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Naturalists, like poets, are born and then made only by years of painstaking observation.

John Burroughs

How many thorns of human nature are bristling conceits, buds of promise grown sharp for want of congenial climate.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Bristling Bud Climate Concept Congenial Grown Human Many Nature Promise Thorn
Birds and animals probably think without knowing that they think; that is, they have not self-consciousness.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Animal Bird Consciousness Know Probably Self Think
Only man seems to be endowed with this faculty; he alone develops disinterested intelligence, intelligence that is not primarily concerned with his own safety and well-being but that looks abroad upon things.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Alon Alone Being Concern Develop Disinterest Endow Intelligence Own Primarily Safety Seem Self
The trunk of a tree is like a community where only one generation at a time is engaged in active business, the great mass of the population being retired and adding solidity and permanence to the social organism.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Active Business Community Engage Generation Like Time Tree Trunk
More than any other poet, Whitman is what we make him; more than any other poet, his greatest value is in what he suggests and implies rather than in what he portrays, and more than any other poet must he wait to be understood by the growth of the taste of himself.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Any Great Make More Poet Portray Suggests Understood Value Whitman
Our flying squirrel is in no proper sense a flyer. On the ground, he is more helpless than a chipmunk, because less agile. He can only sail or slide down a steep incline from the top of one tree to the foot of another.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Agile Chipmunk Fly Flyer Ground Helpless Less Proper Sense Squirrel
My life has been a fortunate one; I was born under a lucky star. It seems as if both wind and tide had favoured me.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Both Favorite Fortunate Life Lucky Seem Star Tide Under
August is the month of the high-sailing hawks. The hen hawk is the most noticeable. He likes the haze and calm of these long, warm days. He is a bird of leisure and seems always at his ease. How beautiful and majestic are his movements!
JOHN BURROUGHS

August Beautiful Calm Ease Hawk Hen High Leisure Majestic Month Most Movement Noticeable Sail
Fear, love, and hunger were the agents that developed the wits of the lower animals, as they were, of course, the prime factors in developing the intelligence of man.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Agent Animal Course Develop Fear Hunger Intelligence Love Lower Man
All the walks I want to take, all the books I want to read, and all the friends I want to see.
JOHN BURROUGHS

All Book Friend Read See Walk Want
The love of nature is a different thing from the love of science, though the two may go together.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Different Love May Nature Science Thing Together Two
If I were to name the three most precious resources of life, I should say books, friends, and nature. And the greatest of these, at least the most constant and always at hand, is nature.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Book Constant Friend Great Life Most Name Nature Precious Resource Three
Nearly every season, I make the acquaintance of one or more new flowers. It takes years to exhaust the botanical treasures of any one considerable neighborhood, unless one makes a dead set at it, like an herbalist.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Acquaintance Botanical Early Every Exhaust Flower More Neighborhood New Season Treasure
How many human aspirations are realized in their free, holiday-lives, and how many suggestions to the poet in their flight and song!
JOHN BURROUGHS

Aspiration Flight Free Holiday Human Live Many Poet Realize Song Suggestion
The life of a swarm of bees is like an active and hazardous campaign of an army: the ranks are being continually depleted and continually recruited.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Active Army Campaign Continue Depleted Hazardous Life Like Swarm Rank Recruit
If we take science as our sole guide, if we accept and hold fast that alone which is verifiable, the old theology must go.
JOHN BURROUGHS

Accept Alone Fast Go Guide Hold Science Sole Take Theology Verifiable

Naturalists, like poets, are born and then made only by years of painstaking observation.

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Naturalists, like poets, are born and then made only by years of painstaking observation.

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Popular Authors

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