Vorrede.

to learn from them how they work so diligently in summer and store things away so that they have enough to live on in winter. The little bees do it, as do almost all creatures, down to the smallest mouse, and they carry the surplus from the fields, which would otherwise lie there and spoil, into their homes so that they might live well from it in the cold winter. Yet we humans are so lazy and inattentive that the animals could shame us and say, "You imprudent, lazy humans, learn to keep house from us, and do not be ashamed of it, even though we are so small." Pride, however, which usually comes before a fall, cannot easily permit that a great one learns from a small one. Nevertheless, I have undertaken—to the honor of God and the high authorities, as well as to the dear Fatherland, and in service to my neighbor—to provide good instruction or guidance on how we might, in these still-good times where everywhere throughout all of Germany