Richard Jefferies quotes:

A kestrel can and does hover in the dead calm of summer days, when there is not the faintest breath of wind. He will, and does, hover in the still, soft atmosphere of early autumn, when the gossamer falls in showers, coming straight down as if it were raining silk.

The 'crownd' is still the unit, the favourite coin of the labourers, especially the elder folk. They use the word something in the same sense as the dollar, and look with regret upon the gradual disappearance of the broad silver disc with the figure of 'St. Gaarge' conquering the dragon.

An inspiration - a long, deep breath of the pure air of thought - could alone give health to the heart.

Science, as illustrated by the printing press, the telegraph, the railway, is a double-edged sword. At the same moment that it puts an enormous power in the hands of the good man, it also offers an equal advantage to the evil disposed.

The cottages erected by farmers or by landlords are now, one and all, fit and proper habitations for human beings; and I verifly believe it would be impossible throughout the length and breadth of Wiltshire to find a single bad cottage on any large estate, so well and so thoroughly have the landed proprietors done their work.

Grief falls upon human beings as the rain, not selecting good or evil, visiting the innocent, condemning those who have done no wrong.

Almost every labourer has his Sunday suit, very often really good clothes, sometimes glossy black, with the regulation 'chimney pot'. His unfortunate walk betrays him, dress how he will.

It would seem that the ant works its way tentatively, and, observing where it fails, tries another place and succeeds.

To the darkness and the night, the spirits seem to have a natural claim - it is their realm; the boldest of us have sometimes felt an unaccountable creeping in the thick darkness.

This sunlight linked me through the ages to that past consciousness.

No tyrant, however evil, has yet lacked ready hands to execute his most abominable will. To read how eagerly men have rushed to serve the despot is the bitterest, the saddest matter of history; it is the saddest sight in our own day.

The old Greeks dwelt on the tendency of human affairs to drift downwards irresistibly to unhappiness. Guilt - that is, untoward and often involuntary actions - pulls generation after generation heavily as lead down, down, down.

When even the most strictly logical mind looks round and investigates the phenomena attending its own existence, perhaps the first fact to attract attention by its strongly marked prominence is the remarkable loneliness of man. He stands alone.

The lover of nature has the highest art in his soul.

I believe in the human form; let me find something, some method, by which that form may achieve the utmost beauty.

That I may have the soul-life, the soul-nature, let divine beauty bring to me divine soul.

If every plant and flower were found in all places, the charm of locality would not exist. Everything varies, and that gives the interest.

Look at another person while living; the soul is not visible, only the body which it animates. Therefore, merely because after death the soul is not visible is no demonstration that it does not still live.

Some, I verily believe, delight to be slave-men; it is a joy to them, and they would not change their condition; not only miserable village wretches, but men in good position, well-to-do sycophants.

Every woman likes her own way, but no woman can endure to see another woman master even over a man who does not concern her.

The heart looks into space to be away from earth.

It is quite true that women like courage, and that boldness often goes a long way; but it is questionable whether with high-bred natures a subdued, quiet, and delicate manner does not go still further.

Beauty - what is beauty, forsooth? Form and color; that is, surface only. Fortune - what is fortune? Nothing is ever a pleasure or a real profit to him who has to labour for it. Truth - you die in the pursuit, and the sea beats the beach as it did a thousand years ago. The stolid are alone happy.

There are people in this servile world who will endure any trampling, and at the first beck rush delightedly to proffer their assistance.

The heart has a yearning for the unknown, a longing to penetrate the deep shadow and the winding glade, where, as it seems, no human foot has been.

The impression left after watching the motions of birds is that of extreme mobility - a life of perpetual impulse checked only by fear.

I desire a greatness of soul, an irradiance of mind, a deeper insight, a broader hope.

The workman in the true sense of the word - the artist in guns - is either extinct, or hidden in an obscure corner. There is no individuality about modern guns. One is exactly like another.

The labourer's muscle is that of a cart-horse, his motions lumbering and slow.

To the soul, there is no past and no future; all is, and will be ever, in now. For artificial purposes time is mutually agreed on, but there is really no such thing.

Many labourers can trace their descent from farmers or well-to-do people, and it is not uncommon to find here and there a man who believes that he is entitled to a large property in Chancery, or elsewhere, as the heir.

Ever since the world began, it has been the belief of mankind that desolate places are the special haunt of supernatural beings.

A man, to read, must read alone. He may make extracts, he may work at books in company; but to read, to absorb, he must be solitary.

I have observed that almost all those whose labour lies in the field, and who go down to their business in the green meadows, admit the animal world to a share in the faculty of reason. It is the cabinet makers who construct a universe of automatons.

I must stay under the old tree in the midst of the long grass, the luxury of the leaves, and the song in the very air. It seems as if I could feel all the glowing life the sunshine gives and the south winds calls into being.

O beautiful human life! Tears come to my eyes as I think of it. So beautiful, so inexpressibly beautiful! The song should never be silent, the dance never still, the laugh should sound like water which runs forever.