Next to the laborer in the fields, the walker holds the closest relation to the soil; and he holds a closer and more vital relation to nature because he is freer and his mind more at leisure.
Interpretation
The walker has a unique connection to nature, often because of their freedom and mindfulness.
In this quote, John Burroughs emphasizes the relationship between individuals and the natural world. He suggests that while laborers work the land, walkers, who roam with a sense of freedom, develop a deeper and more conscious bond with nature, allowing for reflection and a more profound appreciation of their surroundings.
In practice
This quote is perfect for a nature walk group meeting to inspire appreciation for the outdoors.
The very idea of a bird is a symbol and a suggestion to the poet. A bird seems to be at the top of the scale, so vehement and intense is his life, large-brained, large-lunged, hot, ecstatic, his frame charged with buoyancy and his heart with song.
Naturalists, like poets, are born and then made only by years of painstaking observation.
Every walk to the woods is a religious rite, every bath in the stream is a saving ordinance. Communion service is at all hours, and the bread and wine are from the heart and marrow of Mother Earth.
Some of the animals outsee man, outsmell him, outhear him, outrun him, outswim him, because their lives depend more upon these special powers than his does; but he can outwit them all because he has the resourcefulness of reason and is at home in many different fields.
Unadulterated, unsweetened observations are what the real nature-lover craves. No man can invent incidents and traits as interesting as the reality.
Writing is reporting what we saw after the vision has left us. It is catching the fish which the tide has left far up on our shores in the low and depressed places.
Give me a Wildness whose glance no civilization can endure.
Everything in nature is the result of fixed laws.
Many people say that this is not an easy issue, we cannot just say that this is how it is, it's not black and white. But I say that this is black and white. Either we stop the emissions or we don't. There are no gray areas when it comes to survival.
Climate change, if unchecked, is an urgent threat to health, food supplies, biodiversity, and livelihoods across the globe.
It was Autumn, and incessant Piped the quails from shocks and sheaves, And, like living coals, the apples Burned among the withering leaves.
We evolved as creatures knitted into the fabric of nature, and without its intimate truths, we can find ourselves unraveling.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.