Page "John Muir" Paragraph 3

Muir's biographer, Steven J. Holmes, states that Muir has become " one of the patron saints of twentieth-century American environmental activity ," both political and recreational.

As a result, his writings are commonly discussed in books and journals, and he is often quoted in books by nature photographers such as Ansel Adams.

" Muir has profoundly shaped the very categories through which Americans understand and envision their relationships with the natural world ," writes Holmes.

Muir was noted for being an ecological thinker, political spokesman, and religious prophet, whose writings became a personal guide into nature for countless individuals, making his name " almost ubiquitous " in the modern environmental consciousness.

According to author William Anderson, Muir exemplified " the archetype of our oneness with the earth ", while biographer Donald Worster says he believed his mission was "... saving the American soul from total surrender to materialism.