“If you shake the tree, you can bring down fruit, no doubt; but I remember when a boy that persuasion to get out of bed early was the thought of the large white apples that lay beneath the trees, awaiting the first comer – that had dropped upon the grass in the silent night, almost without a breath of wind to stir the branches. Now, I think every man ought to carry his boughs so full of fruits, that, like the apples which drop from the silent dew, they will fall by the weight of their own ripeness for whoever needs to be refreshed. We should go home to the threshing floor like a great harvest wagon full of sheaves, which at every jolt casts down ears for the gleaners, and stray seeds for the birds, and now and then a chance handful, which, blown by winds into nooks and corners, comes up to grow, and to bless another generation.” H.W. Beecher.