New words are always being born and old ones fading away.

In a garden you can find, quiet thoughts that calm the mind.

gardening is something more than a pastime; it is a religion.

much of gardening is a struggle against the fecundity of Nature.

If you want good roses, sharpen your knife and harden your heart.

in February there is everything to hope for and nothing to regret.

Success and failure, triumph and disaster. That is the rhythm of life in the garden.

Happy is the person who can keep a quiet heart, in the chaos and tumult of this modern world.

Every noble achievement is a dream before it is a reality just as the oak is an acorn before it is a tree.

It has been said that the only reason for leaving England is to give yourself the pleasure of coming back to it.

Life is like a field, where we must gather what we grow, weed or wheat... this is the law, we reap the crop we sow.

While it is February one can taste the full joys of anticipation. Spring stands at the gate with her finger on the latch.

Winter sunshine is a fairy wand touching everything with a strange magic. It is like the smile of a friend in time of sorrow.

Few would dispute with the rose her claim to be the queen of flowers, for where is her equal to be found? Is she not God’s masterpiece?

This is the divine moment when we can hold the fairest blossom of spring in one hand and the sweetest flowers of early summer in the other.

In looking back we remember only the triumphant consummations of each season. Failures and frustrations are forgotten; garden-memories are as perfect as garden-hopes.

....the ancient ritual of the earth; ploughing and planting, reaping and threshing. The fundamental business remains unaltered; it is only the methods and tools that science is changing.

September is the month of maturity; the heaped basket and the garnered sheaf. It is the month of climax and completion. September! I never tire of turning it over and over in my mind. It has warmth, depth and colour. It glows like old amber.

I thought I had finished with romantic adventures, but half-way through life and well past the age for losing one's heart, I was suddenly swept off my feet by a new love, a passionate, tyrannical, all-absorbing emotion: the love of a garden.

Forget the times of trouble, but not the truths they taught. Forget the days of sorrow, but not the strength they brought. Forget the storms you battled through beneath a heavy load - but not the light that led you safely down the unknown road.

I welcome the autumnal chill in the air. There is a stimulation about it. Life moves to a different rhythm. There is a sense of change in the atmosphere and change is good inasmuch as it prevents stagnation. We should grow weary of a summer that never ended.

The trees change their voices in autumn as well as their shapes. No longer do they whisper to one another in muffled tones as they did in summer; they talk in a different leaf-language now. The wind moves through the boughs like fingers drawn across the strings of a harp filling the air with the harsh dry sound of sapless leaves. It is the main theme of the autumn music, this murmuring counterpoint of dead leaves.

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