What's The Seder All About?

(4) The attendants poured the second cup for the leader of the seder, and here the son asks his father. And if the son does not have the intelligence to ask questions on his own, his father teaches him the questions: a) Why is this night different from all other nights? As on all other nights we eat leavened bread and matza as preferred; on this night all our bread is matza.
b) As on all other nights we eat other vegetables; on this night we eat bitter herbs.
c) As on all other nights we eat either roasted, stewed, or cooked meat, but on this night all the meat is the roasted meat of the Paschal lamb.
d) As on all other nights we dip the vegetables in a liquid during the meal only once; however, on this night we dip twice. And according to the intelligence and the ability of the son, his father teaches him about the Exodus.

He begins with disgrace and concludes with praise. And he expounds from the passage: “An Aramean tried to destroy my father” (Deuteronomy 26:5), the declaration one recites when presenting his first fruits at the Temple, until he concludes explaining the entire section.

WE WERE SLAVES to Pharaoh in Egypt...and the more one tells of the coming out of Egypt, the more admirable it is.

ONCE, Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Yehoshua and Rabbi Elazar ben Azaria and Rabbi Akiva and Rabbi Tarfon reclined [for the seder] in Benei Brak. And they told of the Exodus from Egypt all that night; until their students came in and said, “Teachers – the time for saying the Shema of the morning has come.”

...It happened that Rabban Gamliel and the Elders were [once] reclining in the house of Beitos ben Zunin in Lud, and they were involved with the laws of Pesach the whole night until the call of the rooster. [Their students] raised the covering of the window from in front of them, and they [then] convened and went to the house of study...

One must begin [the narrative describing our ancestors'] disgrace and conclude with [their] praise. What does this imply? One begins relating how originally, in the age of Terach, our ancestors denied [God's existence] and strayed after vanity, pursuing idol worship. One concludes with the true faith: how the Omnipresent has drawn us close to Him, separated us from the gentiles, and drawn us near to His Oneness.
Similarly, one begins by stating that we were slaves to Pharaoh in Egypt and [describing] all the evil done to us, and concludes with the miracles and wonders that were wrought upon us, and our freedom...Whoever adds and extends his extrapolation of this passage is praiseworthy.

Your table should be set from the daytime, in order to eat right away when it becomes dark; And even if he is in the Bet Midrash, he should leave because it is a commandment to hurry and eat (at the seder) for the children who may fall asleep...