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Celebrate the 51st anniversary of Earth Day with 37 of the best inspirational quotes from Shakespeare, Gandhi, Edison, Thoreau, and others.

The first-ever Earth Day was celebrated on April 22nd, 1970, and this year will mark the holiday’s 51st anniversary. It is also GreenCitizen’s 16th anniversary.

But what is special about Earth Day?

Before the 1960s, there wasn’t much concern about protecting natural resources. Raising awareness began in 1962 with a book by Rachel Carson, Silent Spring, which talked about the dangers of pesticides.

In 1970, Wisconsin Senator Gaylord Nelson and San Francisco activist John Connell separately called the Americans to join in grassroots demonstrations. The response was impressive — 20 million individuals protested together.

This led president Richard Nixon to create the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), which came up with a series of Earth preservation laws.

Today, our planet is showing clear signs of distress and needs us more than ever. In this article, I’m sharing with you 37 Earth Day quotes that give me the inspiration to be better towards our shared home.

I hope you’ll find them inspiring too, and share them with your loved ones.

37 Inspirational Earth Day Quotes

  1. “I felt my lungs inflate with the onrush of scenery—air, mountains, trees, people. I thought, ‘This is what it is to be happy.” –Sylvia Plath
  2. “What is the use of a house if you haven’t got a tolerable planet to put it on?” –Henry David Thoreau
  3. ”Look deep into nature and you will understand everything better.” –Albert Einstein
  4. ”Earth laughs in flowers.” –Ralph Waldo Emerson
  5. “Those who try their best to save the planet will find a loose, cheerful, sexy brass band waiting to honor them right outside the Pearly Gates. What will the band be playing? ‘When the Saints Come Marching In.’” –Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
  6. ”When one tugs at a single thing in nature, he finds it attached to the rest of the world.” –John Muir
  7. ”We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children.” –Native American Proverb
  8. “Away, away, from men and towns, / To the wild wood and the downs, / To the silent wilderness, / Where the soul need not repress its music.” –Percy Bysshe Shelley
  9. “And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair.” –Kahlil Gibran
  10. “Earth rejoices in our words, breathing, and peaceful steps. Let every breath, every word, and every step make the mother earth proud of us.” –Amit Ray
  11. “The only way forward, if we are going to improve the quality of the environment, is to get everybody involved.” – Richard Rogers
  12. “The best friend on earth of man is the tree. When we use the tree respectfully and economically, we have one of the greatest resources on the earth.” – Frank Lloyd Wright
  13. “The environment is where we all meet, where we all have a mutual interest; it is one thing that all of us share. It is not only a mirror of ourselves but a focusing lens on what we can become.” –Lady Bird Johnson
  14. “The Earth is what we all have in common.” –Wendell Berry
  15. “One individual cannot possibly make a difference alone. It is individual efforts, collectively, that makes a noticeable difference — all the difference in the world.” –Dr. Jane Goodall
  16. “Dear old world… You are very lovely, And I am glad to be alive in you.” –Lucy Maud Montgomery
  17. “Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed.” –Mahatma Gandhi
  18. “The proper use of science is not to conquer nature but to live in it.” –Barry Commoner
  19. “The earth has music for those who listen.” –William Shakespeare
  20. “A true conservationist is a man who knows that the world is not given by his fathers, but borrowed from his children.” –John James Audubon
  21. “We need the tonic of wildness — to wade sometimes in marshes where the bittern and the meadow-hen lurk, and hear the booming of the snipe; to smell the whispering sedge where only some wilder and more solitary fowl builds her nest, and the mink crawls with its belly close to the ground.” –Henry David Thoreau
  22. “It seems to me that the natural world is the greatest source of excitement; the greatest source of visual beauty; the greatest source of intellectual interest. It is the greatest source of so much in life that makes life worth living.” –David Attenborough
  23. “A nation that destroys its soils destroys itself. Forests are the lungs of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people.” –Franklin D. Roosevelt
  24. “I believe in God, only I spell it Nature.” –Frank Lloyd Wright
  25. “Nature is painting for us, day after day, pictures of infinite beauty.” –John Ruskin
  26. “To leave the world better than you found it, sometimes you have to pick up other people’s trash.” –Bill Nye
  27. “Flowers are the alphabet of angels, whereby they write on the hills and fields mysterious truths.” –Benjamin Franklin
  28. “One of the first conditions of happiness is that the link between man and nature shall not be broken.” –Leo Tolstoy
  29. “Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.” –George Bernard Shaw
  30. ”… do something. Pay your rent for the privilege of living on this beautiful, blue-green, living Earth.” –Dave Foreman
  31. “The Earth will not continue to offer its harvest, except with faithful stewardship. We cannot say we love the land and then take steps to destroy it for use by future generations.” —John Paul II
  32. “He that plants trees loves others beside himself.” –Thomas Fuller
  33. ”We cannot stop the winter or the summer from coming. We cannot stop the spring or the fall or make them other than they are. They are gifts from the universe that we cannot refuse. But we can choose what we will contribute to life when each arrives.” –Gary Zukav
  34. “Like music and art, love of nature is a common language that can transcend political or social boundaries.” –Jimmy Carter
  35. ”The use of solar energy has not been opened up because the oil industry does not own the sun.” –Ralph Nader
  36. “To cherish what remains of the Earth and to foster its renewal is our only legitimate hope of survival.” –Wendell Berry
  37. ”If you live in harmony with nature you will never be poor; if you live according to what others think, you will never be rich.”— Seneca

Final Thoughts

I hope you’ll celebrate Earth Day by finding inspiration in these quotes as I did. Planet Earth is precious, and every one of us owes it our love and gratitude.

It’s never been more crucial than now to protect our natural resources and live more sustainably. Educate yourself, and never stop gathering information on how to help our environment.

Don’t be scared of making a wrong step. Whether you join your local river cleanup or recycle your old electronics instead of throwing them away, nothing is in vain — every little bit helps.

So be a green citizen today and together, let’s make every day Earth Day.

Marina is passionate about sustainability and works to help ensure our planet stays as our home for a long time. She takes part in environmental conservation by recycling and not buying single-use plastic. When not writing, she can be found with her nose stuck in a book or trying out new baking recipes.

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