They can not come to us by entering ours.
They have no experience of it, and can not understand it.

But we have had experience of theirs, and can enter it if we choose; and in that way we bring ourselves very near to them.
_Sympathy must be Sincere_.
But the sympathy which we thus express with children, in order to be effectual, must be sincere and genuine, and not pretended.

We must renew our own childish ideas and imaginations, and become for the moment, in feeling, one with them, so that the interest which we express in what they are saying or doing may be real, and not merely assumed.

They seem to have a natural instinct to distinguish between an honest and actual sharing of their thoughts and emotions, and all mere condescension and pretense, however adroitly it may be disguised.
_Want of Time_.
Some mothers may perhaps say that they have not time thus to enter into the ideas and occupations of their children.

They are engrossed with the serious cares of life, or busy with its various occupations.