quotations about mountains
All mountain landscapes hold stories: the ones we read, the ones we dream, and the ones we create.
GEORGE MICHAEL SINCLAIR KENNEDY
Editor's Note, The Alpinist, April 1, 2010
The grandeur of each mountain peak
That rears to heaven its granite form;
The craggy cliffs where eagles shriek
Amid the thunder and the storm.
ALBERT LAIGHTON
"New England"
Mountains are not fair or unfair, they are just dangerous.
REINHOLD MESSNER
All Fourteen 8,000ers
A mountain at a distance appears smooth; as we approach, it seems rugged.
TAMIL
attributed, Day's Collacon
We are now in the mountains and they are in us, kindling enthusiasm, making every nerve quiver, filling every pore and cell of us.
JOHN MUIR
My First Summer in the Sierra
The mountain has left me feeling renewed, more content and positive than I've been for weeks, as if something has been given back after a long absence, as if my eyes have opened once again. For this time at least, I've let myself be rooted in the unshakable sanity of the senses, spared my mind the burden of too much thinking, turned myself outward to experience the world and inward to savor the pleasures it has given me.
RICHARD NELSON
The Island Within
So the loud torrent, and the whirlwind's roar,
But bind him to his native mountains more.
OLIVER GOLDSMITH
The Traveller
He who first met the Highlands' swelling blue
Will love each peak that shows a kindred hue,
Hail in each crag a friend's familiar face,
And clasp the mountain in his mind's embrace.
LORD BYRON
The Island
Men meet, mountains stand still.
LEWIS CASS
attributed, Day's Collacon
How glorious a greeting the sun gives the mountains!
JOHN MUIR
The Mountains of California
Sometimes I think my mountains are like a fence that runs between this part of the world and the rest of creation. Nobody can see out and nobody can see in.
CATHRYN HANKLA
A Blue Moon in Poorwater
Faeries, come take me out of this dull world,
For I would ride with you upon the wind,
Run on the top of the disheveled tide,
And dance upon the mountains like a flame.
W. B. YEATS
The Land of Heart's Desire
All the birds have flown up and gone;
A lonely cloud floats leisurely by.
We never tire of looking at each other--
Only the mountain and I.
LI BAI
"Alone Looking at the Mountain"
Mountains are a gateway to higher thinking.
RAINA M. PARIS
The Mother-to-Be's Dream Book
A few hours' mountain climbing make of a rogue and a saint two fairly equal creatures.
FRIEDRICH NIETZSCHE
Human, All Too Human
These mountains, which have seen untold sunrises, long to thunder praise but stand reverent, silent so that man's weak praise should be given God's attention.
DONALD MILLER
Through Painted Deserts
The mountains were his masters. They rimmed in life. They were the cup of reality, beyond growth, beyond struggle and death. They were his absolute unity in the midst of eternal change.
THOMAS WOLFE
Look Homeward
As for me, mountains are like bridges that connect the land we live on with heaven, a place where our souls are close to God. Standing on a hilltop, I always feel myself an integral part of the universe.
PARA LIMBU
Mountains Forever
Mountains were loved by our Lord.
ADAMNAN
attributed, Day's Collacon
For the mountains are like cold islands in the sea From the Lowlands to the Eternal Snows.
THOMAS FISHER
The Plant, Volume 1