Rachel Carson: Earth

“Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts.”

Rachel Carson

Source: The Sense of Wonder (1965)
Context: Those who dwell, as scientists or laymen, among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life. Whatever the vexations or concerns of their personal lives, their thoughts can find paths that lead to inner contentment and to renewed excitement in living. Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts.

Beauty , Hope , Peaceful , Life

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

Rachel Carson

Preface to Humane Biology Projects (1961) by the Animal Welfare Institute
Context: I like to define biology as the history of the earth and all its life — past, present, and future. To understand biology is to understand that all life is linked to the earth from which it came; it is to understand that the stream of life, flowing out of the dim past into the uncertain future, is in reality a unified force, though composed of an infinite number and variety of separate lives.

Life , History , Past , Future

“The real wealth of the Nation lies in the resources of the earth — soil, water, forests, minerals, and wildlife.”

Rachel Carson

Letter to the editor, Washington Post (1953); quoted in Lost Woods: The Discovered Writing of Rachel Carson (1999) edited by Linda Lear, p. 99
Context: The real wealth of the Nation lies in the resources of the earth — soil, water, forests, minerals, and wildlife. To utilize them for present needs while insuring their preservation for future generations requires a delicately balanced and continuing program, based on the most extensive research. Their administration is not properly, and cannot be, a matter of politics.

Water , Wealth

“In every outthrust headland, in every curving beach, in every grain of sand there is the story of the earth.”

Rachel Carson

“Those who dwell, as scientists or laymen, among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life.”

Rachel Carson

The Sense of Wonder (1965)
Context: Those who dwell, as scientists or laymen, among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life. Whatever the vexations or concerns of their personal lives, their thoughts can find paths that lead to inner contentment and to renewed excitement in living. Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts.

Life , Beauty

“It is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties to know the sense of wonder and humility.”

Rachel Carson

Source: The Sense of Wonder

Beauty , Sense

“These sprays, dusts, and aerosols are now applied almost universally to farms, gardens, forests, and homes — nonselective chemicals that have the power to kill every insect, the "good" and the "bad," to still the song of birds and the leaping of fish in the streams, to coat the leaves with a deadly film, and to linger on in soil — all this though the intended target may be only a few weeds or insects. Can anyone believe it is possible to lay down such a barrage of poisons on the surface of the earth without making it unfit for all life? They should not be called "insecticides," but "biocides."”

Rachel Carson book Silent Spring

Silent Spring (1962)

Life , Home , Bird , Fish

“The sediments are a sort of epic poem of the earth.”

Rachel Carson book The Sea Around Us

Chapter 6, Page 98 https://books.google.com/books?id=PvkDFTtW6f4C&&pg=PA98
The Sea Around Us (1951)

“The most alarming of all man's assaults upon the environment is the contamination of air, earth, rivers, and sea with dangerous and even lethal materials.”

Rachel Carson book Silent Spring

Chapter 2, Page 6 http://books.google.com/books?id=5hR_i1rNzAYC&q=%22The+most+alarming+of+all+man's+assaults+upon+the+environment+is+the+contamination+of+air+earth+rivers+and+sea+with+dangerous+and+even+lethal+materials%22&pg=PA6#v=onepage
Silent Spring (1962)

Sea

“We have looked first at man with his vanities and greed and his problems of a day or a year; and then only, and from this biased point of view, we have looked outward at the earth he has inhabited so briefly and at the universe in which our earth is so minute a part. Yet these are the great realities, and against them we see our human problems in a different perspective. Perhaps if we reversed the telescope and looked at man down these long vistas, we should find less time and inclination to plan for our own destruction.”

Rachel Carson

Acceptance speech of the National Book Award for Nonfiction (1952); also in Lost Woods: The Discovered Writing of Rachel Carson (1999) edited by Linda Lear, p. 91

Problem , Reality , Universe , Time

“We have been troubled about the world, and had almost lost faith in man; it helps to think about the long history of the earth, and of how life came to be. And when we think in terms of millions of years, we are not so impatient that our own problems be solved tomorrow.”

Rachel Carson

Speech accepting the John Burroughs Medal (April 1952); also in Lost Woods: The Discovered Writing of Rachel Carson (1999) edited by Linda Lear, p. 96

Life , World , Faith , History