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Agriculture

cultivation of plants and animals to provide useful products
(Redirected fromFarmer)

Agriculture,also calledfarmingorhusbandry,is the cultivation ofanimals,plants,fungi, and other life forms forfood,fiber, biofuel,medicinalsand other products used to sustain and enhance human life.

Theagricultural revolutionalso transformed the way humans think abouttime.Seeds are planted in spring to beharvestedinautumn;fields are left fallow so they may be productive the followingyear.Thus farming-based societies created economies ofhopeandaspiration,in which we focus almost unerringly on thefuture,and where the fruits of ourlabourare delayed.
But it’s not only our work that is future-oriented: so much of modern life is a tangle ofsocialgoalsand often-impossibleexpectationsshaping everything from ourlove-livesto ourhealth.Hunter-gatherers, by contrast, onlyworkedto meet their immediateneeds;they neither held themselves hostage to future aspirations, nor claimedprivilegeon the basis ofpastachievements.~ James Suzman

Arranged alphabetically by author or source:
A·B·C·D·E·F·G·H·I·J·K·L·M·N·O·P·Q·R·S·T·U·V·W·X·Y·Z·See also·External links

Quotes

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A

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Ten acres and a mule.
  • Ten acres and a mule.
    • American phrase indicating the expectations of emancipated slaves (1862): Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.

  • Follow,poet,follow right
    To the bottom of the night,
    With your unconstraining voice
    Still persuade us to rejoice;

    With the farming of a verse
    Make a vineyard of the curse,
    Sing of human unsuccess
    In a rapture of distress;

    In the deserts of the heart
    Let the healing fountains start,
    In the prison of his days
    Teach the free man how to praise.

B

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Three acres and a cow. ~Jeremy Bentham
  • Three acres and acow.
    • Jeremy Bentham,Works,Volume VIII, p. 448. Quoted from Bentham by Lord Rosebery. Monologue on Pitt, in Twelve English Statesmen. Referred to by Sir John Sinclair Code of Agriculture, Miscellaneous Essays, 1802. Same idea in Defoe's Tour through the whole Islands of Britain, 6th Ed. Phrase made familiar by Hon. Jesse Collings in the House of Commons, 1886, "Small Holdings amendment": Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19..
  • Look up! the wide extended plain
    Is billowy with its ripenedgrain,
    And on the summer winds are rolled
    Its waves of emerald and gold.
    • William Henry Burleigh,The Harvest Call,Stanza 5: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.

C

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For of all gainful professions, nothing is better, nothing more pleasing, nothing more delightful, nothing better becomes a well-bred man than agriculture.
-Cicero,44 BC
  • When you have decided to purchase a farm, be careful not to buy rashly; do not spare your visits and be not content with a single tour of inspection. The more you go, the more will the place please you, if it be worth your attention. Give heed to the appearance of theneighbourhood,- a flourishing country should show its prosperity. "When you go in, look about, so that, when needs be, you can find your way out."
  • Arbores serit diligens agricola, quarum adspiciet baccam ipse numquam.
    • The diligent farmer plants trees, of which he himself will never see the fruit.
    • Cicero,Tusculanarum Disputationum,I, 14: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • For of all gainful professions, nothing is better, nothing more pleasing, nothing more delightful, nothing better becomes a well-bred man than agriculture.
    • Cicero,De Oficiis(44 BC), Book 1, section 42. Translation by Cyrus R. Edmonds (1873), p. 73.
  • Oculos et vestigia domini, res agro saluberrimas, facilius admittit.
    • He allows very readily, that the eyes and footsteps of the master are things most salutary to the land.
    • Columella,De Re Rustica,IV. 18: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • We must plant theseaand herd itsanimals…using the sea as farmers instead of hunters. That is what civilization is all about — farming replacing hunting.
    • Jacques-Yves Cousteauin Interview (17 July 1971); Cited in: Elizabeth Brubaker et al. (2008)Breath of Fresh Air,p. 180.
  • Farming as we do it ishunting,and in the sea we act likebarbarians.
    • Jacques-Yves Cousteauin Interview (17 July 1971): Cited in: Jane Goodall et al. (2005)Harvest for Hope: A Guide to Mindful Eating.

D

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Agriculture was launched in the Fertile Crescent by the early domestication of eight crops, termed "founder crops" (because they founded agriculture in the region and possibly in the world). Those eight founders were the cerealsemmerwheat,einkorn wheat,andbarley;the pulseslentil,pea,chickpea,andbitter vetch;and the fiber cropflax.Of these eight, only two, flax and barley, range in the wild at all widely outside the Fertile Crescent and Anatolia. ~Jared Diamond
Aristotle,who has taught us most of the wise things we know, never said a wiser thing than that the cultivators of the soil are the class least inclined to sedition and to violent courses. ~Benjamin Disraeli
  • Agriculture was launched in theFertile Crescentby the early domestication of eight crops, termed "founder crops" (because they founded agriculture in the region and possibly in the world). Those eight founders were the cerealsemmerwheat,einkorn wheat,andbarley;the pulseslentil,pea,chickpea,andbitter vetch;and the fiber cropflax.Of these eight, only two, flax and barley, range in the wild at all widely outside the Fertile Crescent andAnatolia.Two of the founders had very small ranges in the wild, chickpea being confined to southeastern Turkey and emmer wheat to the Fertile Crescent itself. Thus, agriculture could arise in the Fertile Crescent from domestication of locally available wild plants, without having to wait for the arrival of crops derived from wild plants domesticated elsewhere. Conversely, two of the eight founder crops could not have been domesticated anywhere in the world except in the Fertile Crescent, since they did not occur wild elsewhere.
    • Jared Diamond,Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies(1997), p. 141
  • Aristotle,who has taught us most of the wise things we know, never said a wiser thing than that the cultivators of the soil are the class least inclined toseditionand to violent courses.

E

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  • The first farmer was the firstman,and all historicnobilityrests on possession and use ofland.
    • Ralph Waldo Emerson,Society and Solitude,Farming:Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.

F

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  • Although no conclusive proof exists thatGMcereals may be harmful tohuman beings,and in some regions their use has brought abouteconomic growthwhich has helped to resolve problems, there remain a number of significant difficulties which should not be underestimated. In many places, following the introduction of these crops, productive land is concentrated in the hands of a few owners due to “the progressive disappearance of small producers, who, as a consequence of the loss of the exploited lands, are obliged to withdraw from directproduction”.The most vulnerable of these become temporary labourers, and many rural workers end up moving to poverty-stricken urban areas. The expansion of these crops has the effect of destroying the complex network ofecosystems,diminishing the diversity of production and affecting regional economies, now and in the future. In various countries, we see an expansion of oligopolies for the production of cereals and other products needed for their cultivation. This dependency would be aggravated were the production of infertile seeds to be considered; the effect would be to force farmers to purchase them from larger producers.
  • The farmer, the guy getting a sloppy-with-somewhat-processed-grass tail whipped across his face, the fellow squatting planting seeds he kept from last year, the fisherman on a wild and rolling sea… these are mypeople,myheroesand my role models. These are the builders, the makers. These are the foundation stone people on which myAustraliaand theUSandCanada(yes there are others, but at least I know a little about those) were built, and still actually stand.

G

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  • We are returned to mystery and the power of cooperating with life—rather than, as so often now, working against it.
  • Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield:
    Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke:
    How jocund did they drive their team a-field!
    How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!
    • Thomas Gray,Elegy in a Country Churchyard,Stanza 7: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.

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There are now about 100,000 different types of protein-producing plants that are almost completely ignored as food staples. These unused protein suppliers are thefungi,which include the yeasts, mushrooms and molds....there are many carbohydrate-containing plants that can be used as food for fungus... in low-protein areas of the world....even wood pulp has been a fair starting material for the protein-manufacturing machinery of theFungi Imperfecti.~ John F. Henahan
Thedomesticationofanimalsandplantstook place thousands of years ago, with different forms springing up independently in different parts of theworldat differenttimes.The Fertile Crescent,China,India,Mesoamerica(central and southernMexicoand adjacent areas), theAndesofSouth Americaand the easternUnited Statesall boastedfood productionfrom a very early time (Diamond, 2005). ~ Arnold van Huis, Joost Van Itterbeeck, Harmke Klunder, Esther Mertens, Afton Halloran, Giulia Muirand, Paul Vantomme
Thehistoricalcontexts in whichplantandanimaldomestication have taken place should also be taken into account. The domestication of large animals (and plants) gaveEuropeansa considerable advantage over other regions, as evidenced by their worldwide conquests (Diamond, 2005). Arnold van Huis, Joost Van Itterbeeck, Harmke Klunder, Esther Mertens, Afton Halloran, Giulia Muirand, Paul Vantomme
  • As valuable as animal protein is, livestock are relatively inefficient protein-making machines....only 23 percent of the protein that a cow takes in ends up as usable protein in itsmeatormilk.Beefcattlepay back about 10 percent... whilepigsreturn 12 percent....Grazing in a pasture, a 1,000-pound cow turns the grass into edible protein at the rate of about a pound a day. The same weight of bacterial organisms... produces 2,750 pounds of protein in the same "grazing" day. Bacteria are also less demanding... they do not care what the weather is and do not need as much personal attention...
    • John F. Henahan,Men and Molecules(1966)
  • There are now about 100,000 different types of protein-producing plants that are almost completely ignored as food staples. These unused protein suppliers are thefungi,which include theyeasts,mushroomsandmolds....there are manycarbohydrate-containing plants that can be used as food for fungus... in low-protein areas of the world....even wood pulp has been a fair starting material for the protein-manufacturing machinery of theFungi Imperfecti.Dr. [William D.] Gray has calculated that if only seven major crops were converted into fungal protein, the protein would meet the yearly needs of more than four and a half billion people.
    • John F. Henahan,Men and Molecules(1966)
  • Farming here often reminds me of the man who when asked to embark upon some rather doubtful business venture replied that if he wanted togamblehe would preferroulette,…where the chances were only 32 to 1 against him.
  • While early American society was an agrarian society, it was fast becoming more commercial, and commercial goals made their way among its agricultural classes almost as rapidly as elsewhere. The more commercial society became, however, the more reason it found to cling in imagination to the noncommercial agrarian values. The more farming as a self-sufficient way of life was abandoned for farming as abusiness,the more merit men found in what was being left behind. And the more rapidly the farmers' sons moved into the towns, the morenostalgicthe whole culture became about its rural past. The American mind was raised upon a sentimental attachment to rural living and upon a series of notions about rural people and rural life that I have chosen to designate as the agrarian myth. The agrarian myth represents a kind of homage that Americans have paid to the fancied innocence of their origins.
    Like any complex of ideas, the agrarian myth cannot be defined in a phrase, but its component themes form a clear pattern. Its hero was the yeoman farmer, its central conception the notion that he is the ideal man and the ideal citizen.
    • Richard HofstadterThe Age of Reform: from Bryan to F.D.R.(1955) Chapter I, part I (p. 23).
  • Beatus ille qui procul negotiis,
    Ut prisca gens mortalium,
    Paterna rura bobus exercet suis,
    Solutus omni fænore.
    • Happy he who far from business, like the primitive race of mortals, cultivates with his own oxen the fields of his fathers, free from all anxieties of gain.
    • Horace,Epodon,Book II. 1: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • Ye rigidPloughmen!bear in mind
    Your labor is for future hours.
    Advance! spare not! nor look behind!
    Plough deep and straight with all your powers!
    • Richard Henry Horne,The Plough:Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • Thehistoricalcontexts in whichplantandanimaldomestication have taken place should also be taken into account. The domestication of large animals (and plants) gaveEuropeansa considerable advantage over other regions, as evidenced by their worldwide conquests (Diamond, 2005).

J

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Cultivators of the earth are the most valuable citizens. They are the most vigorous, the most independant, the most virtuous, and they are tied to their country and wedded to it’s liberty and interests by the most lasting bands. As long therefore as they can find emploiment in this line, I would not convert them into mariners, artisans, or any thing else. But our citizens will find emploiment in this line till their numbers, and of course their productions, become too great for the demand both internal and foreign.~Thomas Jefferson
  • Cultivators of the earth are the most valuable citizens. They are the most vigorous, the most independant, the most virtuous, and they are tied to their country and wedded to it’s liberty and interests by the most lasting bands. As long therefore as they can find emploiment in this line, I would not convert them into mariners, artisans, or any thing else. But our citizens will find emploiment in this line till their numbers, and of course their productions, become too great for the demand both internal and foreign.
    • Thomas Jefferson,letter to John Jay (August 23, 1785); reported inThe Papers of Thomas Jefferson,ed. Julian P. Boyd (1953), vol. 8, p. 426.
  • Earthis here so kind, that just tickle her with a hoe and she laughs with a harvest.
    • Douglas Jerrold,A Land of Plenty(Australia): Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • The life of the husbandman,—a life fed by the bounty of earth and sweetened by the airs of heaven.
    • Douglas Jerrold,Jerrold's Wit,The Husbandman's Life:Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • Englandis the only country in Europe that can boast of having improved its agriculture and the cultivation of its soil beyond that of any other European nation. The condition of English agriculture, compared with that of our own, is like light contrasted with shade.

K

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  • All I saw before me were acres of skin… It was like a farmer seeing a fertile field for the first time.
    • Albert Kligmanas quoted in Allen M. Hornblum. Sentenced to Science: One Black Man's Story of Imprisonment in America, 2007, p. 52.
  • In the earlytwenty-first centuryfarming had all but died out here. We got our food from thesupermarket,and not everybody cared where the supermarket got it as long as it was there on the shelves. A few elderly dairymen hung on. Many let their fields and pastures go to scrub. Some sold out to what used to be called developers, and they'd put in five or ten poorly build houses. Now, in the new times, there were far fewer people, and many houses outside town were being taken down for their materials. Farming was back. That was the only way we got food.

L

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The status ofwomenup to now has been compared to that of aslave;women have been tied to the home, and only socialism can save them from this. They will only be completely emancipated when we change from small-scale individual farming to collective farming and collective working of the land. ~Vladimir Lenin
The proletarian state must effect the transition to collective farming with extreme caution and only very gradually, by the force of example, without any coercion of the middle peasant. ~Vladimir Lenin
  • Your true modern is separated from the land by many middlemen, and by innumerable physical gadgets. He has no vital relation to it; to him it is the space between cities on which crops grow. Turn him loose for a day on the land, and if the spot does not happen to be a golf links or a ‘scenic’ area, he is bored stiff. If crops could be raised by hydroponics instead of farming, it would suit him very well. Synthetic substitutes for wood, leather, wool, and other natural land products suit him better than the originals. In short, land is something he has ‘outgrown.’
  • The status ofwomenup to now has been compared to that of aslave;women have been tied to the home, and only socialism can save them from this. They will only be completely emancipated when we change from small-scale individual farming to collective farming and collective working of the land.
  • Theproletarian statemust effect the transition to collective farming with extreme caution and only very gradually, by the force of example, without any coercion of the middle peasant.

M

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He who owns thesoil,owns up to thesky.
Withoutcompetitionwe would be clinging to the clumsy antiquated processes of farming and manufacture and the methods ofbusinessof long ago, and thetwentiethwould be no further advanced than theeighteenth century.~William McKinley
  • Cujus est solum, ejus est usque ad cœlum.
    • He who owns the soil, owns up to the sky.
    • Law Maxim: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • Withoutcompetitionwe would be clinging to the clumsy antiquated processes of farming and manufacture and the methods ofbusinessof long ago, and thetwentiethwould be no further advanced than theeighteenth century.
    • William McKinleySpeech delivered at the Pan-American Exposition, Buffalo, New York (September 5, 1901).
  • When the land is cultivated entirely by the spade, and no horses are kept, a cow is kept for every three acres of land.
    • John Stuart Mill,Principles of Political Economy, Book II, Chapter VI, Section V. (Quoting from a treatise on Flemish husbandry): Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • It is certain that by a special dispensation of Providence in favor of those who make up the bulk of the human family, a man may secure a simple livelihood in agricultural pursuits, with less of energy, less of promptitude, less of calculation, and greater unthrift generally, than would be compatible with even this scanty aim, in any other calling of life.

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A field becomes exhausted by constant tillage. ~Ovid
  • Continua messe senescit ager.
    • A field becomes exhausted by constant tillage.
    • Ovid,Ars Amatoria,III. 82: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.

P

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  • La terre, elle, ne ment pas [The land, it does not lie].
    • Philippe Pétain,speech (25 June 1940), quoted in Philippe Pétain,Discours aux Français, 17 juin 1940-20 août 1944(Paris: Albin Michel, 1989), p. 66
  • France will become again what she should never have ceased to be—an essentially agricultural nation. Like the giant of mythology, she will recover all her strength by contact with the soil.
    • Philippe Pétain,speech (August 1940), quoted in Pavlos Giannelia, 'France Returns to the Soil',Land and Freedom,Vol. XLI, No. 1, January-February 1941, p. 23 and Eugen Weber, 'France', in Hans Rogger and Eugen Weber (eds.),The European Right: A Historical Profile(University of California Press, 1966), p. 113
  • Majores fertilissium in agro oculum domini esse dixerunt.
    • Our fathers used to say that the master's eye was the best fertilizer.
    • Pliny the Elder,Historia Naturalis,XVIII. 84: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • Our rural ancestors, with little blest,
    Patient of labour when the end was rest,
    Indulg'd the day that hous'd their annual grain,
    With feasts, and off'rings, and a thankful strain.
    • Alexander Pope,Second Book of Horace,Epistle I, line 241: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), "Lemma Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • Where grows?—where grows it not? If vain ourtoil,
    We ought to blame theculture,not thesoil.

R

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  • One major problem inAfricafrom acapitalistviewpoint was how to induce Africans to becomelaborersorcash-cropfarmers. In some areas, such asWest Africa,Africans had become so attached toEuropeanmanufacturesduring the early period of trade that, on their own initiative, they were prepared to go to great lengths to participate in the colonialmoneyeconomy. But that was not the universal response. In many instances, Africans did not consider the monetary incentives great enough to justify changing their way of life so as to become laborer or cash-crop farmers. In such cases, thecolonial stateintervened to uselaw,taxation,and outrightforceto makeAfricanspursue a line favorable to capitalistprofits.When colonial governments seized African lands, they achieved two things simultaneously. They satisfied their owncitizens(who wantedminingconcessions or farmingland) and they created the conditions whereby landless Africans had to work not just to pay taxes but also to survive. In settler areas such asKenyaandRhodesiathecolonial governmentalso prevented Africans from growing cash crops so that their labor would be available directly for thewhites.One of the Kenya white settlers, ColonelGrogan,put it bluntly when he said of theKikuyu:“We have stolen his land. Now we must steal his limbs. Compulsory labor is the corollary of our occupation of the country.”

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[C]onsidered by many as one of the most important technological advances of the20th century.Haber’s breakthrough enabled mass production of agriculturalfertilizersand led to a massive increase in growth ofcropsforhumanconsumption. ~Science History Institute
  • The adverse economic events following theFirst World Warturned me towardeconomics... I learned during my youth how hard it was for farm families to stay solvent. Farm product prices fell abruptly by more than half. Banks went bankrupt and many farmers suffered foreclosures. Waspoliticsoreconomicsto blame? I opted for economics.
  • Most people in theworldarepoor.If we knew the economy of being poor, we would know much of theeconomicsthat really matter. Most of the world's poor people earn their living in agriculture. If we knew the economics of agriculture, we would know much of the economic of being poor.
  • In 1905Haberreached an objective long sought bychemists—that of fixingnitrogenfromair.Atmospheric nitrogen, or nitrogen gas, is relatively inert and does not easily react with other chemicals to form new compounds. Using highpressureand acatalyst,Haber was able to directly react nitrogen gas andhydrogengas to createammonia.His process was soon scaled up byBASF’s great chemist and engineerCarl Boschand became known as theHaber-Bosch process,considered by many as one of the most important technological advances of the20th century.Haber’s breakthrough enabled mass production of agriculturalfertilizersand led to a massive increase in growth ofcropsforhumanconsumption.
  • In 1933, theSovietandNazialternatives todemocracydepended on their rejection of simpleland reform,now the discredited pabulum of the failed democracies. Hitler and Stalin, for all of their many differences, presumed that one root of the problem was the agricultural sector, and that the solution was drastic state intervention. If the state could enact a radical economic transformation, that would then undergird a new kind of political system. TheStalinistapproach, public since the beginning ofStalin’sFive-Year Planin 1928, was collectivization. Soviet leaders allowed peasants to prosper in the 1920s, but took the peasants’ land away from them in the early 1930s, in order to createcollective farmswhere peasants would work for the state.Hitler’s answer to the peasant question was just as imaginative, and just as well camouflaged. Before and even for a few years after he came to power in 1933, it appeared that Hitler was concerned above all with the Germanworking class,and would addressGermany’s lack ofself-sufficiencyin foodstuffs by means of imports. A policy of rapid (and illegal)rearmamentremoved German men from theunemploymentrolls by placing them in barracks or in arms factories. Public works programs began a few months after Hitler came to power. It even appeared that the Nazis would dolessfor German farmers than they had indicated. Though theNazi partyprogram promised the redistribution of land from richer to poorer farmers, this traditional version of land reform was quietly tabled after Hitler became chancellor. Hitler pursued international agreements rather than redistributive agrarian policy. He sought special trade arrangements witheast Europeanneighbors, by which German industrial goods were in effect exchanged for foodstuffs. Hitler’s agricultural policy of the 1930s was a bit likeLenin’s of the 1920s: it was political preparation for a vision of almost unimaginably radical economic change. Both National Socialism and Soviet socialism baited peasants with the illusion of land reform, but involved far more radical plans for their future.
  • And he gave it for his opinion, that whosoever could make two ears ofcornor two blades of grass to grow upon a spot of ground where only one grew before, would deserve better of mankind, and do more essential service to his country, than the whole race ofpoliticiansput together.

How Neolithic farming sowed the seeds of modern inequality 10,000 years agoby James Suzman (2017)

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James Suzman,“How Neolithic farming sowed the seeds of modern inequality 10,000 years ago”,The Guardian,(5 Dec, 2017).
  • The extraordinary productivity of modernfarmingtechniquesbelies just how precariouslifewas for most farmers from the earliest days of theNeolithicrevolution right up until this century (in the case of subsistence farmers in the world’s poorer countries). Both hunter-gatherers and early farmers were susceptible to short-term food shortages and occasionalfamines– but it was the farming communities who were much more likely to suffer severe, recurrent and catastrophic famines.
  • Wherehunter-gathererssaw themselves simply as part of an inherently productiveenvironment,farmersregarded their environment as something to manipulate, tame and control. But as any farmer will tell you, bending an environment to your will requires a lot of work. The productivity of a patch of land is directly proportional to the amount of energy you put into it.
    This principle that hard work is avirtue,and its corollary that individualwealthis a reflection ofmerit,is perhaps the most obvious of theagricultural revolution’s manysocial,economicandculturallegacies.
  • The agricultural revolution also transformed the way humans think abouttime.Seeds are planted in spring to beharvestedinautumn;fields are left fallow so they may be productive the followingyear.Thus farming-based societies created economies ofhopeandaspiration,in which we focus almost unerringly on thefuture,and where the fruits of ourlabourare delayed.
    But it’s not only our work that is future-oriented: so much of modern life is a tangle ofsocialgoalsand often-impossibleexpectationsshaping everything from ourlove-livesto ourhealth.Hunter-gatherers, by contrast, onlyworkedto meet their immediateneeds;they neither held themselves hostage to future aspirations, nor claimedprivilegeon the basis ofpastachievements.
    Understanding how the agricultural revolution transformed human societies was once no more than a question ofintellectualcuriosity.Now, though, it has taken on a morepracticaland urgent aspect. Many of thechallengescreated by the agricultural revolution, such as theproblemofscarcity,have largely been solved bytechnology– yet our preoccupation with hard work and unrestrained economicgrowthremains undimmed.

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In ancient times, the sacredPloughemploy'd
TheKingsand awfulFathersof mankind:
And some, with whom compared yourinsect-tribes
Are but the beings of asummer'sday,
Have held the Scale of Empire, ruled the Storm
Of mighty War; then, with victorious hand,
Disdaining little delicacies, seized
The Plough, and, greatly independent, scorned
All the vile stores corruption can bestow. ~James Thomson
  • In ancient times, the sacred Plough employ'd
    TheKingsand awfulFathersof mankind:
    And some, with whom compared yourinsect-tribes
    Are but the beings of asummer'sday,
    Have held the Scale of Empire, ruled the Storm
    Of mighty War; then, with victorious hand,
    Disdaining little delicacies, seized
    The Plough, and, greatly independent, scorned
    All the vile stores corruption can bestow.
  • Illhusbandrybraggeth
    To go with the best:
    Good husbandry baggeth
    Up gold in his chest.
    • Thomas Tusser,Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry,Chapter LII. Comparing Good Husbandry: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • Illhusbandrylieth
    In prison for debt:
    Good husbandry spieth
    Where profit to get.
    • Thomas Tusser,Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry,Chapter LII. Comparing Good Husbandry: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • He was a very inferior farmer when he first begun,… and he is now fast rising from affluence to poverty.
    • Mark Twain,Rev. Henry Ward Beecher's Farm:Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.

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  • E'en in mid-harvest, while the jocund swain
    Pluck'd from the brittle stalk the golden grain,
    Oft have I seen the war of winds contend,
    And prone on earth th' infuriate storm descend,
    Waste far and wide, and by the roots uptorn,
    The heavy harvest sweep through ether borne,
    As the light straw and rapid stubble fly
    In dark'ning whirlwinds round the wintry sky.
    • Virgil,Georgics(c. 29 BC), I, line 351. Sotheby's translation.

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Blessed be agriculture! if one does not have too much of it. ~Charles Dudley Warner
Whentillagebegins, otherartsfollow. The farmers, therefore, are the founders of humancivilization.~Daniel Webster
  • Blessed be agriculture! if one does not have too much of it.
    • Charles Dudley Warner,My Summer in a Garden,preliminary: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • Whentillagebegins, otherartsfollow. The farmers, therefore, are the founders of humancivilization.
    • Daniel Webster,Remarks on Agriculture,Jan. 13, 1840, p. 457: Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • But let the good old corn adorn
    The hills our fathers trod;
    Still let us, for his golden corn,
    Send up our thanks to God!
    • John Greenleaf Whittier,The Corn-Song:Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • Heap high the farmer's wintry hoard!
    Heap high the golden corn!
    No richer gift has Autumn poured
    From out her lavish horn!
    • John Greenleaf Whittier,The Corn-Song:Quoted inHoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations(1922), Lemma "Agriculture" p. 18-19.
  • I think the initial reason why I became interested in farming is that I wanted to be outdoors. I've always enjoyed being outdoors. And so, I looked around and when I was at high school, probably 14 or so, my parents through friends arranged for me to be able to go work on farms on the weekend.

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  • Agriculture has been and remains a “catastrophe”at all levels, the one which underpins the entire material and spiritual culture ofalienationnow destroying us.Liberationis impossible without its dissolution.

See also

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