What greater restoratives have we poor mortals than a good meal taken in the company of loving friends?

We cannot bring the good old days back but, if we must eat mass-made foods, get laws passed to insist upon its goodness and purity.

The harvest-home or supper is a thing of the past. To those who feel the fascination of the past this may appear sad, but it is not so really for, even while it existed, this surface goodwill was often an empty show.

Unlike most great talkers, the rooks are good workers, too.

Candleford Green was but a small village and there were fields and meadows and woods all around it. As soon as Laura crossed the doorstep, she could see some of these. But mere seeing from a distance did not satisfy her; she longed to go alone far into the fields and hear the birds singing, the brooks tinkling, and the wind rustling through the corn, as she had when a child. To smell things and touch things, warm earth and flowers and grasses, and to stand and gaze where no one could see her, drinking it all in.

Special qualities are required of the essayist. A poem or a novel may spring from the inner consciousness of an author. Reasoning poers must be brought to reinforce imagination.

The wife ought to have the first child and the husband the second, then there wouldn't ever be any more.