“How like fish we are: ready, nay eager, to seize upon whatever new thing some wind of circumstance shakes down upon the river of time! … Even so, I think there is some virtue in eagerness, whether its object prove true or false.”
“June: The Alder Fork”, p. 39.
A Sand County Almanac, 1949, "May: Back from the Argentine," "June: The Alder Fork," "July: Great Possessions," and "July: Prairie Birthday"
Help us to complete the source, original and additional information
Aldo Leopold 130
American writer and scientist 1887–1948Related quotes

As quoted in "Ep. 261: Kavanaugh, Anonymous, and Us" https://ricochet.com/podcast/need-to-know/kavanaugh-anonymous-and-us/ (6 September 2018), Need to Know, Ricochet
2010s, 2018

Speech to his constituents in Westminster (1784), quoted in W. T. Laprade, 'William Pitt and the Westminster Election', American Historical Review, 23 (1912), p. 263.
1780s
“What’s Wrong with Being Proud?”
Pieces of Eight (1982)
Context: Patriotism is proud of a country’s virtues and eager to correct its deficiencies; it also acknowledges the legitimate patriotism of other countries, with their own specific virtues. The pride of nationalism, however, trumpets its country’s virtues and denies its deficiencies, while it is contemptuous toward the virtues of other countries. It wants to be, and proclaims itself to be, “the greatest,” but greatness is not required of a country; only goodness is.

“There are many things—some true, some false— unsupportable by rational means.”
Barry Mazur,
Context: Sometimes the mathematical anti-Platonist believes that headway is made by showing Platonism to be unsupportable by rational means, and that it is an incoherent position to take when formulated in a propositional vocabulary. It is easy enough to throw together propositional sentences. But it is a good deal more difficult to capture a Platonic disposition in a propositional formulation that is a full and honest expression of some flesh-and-blood mathematician’s view of things. There is, of course, no harm in trying—and maybe its a good exercise. But even if we cleverly came up with a proposition that is up to the task of expressing Platonism formally, the mere fact that the proposition cannot be demonstrated to be true won’t necessarily make it vanish. There are many things—some true, some false— unsupportable by rational means.

Source: The Way to Life: Sermons (1862), P. 23 (Man's Great Duty).

Interview with Bob Keppel days before his execution. audio https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QApVwP4AfY8