Luther Burbank

Those who are making history seldom have time to record it.

— Luther Burbank

Nature has time without limit, but man has immediate need for better and still better food, houses and clothing, and our present state of civilization depends largely upon the improvements of plants and animals which have consciously and half-consciously been made by man, and future civilization must more and more depend upon scientific efforts to this end.

— Luther Burbank

Sex is not a necessary attribute of all living things.. [it is] a most necessary attribute if progress in evolution of new forms is to occur, as they have progressed through the ages and as we now see them progressing on this planet.

— Luther Burbank

Power to vary in plants or animals is itself a feature as readily transmissible as is stability of character. The quality of varying to meet varying environments is therefore one of the hereditary traits which the plant breeder must consider, and which may itself be extended or overcome by the processes of crossing and selection.

— Luther Burbank

It is increasingly necessary to impress the fact that there are two distinct lines in the improvement of any race: the environment which brings individuals up to their best possibilities; the other, ten thousand times more important and effective, selection of the best individuals through a series of generations.

— Luther Burbank

To the gardener who goes about his task with the right spirit must every plant appear as the most wonderful of laboratories in which miracles of transformation, outmatching the utmost feats of the most skillful conjurer, are being performed every hour.

— Luther Burbank

The essential basis of life itself, namely, , is a substance composed largely of water and having the physical constitution of a viscid liquid.

— Luther Burbank

In manufacturing food for its own cells, the plant is producing a supply of food that will be available for the sustenance of animal cells also. Thus the entire animal World may be said to be a vast parasitic colony as absolutely dependent upon the vegetable colony for its essential food supplies as any other parasite is dependent upon its host.

— Luther Burbank

The most interesting thing in the world, from the standpoint of animal economy—which of course includes human economy—is the wonderful laboratory or factory of the plant...

— Luther Burbank

The plant laboratories in which this wonderful and vitally essential transformation is effected are chiefly located in the leaf of the plant... the thoughtful person must regard this structure—the most ordinary green leaf of tree or shrub or vine or the tiniest blade of grass—as in some respects the most wonderful thing in the world.

— Luther Burbank

When the wise plant developer goes into his garden or orchard... his eyes turn always first and foremost to the leaves...

— Luther Burbank

No one at all understands why it is possible for the plant cell that bears within its substance one of these green bodies to combine certain inorganic elements into nutritious foods, a feat that no human chemist can perform.

— Luther Burbank

During the course of many years of investigation into the plant life of the world, creating new forms, modifying old ones, adapting others to new conditions, and blending still others, I have constantly been impressed with the similarity between the organization and development of plant and human life.

— Luther Burbank

The mere crossing of species, unaccompanied by selection, wise supervision, intelligent care, and the utmost patience, is not likely to result in marked good, and may result in vast harm. Unorganized effort is often most vicious in its tendencies.

— Luther Burbank

Let me lay emphasis on the opportunity now presented in the United States for observing and, if we are wise, aiding in what I think it fair to say is the grandest opportunity ever presented of developing the finest race the world has ever known out of the vast mingling of races brought here by immigration.

— Luther Burbank

There is not a single desirable attribute which, lacking in a plant, may not be bred into it. Choose what improvement you wish in a flower, a fruit, or a tree, and by crossing, selection, cultivation, and persistence you can fix this desirable trait irrevocably.

— Luther Burbank

Pick out any trait you want in your child... By surrounding this child with sunshine from the sky and your own heart, by giving the closest communion with nature, by feeding this child well-balanced, nutritious food, by giving it all that is implied in healthful environmental influences, and by doing all in love, you can thus cultivate in the child and fix there for all its life all of these traits.

— Luther Burbank

In child rearing environment is equally essential with heredity.

— Luther Burbank

When certain hereditary tendencies are almost indelibly ingrained, environment will have a hard battle to effect a change in the child; but that a change can be wrought by the surroundings we all know. The particular subject may at first be stubborn against these influences, but repeated application of the same modifying forces in succeeding generations will at last accomplish the desired object in the child as it does in the plant.

— Luther Burbank

But with those who are mentally defective—ah, here is the hardest question of all!—what shall be done with them? ...In the case of human beings in whom the light of reason does not burn... shall they be eliminated from the race? Go to the mother of an imbecile child and get your answer. ...For these helpless unfortunates, as with those who are merely unfortunate from environment, I should enlist the best and broadest state aid.

— Luther Burbank

For those who do not think, it is best at least to rearrange their prejudices once in a while.

— Luther Burbank

The secret of improved plant breeding, apart from scientific knowledge, is love.

— Luther Burbank

We must return to nature and nature's god.

— Luther Burbank

I see humanity now as one vast plant, needing for its highest fulfillment only love, the natural blessings of the great outdoors, and intelligent crossing and selection.

— Luther Burbank

We must return to nature and nature's god.

— Luther Burbank

Justice, love, truth, peace and harmony, a serene unity with science and the laws of the universe.

— Luther Burbank

Flowers always make people better, happier, and more helpful; they are sunshine, food and medicine for the soul.

— Luther Burbank