Echoes

Parents love their children as themselves; for their issue are by virtue of their separate existence a sort of other selves.

It is a wise father that knows his own child.

Nothing has a stronger influence psychologically on their environment and especially on their children than the unlived life of the parent.

Men are what their mothers made them.

Mother's arms are made of tenderness, and sweet sleep blesses the child who lies within.

He who is in love is wise and is becoming wiser, sees newly every time he looks at the object beloved, drawing from it with his eyes and his mind those virtues which it possesses.

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, and though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.

There is a love of wild Nature in everybody, an ancient mother-love ever showing itself whether recognized or no, and however covered by cares and duties.

A friend is one soul abiding in two bodies.

Brothers, have no fear of men's sin. Love a man even in his sin, for that is the semblance of Divine Love and is the highest love on earth. Love all God's creation, the whole of it and every grain of sand in it. Love every leaf, every ray of God's light. Love the animals, love the plants, love everything. If you love everything, you will perceive the divine mystery in things. Once you have perceived it, you will begin to comprehend it better every day, and you will come at last to love the world with an all-embracing love. Love the animals: God has given them the rudiments of thought and untroubled joy. So do not trouble it, do not harass them, do not deprive them of their joy, do not go against God's intent. Man, do not exhale yourself above the animals: they are without sin, while you in your majesty defile the earth by your appearance on it, and you leave the traces of your defilement behind you — alas, this is true of almost every one of us! Love children especially, for like the angels they too are sinless, and they live to soften and purify our hearts, and, as it were, to guide us. Woe to him who offends a child. My young brother asked even the birds to forgive him. It may sound absurd, but it is right none the less, for everything, like the ocean, flows and enters into contact with everything else: touch one place, and you set up a movement at the other end of the world. It may be senseless to beg forgiveness of the birds, but, then, it would be easier for the birds, and for the child, and for every animal if you were yourself more pleasant than you are now. Everything is like an ocean, I tell you. Then you would pray to the birds, too, consumed by a universal love, as though in ecstasy, and ask that they, too, should forgive your sin. Treasure this ecstasy, however absurd people may think it.

The family is the test of freedom; because the family is the only thing that the free man makes for himself and by himself.

You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed.

The first bond of society is the marriage tie; the next, our children; then the whole family of our house.

Nature never did betray the heart that loved her.

The soul is healed by being with children.

I was not aware that a father who is a glutton and a drunkard can beget moderate and virtuous children. Nor did I know, though I know it now, that the food which cannot be digested kills, while that which is digested sustains life.

It is in deep solitude that I find the gentleness with which I can truly love my brothers. The more solitary I am, the more affection I have for them.

To be a good mother — a woman must have sense, and that independence of mind which few women possess who are taught to depend entirely on their husbands. Meek wives are, in general, foolish mothers; wanting their children to love them best, and take their part, in secret, against the father, who is held up as a scarecrow.

Nature everywhere speaks to man in a voice familiar to his soul.

Not in utter nakedness, but trailing clouds of glory do we come from God, who is our home.

True love is like ghosts, which everyone talks about but few have seen.

Love children especially, for they too are sinless like the angels; they live to soften and purify our hearts and as it were to guide us.

My Soul gave me good counsel, teaching me to love what the people abhor and to show good will toward the one they hate. It showed me that Love is a property not of the lover but of the beloved. Before my Soul taught me, Love was for me a delicate thread stretched between two adjacent pegs, but now it has been transformed into a halo; its first is its last, and its last is its first. It encompasses every being, slowly expanding to embrace all that ever will be.

If a man should importune me to give a reason why I loved him, I find it could no otherwise be expressed, than by making answer: because it was he, because it was I.

In peace, sons bury their fathers. In war, fathers bury their sons.