Thoreau on Wilderness

The wilderness is near as well as dear to every man. Even the oldest villages are indebted to the border of wild wood which surrounds them, more than to the gardens of men. There is something indescribably inspiriting and beautiful in the aspect of the forest skirting and occasionally jutting into the midst of new towns, which, like the sand-heaps of fresh fox-burrows, have sprung up in their midst. The very uprightness of the pines and maples asserts the ancient rectitude and vigor of nature. Our lives need the relief of such a background, where the pine flourishes and the jay still screams.

-Henry David Thoreau
"A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers" in The Writings of Henry David Thoreau, vol. 1, p. 179, Houghton Mifflin (1906)., 1849