We cannot but pity the boy who has never fired a gun; he is no more humane, while his education has been sadly neglected.
The pleasure of the sportsman in the chase is measured by the intelligence of the game and its capacity to elude pursuit and in the labor involved in the capture.
Unless a man has considerable skill with and reliance in his weapon, he will not remain cool in the presence of dangerous game close by.
In a civilized and cultivated country, wild animals only continue to exist at all when preserved by sportsmen.
If there is a sacred moment in the ethical pursuit of game, it is the moment you release the arrow or touch off the fatal shot.
I kill when I hunt and do not apologize for that, although I reserve the right to think about its implications. I also hunt without killing- whether by accident or design-and I do not apologize for that either. There is room in longbow country for a spectrum of tastes and attitudes, and that is as it should be.
Keep close to Nature's heart... and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean. None of Nature's landscapes are ugly so long as they are wild.
Wild animals never kill for sport. Man is the only one to whom the torture and death of his fellow creatures is amusing in itself.
Every creature is better alive than dead, men and moose and pine trees, and he who understands it aright will rather preserve its life than destroy it.
When a man wants to murder a tiger he calls it sport; when a tiger wants to murder him he calls it ferocity.