Moisture Quotes - Page 2

• The lancet fluke (Dicrocoelium) infects the brain of ants by taking control and driving them to climb to the top of a blade of grass where they can be eaten by a cow. The ingested fluke then lays eggs in the cow gut. Eventually, the eggs exit the cow, and hungry snails eat the dung (and fluke eggs). The fluke enters the snail's digestive gland and gets excreted in sticky slime full of a seething mass of flukes to be drunk by ants as a source of moisture.

  Darrel Ray

  Eggs, Drunk, Brain

  "The God Virus: How Religion Infects Our Lives and Culture". Book by Darrel Ray, 2009.

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• The seed, swollen with moisture, burst asunder its covering of soil and out peers the blade of wheat, full of symbols. So faith, whose bosom is filled with goodly fruits, is a blade of praise.

  Ephrem the Syrian

  Faith, Covering, Peers

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• [On the propulsive force of rockets] One part of fire takes up as much space as ten parts of air, and one part of air takes up the space of ten parts of water, and one part of water as much as ten parts of earth. Now powder is earth, consisting of the four elementary principles, and when the sulfur conducts the fire into the dryest part of the powder, fire, and air increase ... the other elements also gird themselves for battle with each other and the rage of battle is changed by their heat and moisture into a strong wind.

  Vannoccio Biringuccio

  Strong, Science, Space

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• The infinitesimal seedlings became a forest of trees that grew courteously, correcting the distances between themselves as they shaped themselves to the promptings of available light and moisture, tempering the climate and the temperaments of the Scots, as the driest land became moist and the wettest land became dry, seedlings finding a mean between extremes, and the trees constructing a moderate zone for themselves even into what I would have called tundra, until I understood the fact that Aristotle taught, while walking in a botanic garden, that the middle is fittest to discern the extremes.

  William Wilson

  Distance, Mean, Garden

  William S. Wilson (2002). “Why I Don't Write Like Franz Kafka”, p.110, University of Alabama Press

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• It’s easy to plant a seed and sprinkle it with water, but once the sun scorches the ground, and the earth soaks up all the moisture, you’re left with nothing but a thirsty little flower trying desperately to make it out of the dirt.

  Tiffanie DeBartolo

  Women, Flower, Water

  Tiffanie DeBartolo (2017). “God-Shaped Hole: A Novel”, p.65, Sourcebooks, Inc.

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• The world's forests need to be seen for what they are - giant global utilities, providing essential public services to humanity on a vast scale. They store carbon, which is lost to the atmosphere when they burn, increasing global warming. The life they support cleans the atmosphere of pollutants and feeds it with moisture. They act as a natural thermostat, helping to regulate our climate and sustain the lives of 1.4 billion of the poorest people on this Earth.

  Prince Charles

  Life, People, Support

  Prince Charles' Speech to a WWF gala dinner at Hampton Court Palace on the Prince's Rainforests Project, www.theguardian.com. October 26, 2007.

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• When chemists have brought their knowledge out of their special laboratories into the laboratory of the world, where chemical combinations are and have been through all time going on in such vast proportions,-when physicists study the laws of moisture, of clouds and storms, in past periods as well as in the present,-when, in short, geologists and zoologists are chemists and physicists, and vice versa,-then we shall learn more of the changes the world has undergone than is possible now that they are separately studied.

  Louis Agassiz

  Science, Past, Clouds

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• People often ask me, "What's the difference between couplehood and babyhood?" In a word? Moisture. Everything in my life is now more moist. Between your spittle, your diapers, your spit-up and drool, you got your baby food, your wipes, your formula, your leaky bottles, sweaty baby backs, and numerous other untraceable sources-all creating an ever-present moistness in my life, which heretofore was mainly dry.

  Paul Reiser

  Baby, Children, Humorous

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• While all bodies are composed of the four elements, that is, of heat, moisture, the earthy, and air, yet there are mixtures according to natural temperament which make up the natures of all the different animals of the world, each after its kind.

  Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

  Animal, Air, Four Elements

  "De architectura". Book by Vitruvius. Book I, Chapter IV, Section 5,

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• The winter oak... is very useful in buildings but when in a moist place it takes in water to its centre... and so it rots. The Turkey oak and the beech both... take in moisture to their centre and soon decay. White and black poplar, as well as willow, linden, and the agnus castus... are of great service from their stiffness... they are a convenient material to use in carving.

  Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

  Winter, Turkeys, White

  "De architectura (Ten Books on Architecture)". Book by Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (Book II, Chapter IX, Section 9), circa 15 BC.

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• Oak... lasts for an unlimited period when buried in underground structures... when exposed to moisture... it cannot take in liquid on account of its compactness, but, withdrawing from the moisture, it resists it and warps, thus making cracks.

  Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

  Lasts, Liquid, Cracks

  "De architectura (Ten Books on Architecture)". Book by Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (Book II, Chapter IX, Section 8), circa 15 BC.

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• A mouth that has no moisture and no breath
  Breathless mouths may summon;
  I hail the superhuman;
  I call it death-in-life and life-in-death.

  William Butler Yeats

  Greatness, Mouths, May

  "Byzantium" l. 15 (1933)

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• My dad hates umbrellas, said Deeba, swinging her own. When it rains he always says the same thing. 'I do not believe the presence of moisture in the air is sufficient reason to overturn society's usual sensible taboo against wielding spiked clubs at eye level.

  China Mieville

  Dad, Hate, Rain

  ""Un Lun Dun"". Chapter 3, "The Visiting Smoke". Book by China Miéville, 2007.

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• Trees which grow in places facing the course of the sun are not of porous fiber but are solid, being drained by the dryness... The trees in sunny neighborhoods, therefore, being solidified by the compact texture of their fiber, and not being porous from moisture, are very useful, so far as durability goes, when they are hewn into timber. The lowland firs, being conveyed from sunny places, are better than those highland firs, which are brought here from shady places.

  Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

  Tree, Texture, Fiber

  "De architectura (Ten Books on Architecture)". Book by Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (Book II, Chapter X "Highland and Lowland Fir", Section 1), circa 15 BC.

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• Fir : it contains a great deal of air and fire with very little moisture and the earthy, so that, as its natural properties are of the lighter class, it is not heavy. Hence, its consistence being naturally stiff, it does not easily bend under the load, and keeps its straightness when used in the framework. But it contains so much heat that it generates and encourages decay, which spoils it; and it also kindles fire quickly because of the air in its body, which is so open that it takes in fire and so gives out a great flame.

  Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

  Fire, Air, Flames

  "The Ten Books On Architecture". Book by Marcus Vitruvius Pollio, Book II, Chapter IX, Sec. 6, c. 15 BC.

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• The larch... is not only preserved from decay and the worm by the great bitterness of its sap, but also it cannot be kindled with fire nor ignite of itself, unless like stone in a limekiln it is burned with other wood... This is because there is a very small proportion of the elements of fire and air in its composition, which is a dense and solid mass of moisture and the earthy, so that it has no open pores through which fire can find its way... Further, its weight will not let it float in water.

  Marcus Vitruvius Pollio

  Fire, Air, Water

  "De architectura (Ten Books on Architecture)". Book by Marcus Vitruvius Pollio (Book II, Chapter IX, Section 14), circa 15 BC.

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• There's a lot of research that suggests that organic yields are close or superior to conventional yields depending on factors like climate. In a drought year an organic field of corn will yield more - considerably more - than a conventional field; organic fields hold moisture better so they don't need as much water. It simply isn't true that organic yields are lower than conventional yields.

  Michael Pollan

  Yield, Years, Water

  "Michael Pollan Fixes Dinner (Extended Interview)". Interview with Clara Jeffery, www.motherjones.com. March/April 2009.

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• There was a deliberate voluptuousness that was both thrilling and repulsive. And as she arched her neck she actually licked her lips like an animal till I could see in the moonlight the moisture Then lapped the white, sharp teeth. Lower and lower went her head. I closed my eyes in a languorous ecstasy and waited.

  Bram Stoker

  Eye, Animal, White

  Lucy Hartbury, Bram Stoker (2013). “Dracula: The Wild And Wanton Edition”, p.57, Simon and Schuster

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• I once had a leather jacket that got ruined in the rain. Why does moisture ruin leather? Aren't cows outside a lot of the time? When it's raining, do cows go up to the farmhouse, "Let us in! We're all wearing leather! Open the door! We're going to ruin the whole outfit here!"

  Jerry Seinfeld

  Rain, Doors, Leather Jackets

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• And wasn't my mind also like another crib in the depths of which I felt I remained ensconced, even in order to watch what was happening outside? When I saw an external object, my awareness that I was seeing it would remain between me and it, lining it with a thin spiritual border that prevented me from ever directly touching its substance; it would volatize in some way before I could make contact with it, just as an incandescent body brought near a wet object never touches its moisture because it is always preceded by a zone of evaporation.

  Marcel Proust

  Spiritual, Order, Touching

  Marcel Proust (2003). “Swann's Way”, Viking Press

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• Wildfires are a result of temperature conditions, of soil moisture conditions; and, of course, something has to start it.

  John Holdren

  Soil, Temperature, Results

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• Love is like a teacup that every day falls to the ground and breaks to pieces. In the morning the pieces are gathered and with a little moisture and a little warmth, the pieces are glued together, and again there is a little teacup. He who is in love spends life fearing that the terrible day will come when the teacup is so broken that it can no longer mended.

  Subcomandante Marcos

  Morning, Fall, Love Is

  "Our Word Is Our Weapon". Book by Subcomandante Marcos, 2000.

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• If gardeners will forget a little the phrase, "watering the plants" and think of watering as a matter of "watering the earth" under the plants, keeping up its moisture content and gauging its need, the garden will get on very well.

  Henry Beston

  Rain, Garden, Thinking

  Henry Beston, Roger B. Swain (2001). “Herbs and the Earth”, p.123, David R. Godine Publisher

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• During our mortal schooling in submissiveness, we will see the visible crosses that some carry, but other crosses will go unseen. A few individuals may appear to have no trials at all, which, if it were so, would be a trial in itself. Indeed, if, as do trees, our souls had rings to measure the years of greatest personal growth, the wide rings would likely reflect the years of greatest moisture-but from tears, not rainfall.

  Neal A. Maxwell

  Adversity, Years, Tree

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• Character grows in the soil of experience with the fertilization of example, the moisture of ambition, and the sunshine of satisfaction. Character cannot be purchased, bargained for, inherited, rented or imported from afar. It must be home-grown. Purely intellectual development without commensurate internal character development makes as much sense as putting a high-powered sports car in the hands of a teenager who is high on drugs. Yet all too often in the academic world, that's exactly what we do by not focusing on the character development of young people.

  Stephen Covey

  Sports, Teenager, Home

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