A Quote by Henry David Thoreau
As I stand over the insect crawling amid the pine needles on the forest floor, and endeavoring to conceal itself from my sight, and ask myself why it will cherish those humble thoughts, and hide its head from me who might, perhaps, be its benefactor, and impart to its race some cheering information, I am reminded of the greater Benefactor and Intelligence that stands over me the human insect.
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The ascent to the divine Life is the human journey, the Work of works, the acceptable Sacrifice. This alone is man's real business in the world and the justification of his existence, without which he would only be an insect crawling among the ephemeral insects on a speck of surface mud and water which has managed to form itself amid the appalling immensities of the physical universe.
I've come to realize that the mark is the primal gesture, the internal connection of the caveman to the cosmos; an impossibility similar to an impulse in an insect's nervous system that it could somehow reduce to dust a steel beam by endlessly crawling over it.
Some people point to me as the cause of all society's problems, others as if I am the benefactor, responsible for everything good, but I am neither the former nor the latter. I am but a man in particular circumstances, and the most beautiful part is that an individual human life is capable of contributing to the growth, the awakening of the collective strength. That is what matters!
Nathan, how can you stand playing the same piece over and over again?" And Grandpa Nate answered, "Why don't you ask me how I can stand making love to the same woman over and over again?
Knowing is a veneer out minds create and lay over the landscape like a painter's drop cloth set upon a forest floor. Its uniformity protects us from the pine needles and beetles, but it also obscures them, as well as the soft moss, fragrant soil, and the teeming complexity of nature's bed. In moments, however, we catch glints and feel the breezes of something more direct, something outside that self system.
I think all those years that I spent as a nurse, from the age of seventeen, just allowed me an insight into human emotion at those times of life when it's so important. And to see and witness those times of grief and love and loss and all those things was such a huge privilege, both in my own personal life, but it also, I think, spills over into my writing. I think the one thing that most novelists have is some degree of emotional intelligence, and if you don't have that, then perhaps you might struggle to be a novelist, because that has to come out somewhere.
The ideal job letter starts with a brilliant light. Then we realize that this brilliant light is actually sunlight, shafts of it, pouring through trees onto a thick bed of pine needles. Soft dusty resin floats in the sun shafts, invitingly. The smell of pine and sap rises from the forest floor. A twig snaps underfoot.
On wet days I will go into the thickest parts of the forest, where the pine needles are everlastingly dry, and when the sun shines I'll lie on the heath and see how the broom flares against the clouds. I shall be perpetually happy, because there will be no one to worry me.
From inanimate object, to microorganism, to plant, to insect, to animal, to human, there is an evolving level of intelligence.
Question all information when you receive it. You might not even trust me Look at me, I've got a blanket over me head.
No insect hangs its nest on threads as frail as those which will sustain the weight of human vanity.
The transformation scene, where man is becoming insect and insect has become at least man and beyond that - a flying, godlike, shimmering, diaphanous, beautiful creature.
I'm obsessed with insects, particularly insect flight. I think the evolution of insect flight is perhaps one of the most important events in the history of life. Without insects, there'd be no flowering plants. Without flowering plants, there would be no clever, fruit-eating primates giving TED Talks.
I worked closely with Steve Peters, the British Cycling team's psychologist, and we came up with a strategy of dealing with the pressure. It basically involved displacing the negative thoughts with visualisation. Not a complicated technique, but very effective if done properly. I just kept running through the race in my head over and over so that I wouldn't let the distractions around me put me off.
At some thoughts one stands perplexed, especially at the sight of men's sin, and wonders whether one should use force or humble love. Always decide to use humble love. If you resolve on that once for all, you may subdue the whole world.
There are some who affect a want of affectation, and flatter themselves that they are above flattery; they are proud of being thought extremely humble, and would go round the world to punish those who thought them capable of revenge; they are so satisfied of the suavity of their own temper that they would quarrel with their dearest benefactor only for doubting it.
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