The Prophet (Macmillan Collector's Library) by Kahlil Gibran (2016-07-14)

by Kahlil Gibran

Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts, For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of to-morrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.

All you have shall someday be given; Therefore give now, that the season of giving may be yours and not your inheritors’.