“Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life.”

— John Muir , book Our National Parks

Source: 1900s, Our National Parks (1901), chapter 1: The Wild Parks and Forest Reservations of the West

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update March 23, 2024. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going …" by John Muir?

John Muir 183

Scottish-born American naturalist and author 1838–1914

Related quotes

“Government protection should be thrown around every wild grove and forest on the mountains, as it is around every private orchard, and the trees in public parks. To say nothing of their value as fountains of timber, they are worth infinitely more than all the gardens and parks of towns.”

John Muir (1838–1914) Scottish-born American naturalist and author

1895, pages 350-351
John of the Mountains, 1938

“In every country the mountains are fountains, not only of rivers but of men. Therefore we all are born mountaineers, the offspring of rock and sunshine.”

John Muir (1838–1914) Scottish-born American naturalist and author

"From Fort Independence to Yosemite", San Francisco Daily Evening Bulletin (part 6 of the 11 part series "Summering in the Sierra") dated September 1875, published 15 September 1875; reprinted in John Muir: Summering in the Sierra, edited by Robert Engberg (University of Wisconsin Press, 1984) page 113
1870s

“Over the mountains,
And over the waves,
Over the fountains,
And under the graves;
Over the floods that are deepest,
Which do Neptune obey;
Over the rocks that are steepest,
Love will find out the way.”

Thomas Percy (Bishop of Dromore)

"Love Will Find Out the Way"; in its published form this is suspected to have been extensively written by Percy himself; it was later used by Pierre de Beaumarchais in Act III of The Marriage of Figaro (1778).
Reliques of Ancient English Poetry (1765)

“Like the dew on the mountain,
Like the foam on the river,
Like the bubble on the fountain,
Thou art gone, and forever!”

Walter Scott (1771–1832) Scottish historical novelist, playwright, and poet

Canto III, stanza 16 (Coronach, stanza 3).
The Lady of the Lake http://www.gutenberg.org/etext/3011 (1810)

“My harp and I a-wandering
Went over Snowdon Mountain,
From Anglesey to Swansea Bay
It sang like any fountain.”

Eleanor Farjeon (1881–1965) English children's writer

The Welsh Harp
More Nursery Rhymes of London Town (1917)

“Going to the mountains is going home.”

John Muir (1838–1914) Scottish-born American naturalist and author

"In the Sierra Forests", San Francisco Daily Evening Bulletin (part 3 of the 11 part series "Summering in the Sierra") dated July 1875, published 3 August 1875; reprinted in John Muir: Summering in the Sierra, edited by Robert Engberg (University of Wisconsin Press, 1984) page 79
1870s
Variant: Going to the woods is going home.