Quotes by Wendell Berry

But when nothing is valued for what it is, everything is destined to be wasted. Once the values of things refer only to their future usefulness, then an infinite withdrawal of value from the living present has begun. Nothing (and nobody) can then exist that is not theoretically replaceable by something (or somebody) more valuable. The country that we (or some of us) had thought to make our home becomes instead 'a nation rich in natural resources'; the good bounty of the land begins its mechanical metamorphosis into junk, garbage, silt, poison, and other forms of 'waste.' "The inevitable result of such an economy is that no farm or any other usable property can safely be regarded by anyone as a home, no home is ultimately worthy of our loyalty, nothing is ultimately worth doing, and no place or task or person is worth a lifetime's devotion. 'Waste,' in such an economy, must eventually include several categories of humans--the unborn, the old, 'disinvested' farmers, the unemployed, the 'unemployable.' Indeed, once our homeland, our source, is regarded as a resource, we are all sliding downward toward the ashheap or the dump.

Eating with the fullest pleasure - pleasure, that is, that does not depend on ignorance - is perhaps the profoundest enactment of our connection with the world. In this pleasure we experience and celebrate our dependence and our gratitude, for we are living from mystery, from creatures we did not make and powers we cannot comprehend.

And the world cannot be discovered by a journey of miles, no matter how long, but only by a spiritual journey, a journey of one inch, very arduous and humbling and joyful, by which we arrive at the ground at our feet, and learn to be at home.

It may be when we not longer know what to do,
     we have come to our real work,
And that when we no longer know what way to go,
     we have begun our real journey

"It may be that when we no longer know what to do we have come to our real work, And that when we no longer know which way to go we have come to our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings. "

Eating with the fullest pleasure –pleasure, that is, that does not depend on ignorance –is perhaps the profoundest enactment of our connection with the world.  In this pleasure we experience and celebrate our dependence and gratitude, for we are living from mystery, from creatures we did not make and powers we cannot comprehend.

"It may be that when we no longer know what to do, we have come to our

real work, and that when we no longer know which way to go, we have

begun our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed.

The impeded stream is the one that sings."

The Earth is what we all have in common.

Willing to die you give up your will; keep still, until moved by what moves all else, you move.

A teacher's major contribution may pop out anonymously in the life of some ex-student's grandchild.  A teacher, finally, has nothing to go on but faith, a student nothing to offer in return but testimony.