The Gift of Good Land has been resting on my living room coffee table for more than a year now, waiting patiently for my occasional bursts of reading and my even more occasional writing. Nearing its end now, I have scant recollection of the early essays and themes. But I was struck a week ago upon realizing that the book's last quarter is most decidedly not about the gift of good land. It's about something more common and more rare. And more necessary for us to apprehend.