To share my (Libby’s) love of quotes… Enjoy!
“Like water, be gentle and strong. Be gentle enough to follow the natural paths of the earth, and strong enough to rise up and reshape the world.” – Brenda Peterson
“We’re all in this thing together, walking the line between faith and fear. This life don’t last forever. When you cry I taste the salt of your tears.” – Old Crow Medicine Show
“May all your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view, where something strange and more beautiful and more full of wonder than your deepest dreams waits for you.” – Edward Abbey
“It seems they had always been and would always be, friends. Time could change much, but not that.” – Winnie the Pooh
“Paths are to be followed not for their endings, but for the joy and wonder of going.” – Elfant
“To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that’s all.”
– Oscar Wilde
“I would like to be thought of as a philosopher, and as of one who sought to persuade people to get along in friendship and to abandon force as a means of settling the great questions of the world.” – Cyrus Eaton
“There can be no winners in a nuclear war.” – Russell-Einstein Manifesto
“Peace cannot be kept by force; it can only be achieved by understanding.” – Albert Einstein
“…because when you are imagining, you might as well imagine something worthwhile.” – L.M.Montgomery – Anne of Green Gables Chapter 2
“This evening I went for a walk – all alone but not a lonely one. I am sometimes lonely in the house or when walking with uncongenial company but I have never known a moment’s loneliness in the woods and fields. I have rich, rare good company there.” – L. M. Montgomery (My Dear Mr. M, 7)
“A little fern growing in the woods, a shallow sheet of June-bells under the firs, moonlight falling on the ivory column of a tall birch … shadow waves rolling over a field of ripe wheat – all gave me ‘thoughts that lay too deep for tears’ and feelings which I had then no vocabulary to express.” – L. M. Montgomery (The Alpine Path, Chp 6)
“What a great blessing faithful friendship is – the friendship of a true woman on whom one can depend and in whom one can trust.” – L. M. Montgomery (Complete Journals II: 291. March 29, 1910)
“I am thankful above all else for my love of nature and my capacity for finding fullness of joy in her companionship. I would rather lose everything else I possess than that.” – L. M. Montgomery (Complete Journals II: 208. December 20, 1908)
“How we did love trees! I am grateful that my childhood was spent in a spot where there were many trees… .” – L. M. Montgomery (The Alpine Path, Chp. 3)
“I went for a walk over the hill… I saw a poem. Two spruces were clasping dark hands over an arc of silvery twilight sky; and right under the arch formed by their boughs was the new moon, like a sickle of red gold. I looked at it and thanked God for life in a world where such a wight could be seen.” – L. M. Montgomery (Complete Journals II: 134. August 4, 1905)
“I had left Cavendish forever, save as a fitful visitor; and in leaving it felt that I was leaving the only place on earth my heart would ever truly love. The world might have a home for me somewhere; but the only home my inmost soul would ever acknowledge would be that little country settlement by the gulf shore…” – L. M. Montgomery (her journal, January 28, 1912
“So this evening I went over to the graveyard and kept tryst with my dead. The old spot was beautiful in the sunset light, with its plots snow-white with clover. And I did what sounds rather dismal but which did not seem dismal to me at all – I selected a plot for my own resting place. I want to be buried in Cavendish graveyard when my time comes. I want to lie among my kindred in the old spot I love so much better than any other spot on earth . . . I selected a plot on the crest of the hill, looking down on the beautiful scene I always loved – the pond, the shore, the sand-dunes, the harbour. On innumerable summer eves I have stood there and gazed on them, longing for some diviner speech to express what I felt. I want to feel that my last resting place is in sight of them . . . There, sometime I shall lie and the wind will creep up from the sea to sing over my and the old gulf will croon me a lullaby.” – L. M. Montgomery (her journal, July 21, 1923)
“This afternoon I took a walk back through dear old Lover’s Lane. Surely, it is the prettiest spot in the world. Apart from its beauty I have a strange love for it. In those divine woodland solitudes one can hear the voice of one’s own soul – the voice of nature – the voice of God. I wish I might go there every day of my life – I always feel better after a stroll under those green arches where nature reveals herself in all her beauty.” – L. M. Montgomery (Complete Journals I: 165. August 21, 1983)
“… once and again I stray down and listen to the duet of the brook and wind, and watch the sunbeams creeping through the dark boughs, the gossamers glimmering here and there, and the ferns growing up in the shadowy nooks.” – L. M. Montgomery (Complete Journals 1: 438. July 24, 1899)
“The brook was laughing to itself in the hollow. Brooks are always in good spirits. They never do anything but laugh. It is infectious to hear them, those gay vagabonds of the valleys.” – L. M. Montgomery (My Dear Mr. M, November 9, 1904)
“The woods always seem to me to have a delicate, subtle life all their own … . [I]n the woods I like to be alone for every tree is a true old friend and every tip-toeing wind a merry comrade. … I always feel so utterly and satisfyingly at home … .” – L. M. Montgomery (My Dear Mr. M. September 16, 1906)
“Everyone needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in… where nature may heal and cheer and give strength to body and soul.” – John Muir (Acadia National Park)
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. – Abraham Lincoln November 19, 1863 (Other versions of the Gettysburg Address can be found here.)
Quotes from MLK Jr. at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial
“We shall overcome because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”
“Darkness cannot drive out darkness, only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.”
“I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right, temporarily defeated, is stronger than evil triumphant.”
“Make a career of humanity. Commit yourself to the noble struggle for equal rights. You will make a greater person of yourself, a greater nation of your country, and a finer world to live in.”
“I oppose the war in Vietnam because I love America. I speak out against it not in anger, but with anxiety and sorrow in my heart, and above all with a passionate desire to see our beloved country stand as a moral example of the world.”
“If we are to have peace on earth, our loyalties must become ecumenical rather than sectional. Our loyalties must transcend our race, our tribe, our class, and our nation, and this means we must develop a world perspective.”
“True peace is not merely the absence of tension. It is the presence of justice.”
“We must come to see that the end we seek is a society at peace with itself, a society that can live with its conscience.”
“We are determined here in Montgomery to work and fight until justice runs down like water, and righteousness like a mighty stream.”
“Every nation must now develop an overriding loyalty to mankind as a whole in order to preserve the best in their individual societies.”
“It is not enough to say, “We must not wage war.” It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it. We must concentrate not merely on the negative expulsion of war, but on the positive affirmation of peace.”
“The ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”
“I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality, and freedom for their spirits.”
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one, directly affects all indirectly.”
Quotes published in Poor Richard’s Almanack, 1735 – 1745
“Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead.”
“Well done is better than well said.”
“Keep your eyes wide open before marriage, half shut afterwards.”
“No gains without pains”
Food for Thought (Art by Kristen Muench) This series began by sharing. Friends shared vegetables from the bounty of their personal gardens. Some of these vegetables were strangely shaped, multicolored, all were fascinating. Some, specifically the eggplants, were silkenly flawless, without mar or mark, and naturally elegant. Thus, I engaged in a visual exploration and interpretation of the beauty and variety of the vegetables that abound in our part of the country. These earthly wonders are a magnificent display of the regenerative processes of Mother Earth. This series is a natural progression from the landscapes and nature studies that have always delighted me and remain my preferred subjects. From the charming miracle of a seemingly simple seed, with a bit of nature’s organic nutritive compost, snuggling mulch, the signal from a drop of water, with temperatures aligned for comfort, comes a veritable fountain of green wonder. The fractal qualities of structure, the colors within leaves that change with photosynthesis, the chlorophyllin chemistry which not only takes our breath away, but replaces it with the essential oxygen we need to live is wonderous alchemy. This earth is a wise, magical place. We are the beneficiaries of this magic. It is our responsibility to keep her healthy, keep ourselves healthy, and protect the magic that sustains all living creatures. So here I am. Painting vegetables. Describing wildly, the beauty of nature. Painting an array of expressionist portrayals that keep me in tune with the nature that surrounds, comforts and sustains me. Enjoy. – Art show at the Presque Isle Environmental Center
Quotes from the Kennedy Space Center
“The heroic spirit of these astronauts lives on in you. Their stories tell the story of humanity: embracing the legendary in all of us.” – James Lovell
From the Astronaut Hall of Fame: “A hero is… Inspired… Passionate… Curious… Tenacious… Disciplined… Confident… Courageous… Principled… Selfless.”
“Exploration is really the essence of the human spirit.” – Frank Borman
A Christmas Eve Prayer from Lunar Orbit – December 24, 1968
Give us, O God, the vision
which can see Thy love in the world
on spite of human failure.
Give us the faith, the trust,
the goodness in spite of
our ignorance and weakness.
Give us the knowledge
That we may continue to pray
With understanding hearts,
and show us what each one of us
can do to set forth
the coming of the day
of universal peace. Amen.
From the Apollo 8 crew