Rachel Carson

The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction.

If I had influence with the good fairy who is supposed to preside over all children, I should ask that her gift to each child in the world be a sense of wonder so indestructible that it would last throughout life.

Man is a part of nature, and his war against nature is a war against himself.

The 'control of nature' is a phrase conceived in arrogance, born of the Neanderthal age of biology and philosophy, when it was supposed that nature exists for the convenience of man.

A child's world is fresh and new and beautiful, full of wonder and excitement. It is our misfortune that for most of us that clear-eyed vision, that true instinct for what is beautiful and awe-inspiring, is dimmed and even lost before we reach adulthood.

The most alarming of all man's assaults upon the environment is the contamination of air, earth, rivers, and sea with dangerous and even lethal materials.

In nature, nothing exists alone.

Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts.

The edge of the sea is a strange and beautiful place.

It is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties to know the sense of wonder and humility.

The beauty of the living world I was trying to save has always been uppermost in my mind—that, and anger at the heedless and needless destruction of it.

We stand now where two roads diverge. But unlike the roads in Robert Frost's familiar poem, they are not equally fair. The road we have long been traveling is deceptively easy, a smooth superhighway on which we progress with great speed, but at its end lies disaster. The other road—the one less traveled by—offers our only chance to arrive at a destination that assures the preservation of our earth.

The question is whether any civilization can wage relentless war on life without destroying itself, and without losing the right to be called civilized.

For the first time in the history of the world, every human being is now subjected to contact with dangerous chemicals, from the moment of conception until death.

The ocean is a place of paradoxes.

There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature—the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after winter.

The sea lies all about us. The commerce of all the world is carried on its surface. The armies of all the world have fought over it. The navies of all the world have sailed through it. The sea is the universal solvent.

It is not my contention that chemical insecticides must never be used. I do contend that we have put poisonous and biologically potent chemicals indiscriminately into the hands of persons largely or wholly ignorant of their potential for harm.

The more we learn about the truly intricate and delicate balance of nature, the more we realize how important it is to preserve it.

One way to open your eyes is to ask yourself, 'What if I had never seen this before? What if I knew I would never see it again?'