When childhood dies, its corpses are called adults and they enter society, one of the politer names of Hell. That is why we dread children, even if we love them. They show us the state of our decay.

Quoted in the Manchester Guardian (31 December 1977), and Simpson’s Contemporary Quotations (1988) edited by James B. Simpson; Says Who?: A Guide To The Quotations Of The Century (1988) by Jonathon Green, p. 17 and The Concise Columbia Dictionary of Quotations (1989), p. 45