“We came to a tree which was still bare, and on which the birds were singing out gaily in the morning, without any fear of us. Then stooping over like an Indian on the hunt, my companion placed a pebble in the leather of his sling and stretched it. Obeying his peremptory glance I did the same, with frightful twinges of conscience, vowing firmly that I would shoot when he did. At that very moment the church bells began to sound, mingling with the song of the birds in the sunshine. It was the warning bell that came a half-hour before the main bell. For me it was a voice from heaven. I threw the sling down, scaring the birds away, so that they were safe from my companion's sling, and fled home. And ever afterwards when the bells of Holy Week ring out amidst the leafless trees in the sunshine I remember with moving gratitude how they rang into my heart at that time the commandment: Thou shalt not kill.”

— Albert Schweitzer

Memoirs of Childhood and Youth (1924)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Sept. 28, 2023. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "We came to a tree which was still bare, and on which the birds were singing out gaily in the morning, without any fear …" by Albert Schweitzer?

Albert Schweitzer 126

French-German physician, theologian, musician and philosoph… 1875–1965

Related quotes

“Though I know something about British birds I should have been lost and confused among American birds, of which unhappily I know little or nothing. Colonel Roosevelt not only knew more about American birds than I did about British birds, but he knew about British birds also. What he had lacked was an opportunity of hearing their songs, and you cannot get a knowledge of the songs of birds in any other way than by listening to them.
We began our walk, and when a song was heard I told him the name of the bird. I noticed that as soon as I mentioned the name it was unnecessary to tell him more. He knew what the bird was like. It was not necessary for him to see it. He knew the kind of bird it was, its habits and appearance. He just wanted to complete his knowledge by hearing the song. He had, too, a very trained ear for bird songs, which cannot be acquired without having spent much time in listening to them. How he had found time in that busy life to acquire this knowledge so thoroughly it is almost impossible to imagine, but there the knowledge and training undoubtedly were. He had one of the most perfectly trained ears for bird songs that I have ever known, so that if three or four birds were singing together he would pick out their songs, distinguish each, and ask to be told each separate name; and when farther on we heard any bird for a second time, he would remember the song from the first telling and be able to name the bird himself.”

Edward Grey, 1st Viscount Grey of Fallodon (1862–1933) British Liberal statesman

Recreation (1919)

“One more instance I will give of his interest and his knowledge. We were passing under a fir tree when we heard a small song in the tree above us. We stopped and I said that was the song of a golden-crested wren. He listened very attentively while the bird repeated its little song, as its habit is. Then he said, "I think that is exactly the same song as that of a bird that we have in America"; and that was the only English song that he recognized as being the same as any bird song in America. Some time afterwards I met a bird expert in the Natural History Museum in London and told him this incident, and he confirmed what Colonel Roosevelt had said, that the song of this bird would be about the only song that the two countries had in common. I think that a very remarkable instance of minute and accurate knowledge on the part of Colonel Roosevelt. It was the business of the bird expert in London to know about birds. Colonel Roosevelt's knowledge was a mere incident acquired, not as part of the work of his life, but entirely outside it.”

Edward Grey, 1st Viscount Grey of Fallodon (1862–1933) British Liberal statesman

Recreation (1919)

“I sit in my tree
I sing like the birds
My beak is my pen
My songs are my poems.”

David Almond book My Name Is Mina

Source: My Name Is Mina

“Does the sweet morning rise,
Bride-like, from sleep,
When their first revelries
Bird and bee keep,
Singing out joyously
In the green tree?
Then, when my hopes are high,
Think I of thee.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

(5th January 1833) Songs
The London Literary Gazette, 1833-1835

“The caged bird sings with a fearful trill,
of things unknown, but longed for still,
and his tune is heard on the distant hill,
for the caged bird sings of freedom.”

Maya Angelou book I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

Source: I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

“In the desert a fountain is springing,
In the wide waste there still is a tree,
And a bird in the solitude singing,
Which speaks to my spirit of thee.”

George Gordon Byron (1788–1824) English poet and a leading figure in the Romantic movement

Stanzas to Augusta (1816), reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

“I know what the caged bird feels, alas!
When the sun is bright on the upland slopes;
When the wind blows soft through the springing grass,
And the river floats like a stream of glass;
When the first bird sings and the first bud opes,
And the faint perfume from its chalice steals—
I know what the caged bird feels!

I know why the caged bird beats his wing
Till its blood is red on the cruel bars;
For he must fly back to his perch and cling
When he fain would be on the bough a-swing;
And a pain still throbs in the old, old scars
And they pulse again with a keener sting—
I know why he beats his wing!

I know why the caged bird sings, ah me,
When his wing is bruised and his bosom sore,—
When he beats his bars and he would be free;
It is not a carol of joy or glee,
But a prayer that he sends from his heart's deep core,
But a plea that upward to Heaven he flings—
I know why the caged bird sings!”

Paul Laurence Dunbar Sympathy

Sympathy, in the 1913 collection of his work, The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar; the poem inspired the title of Maya Angelou's book, Why the Caged Bird Sings.

“He never discriminated between us children. He got us to learn horse riding. He always used to take us out shooting when hunting was still allowed. My first experience was a tiger hunt when I was 14-year old. We went to Omkar, a favourite hunting place of my father which lies between Begur and Kakanakote forest range. I shot a spotted deer with Daddy’s supervision.”

Jayachamarajendra Wadiyar (1919–1974) Indian writer

My daddy, His Highness, the Maharaja of Mysore

“My heart is like a singing bird
Whose nest is in a water'd shoot;
My heart is like an apple-tree
Whose boughs are bent with thick-set fruit.”

Christina Rossetti (1830–1894) English poet

A Birthday http://www.poetry-online.org/rossetti_christina_a_birthday.htm, st. 1 (1861).

“I’ve been listening to my father’s songs lately. He was a wonderful composer; I love his songs very much. My father used to say to me, “My son Ranariddh sang my songs the best,” because you had to sing it with your own heart. I used to sing a lot. He didn't like to sing his own songs, so I used to do it.”

Norodom Ranariddh (1944) Cambodian politician

[Post Staff, http://www.phnompenhpost.com/national/recollections-king-father, Recollections of the King Father, 3 February 2013, 29 June 2015, Phnom Penh Post]

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Albert Schweitzer 126

Related quotes

Related topics