http://www.naturefocused.com/archives/view.php?name=jmt/101_0121
This is a picture of Lyell Canyon in Yosemite National Park just as the sun is starting to hit the mountains. This picture would most likely look a lot different if John Muir had not been such an advocate for making and saving national parks.
I feel a connection with Muir in many ways. His love of nature and descriptive writings transport me to where ever he may be writing about. I can feel his passion and love for the beauty and awe-inspiring things nature creates.
Muir had a spiritual connection to nature and had the belief that God can be and is revealed through nature. I agree with that belief 100%. Most of the times I have felt the deepest connected with God was when I was out in nature. Whether I was laying on a dock by a lake or deep in the mountains in Skagway, Alaska there were moments where there was no doubt in my mind that 1. there was a God and 2. the He was there with me. http://www.pbs.org/
This is a picture I took on a train ride through the mountains in Skagway, Alaska this summer. Alaska was the most beautiful place I have ever been in my life. It was almost overwhelming at times. I feel priviledged to say that I have experienced some the beauty and magnatude that this continent has to offer. Mountains in every direction as far as your eyes could see. Rushing rivers, glaciers, snowcapped mountains, trees soaring to the heavens, giganitc boulders of granit, seals and whales coming up from the water, and bald eagles soaring through the sunny clear sky. No tall buildings, or traffic, or pollution. Just nature at its best. Not being torn down for highways and buildings.Muir's love and passion for nature is clear in his writings. He says things like "the colors and lines and expressions of this divine landscape-countenance are so burned into mind and heart they surely can never grow dim." And, "The whole landscape showed design, like man's noblest sculptures. How wonderful the power of its beauty! Gazing awe-stricken, I might have life everything for it." The passion he has in his writings bleeds off the pages. (Muir pg. 56)
It is this kind of passion that helped John Muir to get congress to pass legislation through in 1890 to make Yosemite a National Park. Muir was called the "Guardian of Yosemite" because of his love for the park. Also because of his determination to get the park to have the national park title and the protection that is provided by being given the national park title. (history1800s.about.com, www.nytimes.com)
Without John Muir not only would we not have Yosemite but people would not understand the importance of conserving some of our countries most beautiful sites to see. Without nature we can not live and I think that people forget that. Without trees we can not breathe, with out the sun and the moon the world won't turn, and with out oceans, lakes, rivers, and ponds we would not have water. God put everything on this planet for a reason. And everything natural on this planet is made to help us live even if its only to make us sit back, take a breath, and relax in this crazy busy world we live in.
The Literary West. John Muir. Pg. 55-59
http://history1800s.about.com/od/americanoriginals/a/johnmuirbio.htm
http://www.nytimes.com/learning/general/onthisday/bday/0421.html
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/americanmasters/episodes/john-muir-in-the-new-world/read-a-biographical-essay-john-muir-natures-witness/1806/
