Robin is one of the most native and democratic of our birds; he is one of the family, and seems much nearer to us than those rare, exotic visitants, as the orchard starling or rose-breasted grossbeak, with their distant, high-bred ways.
JOHN BURROUGHSIf America wishes to preserve her native birds, we must help supply what civilization has taken from them.
More John Burroughs Quotes
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Not so the oven-bird, or the other birds that walk, as the cow-bunting, or the quail, or the crow. They move the head forward with the movement of the feet.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
As with other phases of nature, I have probably loved the rocks more than I have studied them.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
Every species of tree-squirrel seems to be capable of a sort of rudimentary flying, at least of making itself into a parachute, so as to ease or break a fall or a leap from a great height.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
One may summon his philosophy when they are beaten in battle, not till then.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
Whitman will always be a strange and unwonted figure among his country’s poets, and among English poets generally: a cropping out again, after so many centuries, of the old bardic prophetic strain.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
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 -
There is a great deal of speculation in the eye of an animal, but very little science.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
The smallest deed is better than the greatest intention.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
Science has done more for the development of western civilization in one hundred years than Christianity did in eighteen hundred years.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
You are always nearer the divine and the true sources of your power than you think.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
Without the name, any flower is still more or less a stranger to you. The name betrays its family, its relationship to other flowers, and gives the mind something tangible to grasp. It is very difficult for persons who have had no special training to learn the names of the flowers from the botany.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
Sometimes I am worried by the thought of the effect that life in the city will have on coming generations.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
Life is a struggle, but not a warfare.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
The distribution of plants in a given locality is not more marked and defined than that of the birds. Show a botanist a landscape, and he will tell you where to look for the lady’s-slipper, the columbine, or the harebell.
JOHN BURROUGHS -
If one gains an interest in the history of the earth, he is quite sure to gain an interest in the history of the life on the earth. If the former illustrates the theory of development, so must the latter.
JOHN BURROUGHS