#t

Here and there awareness is growing that man, far from being the overlord of all creation, is himself part of nature, subject to the same cosmic forces that control all other life. Man's future welfare and probably even his survival depend upon his learning to live in harmony, rather than in combat, with these forces." Essay on the Biological Sciences, in: Good Reading (1958) ↗

— Rachel Carson

#humanity #life #mankind #nature #survival

The nature of man is such that people consider themselves put under an obligation as much by the benefits they confer as by those they receive. ↗

— Niccolò Machiavelli

#nature

It is something like the way dame Nature gathers round a foreign body an envelope of some insensitive tissue which can protect from evil that which it would otherwise harm by contact. If this be an ordered selfishness, then we should pause before we condemn any one for the vice of egoism, for there may be deeper root for its causes than we have knowledge of. ↗

— Bram Stoker

#human-nature #selfishness #nature

National boundaries are not evident when we view the Earth from space. Fanatical ethnic or religious or national chauvinisms are a little difficult to maintain when we see our planet as a fragile blue crescent fading to become an inconspicuous point of light against the bastion and citadel of the stars. ↗

— Carl Sagan

#astronomy #conceit #earth #folly #human-nature

Man has one name, and many more than two natures. But the essential two are these: that he shall strive to impose order on chaos, and that he shall strive to take advantage of chaos… A third element of man’s nature is this: that he shall not understand what he is doing. ↗

— John Brunner

#human-nature #order #pattern #understanding #nature

I wanted to give you a victory. But by their essential nature triumphs can’t be given. ↗

— Lois McMaster Bujold

#give #giving #nature #nature-of-things #triumph

I am grateful for the magic, mystery and majesty of nature – my loyal friend and companion – always there, welcoming and waiting for me to come; to be healed. ↗

— Tom North

#magic #mystery #nature #nature

Most geniuses are geniuses because of the way they manage their natural talents. He was one because of the way he took advantage of the world's defects. -pg 129 ↗

— Albert Sánchez Piñol

#geniuses #nature

It was as though, so long as the deceit ran along quiet and monotonous, all of us let ourselves be deceived, abetting it unawares or maybe through cowardice, since all people are cowards and naturally prefer any kind of treachery because it has a bland outside. ↗

— William Faulkner

#enabling #nature

Outside, the afternoon sun was an orange sliver on an icy horizon. ↗

— Tracy Kidder

#nature