What do we teach our children? . . . We should say to each of them: Do you know what you are? You are a marvel. You are unique . . . You may become a Shakespeare, a Michelangelo, a Beethoven. You have the capacity for anything.
Interpretation
Encouraging children to recognize their unique potential and greatness.
This quote emphasizes the importance of nurturing and recognizing the individual potential in children. Pablo Casals urges us to communicate to the younger generation that they possess unique talents and abilities that could lead them to achieve greatness, much like renowned figures in art and literature. By acknowledging their uniqueness, we empower them to pursue their dreams and aspirations.
In practice
In a school assembly, a teacher shares this quote to inspire creativity and self-confidence among students.
Bach is the supreme genius of music... This man, who knows everything and feels everything, cannot write one note, however unimportant it may appear, which is anything but transcendent. He has reached the heart of every noble thought, and has done it in the most perfect way.
In music, in the sea, in a flower, in a leaf, in an act of kindness... I see what people call God in all these things.
The love of one's country is a splendid thing. But why should love stop at the border?
The child must know that he is a miracle, that since the beginning of the world there hasn't been, and until the end of the world there will not be, another child like him.
I am an old man but in many senses a very young man. And this is what I want you to be, young, young all your life.
To the whole world you might be just one person, but to one person you might just be the whole world.
I suggest to my students that they write under a pseudonym for a week. That allows young men to write as women, and women as men. It allows them a lot of freedom they don't have ordinarily.
If a man keeps cherishing his old knowledge so as continually to be acquiring new, he may be a teacher of others.
I had hundreds of books under my skin already. Not selected reading, all of it. Some of it could be called trashy. I had been through Nick Carter, Horatio Alger, Bertha M. Clay and the whole slew of dime novelists in addition to some really constructive reading. I do not regret the trash. It has harmed me in no way. It was a help, because acquiring the reading habit early is the important thing. Taste and natural development will take care of the rest later on.
Experience by itself teaches nothing... Without theory, experience has no meaning. Without theory, one has no questions to ask. Hence, without theory, there is no learning.
The dream begins, most of the time, with a teacher who believes in you.
The love of learning, the sequestered nooks, And all the sweet serenity of books.
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