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Children can be told anything—anything. I've always been struck by seeing how little grown-up people understand children, how little parents even understand their own children. Nothing should be concealed from children on the pretext that they are little and that it is too early for them to understand. What a miserable and unfortunate idea! And how readily the children detect that their fathers consider them too little to understand anything, though they understand everything. Grown-up people do not know that a child can give exceedingly good advice even in the most difficult case.

Children can be told anything—anything. I've always been struck by seeing how little grown-up people understand children, how little parents even understand their own children. Nothing should be concealed from children on the pretext that they are little and that it is too early for them to understand. What a miserable and unfortunate idea! And how readily the children detect that their fathers consider them too little to understand anything, though they understand everything. Grown-up people do not know that a child can give exceedingly good advice even in the most difficult case.

Approximate author period: c. 1851 AD · industrial

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Attribution & collection notes
Author or tradition
Fyodor Dostoyevsky
Attribution: attributed
Country attributed
Not established
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Historical period
Approximate author period: c. 1851 AD · industrial
author lifetime midpoint (1821–1881)
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Recorded source
Contributor-provided quotation collection

Supplied reference C; CSV row 146761; supplied attribution, independently unverified

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