Anarchism is founded on the observation that since few men are wise enough to rule themselves, even fewer are wise enough to rule others.
— Edward Abbey
One man alone can be pretty dumb sometimes, but for real bona fide stupidity, there ain't nothin' can beat teamwork.
The missionaries go forth to Christianize the savages - as if the savages weren't dangerous enough already.
Love implies anger. The man who is angered by nothing cares about nothing.
Wilderness is not a luxury but a necessity of the human spirit.
A drink a day keeps the shrink away.
If the end does not justify the means - what can?
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government.
The idea of wilderness needs no defense, it only needs defenders.
Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.
Climbing K2 or floating the Grand Canyon in an inner tube; there are some things one would rather have done than do.
Society is like a stew. If you don't stir it up every once in a while then a layer of scum floats to the top.
There is science, logic, reason; there is thought verified by experience. And then there is California.
Power is always dangerous. Power attracts the worst and corrupts the best.
When a man's best friend is his dog, that dog has a problem.
Grown men do not need leaders.
The tragedy of modern war is that the young men die fighting each other - instead of their real enemies back home in the capitals.
What is the purpose of the giant sequoia tree? The purpose of the giant sequoia tree is to provide shade for the tiny titmouse.
That which today calls itself science gives us more and more information, and indigestible glut of information, and less and less understanding.
Civilization is a youth with a molotov cocktail in his hand. Culture is the Soviet tank or L.A. cop that guns him down.
Say what you like about my bloody murderous government,' I says, 'but don't insult me poor bleedin' country.
Our culture runs on coffee and gasoline, the first often tasting like the second.
Belief in the supernatural reflects a failure of the imagination.
You can't study the darkness by flooding it with light.
Taxation: how the sheep are shorn.
Our 'neoconservatives' are neither new nor conservative, but old as Bablyon and evil as Hell.
May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds.
For myself I hold no preferences among flowers, so long as they are wild, free, spontaneous. Bricks to all greenhouses! Black thumb and cutworm to the potted plant!
