One does not hunt in order to kill; on the contrary, one kills in order to have hunted. If one were to present the sportsman with the death of the animal as a gift, he would refuse it. What he is after is having to win it, to conquer the surly brute through his own effort and skill with all the extras this carries with it; the immersion in the countryside, the healthfulness of the exercise, the distraction from his job, and so on…

- “Meditations on Hunting” by Jose Ortega y Gasset.

People want nothing but mirrors around them. To reflect them while they’re reflecting too. You know, like the senseless infinity you get from two mirrors facing each other across a narrow passage. Usually in the more vulgar kind of hotels. Reflections of reflections and echoes of echoes. No beginning and no end. No center and no purpose.

-The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand

The mere fair-weather hunter, who trusts entirely to the exertion of others, and does nothing more than ride or walk about under favorable circumstances, and shoot at what somebody else shows him, is a hunter in name only. Whoever would really deserve the title must be able at a pinch to shift for himself, to grapple with the difficulties and hardships of wilderness life unaided, and not only to hunt, but at times to travel for days, whether on foot or on horseback, alone.

- Theodore Roosevelt

When you have shot one bird flying you have shot all birds flying. They are all different and they fly in different ways but the sensation is the same and the last one is as good as the first.

- Ernest Hemingway

There is a passion for hunting something deeply implanted in the human breast.

- Charles Dickens

Hell, I even thought I was dead ’til I found out it was just that I was in Nebraska.

- Unforgiven (1992)

We shall never achieve harmony with land, any more than we shall achieve absolute justice or liberty for people. In these higher aspirations, the important thing is not to achieve but to strive.

- Aldo Leopold