Most men employ the first years of their life in making the last miserable.
—Jean de La Bruyère, 1688Quotes
The thing that impresses me most about America is the way parents obey their children.
—Edward VIII, 1957Even members of the nobility, let alone persons of no consequence, would do well not to have children.
—Yoshida Kenko, c. 1330I shall soon be six-and-twenty. Is there anything in the future that can possibly console us for not being always twenty-five?
—Lord Byron, 1813There comes a time in every rightly constructed boy’s life when he has a raging desire to go somewhere and dig for hidden treasure.
—Mark Twain, 1876I’ve never understood why people consider youth a time of freedom and joy. It’s probably because they have forgotten their own.
—Margaret Atwood, 1976A dissolute and intemperate youth hands down the body to old age in a worn-out state.
—Cicero, 44 BCThe boy is, of all wild beasts, the most difficult to manage.
—Plato, c. 348 BCChildhood has no forebodings—but then, it is soothed by no memories of outlived sorrow.
—George Eliot, 1860The young leading the young is like the blind leading the blind.
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 1747Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt.
—Herbert Hoover, 1936I was born at a very early age. Before I had time to regret it, I was four and a half years old.
—Groucho Marx, 1959Ah, there are no children nowadays.
—Molière, 1673