“The family exists for many reasons, but its most basic function may be to draw together after a member dies.”
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Stephen King 733
American author 1947Related quotes

“The most merciful thing that the large family does to one of its infant members is to kill it.”
Source: Woman and the New Race, (1922), Chapter 5, "The Wickedness of Creating Large Families."
Context: Thus we see that the second and third children have a very good chance to live through the first year. Children arriving later have less and less chance, until the twelfth has hardly any chance at all to live twelve months. This does not complete the case, however, for those who care to go farther into the subject will find that many of those who live for a year die before they reach the age of five. Many, perhaps, will think it idle to go farther in demonstrating the immorality of large families, but since there is still an abundance of proof at hand, it may be offered for the sake of those who find difficulty in adjusting old-fashioned ideas to the facts. The most merciful thing that the large family does to one of its infant members is to kill it. The same factors which create the terrible infant mortality rate, and which swell the death rate of children between the ages of one and five, operate even more extensively to lower the health rate of the surviving members.
Source: Beautiful Boy: A Father's Journey Through His Son's Addiction

“The family that prays together, still probably dies in the fire.”
A Softer World

Source: The Hundred Verses of Advice: Tibetan Buddhist Teachings on What Matters Most

"Fiat's John Elkann shares family business views" http://www.fbn-i.org/dec-10/article1.html, FBNenews, 12-15-2010
Source: Systems Engineering Tools, (1965), Systems Engineering Methods (1967), p. 1: First paragraph of Ch. 1. The Environment for System Engineering Methods
“Technology has deprived the family of almost all its functions.”
Source: The Greening of America (1970), Chapter VII : "It's Just Like Living", p. 182