The Child Who Never Grew Quotes

“Sorrow fully accepted brings its own gifts. For there is alchemy in sorrow. It can be transmitted into wisdom, which, if it does not bring joy, can yet bring happiness.”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew

“We learn as much from sorrow as from joy, as much from illness as from health, from handicap as from advantage—and indeed perhaps more.”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew: A Memoir

“I am always moved, with grateful wonder, by the goodness of people. For the few who are prying or meanly critical, for the very few who rejoice in the grief of others, there are the thousands who are kind. I have come to believe that the natural human heart is good, and I have observed that this goodness is found in all varieties of people, and that it can and does prevail in spite of other corruptions. This human goodness alone provides hope enough for the world.”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew: A Memoir

“The first question I can answer, but the second is difficult indeed, for endurance of inescapable sorrow is something which has to be learned alone. And only to endure is not enough. Endurance can be a harsh and bitter root in one’s life, bearing poisonous and gloomy fruit, destroying other lives. Endurance is only the beginning. There must be acceptance and the knowledge that sorrow fully accepted brings its own gifts. For there is an alchemy in sorrow. It can be transmuted into wisdom, which, if it does not bring joy, can yet bring happiness.”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew: A Memoir

“It was in those days that I learned to distinguish between the two kinds of people in the world: those who have known inescapable sorrow and those who have not.”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew: A Memoir

“I am always moved, with grateful wonder, by the goodness of people. For the few who are prying or meanly critical, for the very few who rejoice in the grief of others, there are the thousands who are kind. I have come to believe that the natural human heart is good, and I have observed that this goodness is found in all varieties of people, and that it can and does prevail in spite of other corruptions. This human goodness alone provides hope enough for the world. I have sometimes”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew: A Memoir

“The best thing in the world for each of us is that which we can best do, because it gives us the feeling of being useful. That’s happiness.”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew: A Memoir

“Why must this happen to me?” To this there could be no answer and there was none. When I knew at last that there could never be an answer, my own resolve shaped into the determination to make meaning out of the meaningless, and so provide the answer, though it was of my own making.”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew: A Memoir

“There is a sacred quality of life which none of us can fathom. All peoples feel it, for in all societies it is considered a sin for one human being to kill another for a reason of his own. Society decrees death for certain crimes, but the innocent may not be killed, and there is none more innocent than these children who never grow up. Murder remains murder. Were the right to kill a child put even into a parent’s hands, the effect would be evil indeed in our world. Were the right to kill any innocent person assumed by society, the effect would be monstrous. For first it might be only the helpless children who were killed, but then it might seem right to kill the helpless old; and then the conscience would become so dulled that prejudice would give the right to kill, and persons of a certain color or creed might be destroyed. The only safety is to reject completely the possibility of death as a means of ending any innocent life, however useless. The damage is not to the one who is killed, but to the one who kills. Euthanasia is a long, smooth-sounding word, and it conceals its danger as long, smooth words do, but the danger is there, nevertheless.”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew: A Memoir

“endurance of inescapable sorrow is something which has to be learned alone. And only to endure is not enough. Endurance can be a harsh and bitter root in one’s life, bearing poisonous and gloomy fruit, destroying other lives. Endurance is only the beginning. There must be acceptance and the knowledge that sorrow fully accepted brings its own gifts. For there is an alchemy in sorrow. It can be transmuted into wisdom, which, if it does not bring joy, can yet bring happiness.”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew: A Memoir

“I have come to believe that the natural human heart is good, and I have observed that this goodness is found in all varieties of people, and that it can and does prevail in spite of other corruptions. This human goodness alone provides hope enough for the world.”
― Pearl S. Buck, The Child Who Never Grew: A Memoir