quotations about gardens & gardening
The flower that blooms in adversity is the most rare and beautiful of all.
RITA HSIAO
Mulan
I walk down the garden paths,
And all the daffodils
Are blowing, and the bright blue squills.
I walk down the patterned garden-paths
In my stiff, brocaded gown.
With my powdered hair, and jewelled fan,
I too am a rare
Pattern. As I wander down
The garden paths.
AMY LOWELL
Patterns
A garden is not a place: it is a passage, a passion. We don't know where we're going; to pass through is enough; to pass through is to remain.
OCTAVIO PAZ
"A Tale of Two Gardens"
The gardener gives space and freedom to young plants, that they may grow and spread forth their sweet branches, and so should masters provide indulgence for the young, who, by oblation, are planted in the garden of the church, that they increase and bear fruit to God.
ST. ANSELM
attributed, Day's Collacon
The best way to raise a successful garden is by trowel and error.
EVAN ESAR
20,000 Quips & Quotes
Though an old man, I am but a young gardener.
THOMAS JEFFERSON
letter to Charles W. Peale, August 20, 1811
Odd as I am sure it will appear to some, I can think of no better form of personal involvement in the cure of the environment than that of gardening. A person who is growing a garden, if he is growing it organically, is improving a piece of the world. He is producing something to eat, which makes him somewhat independent of the grocery business, but he is also enlarging, for himself, the meaning of food and the pleasure of eating.
WENDELL BERRY
The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays
The chief objection to gardening is that by the time your back gets used to it, your enthusiasm is gone.
BOB PHILLIPS
Phillips' Treasury of Humorous Quotations
Every resident of village or suburb who owns or occupies a rod square of mother earth, should have a garden; it pays largely in health and pleasure.
D. D. T. MOORE
attributed, Day's Collacon
A garden is like a big family. The plants all live and grow together. Some are big. Some are small. But all of them are special. All of them have a story.
MARY A. AGRIA
Second Leaves
Sometimes when you think the storm is coming to rain on your parade, it's actually there to water your garden.
ANONYMOUS
Once learn how Nature gardens for herself, and you will be able to spare yourself a good deal of trouble.
ALFRED AUSTIN
The Garden that I Love
A person cannot love a plant after he has pruned it, then he has either done a poor job or is devoid of emotion.
LIBERTY HYDE BAILEY
The Pruning-Book
Gardening is like the rest of life--there's a fine line between optimism and lunacy.
CONNIE CRONLEY
Poke a Stick at It: Unexpected True Stories
The art of gardening is like the art of writing, of painting, of sculpture; it is the art of composing, and making a harmony, with disparate elements.
IAN HAMILTON FINLAY
Ian Hamilton Finlay: Selections
No one can rightly call his garden his own unless he himself made it.
ALFRED AUSTIN
The Garden that I Love
In almost every garden, the land is made better and so is the gardener.
ROBERT RODALE
attributed, A Garden of Inspiration
The less help you have in your garden, the more it belongs to you.
EVAN ESAR
20,000 Quips & Quotes
A garden always has a point.
ELIZABETH HOYT
The Raven Prince
I go into the garden with a spade, and dig a bed, I feel such an exhilaration and health that I discover that I have been defrauding myself all this time in letting others do for me what I should have done with my own hands.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
oration read before the Mechanics' Apprentices' Library Association at the Masonic Temple in Boston, MA, "Man the Reformer"