Silent Spring Quotes

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  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. This pollution is for the most part irrecoverable; the chain of evil it initiates not only in the world that must support life but in living tissues is for the most part irreversible. In this now universal contamination of the environment, chemicals are the sinister and little-recognized partners of radiation in changing the very nature of the world-the very nature of its life.

  Rachel Carson

  Nature, Men, Sea

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.6, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature.

  Rachel Carson

  Nature, Healing, Wilderness

  Rachel Carson (2011). “The Sense of Wonder”, p.41, Open Road Media

  90 Copy quote

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• The human race is challenged more than ever before to demonstrate our mastery, not over nature but of ourselves.

  Rachel Carson

  Nature, Future, Character

  189 Copy quote

• Why should we tolerate a diet of weak poisons, a home in insipid surroundings, a circle of acquaintances who are not quite our enemies, the noise of motors with just enough relief to prevent insanity? Who would want to live in a world which is just not quite fatal?

  Rachel Carson

  Home, Circles, Insanity

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.12, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

  55 Copy quote

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

  Rachel Carson

  Strength, Beauty, Nature

  Rachel Carson (2011). “The Sense of Wonder”, p.41, Open Road Media

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• These sprays, dusts, and aerosols are now applied almost universally to farms, gardens, forests, and homes-nonselective chemicals that have the power to kill every insect, the 'good' and the 'bad,' to still the song of birds and the leaping of fish in the streams, to coat the leaves with a deadly film, and to linger on in soil-all this though the intended target may be only a few weeds or insects. Can anyone believe it is possible to lay down such a barrage of poisons on the surface of the earth without making it unfit for all life? They should not be called 'insecticides,' but 'biocides.'

  Rachel Carson

  Weed, Song, Believe

  Paul Brooks, Rachel Carson (1972). “The house of life: Rachel Carson at work”

  57 Copy quote

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• 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.

  Rachel Carson

  History, Historical, Environmental

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.15, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• 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.

  Rachel Carson

  Nature, Zoos, Ocean

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.19, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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  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?

  Rachel Carson

  Motivational, Change, Gratitude

  Rachel Carson (2011). “The Sense of Wonder”, p.24, Open Road Media

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• It is also an era dominated by industry, in which the right to make a dollar at whatever cost is seldom challenged.

  Rachel Carson

  Dollars, Cost, Eras

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.13, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• We urgently need an end to these false assurances, to the sugar coating of unpalatable facts. It is the public that is being asked to assume the risks that the insect controllers calculate. The public must decide whether it wishes to continue on the present road, and it can do so only when in full possession of the facts.

  Rachel Carson

  Risk, Wish, Needs

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.13, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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  But man is a part of nature, and his war against nature is inevitably a war against himself.

  Rachel Carson

  Inspirational, Motivational, War

  Paul Brooks, Rachel Carson (1972). “The house of life: Rachel Carson at work”

  278 Copy quote

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• We won't have a society if we destroy the environment.

  Margaret Mead

  Nature, Carpe Diem, Society

  28 Copy quote

• 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.

  Rachel Carson

  Men, Rivers, Air

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.6, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• In an age when man has forgotten his origins and is blind even to his most essential needs for survival, water along with other resources has become the victim of his indifference.

  Rachel Carson

  Men, Dirty Water, Ice Water

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.39, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• 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 fork of the road - the one less traveled by - offers our last, our only chance to reach a destination that assures the preservation of the earth.

  Rachel Carson

  Nature, Women, Lying

  "Silent Spring" by Rachel Carson, (p. 277), 1962.

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• Over increasingly large areas of the United States, spring now comes unheralded by the return of the birds, and the early mornings are strangely silent where once they were filled with the beauty of bird song.

  Rachel Carson

  Beauty, Song, Morning

  Silent Spring ch. 8 (1962)

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• How could intelligent beings seek to control a few unwanted species by a method that contaminated the entire environment and brought the threat of disease and death even to their own kind?

  Rachel Carson

  Intelligent, Disease And Death, Kind

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.8, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• No witchcraft, no enemy action had silenced the rebirth of new life in this stricken world. The people had done it themselves.

  Rachel Carson

  People, Enemy, Done

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.3, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• A Who's Who of pesticides is therefore of concern to us all. If we are going to live so intimately with these chemicals eating and drinking them, taking them into the very marrow of our bones - we had better know something about their nature and their power.

  Rachel Carson

  Drinking, Pesticides, Bones

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.17, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• The obligation to endure gives us the right to know.

  Rachel Carson

  Philosophy, Giving, Endure

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.13, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• We cannot have peace among men whose hearts find delight in killing any living creature.

  Rachel Carson

  Life, Peace, Heart

  Paul Brooks, Rachel Carson (1972). “The house of life: Rachel Carson at work”

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• Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature -- the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after winter.

  Rachel Carson

  Inspirational, Time, Nature

  Rachel Carson (2011). “The Sense of Wonder”, p.41, Open Road Media

  230 Copy quote

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• 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.

  Rachel Carson

  Nature, Philosophy, Men

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.297, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• Only within the moment of time represented by the present century has one species -- man -- acquired significant power to alter the nature of the world.

  Rachel Carson

  Change, Nature, Men

  Rachel Carson (2002). “Silent Spring”, p.5, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

  9 Copy quote

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