Life and Literature / Over two thousand extracts from ancient and modern writers, / and classified in alphabetical order

Say "Yes" and "No" to a child and stick to it. This is the beginning of discipline.

The way to spoil a child is to give it all it wants and require nothing in return. The way to make a child grow up sensible and unselfish is to give it little, and require of it much. For it is not what others do for us that benefits us, but what we do for ourselves and others.

Some one truly said, the best way for a man to train up a child in the way it should go, is to travel that way sometimes himself.

I Kings, i, 6—"His father had not displeased him at any time in saying, 'Why hast thou done so?'"

A young man, as he was going to the place of execution, desired to whisper something into his mother's ear; but when she came, instead of whispering, he bit off her ear, telling her, that it was because she did not chastise him for his faults when a boy, he was brought to such an unhappy end.

Could it be believed that a child should be forced to learn the rudiments of a language which he is never to use, and neglect the writing a good hand, and casting accounts?

—Locke.

Childhood shows the man, as morning shows the day.

—Milton.

Children, a bond of union than which the human heart feels none more endearing.

What children hear at home soon flies abroad.

CHILDREN.

I never hear parents exclaim impatiently, "Children, you must not make so much noise," that I do not think how soon the time may come when, beside the vacant chair, those parents would give all the world, could they hear once more the ringing laughter which once so disturbed them.

—A. E. Kittredge.

Children are certain cares, but uncertain comforts.

What is there in nature so dear to man as his own children?

—Cicero.

The dutifulness of children is the foundation of all virtues.

—Cicero.

—Dryden.

A BAD EXAMPLE.

Whatever parent gives his children good instruction, and sets them at the same time a bad example, may be considered as bringing them food in one hand, and poison in the other.

Children have neither past nor future; and what scarcely ever happens to us, they enjoy the present.

—La Bruyere.

An honorable life is the best legacy a father can leave to his children.

Children should not be flattered, but they should be encouraged. They should not be so praised as to make them vain and proud, but they should be commended when they do well.

Children are excellent physiognomists, and soon discover their real friends.

Dr. Guthrie—He believed—to use his own words—that "where parents will never punish their children, those children will punish them."

From Dr. Guthrie's Memoir.

Indulgence to children breeds ingratitude.

A man who gives his children habits of industry, provides for them better than by giving them a fortune.

Whately.

Choose rather to leave your children well instructed than rich. For the hopes of the learned are better than the riches of the ignorant.

WOULD YOU HAVE ANSWERED SO?

You would not be in a Japanese house long without noticing their extreme politeness, and that this politeness was especially shown by children toward their parents. The one thing that Japanese children must learn is perfect obedience; a child would as soon think of refusing to do a thing altogether, when told, as to ask why he must do it.

A little *  *  * girl, the child of a missionary, was playing in the street with some Japanese children.

"Mary," called her father from the house, "come in."

As she paid no attention, the others thought she had not heard, and began to say to her: "Your august father is calling you," "Your honorable parent is beckoning to you," and so on.

"I don't care," said Mary.

The children stopped playing and looked at her in astonishment. Her father called her again. This time she answered crossly, "I don't want to come in. What for?"

At this the children picked up their playthings and hurried home, talking excitedly all the way. "Rude little foreigner!" "Bad little girl!" they said, and it was a long time before Mary saw anything of her friends again.

Juniors in Japan.

Children—Living jewels, dropped unstained from Heaven.

—Pollock.

Do not confine your children to your own learning, for they were born in another time.

Children are like the to-morrow of society.

—Whately.

Children think not of what is past, nor what is to come, but enjoy the present time, which few of us do.

—Bruyere.

Children—I love these little people; and it is not a slight thing when they, who are so fresh from God, love us.

—Dickens.

Love of children is always the indication of a genial nature, a pure and unselfish heart.

MY CHILDREN.

Children need models rather than critics.

—Joseph Joubert.

Spurgeon said: "With children we must mix gentleness with firmness; they must not always have their own way, but they must not always be thwarted. If we never have headaches through rebuking them, we shall have plenty of heartaches when they grow up. If you yield up your authority once, you will hardly ever get it again."

Parents deserve reproof when they refuse to benefit their children by proper discipline.

My dearest pastime is with children.

Children are poor men's riches.

Nothing has a better effect upon children than praise.

—Sir P. Sidney.

Their Little Needs—It is often asserted that both men and women would be selfish beings but for children. They call out, and refine, and soften the best feelings of the parental heart. Their little needs are so many, and their simple ignorance so affecting, and their very caprices so winning, that love and attention flow out to them almost instinctively.

That must be a hardened nature which can be unmoved by the soft touch, the playful childishness, and the hundred little pranks of a baby.

—Unknown.

You can not expect better manners from your children than you teach them. They imitate instinctively.

MY CHILDREN STILL.

A young preacher recently called upon an eminent Divine, and in the course of conversation asked him how many children he had. "Four, sir," was the reply. At the supper-table, the visitor perceived two beautiful children seated by the side of the mother. Turning to his host, he said, "I thought you had four children, sir: Where are the other two?" Lifting his eyes, the holy man of God pointed upwards, while a sweet smile broke over his countenance. "They are in Heaven," he repeated slowly and calmly; "yet my children still: not dead, but gone before."

Dr. Samuel Johnson once said, "Above all, accustom your children constantly to tell the truth; without varying in any circumstance." A lady who heard him said, "Nay, this is too much, for a little variation in narrative must happen a thousand times a day, if one is not perpetually watching." "Well, madam," said the Doctor, "you ought to be perpetually watching."

He knows not what love is, that has no children.

Children are travelers newly arrived in a strange country; we should therefore make conscience not to mislead them.

IT'S ONLY ME.

A lady had two children—both girls. The elder was a fair child; the younger a beauty, and the mother's pet. Her whole love centered in it. The elder was neglected, while "Sweet" (the pet name of the younger) received every attention that affection could bestow. One day, after a severe illness, the mother was sitting in the parlor, when she heard a childish footstep on the stairs, and her thoughts were instantly with the favorite.

"Is that you, Sweet?" she enquired.

"No, mamma," was the sad, touching reply, "it isn't Sweet: it's only me."

The mother's heart smote her; and from that hour "only me" was restored to an equal place in her affections.

Children are usually what their mothers were, or are.

—Landor.

Be careful to discountenance in children anything that looks like rage and furious anger.

—Tillotson.

Children will grow up substantially what they are by nature—and only that.

—Mrs. Stowe.

St. Luke, xxiv, 29—"Abide with us, for it is toward evening, and the day is far spent."

(Two of the disciples to our Lord on the way to Emmaus.)

DESCRIPTION OF THE PERSON OF JESUS CHRIST.

The following description is alleged to be derived from an ancient manuscript sent by Publius Lentellus, President of Judea, to the Senate of Rome:

LAST SUPPER.

To turn one's back on the Memorial Supper is to disregard the most tender, and loving, and melting of all our Saviour's commandments. It is not needful to know just how obedience will help us. It is enough to know that it was His dying command that we keep it till He come.

—Henry M. Grout.

No man ought to profess the name of Christ who is not willing to do the deeds of Christ.

Our Saviour is represented everywhere in Scripture as the special patron of the poor and afflicted.

—Atterbury.

IS NOT THIS THE CARPENTER?

Mark, vi, 3.

—From Thoughts for Every-day Living.

He that thinks he hath no need of Christ hath too high thoughts of himself. He that thinks Christ can not help him hath too low thoughts of Christ.

—John Mason.

A Christian is the highest style of man.

—Young.

He that is a good man, is three-quarters of his way towards the being a good Christian, wheresoever he lives, or whatsoever he is called.

—South.

—Rev. L. W. Irwin.

As Henry Drummond, on board a government packet, was steaming away from that group of islands known as the New Hebrides, after having visited the missions there, he was asked by a fellow-passenger who had been visiting the islands for a very different purpose, what good the missionary had been to those people. "My dear young man," said Drummond, "only for the missionary, you and I, instead of being in this cabin, would probably by this time have been inside some of those savages, as you call them, who waved us such an affectionate farewell from their shores." Yes, Christianity is now recognized the world over, as foremost among the moral forces that are civilizing the dark corners of the earth. Even Matthew Arnold was forced to admit that there is no civilization without it. "Show me," he said, "ten square miles outside of Christianity where the life of man or woman is safe, and I'll throw over Christianity at once."

—From the Missionary Outlook.

Christmas is truly merry only to those who think of others.

PLENTY OF ROOM.

A visiting bishop, in Washington, was arguing with a senator on the desirability of attending church. At last he put the question squarely: "What is your personal reason for not attending?"

The senator smiled in a no-offense-intended way, as he replied: "The fact is, one finds so many hypocrites there."

Returning the smile, the bishop said:

"Don't let that keep you away, senator; there's always room for one more."

—Evening Post.

Some bring their clothes to church rather than themselves.

Bare communion with a good church can never alone make a good man.

—Dr. South.

HOW THE CHURCH MUST GROW.

It has seemed sometimes in recent years as if the deaths were more than the births. This has brought home to the Church the absolute need of the revival of religion if Christianity is not to perish from the world which it has re-made. The Church is not an establishment in the world, but an encampment. She has no natural increase. She lives only by capture, by winning over from the world the citizens that make her number. One must arm another with the Christian panoply, if the Church is to continue.

—The British Weekly.

HOW TO WARM UP THE CHURCH.

I was once preaching in Scotland, and when I got to the church it was so cold that I could see my breath three feet away, said Rev. D. L. Moody. I said to the "beadle," as they call him:

"Aren't you going to have any heat in this building?"

He said they had no stoves or any other provision for heat.

"Well, how do you expect people to get warm?"

"Oh!" he said, "we expect the pulpit to warm us up."

Note: In Dr. Guthrie's Autobiography, vol. I, page 125—Describing the first church he became pastor of, in Arbirlot, in 1830, he says: "As to stoves, they were never thought of—the pulpit had to keep the people warm."

LATE CHURCH-GOERS.

A minister, observing that some of his people made a practice of coming in very late, and after a considerable part of the sermon was over, determined that they should feel the force of public reproof. One day, therefore, as they entered the place of worship at their usual late hour, the minister, addressing his congregation, said: "But, my hearers, it is time for us now to conclude, for here are our friends just come to fetch us home."

We may easily conjecture what the parties felt at this curious but pointed address.

—Anon.

BOTH KEPT AWAKE IN CHURCH.

When once thy foot enters the church, beware, God is more there than thou; for thou art there only by His permission. Then beware and make thyself all reverence and fear.

—Herbert.

Take the child to church, whether he likes it or not. What he likes has nothing to do with it; what is best for him is the only question.

—Bishop Vincent.

There are two classes of people in the church; the one is made up of those who do the hard work of the church, and the other of those who sit at home and—criticise.

—Lutheran Weekly.

Men are dependent on circumstances, and not circumstances on men.

—Herodotus.

A great merchant was asked by what means he contrived to realize so large a fortune as he possessed. His reply was: "Friend, by one article alone, in which thou may'st deal too if thou pleasest—civility."

Civility is a desire to receive civility, and to be accounted well-bred.

—Rochefoucauld.

The clergyman who lives in the city may have piety, but he must have taste.

—Emerson.

AN IDEAL.

M. in Hampden-Sidney Magazine.

I do not envy a clergyman's life as an easy life, nor do I envy the clergyman who makes it an easy life.

—Dr. Johnson.

A clergyman should never come tired before his people, but rather like an engine when it leaves the round-house, oiled, equipped with fuel and water, and with all its strength waiting to be put forth.

In his last annual report, President Eliot states that the average age of students entering Harvard is eighteen years of age and ten months. He then intimates that if students could be induced to enter college earlier, as they did in Emerson's time, there would be fewer failures.

"Aye gang (always go) wi' them that's better than yerself."

—Old Scotch Saying.

If this was done generally, there would be a levelling up, instead of a levelling down.

Pleasant company shortens the miles.

COMPENSATION.

POOR AND RICH.

Every one must see daily instances of people who complain, from a mere habit of complaining.

—Graves.

A compliment is usually accompanied with a bow, as if to beg pardon for paying it.

—J. C. Hare.

Illuminate me with a ray of your intelligence!

Deference is the most complicate, the most indirect, and the most elegant of all compliments.

Legitimate Sport—Those who fish for compliments deserve to get a bite.

To attempt to advise conceited people is like whistling against the wind.

—Hood.

Never seem wiser, nor more learned, than the people you are with.

I've never any pity for conceited people, because I think they carry their comfort about with them.

Conceit may puff a man up, but never prop him up.

—Ruskin.

Many persons are obliged to their imagination for more than three-fourths of their importance.

Discuss your plans with many, decide on them with few, or by yourself.

Between right and wrong never waver a moment.

—From the German.

Confidence always gives pleasure to the man in whom it is placed.

No one so sure but he may miss.

—Dutch.

Don't cry hurrah till you are over the bridge.

—From the German.

Confidence is a plant of slow growth in an aged bosom.

—Wm. Pitt.

He who knows the road, can ride at full trot.

—From the Italian.

Never put much confidence in those who put no confidence in others.

—Hare.

A good conscience is sometimes sold for money, but never bought with it.

Money dishonestly acquired is never worth its cost, while a good conscience never costs as much as it is worth.

A clear conscience is a good pillow.

—Kingsley.

A quiet conscience makes one so serene!

Conscience is the chamber of justice.

—Origen.

Conscience may be said to be the voice of God within us.

—Aughey.

Conscience, that sound of God in the human heart, whose "still small voice" the loudest revelry can not drown.

—W. H. Harrison.

Consistency—Thou art a jewel!

Do even as you will, that this dispute live not between us as a consuming fire forever!

CONTENTION—AVOIDING OF.

—Plutarch.

"I never complained of my condition but once," said an old man, "when my feet were bare and I had no money to buy shoes; but I met a man without feet, and became contented."

It is right to be contented with what we have, but never with what we are.

—Sir James Mackintosh.

A favorite saying of the beloved Dr. John A. Broaddus was: "It is better to like what you have, than to have what you like."

—Christian Observer.

If you live according to nature, you never will be poor; if according to the world's caprice, you never will be rich.