Skip to content
quotesby

About this quote

What does it mean?
Muir argues that civilized people need the mountains for spiritual renewal and that wild spaces are essential for life, not just resources.
In plain terms
Going to wild places heals people and is necessary for well-being.
What can you take from it?
Wilderness is a human necessity, not a luxury.

Where it applies

  • debate on land use
  • personal mental health

Putting it to work

  • advocating for park funding
  • taking nature breaks

Questions to consider

  • How does nature affect your mood?
  • Should wildlands be protected from development?

Another view

Access to mountains is not equally available to all people.

More from John Muir

  1. These temple-destroyers, devotees of ravaging commercialism, seem to have a perfect contempt for Nature, and instead of lifting their eyes to the God of the mo…

    Permalink to quote #70
  2. Wander a whole summer if you can. Thousands of God's blessings will search you and soak you as if you were a sponge, and the big days will go by uncounted. If …

    Permalink to quote #72
  3. There is that in the glance of a flower which may at times control the greatest of creation's braggart lords.

    Permalink to quote #69

Related quotes

  1. My job is to save the fucking wilderness. I don't know anything else worth saving.

    Edward AbbeyEdward Abbey quote #1
  2. Depression presents itself as a realism regarding the rottenness of the world in general and the rottenness of your life in particular.

    Jonathan FranzenJonathan Franzen quote #1
  3. The human being cannot live in a condition of emptiness for very long: if he is not growing toward something, he does not merely stagnate; the pent-up potentia…

    Rollo MayRollo May quote #2