Simple living is a topic that often brings out the worst in both its advocates and its detractors. Proponents are inclined to preach simple living with the zeal of the converted, using it as a big stick with which to beat those who question them about the head and shoulders. And skeptics look for cheap points to make against its advocates, determined to sniff out the slightest hint of pietism, legalism, pride, or—most especially—hypocrisy.
As with most of the things we advocate, we're not here to pick a fight about simple living, or even to present it as the One Best Way. Whether or not it represents a superior way of life, we think that it definitely represents a body of wisdom that addresses an important component of the good life: contentment.
A primary cause of discontent is the ineffectiveness of complex modern solutions. We put less effort and money into obtaining our food than ever, but it doesn't taste like much. We schedule quality time with our children, and discover that both we and they would prefer to pursue our own interests. We send our children to the shiniest, liveliest, meatiest school or youth program in town, and they come home sarcastic, disrespectful, and puffed up with what passes for knowledge over there.
For each of the complex modern solutions there is a simpler, older alternative, a way of life that some call agrarianism. And here's the good news—you don't have to sign up for the whole program in order to enjoy some of the benefits. We have forgotten so much that exploring this topic is like walking through an orchard where the trees hang heavy with an abundance of low-hanging fruit, ready for the picking. Not all of it will be useful to you—perhaps almost none of it will—but the bits you do find useful will repay your studies many times over.
Agrarianism didn't used to be a little-known philosophy, it was once a way of life—in fact, it was once the way of life. Throughout history, the vast majority of people made their living by subsistence farming. Until 1830, nine out of ten Americans lived and worked on a family farm that provided for nearly all their needs. Even those who plied a trade also raised gardens and livestock to supply most of their food.
Then came the Industrial Revolution, and suddenly it was imperative to get people out of the business of providing for themselves and into the business of operating factory machines. The transition was complex and sporadic and in many ways mysterious. Even by 1900 more than half the population was still down on the farm, and there was a growing concern among thinking people that the agrarian way of life needed to be preserved and protected against the pressures of industrialism. But as with so many other things, well-intentioned concern was not enough, and by 1990 there were so few family farms that the U.S. Census Bureau stopped keeping statistics on them.
More surprising than the shift from the farm to the factory is the shift in attitude towards farm life. Two hundred years ago, the American ideal was a multi-generational home economy, where parents and children and grandparents would work their own land to provide what they needed to live comfortably, plus a bit more to be traded for things they weren't able or didn't care to produce. Nowadays such a life would be considered hellish, an unbroken stretch of drudgery and back-breaking labor, and we give heartfelt thanks that we have been delivered from the bondage of living off the land.
I honestly don't know if the agrarian life is the best one, or if the recent shift away from it is merely a rocky path to a better existence. Christian foes of agrarianism never tire of pointing out that the New Jerusalem is portrayed in scripture as a garden-city. It may be that a fusion of agrarianism and urbanism lies ahead of us, one that takes the best of each and leaves the rest behind. However, I do know that in the shift from agrarianism to industrialism we have abandoned many important elements of the good life. More important, this abandonment was not accidental but deliberate. The independence, the contentment, the relaxed pace, and the family-centeredness of agrarian life are all directly opposed to the regimentation, the consumerism, the time-is-money attitude and the individualism it takes to make an industrial society run efficiently, and so industrialists needed it abandoned.
Perhaps the agrarian way of life can be reclaimed, and perhaps not. Perhaps we shouldn't try. But I think it is important to know exactly what what we lost in the transition away from the agrarian life. Whether those things are inextricably tied to agrarian living, or whether they can be cultivated in an urban environment, we can't do anything at all if we don't know what those things are. The books we have selected will teach you some things about agrarian living, and they will counter some lies that industrialism finds convenient to propagate. Hopefully, they will stimulate your own thinking about these matters, and spur you on to seek out some of the good things they celebrate.
Most important, agrarian living makes for a fascinating and thought-provoking study. As you read through the books we offer you'll find a different way of living, another path to the good life, and by pondering the ways in which your life differs from the simple life (perhaps for the better), you'll develop a deeper understanding of why you do the things you do—and perhaps a desire to do some of them differently.