John Muir is known as the “Father of our National Parks” for no small reason. He helped convince Roosevelt and his buddies in Congress to protect our natural lands as National Monuments and Parks. Yup, Yosemite National Park and Sequoia National Park are on his resume amongst a bunch of others. His writings were part of what made him so influential to so many. We’ve made a list of some of the best John Muir quotes, or at least our favorites.
“Keep close to Nature's heart... and break clear away, once in a while, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean.”
“None of Nature's landscapes are ugly so long as they are wild.”
“This grand show is eternal. It is always sunrise somewhere; the dew is never all dried at once; a shower is forever falling; vapor ever rising. Eternal sunrise, eternal sunset, eternal dawn and gloaming, on seas and continents and islands, each in its turn, as the round earth rolls.”
“Only by going alone in silence, without baggage, can one truly get into the heart of the wilderness. All other travel is mere dust and hotels and baggage and chatter.”
“The snow is melting into music.”
“I only went out for a walk, and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.”
“All the wild world is beautiful, and it matters but little where we go, to highlands or lowlands, woods or plains, on the sea or land or down among the crystals of waves or high in a balloon in the sky; through all the climates, hot or cold, storms and calms, everywhere and always we are in God's eternal beauty and love. So universally true is this, the spot where we chance to be always seems the best.”
“Climb the mountains and get their good tidings. Nature's peace will flow into you as sunshine flows into trees. The winds will blow their own freshness into you, and the storms their energy, while cares will drop off like autumn leaves.”
“Who wouldn’t be a mountaineer! Up here all the world’s prizes seem nothing.”
“Few places in this world are more dangerous than home. Fear not, therefore, to try the mountain passes. They will kill care, save you from deadly apathy, set you free, and call forth every faculty into vigorous, enthusiastic action.”
“Going to the mountains is going home.”
“One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.”
“In every walk with Nature one receives far more than he seeks.”
“The world is big and I want to have a good look at it before it gets dark.”
“Between every two pine trees there is a door leading to a new way of life.”
“Come to the woods, for here is rest. There is no repose like that of the green deep woods. Here grow the wallflower and the violet. The squirrel will come and sit upon your knee, the logcock will wake you in the morning. Sleep in forgetfulness of all ill. Of all the upness accessible to mortals, there is no upness comparable to the mountains.”
"The mountains are calling and I must go."
