“We are not truly civilized if we concern ourselves only with the relation of man to man. What is important is the relation of man to all life.”

I like to define biology as the history of the earth and all its life – past, present, and future.

The road we have long been traveling is deceptively easy, a smooth superhighway on which we progress with great speed, but at its end lies disaster.

The beauty of the living world I was trying to save has always been uppermost in my mind – that, and anger at the senseless, brutish things that were being done. . . . Now I can believe I have at least helped a little.

Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature – the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after winter.

There is no drop of water in the ocean, not even in the deepest parts of the abyss, that does not know and respond to the mysterious forces that create the tide.

Conservation is a cause that has no end. There is no point at which we will say our work is finished.

Autumn comes to the sea with a fresh blaze of phosphorescence, when every wave crest is aflame. Here and there the whole surface may glow with sheets of cold fire, while below schools of fish pour through the water like molten metal.

Only within the moment of time represented by the present century has one species — man — acquired significant power to alter the nature of the world.

The years of early childhood are the time to prepare the soil.

A child’s world is fresh and new and beautiful, full of wonder and excitement.

Nowhere on the shore is the relation of a creature to its surroundings a matter of a single cause and effect; each living thing is bound to its world by many threads, weaving the intricate design of the fabric of life.

By suggestion and example, I believe children can be helped to hear the many voices about them. Take Time to listen and talk about the voices of the earth and what they mean-the majestic voice of thunder, the winds, the sound of surf or flowing streams.

Nature reserves some of her choice rewards for days when her mood may appear to be somber.

Have we fallen into a mesmerized state that makes us accept as inevitable that which is inferior or detrimental, as though having lost the will or the vision to demand that which is good?

But man is a part of nature, and his war against nature is inevitably a war against himself.

The question is whether any civilization can wage relentless war on life without destroying itself, and without losing the right to be called civilized.

I think the health of our civilization, the depth of our awareness about the underpinnings of our culture and our concern for the future can all be tested by how well we support our libraries.

Voting is the cornerstone of our democracy and the fundamental right upon which all our civil liberties rest.

There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.

There is no civilization that did not begin with art, Whether it was drawing a line in the sand, painting a cave or dancing.

All civilizations become either spacefaring or extinct.

If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.

When space travel becomes as common as air travel, the future of civilization will be assured.

In the twenty-first century, the robot will take the place which slave labor occupied in ancient civilization.