4 quotations linked to The Mountains of California by or associated with John Muir, with source notes, explanations and related topics.
Mountains, wilderness travel, risk, firsthand observation, beauty, sunlight, language and Muir’s invitation to encounter landscapes directly.
Use these links when you want to inspect the wording in its wider work or edition.
“Fear not, therefore, to try the mountain-passes.”
The invitation encourages experience beyond familiar safety while following Muir’s argument that wilderness danger should not automatically prevent exploration.
The Mountains of California, immediately after Muir’s comparison of mountain hazards with the risks of home.
“How glorious a greeting the sun gives the mountains!”
The exclamation turns sunrise into an event worth deliberate attention, expressing Muir’s habit of treating ordinary natural processes as occasions for wonder.
The Mountains of California, in a passage describing morning light on the mountains.
“Few places in this world are more dangerous than home.”
Muir uses deliberate provocation to challenge exaggerated fear of wilderness by comparing mountain risk with dangers accepted without notice in ordinary life.
The Mountains of California; the surrounding paragraph discusses hazards in the mountains and fear of leaving home.
“But the best words only hint its charms. Come to the mountains and see.”
Description has limits; Muir ultimately directs the reader toward firsthand experience because language can only approximate the landscape’s effect.
The Mountains of California, in Muir’s description of mountain forest scenery.
