Environmental destruction

Explore 19 quotes about Environmental destruction

We have forgotten how to be good guests, how to walk lightly on the earth as its other creatures do.

Barbara Wand

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Topic

Man and nature Environmental destruction

Speaker

Barbara Wand

Medium

Speech

Language

English

Time

1972 1970s 20th century

Authentication Score 1

Citation

Wand, Barbara. Spoken at the Only One Earth: The Care and Maintenance of a Small Planet conference. United Nations Conference on the Human Environment. June 1972, Stockholm, Sweden.

Man is everywhere a disturbing agent. Wherever he plants his foot, the harmonies of nature are turned to discords.

George Perkins Marsh

Man and Nature

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Topic

Man and nature Environmental destruction

Author

George Perkins Marsh

Source

Man and Nature

Language

English

Time

1864 1860s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Marsh, George Perkins. Man and Nature: Or, Physical Geography as Modified by Human Action. New York: Charles Scribner, 1864, ch. 1.

Current Citation

Marsh, George Perkins. Man and Nature: Or, Physical Geography as Modified by Human Action. Dover Publications, 2021, ch. 1.

By avarice and selfishness, and a grovelling habit, from which none of us is free, of regarding the soil as property...the landscape is deformed.

Henry David Thoreau

Walden

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Topic

Property rights Environmental destruction

Author

Henry David Thoreau

Source

The Bean-Field Walden

Genre

Autobiography and memoir

Language

English

Time

1854 1850s 19th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Thoreau, Henry David. "The Bean-Field." Walden; or, Life in the Woods. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1854.

Current Citation

Thoreau, Henry David. "The Bean-Field." Walden and Civil Disobedience. Signet, 2012.

Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.

Edward Abbey

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Topic

Economic growth Consumerism Environmental destruction Capitalism

Author

Edward Abbey

Source

Arizona: How Big is Big Enough?

Medium

Essay

Language

English

Time

1984 1980s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Abbey, Edward. "Arizona - How Big is Big Enough?" One Life at a Time, Please. Henry Holt and Company, 1988.

We have met the enemy and he is us.

Walt Kelly

The cartoon-strip character, Pogo the opossum, looking at litter under a tree. Used as an Earth Day poster in 1971.

More information about this quote

Topic

Environmental destruction Man and nature

Author

Walt Kelly

Language

English

Time

1970 1970s 20th century

Authentication Score 2

Citation

Kelly, Walt. "We Have Met the Enemy…" Pogo. 22 Apr. 1970. Poster.

What have they done to the earth, yeah?
What have they done to our fair sister?
Ravaged and plundered and ripped her and bit her
Stuck her with knives in the side of the dawn,
And tied her with fences and dragged her down.
I hear a very gentle sound,
With your ear down to the ground
We want the world and we want it
We want the world and we want it
Now.

The Doors

When the Music's Over

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Topic

Environmental destruction Fighting for justice

Speaker

The Doors

Source

When the Music's Over

Medium

Song

Genre

Rock music

Language

English

Time

1967 1960s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

The Doors. "When the Music's Over." Strange Days. Elektra Records, 1967.

There is enough in the world for everyone's need, but not enough for everyone's greed.

Frank Buchman

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Topic

Environmental destruction Natural resources Capitalism

Author

Frank Buchman

Source

Moral Re-Armament

Medium

Speech

Language

English

Time

1938 1930s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Buchman, Frank. "Moral Re-Armament." 29 May 1938, East Ham Town Hall, London, England, UK.

it wont be long now it wont be long
man is making deserts of the earth
it wont be long now
before man will have it used up
so that nothing but ants
and centipedes and scorpions
can find a living on it

Don Marquis

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Topic

Environmental destruction

Author

Don Marquis

Source

What the Ants are Saying

Medium

Poem

Language

English

Time

1935 1930s 20th century

Authentication Score 1

Citation

Marquis, Donald. "What the Ants are Saying." Archy Does His Part. The Evening Sun, c. 1935.

To waste, to destroy, our natural resources, to skin and exhaust the land instead of using it so as to increase its usefulness, will result in undermining in the days of our children the very prosperity which we ought by right to hand down to them amplified and developed.

Theodore Roosevelt

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Topic

Environmental destruction Environmental protection

Speaker

Theodore Roosevelt

Medium

Speech

Genre

Political speech

Language

English

Time

1907 1900s 20th century

Authentication Score 2

Citation

Roosevelt, Theodore, Jr. "Seventh Annual Message." Joint session of the Senate and House of Representatives. 3 Dec. 1907, US Capitol Building, Washington, DC, USA.

We have squandered a great part of what we might have used, and have not stopped to conserve the exceeding bounty of nature, without which our genius for enterprise would have been worthless and impotent.

Woodrow Wilson

First Inaugural Address of Woodrow Wilson

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Topic

Environmental destruction

Speaker

Woodrow Wilson

Source

First Inaugural Address of Woodrow Wilson Presidential inaugural address

Medium

Speech

Genre

Political speech

Language

English

Time

1913 1910s 20th century

Authentication Score 2

Citation

Wilson, Woodrow. "First Inaugural Address." 4 Mar. 1913, East Portico, US Capitol Building, Washington, DC, USA.

All the animals, the plants, the minerals, even other kinds of men, are being broken and reassembled every day, to preserve an elite few, who are the loudest to theorize on freedom, but the least free of all.

Thomas Pynchon

Gravity's Rainbow

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Topic

Capitalism Man and nature Environmental destruction

Author

Thomas Pynchon

Source

Gravity's Rainbow

Medium

Novel

Language

English

Time

1973 1970s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Pynchon, Thomas. Gravity's Rainbow. Viking Press, 1973.

What would the world be, once bereft
Of wet and of wilderness? Let them be left,
O let them be left, wildness and wet;
Long live the weeds and the wilderness yet.

Gerard Manley Hopkins

More information about this quote

Topic

Wilderness Nature Environmental destruction

Author

Gerard Manley Hopkins

Source

Inversnaid

Medium

Poem

Statement Type

Question

Language

English

Time

1918 1910s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Original Citation

Hopkins, Gerard Manley. "Inversnaid." Poems by Gerard Manley Hopkins. Humphrey Milford, 1918, I. 13.

Current Citation

Hopkins, Gerard Manley. "Inversnaid." Gerard Manley Hopkins: The Major Works, edited by Catherine Phillips. Oxford University Press, 2009.

North American civilization is one of the ugliest to have emerged in human history, and it has engulfed the world. Asphalt and exhaust fumes clog the villages... This great, though disastrous, culture can only change as we begin to stand off and see... The inveterate materialism which has become the model for cultures around the globe.

Arthur Charles Erickson

More information about this quote

Topic

America Materialism Environmental destruction

Speaker

Arthur Charles Erickson

Medium

Speech

Language

English

Time

1973 1970s 20th century

Authentication Score 1

Citation

Erickson, Arthur Charles. Speech recieving an honorary university degree, LL.D. (Honoris Causa). 1973, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada.

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.

Aldo Leopold

A Sand County Almanac

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More information about this quote

Topic

Man and nature Environmental destruction Conservation

Author

Aldo Leopold

Source

A Sand County Almanac

Medium

Essay

Genre

Nature writing

Language

English

Time

1949 1940s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Leopold, Aldo. A Sand County Almanac: And Sketches Here and There. Oxford University Press, 1949, foreword.

Forests keep disappearing, rivers dry up, wild life's become extinct, the climate's ruined and the land grows poorer and uglier every day.

Anton Chekhov

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Topic

Environmental destruction

Speaker

Mikhail Lvovich Astrov

Author

Anton Chekhov

Source

Uncle Vanya

Medium

Play

Language

Russian

Time

1897 1890s 19th century

Authentication Score 2

Original Citation

Chekhov, Anton. Dyadya Vanya. 1897, act 1.

Current Citation

Chekhov, Anton. "Uncle Vanya." Plays: Ivanov; The Seagull' Uncle Vanya; Three Sisters; The Cherry Orchard, translated by Peter Carson. Penguin Classics, 2002, act 1.

Over increasingly large areas of the United States, spring now comes unheralded by the return of the birds, and the early mornings are strangely silent where once they were filled with the beauty of bird song.

Rachel Carson

Silent Spring

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Read this quote at The New Yorker

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Topic

Environmental destruction

Author

Rachel Carson

Source

Silent Spring

Language

English

Time

1962 1960s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Carson, Rachel. Silent Spring. Houghton Mifflin, 1962, ch. 8.

Mankind has probably done more damage to the earth in the 20th century than in all of previous human history.

Jacques Cousteau

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Topic

Environmental destruction

Speaker

Jacques Cousteau

Medium

Interview Magazine

Language

French

Time

1999 1990s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Cousteau, Jacques. "Consumer Society Is the Enemy." Interviewed by Nathan Gardels. New Perspectives Quarterly, 1999.

Mother Nature always bats last and she always bats 1000.

Rob Watson

Quoted in The New York Times

More information about this quote

Topic

Environmental destruction Nature

Speaker

Rob Watson

Source

The New York Times

Medium

Newspaper

Language

English

Time

2010 2010s 21st century

Authentication Score 0

Citation

Watson, Rob. Quoted in "We're Gonna Be Sorry." Written by Thomas L. Friedman. The New York Times, 24 July 2010.

Nature is party to all our deals and decisions, and she has more votes, a longer memory and a sterner sense of justice than we do.

Wendell Berry

More information about this quote

Topic

Environmental destruction Nature

Author

Wendell Berry

Language

English

Time

1995 1990s 20th century

Authentication Score 3

Citation

Berry, Wendell. Quoted in The Dying of the Trees, written by Charles E. Little. Viking Press, 1995, endorsement, back cover.