“Beside the grand history of the glaciers and their own, the mountain streams sing the history of every avalanche or earthquake and of snow, all easily recognized by the human ear, and every word evoked by the falling leaf and drinking deer, beside a thousand other facts so small and spoken by the stream in so low a voice the human ear cannot hear them.” HumansFactsFallVoiceThousandMountainLowsRiversEarsDrinkingEnvironmentalSnowStreamsLeafsEarthquakesDeerGlaciersAvalanchesFalling LeavesMountain Streams Book:John of the Mountains: The Unpublished Journals of John Muir Source: John of the Mountains: The Unpublished Journals of John Muir
“Whatever is felt upon the page without being specifically named there - that, one might say, is created. It is the inexplicable presence of the thing not named, of the overtone divined by the ear but not heard by it, the verbal mood, the emotional aura of the fact or the thing or the deed, that gives high quality to the novel or the drama, as well as to poetry itself.” GivingWellsFactsMightFeltQualityNovelHeardEmotionalDramaPagesEarsDeedsMoodAurasInexplicableHigh Quality Book:Not Under Forty Source: Not Under Forty
“Paris is a city of centralisation--and centralisation and classification are closely allied. In the early times, when centralisation is becoming a fact, its forerunner is classification. All things which are similar or analogous become grouped together, and from the grouping of groups rises one whole or central point. We see radiating many long arms with innumerable tentaculae, and in the centre rises a gigantic head with a comprehensive brain and keen eyes to look on every side and ears sensitive to hear--and a voracious mouth to swallow.” LooksLongWholeFactsEyeTogetherSidesCitiesBrainGroupsArmsBecomingMouthsAll ThingsEarsParisSensitiveCentreComprehensiveClassificationForerunners Book:The Burial of the Rats Source: The Burial of the Rats
“We accepted a definition of ourselves which confined the self to the source and to the limitations of conscious attention. This definition is miserably insufficient, for in fact we know how to grow brains and eyes, ears and fingers, hearts and bones, in just the same way that we know how to walk and breathe, talk and think - only we can't put it into words. Words are too slow and too clumsy for describing such things, and conscious attention is too narrow for keeping track of all their details.” ThinkingKnowsWayHeartSelfFactsEyeGrowsWalksAttentionBrainKnow HowSourceConsciousEarsFingersTrackDefinitionsDetailsBonesBreatheAcceptedLimitationConfinedDescribingClumsyInsufficient Author:Alan Watts