How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
Jethro did not actually visualize the grim possibilities that faced him. He was still too much of a child, still insufficiently acquainted with violence, to believe that bodily harm could possibly come to him. (5.171)
Guess we're not as grown up as we think we are. And ignorance is most certainly bliss. All that violence that Jethro is not acquainted with yet will eventually catch up to him and then it'll be "so long, childhood" for Jeth.
Quote #5
If someone had asked Jethro to name a time when he left childhood behind him, he might have named that last week of March in 1862. He had learned a great deal about men and their unpredictable behavior the day he drove alone to Newton; now he was to learn what it meant to be the man of a family at ten. (6.16)
A lot of changes happen all at once for Jethro, and most are brought on sooner than normal. It's like the Express Lane to adulthood. We'll allow that Jethro is no longer solely a child at this point, but at age ten, he is still very far from being a man. And yet he is expected to perform the tasks of a man. Which brings Ed Turner to say…
Quote #6
"You kin count on me fer whatever help I kin spare, Jeth, and whatever counsel. You air young fer what's ahead—and I don't like to see a boy made a man too soon…" (6.18)
Like a good neighbor, Ed Turner's there. Ed knows that it's not going to be an easy ride for Jethro, and he even suggests that there is something heartbreaking about a boy being stripped of his childhood.