Quotes and Quick Inspiration

Volume Four

From Tom Spencer's Soul of the Garden

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There is a little plant called reverence in the corner of my soul's garden,
which I love to have watered once a week.

-   Oliver Wendell Holmes

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.

- Marcel Proust

Ears hear and eyes see. What then does mind do?

- Zen riddle

Conversion consists in doing the next thing you have to do, doing it with your whole heart and finding delight in doing it.

— Meister Eckhardt

In this life we cannot do great things.  We can only do small things with great love.

—  Mother Teresa

You must be the change you wish to see in the world.

-Mahatma Gandhi

The soul cannot thrive in the absence of a garden. 
 

-  Thomas Moore

Bread feeds the body, indeed, but flowers feed also the soul.

 - The Koran

The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious.

It is the source of all true art and science.

- Albert Einstein

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

- Rachel Carson

We are cups, constantly and quietly being filled. The trick is, knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out.
 

- Ray Bradbury

"... you are in the desert. So immerse yourself in it. The desert will give you an understanding of the world; in fact, anything on the face of the earth will do that. You don't even have to understand the desert: all you have to do is contemplate a simple grain of sand, and you will see the marvels of creation."

"How do I immerse myself in the desert?"

"Listen to your heart. It knows all things, because it came from the Soul of the World, and it will one day return there."

- Paulo Coehlo

from The Alchemist

An understanding heart is everything in a teacher, and cannot be esteemed highly enough. One looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers, but with gratitude to those who touched our human feeling. The curriculum is so much necessary raw material, but warmth is the vital element for the growing plant and for the soul of the child.
 

- Carl Jung

Nothing is more honorable than a grateful heart.
 

-  Seneca

Consider that the word ecology comes from the Greek word for "home" (eikos).  An ecological awakening is an awakening about our true home.  And our true home is the Unverse itself.

He who experiences the unity of life sees his own Self in all beings, and all beings in his own Self, and looks on everything with an impartial eye.

- Buddha

I have concluded that the whole misfortune of men comes from a single thing, and that is their inability to remain at rest in a room.

We are here and it is now. 
Further than that all human knowledge is moonshine.

- H. L. Mencken

Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blind-folded fear.

- Thomas Jefferson

Do not go where the path may lead, go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

Simple pleasures are the last refuge of the complex.
 

- Oscar Wilde

My hut isn’t quite six feet across
Surrounded by pine, bamboos, and mountains,
An old monk hardly has room for himself
Much less for a visiting cloud.

- Shih-wu (1272-1352)

To cherish what remains of the Earth and to foster its

renewal is our only legitimate hope of survival.

- Wendell Berry