Before I got married I had six theories about bringing up children; now I have six children and no theories.

John Wilmot

As we read the school reports on our children, we realize a sense of relief that can rise to delight that thank Heaven—nobody is reporting in this fashion on us.

J B Priestley

Most of the things we do, we do for no better reason than that our fathers have done them or our neighbors do them, and the same is true of a larger part than what we suspect of what we think.

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

You can do anything with children if you only play with them.

Prince Otto von Bismarck

Having children makes you no more a parent than having a piano makes you a pianist.

Michael Levine

Parents must get across the idea that "I love you always, but sometimes I do not love your behavior."

Amy Vanderbilt

If a child lives with approval, he learns to live with himself.

Dorothy Law Nolte

Allow children to be happy in their own way, for what better way will they ever find?

Samuel Johnson

Don't limit a child to your own learning, for he was born in another time.

Rabbinic saying

Every adult needs a child to teach; it's the way adults learn.

Frank A. Clark

The most effective kind of education is that a child should play amongst lovely things.

Plato

Children need models rather than critics.

Joseph Joubert Persees

The only reason I always try to meet and know the parents better is because it helps me to forgive their children.

Louis Johannot, Headmaster, Institut Le Rosey, Switzerland

When we are planning for posterity, we ought to remember that virtue is not hereditary.

Thomas Paine

Kids today learn a lot about getting to the moon, but very little about getting to heaven.

David Jeremiah

Loving a child doesn’t mean giving in to all his whims; to love him is to bring out the best in him, to teach him to love what is difficult.

Nadia Boulanger