Excerpt from Wayside Notes and Fireside Thoughts The contents of Fireside Thoughts have been written at various times, and called forth by various circumstances. Whatever else may be said of these poems and essays, I think I can safely promise that no reader will be made the worse by their perusal and, it may be, the less experienced may find in them some lessons of wisdom. Under many difficulties have these Wayside Notes and Fireside Thoughts been finally prepared for the publisher, and the author sends them forth with the prayer that they may not be wholly barren of good results. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.