"Trees perspire profusely, condense largely, and check evaporation so much, that woods are always moist: no wonder therefore that they contribute much to pools and streams. That trees are great promoters of lakes and rivers appears from a well known fact in North-America; for, since the woods and forests have been grubbed and cleared, all bodies of water have much diminished; so that some streams, that were very considerable a century ago, will not now drive a common mill."

"The best time to plant a tree was thirty years ago; the second best time is today"

"To plant trees is an act of faith."

"The place is all Awave with trees, Limes, myrtles, purple-beaded, Acacias having drunk the lees Of the night-dew, faint headed, And wan, grey olive-woods, which seem The fittest foliage for a dream."

"Stranger, if thou hast learned a truth which needs No school of long experience, that the world Is full of guilt and misery, and hast seen Enough of all its sorrows, crimes and cares, To tire thee of it, enter this wild wood And view the haunts of Nature. The calm shade Shall bring a kindred calm, and the sweet breeze That makes the green leaves dance, shall waft a balm To thy sick heart."

"The groves were God's first temples. Ere man learned To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave, And spread the roof above them,—ere he framed The lofty vault, to gather and roll back The sound of anthems; in the darkling wood, Amidst the cool and silence, he knelt down And offered to the Mightiest solemn thanks And supplication."

"Oh, leave this barren spot to me! Spare, woodman, spare the beechen tree!"

"Es ist dafür gesorgt, dass die Bäume nicht in den Himmel wachsen."

"Where is the pride of Summer,—the green prime,— The many, many leaves all twinkling?—three On the mossed elm; three on the naked lime Trembling,—and one upon the old oak tree! Where is the Dryad's immortality?"

"Nullam vare, sacra vite prius arborem."

"I think that I shall never scan A tree as lovely as a man. * * * * A tree depicts divinest plan, But God himself lives in a man."

"He that planteth a tree is the servant of God, He provideth a kindness for many generations, And faces that he hath not seen shall bless him."

"Lo que soñó la tierra/es visible en el árbol."

"A birch tree doesn't feel cosmic fulfillment when a moose munches its leaves; the tree species, in fact, evolves to fight the moose, to keep the animal's munching lips away from vulnerable young leaves and twigs. In the final analysis, the merciless hand of natural selection will favor the birch genes that make the tree less and less palatable to the moose in generation after generation. No plant species could survive for long by offering itself as unprotected fodder."

"Now rings the woodland loud and long, The distance takes a lovelier hue, And drowned in yonder living blue The lark becomes a sightless song."

"The woods are hush'd, their music is no more; The leaf is dead, the yearning past away; New leaf, new life—the days of frost are o'er; New life, new love, to suit the newer day: New loves are sweet as those that went before: Free love—free field—we love but while we may."

"Cedar, and pine, and fir, and branching palm, A sylvan scene, and as the ranks ascend Shade above shade, a woody theatre Of stateliest view."

"We, the trees. Our roots run all the way down to the heart of the earth, and we can feel the beat of her pulse. We inhale her breath. We taste her flesh. We live and die in the exact same spot, never moving from the land we occupy. Both prisoners and conquerors of time, we stand riveted to the ground yet soaring upward, reaching for the clouds. We adapt to all weathers, rain or shine, hurricanes or the dry harmattan winds. Our crowns merge with the sky's cotton-wool dreams. We are the link between Man and his past, his present, and his unpredictable future."

"It is not so much for its beauty that the forest makes a claim upon men's hearts, as for that subtle something, that quality of air that emanates from old trees, that so wonderfully changes and renews a weary spirit."

"Trees — especially old trees — have a strong and definite individuality, well worthy the name of a soul. This soul, though temporary, in the sense that it is not yet a reincarnating entity, is nevertheless possessed of considerable power and intelligence along its own lines. It has decided likes and dislikes, and to clairvoyant sight it shows quite clearly by a vivid rosy flush an emphatic enjoyment of the sunlight and the rain, and distinct pleasure also in the presence of those whom it has learnt to like, or with whom it has sympathetic vibrations. Emerson appears to have realised this, for he is quoted in Hutton’s Reminiscences as saying of his trees: "I am sure they miss me ; they seem to droop when I go away, and I know they brighten and bloom when I go back to them and shake hands with their lower branches.”"

"O, the mulberry-tree is of trees the queen! Bare long after the rest are green; But as time steals onwards, while none perceives Slowly she clothes herself with leaves — Hides her fruit under them, hard to find. ***** But by and by, when the flowers grow few And the fruits are dwindling and small to view — Out she comes in her matron grace With the purple myriads of her race; Pull of plenty from root to crown, Showering plenty her feet adown. While far over head hang gorgeously Large luscious berries of sanguine dye, For the best grows highest, always highest, Upon the mulberry-tree."

"The laurell, meed of mightie conquerours And poets sage; the firre that weepeth still; The willow, worne of forlorne paramours; The eugh, obedient to the bender's will; The birch, for shafts; the sallow for the mill; The mirrhe sweete-bleeding in the bitter wound; The warlike beech; the ash for nothing ill; The fruitfull olive; and the platane round; The carver holme; the maple seldom inward sound."

"A barren detested vale, you see it is; The trees, though summer, yet forlorn and lean, O'ercome with moss and baleful mistletoe."

"Earlier this year in , I got to visit the oldest tree on the planet. It’s a giant ', southern cousin to California’s s, that was recently dated at 5400 years old. The Chilean National Park Service is taking good care of this elder, only allowing a handful of visitors each week (you make your appointment with the tree online), and it’s quite a hike to get there. When I reached its feet, I burst into tears. No human thoughts are appropriate to existence on that scale. I could only picture fires and earthquakes and and empires rising and collapsing, so much noise, while that tree has stood quietly in its . I’m still vibrating from my communion with this giant life. Survival on that order can help you believe in a future."

"Who am no more but as the tops of trees, Which fence the roots they grow by and defend them."

"One impulse from a vernal wood May teach you more of man, Of moral evil and of good, Than all the sages can."

"A brotherhood of venerable Trees."

"If aught possess thee from me, it is dross, Usurping ivy, brier, or idle moss; Who, all for want of pruning, with intrusion Infect thy sap and live on thy confusion."

"From the acorn, quickly sprouting, Mighty Tursas, tall and hardy, Grows the oak-tree, tall and stately, Pressed compactly all the grasses, From the ground enriched by ashes, That the maidens had been raking, Newly raked by water-maidens; When a fire within them kindles, Spread the oak-tree's many branches, And the flames shot up to heaven, Rounds itself a broad corona, Till the windrows burned to ashes, Raises it above the storm-clouds; Only ashes now remaining Far it stretches out its branches, Of the grasses raked together. Stops the white-clouds in their courses, In the ashes of the windrows, With its branches hides the sunlight, Tender leaves the giant places, With its many leaves, the moonbeams, In the leaves he plants an acorn, And the starlight dies in heaven."

"The earth brought forth vegetation, plants yielding seed according to their own kinds, and trees bearing fruit in which is their seed, according to its kind. And God saw that it was good."

"Thou shalt not destroy the trees thereof by forcing an axe against them: for thou mayest eat of them, and thou shalt not cut them down (for the tree of the field is man's life)."

"In the place where the tree falleth, there it shall be."

"The tree is known by his fruit."

"Spreading himself like a green bay-tree."

"Happy is the man … his delights is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water, that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither."

"The fruitage of the righteous one is a tree of life, and the one who wins souls is wise."

"Expectation postponed makes the heart sick, but a desire realized is a tree of life."

"The angel cried with a loud voice, saying, Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees."

"The trees are coming into leaf Like something almost being said; The recent buds relax and spread, Their greenness is a kind of grief.Is it that they are born again And we grow old? No, they die too. Their yearly trick of looking new Is written down in rings of grain.Yet still the unresting castles thresh In fullgrown thickness every May. Last year is dead, they seem to say, Begin afresh, afresh, afresh."

"Lightly the breath of the spring wind blows,"

"A great acacia, with its slender trunk And overpoise of multitudinous leaves, (In which a hundred fields might spill their dew And intense verdure, yet find room enough) Stood reconciling all the place with green."

"Light-leaved acacias, by the door, Stood up in balmy air, Clusters of blossomed moonlight bore, And breathed a perfume rare."

"Our rocks are rough, but smiling there Th' acacia waves her yellow hair, Lonely and sweet, nor loved the less For flow'ring in a wilderness."

"I said to the almond tree: "Speak to me of God." and the almond tree blossomed."

"I heard the bells from the future churches, the children playing and laughing in the schoolyards … and here was an almond tree in bloom before me: I must reach out and cut a flowering branch. For, by believing passionately in something which still does not exist, we create it. The nonexistent is whatever we have not sufficiently desired, whatever we have not irrigated with our blood to such a degree that it becomes strong enough to stride across the somber threshold of nonexistence."

"The ash her purple drops forgivingly And sadly, breaking not the general hush; The maple swamps glow like a sunset sea, Each leaf a ripple with its separate flush; All round the wood's edge creeps the skirting blaze, Of bushes low, as when, on cloudy days, Ere the rain falls, the cautious farmer burns his brush."

"THE quiet of the evening hour Was laid on every summer leaf; That purple shade was on each flower, At once so beautiful, so brief, Only the aspen knew not rest, But still, with an unquiet song, Kept murmuring to the gentle west, And cast a changeful shade along."

"What whispers so strange at the hour of midnight, From the aspen leaves trembling so wildly? Why in the lone wood sings it sad, when the bright Full moon beams upon it so mildly?"

"Some boundless contiguity of shade."