Authors / Writers

Top 42 Wendell Berry Quotes (NATURE)

Top 10 Most Famous Wendell Berry Quotes (BEST)

“We have lived our lives by the assumption that what was good for us would be good for the world. We have been wrong. We must change our lives so that it will be possible to live by the contrary assumption, that what is good for the world will be good for us. And that requires that we make the effort to know the world and learn what is good for it.”

Wendell Berry
The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all our most pleasing responsibility.Pin
The care of the Earth is our most ancient and most worthy, and after all our most pleasing responsibility.
To cherish what remains of the Earth and to foster its renewal is our only legitimate hope of survival.Pin
To cherish what remains of the Earth and to foster its renewal is our only legitimate hope of survival.
If you don’t know where you’re from, you’ll have a hard time saying where you’re going.Pin
If you don’t know where you’re from, you’ll have a hard time saying where you’re going.
People are fed by the food industry, which pays no attention to health, and are treated by the health industry, which pays no attention to food.Pin
People are fed by the food industry, which pays no attention to health, and are treated by the health industry, which pays no attention to food.

“A community is the mental and spiritual condition of knowing that the place is shared, and that the people who share the place define and limit the possibilities of each other’s lives. It is the knowledge that people have of each other, their concern for each other, their trust in each other, the freedom with which they come and go among themselves.”

Wendell Berry
Telling a story is like reaching into a granary full of wheat and drawing out a handful. There is always more to tell than can be told.Pin
Telling a story is like reaching into a granary full of wheat and drawing out a handful. There is always more to tell than can be told.
Be joyful because it is humanly possible.Pin
Be joyful because it is humanly possible.
The past is our definition. We may strive with good reason to escape it, or to escape what is bad in it. But we will escape it only by adding something better to it.Pin
The past is our definition. We may strive with good reason to escape it, or to escape what is bad in it. But we will escape it only by adding something better to it.
I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief… For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.Pin
I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief… For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

9 Wendell Berry Quotes About the Earth and Nature

“The ecological teaching of the Bible is simply inescapable: God made the world because He wanted it made. He thinks the world is good, and He loves it. It is His world; He has never relinquished title to it. And He has never revoked the conditions, bearing on His gift to us of the use of it, that oblige us to take excellent care of it.”

Wendell Berry
Whether we and our politicians know it or not, Nature is party to all our deals and decisions, and she has more votes, a longer memory, and a sterner sense of justice than we do.Pin
Whether we and our politicians know it or not, Nature is party to all our deals and decisions, and she has more votes, a longer memory, and a sterner sense of justice than we do.
If we can't afford to take good care of the land that feeds us, we're in an insurmountable mess.Pin
If we can’t afford to take good care of the land that feeds us, we’re in an insurmountable mess.

“We have the world to live in on the condition that we will take good care of it. And to take good care of it, we have to know it. And to know it and to be willing to take care of it, we have to love it.”

Wendell Berry
Outdoors we are confronted everywhere with wonders; we see that the miraculous is not extraordinary, but the common mode of existence. It is our daily bread.Pin
Outdoors we are confronted everywhere with wonders; we see that the miraculous is not extraordinary, but the common mode of existence. It is our daily bread.
There are no sacred and unsacred places; there are only sacred and desecrated places. My belief is that the world and our life in it are conditional gifts.Pin
There are no sacred and unsacred places; there are only sacred and desecrated places. My belief is that the world and our life in it are conditional gifts.

“We don’t have a right to ask whether we’re going to succeed or not. The only question we have a right to ask is what’s the right thing to do? What does this earth require of us if we want to continue to live on it?”

Wendell Berry
We enter solitude, in which also we lose loneliness. True solitude is found in the wild places, where one is without human obligation.Pin
We enter solitude, in which also we lose loneliness. True solitude is found in the wild places, where one is without human obligation.
Do unto those downstream as you would have those upstream do unto you.Pin
Do unto those downstream as you would have those upstream do unto you.

10 Inspirational Wendell Berry Quotes About Life

“I dislike the thought that some animal has been made miserable to feed me. If I am going to eat meat, I want it to be from an animal that has lived a pleasant, uncrowded life outdoors, on bountiful pasture, with good water nearby and trees for shade.”

Wendell Berry
You mustn’t wish for another life. You mustn’t want to be somebody else. What you must do is this: Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing. In everything give thanks.Pin
You mustn’t wish for another life. You mustn’t want to be somebody else. What you must do is this: Rejoice evermore. Pray without ceasing. In everything give thanks.
Love is what carries you, for it is always there, even in the dark, or most in the dark, but shining out at times like gold stitches in a piece of embroidery.Pin
Love is what carries you, for it is always there, even in the dark, or most in the dark, but shining out at times like gold stitches in a piece of embroidery.
To hear of a thousand deaths in war is terrible, and we 'know' that it is. But as it registers on our hearts, it is not more terrible than one death fully imagined.Pin
To hear of a thousand deaths in war is terrible, and we ‘know’ that it is. But as it registers on our hearts, it is not more terrible than one death fully imagined.
When I rise up, let me rise up joyful like a bird. When I fall, let me fall without regret like a leaf.Pin
When I rise up, let me rise up joyful like a bird. When I fall, let me fall without regret like a leaf.

“So, friends, every day do something that won’t compute… Give your approval to all you cannot understand… Ask the questions that have no answers. Put your faith in two inches of humus that will build under the trees every thousand years… Laugh. Be joyful though you have considered all the facts… Practice resurrection.”

Wendell Berry
The teachers are everywhere. What is wanted is a learner.Pin
The teachers are everywhere. What is wanted is a learner.
You can't know where life will take you, but you can commit to a direction.Pin
You can’t know where life will take you, but you can commit to a direction.
Don't own so much clutter that you will be relieved to see your house catch fire.Pin
Don’t own so much clutter that you will be relieved to see your house catch fire.
I've had a good life, and was born to and among people I've admired and loved.Pin
I’ve had a good life, and was born to and among people I’ve admired and loved.

4 Wendell Berry Quotes on Journeys and Exploration

“And the world cannot be discovered by a journey of miles, no matter how long, but only by a spiritual journey, a journey of one inch, very arduous and humbling and joyful, by which we arrive at the ground at our own feet, and learn to be at home.”

Wendell Berry
You have been given questions to which you cannot be given answers. You will have to live them out - perhaps a little at a time.Pin
You have been given questions to which you cannot be given answers. You will have to live them out – perhaps a little at a time.
Nobody can discover the world for somebody else. Only when we discover it for ourselves does it become common ground and a common bond and we cease to be alone.Pin
Nobody can discover the world for somebody else. Only when we discover it for ourselves does it become common ground and a common bond and we cease to be alone.
It may be that when we no longer know which way to go that we have come to our real journey.Pin
It may be that when we no longer know which way to go that we have come to our real journey.

9 Wendell Berry Quotes that will Make You Think

Rats and roaches live by competition under the laws of supply and demand; it is the privilege of human beings to live under the laws of justice and mercy.Pin
Rats and roaches live by competition under the laws of supply and demand; it is the privilege of human beings to live under the laws of justice and mercy.
A corporation, essentially, is a pile of money to which a number of persons have sold their moral allegiance.Pin
A corporation, essentially, is a pile of money to which a number of persons have sold their moral allegiance.
It is not from ourselves that we learn to be better than we are.Pin
It is not from ourselves that we learn to be better than we are.
I don't believe that grief passes away. It has its time and place forever. More time is added to it; it becomes a story within a story. But grief and griever alike endure.Pin
I don’t believe that grief passes away. It has its time and place forever. More time is added to it; it becomes a story within a story. But grief and griever alike endure.
We learn from our gardens to deal with the most urgent question of the time: How much is enough?Pin
We learn from our gardens to deal with the most urgent question of the time: How much is enough?
The latest technology is not always good for anything except to the producers of the technology.Pin
The latest technology is not always good for anything except to the producers of the technology.
Healing is impossible in loneliness; it is the opposite of loneliness. Conviviality is healing. To be healed we must come with all the other creatures to the feast of Creation.Pin
Healing is impossible in loneliness; it is the opposite of loneliness. Conviviality is healing. To be healed we must come with all the other creatures to the feast of Creation.
You can best serve civilization by being against what usually passes for it.Pin
You can best serve civilization by being against what usually passes for it.
To be interested in food but not in food production is clearly absurd.Pin
To be interested in food but not in food production is clearly absurd.
YouTube video

(MUST READ) The Unsettling of America: Culture & Agriculture

Also read:

Top Wendell Berry Quotes (NATURE) - Gracious QuotesPin
107