Many children, many cares; no children, no felicity.

Many children, many cares; no children, no felicity.

Children should be like waffles--you should be able to throw the first one away.

Children should be like waffles--you should be able to throw the first one away.

It might sound a paradoxical thing to say --for surely never has a generation of children occupied more sheer hours read more

It might sound a paradoxical thing to say --for surely never has a generation of children occupied more sheer hours of parental time --but the truth is that we neglected you. We allowed you a charade of trivial freedoms in order to avoid making those impositions on you that are in the end both the training ground and proving ground for true independence. We pronounced you strong when you were still weak in order to avoid the struggles with you that would have fed your true strength. We proclaimed you sound when you were foolish in order to avoid taking part in the long, slow, slogging effort that is the only route to genuine maturity of mind and feeling. Thus, it was no small anomaly of your growing up that while you were the most indulged generation, you were also in many ways the most abandoned to your own meager devices by those into whose safe-keeping you had been given.

There are only two things a child will share willingly: communicable diseases and his mother's age.

There are only two things a child will share willingly: communicable diseases and his mother's age.

Give me a child for the first seven years, and you may do what you like with him afterwards.

Give me a child for the first seven years, and you may do what you like with him afterwards.

What a cunning mixture of sentiment, pity, tenderness, irony surrounds adolescence, what knowing watchfulness! Young birds on their first flight read more

What a cunning mixture of sentiment, pity, tenderness, irony surrounds adolescence, what knowing watchfulness! Young birds on their first flight are hardly so hovered around.

Children are our most valuable natural resource.

Children are our most valuable natural resource.

The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible, and achieve it, generation after read more

The young do not know enough to be prudent, and therefore they attempt the impossible, and achieve it, generation after generation. -Pearl S. Buck.

I don't know why I did it, I don't know why I enjoyed it, and I don't know why I'll read more

I don't know why I did it, I don't know why I enjoyed it, and I don't know why I'll do it again.