right answer for the world. Wendell Berry spacetakenthinking We live the given life, and not the planned. Wendell Berry given-lifegiven Sabbath observance invites us to stop. It invites us to rest. It asks us to notice that while we rest, the world continues without our help. It invites us to delight in the world's beauty and abundance. Wendell Berry delighthelpingworld How joyful to be together, alone as when we first were joined in our little house by the river long ago, except that now we know each other, as we did not then; and now instead of two stories fumbling to meet, we belong to one story that the two, joining, made. And now we touch each other with the tenderness of mortals, who know themselves Wendell Berry soulmatelong-agotwo They learned to have a very high opinion of God and a very low opinion of His works—although they could tell you that this world had been made by God Himself. What they didn’t see was that it is beautiful, and that some of the greatest beauties are the briefest. Wendell Berry opinionbeautifulworld To defend what we love we need a particularizing language, for we love what we particularly know. Wendell Berry languageknowsneeds
