“Too often, I think, children are required to write before they have anything to say. Teach them to think and read and talk with self-repression, and they will write because they cannot help it.”

“Children require guidance and sympathy far more than instruction.”

“I am beginning to suspect all elaborate and special systems of education. They seem to me to be built up on the supposition that every child is a kind of idiot who must be taught to think.”

“Is it not true, then, that my life with all its limitation touches at many points the life of the World Beautiful? Everything has its wonders, even darkness and silence, and I learn, whatever state I may be, therein to be content.”

“Let's not talk about it any more, but if you still want anything please write to me about it, because I can say what I mean much better on paper.”

“I don't think you have time to waste not writing because you are afraid you won't be good at it.”

“Obedience is the gateway through which knowledge enters the mind of the child.”