Children sweeten labors, but they make misfortunes more bitter.—They increase the cares of life, but they mitigate the remembrance of death.
—Francis Bacon (1561–1626) English Philosopher
Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted.
—Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian Revolutionary Leader
Of all nature’s gifts to the human race, what is sweeter to a man than his children?
—Cicero (106BCE–43BCE) Roman Philosopher, Orator, Politician, Lawyer
Children will not remember you for the material things you provided but for the feeling that you cherished them.
—Richard L. Evans (1906–71) American Mormon Religions Leader
Children aren’t happy with nothing to ignore, and that’s what parents were created for.
—Ogden Nash (1902–71) American Writer of Sophisticated Light Verse
The child is the father of the man.
—William Wordsworth (1770–1850) English Poet
Children are the hands by which we take hold of heaven.
—Henry Ward Beecher (1813–87) American Clergyman, Writer
How full and rich a world
Theirs to inhabit is—
Sweet scent of grass and bloom,
Playmates’ glad symphony,
Cool touch of western wind,
Sunshine’s divine caress.
How should they know or feel
They are in darkness?
But, oh, the miracle!
If a Redeemer came,
Laid finger on their eyes—
One touch and what a world,
New-born in loveliness!
—Israel Zangwill (1864–1926) English Playwright, Novelist, Zionist Activist
Children, taught either years beneath their intelligence or miles wide of relevance to it, or both: their intelligence becomes hopelessly bewildered, drawn off its centers, bored, or atrophied.
—James Agee (1909–55) American Journalist, Poet, Screenwriter, Film Critic
What is done to children, they will do to society.
—Karl Menninger (1893–1990) American Psychiatrist
It is not a bad thing that children should occasionally, and politely, put parents in their place.
—Colette (1873–1954) French Novelist, Performer
It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones.
—The Holy Bible Scripture in the Christian Faith
So long as little children are allowed to suffer, there is no true love in this world.
—Isadora Duncan (1877–1927) American Dancer, Choreographer
A child’s education should begin at least one hundred years before he is born.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–94) American Physician, Essayist
Too many parents are not on spanking terms with their children.
—Indian Proverb
A rich child often sits in a poor mother’s lap.
—Danish Proverb
All women should know how to take care of children. Most of them will have a husband some day.
—Franklin P. Jones
What children hear at home soon flies abroad
—Thomas Fuller (1608–61) English Cleric, Historian
When you put faith, hope, and love together, you can raise positive kids in a negative world.
—Zig Ziglar (1926–2012) American Author
With children… it is a fact that most parents criticize children more than they laud or congratulate them. We tend to be quick to criticize, slow to praise. We should be careful to keep the praise and the expectations far ahead of the criticism.
—Unknown
There never was a child so lovely but his mother was glad to get him to sleep.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
No man can tell but he that loves his children, how many delicious accents make a man’s heart dance in the pretty conversation of those dear pledges; their childishness, their stammering, their little angers, their innocence, their imperfections, their necessities, are so many little emanations of joy and comfort to him that delights in their persons and society.
—Jeremy Taylor
You may chisel a boy into shape, as you would a rock, or hammer him into it, if he be of a better kind, as you would a piece of bronze. But you cannot hammer a girl into anything. She grows as a flower does.
—John Ruskin (1819–1900) English Writer, Art Critic
Children are our most valuable natural resource.
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964) 31st American President
Those lives are, indeed, narrow and confined which are not blessed with several children.
—John Burroughs (1837–1921) American Naturalist, Writer
The smallest children are nearest to God, as the smallest planets are nearest the sun.
—Jean Paul (1763–1825) German Novelist, Humorist
A toddling little girl is a center of common feeling which makes the most dissimilar people understand each other.
—George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans) (1819–80) English Novelist
Of nineteen out of twenty things in children, take no special notice; but if, as to the twentieth, you give a direction or command, see that you are obeyed.
—Tryon Edwards American Theologian
With children we must mix gentleness with firmness.—They must not always have their own way, but they must not always be thwarted.—If we never have headaches through rebuking them, we shall have plenty of heartaches when they grow up.—Be obeyed at all costs; for if you yield up your authority once, you will hardly get it again.
—Charles Spurgeon (1834–92) English Baptist Preacher
The finest inheritance you can give to a child is to allow it to make its own way, completely on its own feet.
—Isadora Duncan (1877–1927) American Dancer, Choreographer
Sons have always a rebellious wish to be disillusioned by that which charmed their fathers.
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963) English Humanist, Pacifist, Essayist, Short Story Writer, Satirist
Your little child is your only true democrat.
—Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811–96) American Abolitionist, Author
Children are excellent physiognomists, and soon discover their real friends.—Luttrell calls them all lunatics, and so in fact they are.—What is childhood but a series of happy delusions?
—Sydney Smith (1771–1845) English Clergyman, Essayist, Wit
I love these little people; and it is not a slight thing, when they, who are so fresh from God, love us.
—Charles Dickens (1812–70) English Novelist
What the best and wisest parent wants for his own child that must the community want for all its children.
—John Dewey (1859–1952) American Philosopher, Psychologist, Educator
Winning children (who appear so guileless) are children who have discovered how effective charm and modesty and a delicately calculated spontaneity are in winning what they want.
—Thornton Wilder (1897–1975) American Novelist, Playwright
To bring up a child in the way he should go, travel that way—yourself once in a while.
—Josh Billings (Henry Wheeler Shaw) (1818–85) American Humorist, Author, Lecturer
Ah! what would the world be to us If the children were no more?. We should dread the desert behind us Worse than the dark before.
—Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (1807–82) American Poet, Educator, Academic
Children are unpredictable. You never know what inconsistency they’re going to catch you in next.
—Franklin P. Jones
Childhood has no forebodings; but then it is soothed by no memories of outlived sorrow.
—George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans) (1819–80) English Novelist
The best way to make children good is to make them happy.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
The child’s grief throbs against its little heart as heavily as the man’s sorrow; and the one finds as much delight in his kite or drum, as the other in striking the springs of enterprise, or soaring on the wings of fame.
—Edwin Hubbell Chapin (1814–80) American Preacher, Poet
I never see any difference in boys. I only know two sorts of boys. Mealy boys and beef-faced boys.
—Charles Dickens (1812–70) English Novelist
If you want children to keep their feet on the ground, put some responsibility on their shoulders.
—Pauline Phillips (Abigail van Buren) (b.1918) American Columnist
It always grieves me to contemplate the initiation of children into the ways of life when they are scarcely more than infants.—It checks their confidence and simplicity, two of the best qualities that heaven gives them, and demands that they share our sorrows before they are capable of entering into our enjoyments.
—Charles Dickens (1812–70) English Novelist
Little girl’s definition of conscience: “Something that makes you tell your mother before your brother or sister does.”
—Unknown
Heaven lies about us in our infancy! Shades of the prison-house begin to close upon the growing boy.
—William Wordsworth (1770–1850) English Poet
Adults are obsolete children.
—Theodor Seuss Geisel (‘Dr. Seuss’) (1904–91) American Children’s Books Writer, Writer, Cartoonist, Animator
What guides us is children’s response, their joy in learning to dance, to sing, to live together. It should be a guide to the whole world.
—Yehudi Menuhin (1916–99) American-born British Violinist, Conductor
The glory of the nation rests in the character of her men. And character comes from boyhood. Thus every boy is a challenge to his elders. It is for them that we must win the war-it is for them that we must make a just and lasting peace. For the world of tomorrow, about which all of us are dreaming and planning, will be carried forward by the boys of today.
—Herbert Hoover (1874–1964) 31st American President