Henry Beston
Henry Beston
Henry Bestonwas an American writer and naturalist, best known as the author of The Outermost House, written in 1928...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth1 June 1888
CountryUnited States of America
stars night our-world
For a moment of night we have a glimpse of ourselves and of our world islanded in a stream of stars - pilgrims of mortality, voyaging between horizons across the eternal seas of space and time
night sea light
We of the age of the machines, having delivered ourselves of nocturnal enemies, now have a dislike of night itself. With lights and ever more lights, we drive the holiness and beauty of night back to the forests and the sea.
night banishment vulgar
Learn to reverence night and to put away the vulgar fear of it.
stars fear night
Our civilization has fallen out of touch with night. With lights, we drive the holiness and beauty of night back to the forests and the sea; the little villages, the crossroads even, will have none of it. Are modern folk, perhaps, afraid of night? Do they fear that vast serenity, the mystery of infinite space, the austerity of stars?
religious adventure night
Learn to reverence night and to put away the vulgar fear of it, for, with the banishment of night from the experience of man, there vanishes as well a religious emotion, a poetic mood, which gives depth to the adventure of humanity.
night civilization astronomy
Our fantastic civilization has fallen out of touch with many aspects of nature, and with none more completely than with night.
night evil absurd
To know only artificial night is as absurd and evil as to know only artificial day.
animal below caught civilization complete concept creature extensions far fate feather fellow finished form gifted glass greatly image knowledge life living lost man measured move mystical nations net older ours ourselves patronize perhaps prisoners remote sees senses shall splendour taken thereby tragic universal voices wiser
We need another and a wiser and perhaps a more mystical concept of animals. Remote from universal nature, and living by complicated artifice, man in civilization surveys the creature through the glass of his knowledge and sees thereby a feather magnified and the whole image in distortion. We patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having taken form so far below ourselves. And therein we err, and greatly err. For the animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other nations caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners of the splendour and travail of the earth.
becomes personal quality social spring
The quality of life, which in the ardor of spring was personal and sexual, becomes social in midsummer
animal complete extensions finished gifted living lost measured move older ours shall voices
The animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more complete than ours they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions of the sense we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall never hear.
dishonour earth spirit
Do no dishonour to the earth least you dishonour the spirit of man.
answer checks competing economy ethic expect great house human marvel nature sit values
As well expect Nature to answer to your human values as to come into your house and sit in a chair. The economy of nature, its checks and balances, its measurements of competing life-all this is its great marvel and has an ethic of its own.
animal vegetarianism needs
We need another and a wiser and a perhaps more mystical concept of animals.
summer country fall
The leaves fall, the wind blows, and the farm country slowly changes from the summer cottons into its winter woods.