The very souls of children readily receive the impressions of those things that are dropped into them while they are yet but soft. _Plutarch_
As babes will sigh for deep content When their sweet hearts for peace make room, As given, not lent. _Jean Ingelow_
Childhood soberly she wears, Taking hold of woman's cares Through love's outreach, unawares. _Lucy Larcom_
I searched for love through many a weary mile, Till, sick and weary, to my homestead turning Thou earnest to greet me with a mother's smile And there upon thy dearest features burning I saw that love I long had sought in vain. _Heine_
And still the children listed, their blue eyes Fixed on their mother's face in wide surprise. _Matthew Arnold_
So we will not sell the Baby! Your gold and gems and stuff, Were they ever so rare and precious Would never be half enough! For what would we care, My Dearie, What glory the world put on, If our beautiful darling was going, If our beautiful darling was gone. _Selected_
The happy children! Full of frank surprise, And sudden whims and innocent ecstacies: What Godhead sparkles from their liquid eyes. _Edmund Gosse_
In him woke With his first babe's first cry, the noble wish To save all earnings to the uttermost, And give his child a better bringing up Than his had been, or hers. _Tennyson_
Children have more need of models than of critics. _Joubert_
I wait for my story--the birds cannot sing it, Not one as he sits on his tree; The bells can not ring it, but long years oh, bring it Such as I wish it to be. _Jean Ingelow_
Thou who didst not erst deny The mother-joy to Mary mild, Blessed in the blessed child. Which hearkened in meek babyhood Her cradle hymn, albeit used To all that music interfused In breasts of angels high and good. _Mrs. Browning_
So sits the while at home the mother well content. _Robert Louis Stevenson_
What use to me the gold and silver hoard? What use to me the gems most rich and rare? Brighter by far--aye, bright beyond compare, The joys my children to my heart afford. _From the Japanese_
Never to living ears came sweeter sounds Than when I heard thee, by our own fireside First uttering, without words, a natural tune While thou, a feeding babe, didst in thy joy Sing at thy mother's breast. _Wordsworth_