When a child can be brought to tears, and not from fear of punishment, but from repentance he needs no chastisement. When the tears begin to flow from the grief of their conduct you can be sure there is an angel nestling in their heart.

Meaning of the quote

When a child cries not because they're scared of getting in trouble, but because they feel sorry for what they did, that means they don't need to be punished. When they start crying out of guilt for their actions, you can be sure they have a kind, caring heart.

About Horace Mann

Horace Mann was an American educational reformer and politician who is known as the Father of American Education. He worked to establish public education and promote the Common School Movement, serving as the Secretary of the Massachusetts State Board of Education and later as the President of Antioch College.

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More quotes from Horace Mann

When a child can be brought to tears, and not from fear of punishment, but from repentance he needs no chastisement. When the tears begin to flow from the grief of their conduct you can be sure there is an angel nestling in their heart.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Scientific truth is marvelous, but moral truth is divine and whoever breathes its air and walks by its light has found the lost paradise.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Much that we call evil is really good in disguises; and we should not quarrel rashly with adversities not yet understood, nor overlook the mercies often bound up in them.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

To pity distress is but human; to relieve it is Godlike.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

A teacher who is attempting to teach without inspiring the pupil with a desire to learn is hammering on cold iron.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Two golden hours somewhere between sunrise and sunset. Both are set with 60 diamond minutes. No reward is offered. They are gone forever.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

A human being is not attaining his full heights until he is educated.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Jails and prisons are the complement of schools; so many less as you have of the latter, so many more must you have of the former.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Resolve to edge in a little reading every day, if it is but a single sentence. If you gain fifteen minutes a day, it will make itself felt at the end of the year.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Generosity during life is a very different thing from generosity in the hour of death; one proceeds from genuine liberality and benevolence, the other from pride or fear.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Let us not be content to wait and see what will happen, but give us the determination to make the right things happen.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Education alone can conduct us to that enjoyment which is, at once, best in quality and infinite in quantity.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

The teacher who is attempting to teach without inspiring the pupil with a desire to learn is hammering on cold iron.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

If any man seeks for greatness, let him forget greatness and ask for truth, and he will find both.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Doing nothing for others is the undoing of ourselves.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Evil and good are God’s right hand and left.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Manners easily and rapidly mature into morals.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

If evil is inevitable, how are the wicked accountable? Nay, why do we call men wicked at all? Evil is inevitable, but is also remediable.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Habit is a cable; we weave a thread of it each day, and at last we cannot break it.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

A house without books is like a room without windows. No man has a right to bring up his children without surrounding them with books, if he has the means to buy them.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Education is our only political safety. Outside of this ark all is deluge.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Education then, beyond all other devices of human origin, is the great equalizer of the conditions of men, the balance-wheel of the social machinery.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

It is well to think well; it is divine to act well.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Every addition to true knowledge is an addition to human power.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Seek not greatness, but seek truth and you will find both.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Unfaithfulness in the keeping of an appointment is an act of clear dishonesty. You may as well borrow a person’s money as his time.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)

Lost, yesterday, somewhere between sunrise and sunset, two golden hours, each set with sixty diamond minutes. No reward is offered for they are gone forever.

Horace Mann

American politician (1796-1859)