Edward Abbey

You can't study the darkness by flooding it with light.
Edward Abbey

Wilderness is not a luxury but a necessity of the human spirit.
Edward Abbey

Abolition of a woman's right to abortion, when and if she wants it, amounts to compulsory maternity: a form of rape by the State.
Edward Abbey

A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government.
Edward Abbey

Civilization is a youth with a molotov cocktail in his hand. Culture is the Soviet tank or L.A. cop that guns him down.
Edward Abbey

A drink a day keeps the shrink away.
Edward Abbey

Climbing K2 or floating the Grand Canyon in an inner tube; there are some things one would rather have done than do.
Edward Abbey

Grown men do not need leaders.
Edward Abbey

Belief in the supernatural reflects a failure of the imagination.
Edward Abbey

For myself I hold no preferences among flowers, so long as they are wild, free, spontaneous. Bricks to all greenhouses! Black thumb and cutworm to the potted plant!
Edward Abbey

Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.
Edward Abbey

One man alone can be pretty dumb sometimes, but for real bona fide stupidity, there ain't nothin' can beat teamwork.
Edward Abbey

The idea of wilderness needs no defense, it only needs defenders.
Edward Abbey

That which today calls itself science gives us more and more information, and indigestible glut of information, and less and less understanding.
Edward Abbey

May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view. May your mountains rise into and above the clouds.
Edward Abbey

If the end does not justify the means - what can?
Edward Abbey

What is the purpose of the giant sequoia tree? The purpose of the giant sequoia tree is to provide shade for the tiny titmouse.
Edward Abbey

Love implies anger. The man who is angered by nothing cares about nothing.
Edward Abbey

Our 'neoconservatives' are neither new nor conservative, but old as Bablyon and evil as Hell.
Edward Abbey

Taxation: how the sheep are shorn.
Edward Abbey

Power is always dangerous. Power attracts the worst and corrupts the best.
Edward Abbey

Our culture runs on coffee and gasoline, the first often tasting like the second.
Edward Abbey

There is science, logic, reason; there is thought verified by experience. And then there is California.
Edward Abbey

Anarchism is founded on the observation that since few men are wise enough to rule themselves, even fewer are wise enough to rule others.
Edward Abbey

Say what you like about my bloody murderous government,' I says, 'but don't insult me poor bleedin' country.
Edward Abbey

Society is like a stew. If you don't stir it up every once in a while then a layer of scum floats to the top.
Edward Abbey

The tragedy of modern war is that the young men die fighting each other - instead of their real enemies back home in the capitals.
Edward Abbey

When a man's best friend is his dog, that dog has a problem.
Edward Abbey

The missionaries go forth to Christianize the savages - as if the savages weren't dangerous enough already.
Edward Abbey