A mother is the truest friend we have, when trials heavy and sudden fall upon us; when adversity takes the place of prosperity; when friends desert us; when trouble thickens around us, still will she cling to us, and endeavor by her kind precepts and counsels to dissipate the clouds of darkness, and cause peace to return to our hearts.

A mother's love for her child is like nothing else in the world. It knows no law, no pity. It dares all things and crushes down remorselessly all that stands in its path.

-The Last Seance (from The Hound of Death and Other Stories, also Double Sin and Other Stories)

Mother's love is peace. It need not be acquired, it need not be deserved.

Mothers not only navigate through life's challenges but also defy the forces of nature when it comes to protecting and caring for their children.

The mother, if she commits herself to life and builds a vast storehouse of knowing inside of her, is her children’s bastion. She has a relationship with her children forever as mother. And she has the wisdom, hopefully, to know when to let go and let them lead their lives on their own. But she also is there when they come back and need something. There has to be a prototype for the mother who remains mother forever.

Youth fades, love droops, the leaves of friendship fall; A mother's secret hope outlives them all.

The one bond of love that seems inalienable is that of a mother to her child. Motherhood is one of the greatest blessings in life, I had always been told. And in many ways, it is. That it is also one of the heaviest burdens is kept secret from one generation to the next. The charming smiles, the adorable gurglings of your infant son or daughter are paid for with sleepless nights, and later with the inevitable clashes between you and your growing child. "Little children, little worries. Big children, big worries," isn't that how the saying goes? Yet so strong is the imperative of nature that women uncomplainingly carry out this task and hand down the myth of the joys of motherhood to their unsuspecting daughters. Today I know that the unconditional love a mother is supposed to bear her child is as much of a fable as that child's unconditional love for her. There is as much ambivalence in the mother-child relationship as with the rest of the family members. The nuclear family, so vital to the well-being of the growing child, is also the breeding ground for the psychological damage that characterizes so much of today's civilized society. By the time I was in my thirties I had already seen through these myths. (Chapter Twenty-two)

Few misfortunes can befall a boy which bring worse consequences than to have a really affectionate mother.

Children love their mothers. Especially with a boy child and his mother, there's a bond that's unbreakable. I love my mother to this day. One of the most painful things I ever had to do was bury her, realizing that even though I was her hero, I couldn't help her with this last thing. I couldn't help her get better. All I wanted was to give her everything she wanted. Everything my father didn't give her, everything she never had.

There is only one person that can be "more than a father", it is your dear mother, whose love for her offspring is unbounded by heaven and earth.

Mom gives life in every way.

mothers are often fondest of the child which has caused them the greatest pain.

A mother’s traditional role prepared her to love her family by being with the family she loved.

Die Liebe einer Mutter zu ihren Kindern ist beherrschend, löwinnenhaft, selbstsüchtig und zugleich selbstlos […]. Die Liebe eines Vaters zu seinem Sohn oder seiner Tochter ist, wenn es sich überhaupt um Liebe handelt, ein weitherziges, großzügiges, schwermütiges und nachdenkliches Schenken ohne Hoffnung auf Erwiderung, ein Abschiedsgruß an einen geplagten Wanderer, den er gern beschützen möchte, ein richtig abgewogenes Urteil über Stärke und Schwäche, voll Mitleid für den Misserfolg und voll Stolz auf Erfolg.