Slightly reactionary quote...

[T]here is no reason, art should gain the point of honour of our great and puissant mother Nature. We have so much by our inventions, surcharged the beauties and riches of her works, that we have altogether over-choked her: yet wherever her purity shineth, she makes our vain and frivolous enterprises wonderfully ashamed.
-MONTAIGNE, 'OF THE CANNIBALs', FROM THE ESSAYS, TRANSLATED BY JOHN FLORIO, 1603