English Proverbs – THE HAND THAT ROCKS THE CRADLE RULES THE WORLD OR MOTHER — THE FIRST AND THE BEST TEACHER

Proverb Expansion

THE HAND THAT ROCKS THE CRADLE RULES THE WORLD OR MOTHER — THE FIRST AND THE BEST TEACHER

There is a saying in Sanskrit that ‘Janani Janmabhumishcha Swargadapi Gariyasi.’ It just means that mother and the motherland are more important even than heaven. It is the mother who sees the first smile on the lips of the baby and dreams of making it a permanent one. She rears the child according to her plan. She is not only mother but the first teacher of the child. She creates permanent impressions upon the heart and mind of the child. These go to make the whole personality of the young one.

Mother has the greatest affection for the child. No one can love the child as much as the mother does. It is the affectionate lullaby that starts the impressions on the child. The father or the teachers in the school enter his life at a later stage. Even then it is the mother who sees to it whether the child has done his work. She supplements what is taught at the school. She is rather omnipotent and omnipresent for the child. That is why a Jewish saint used to say ‘God could not be everywhere and therefore he made mothers.’ The teachings of the mother are divine teachings.

It was the mother of Shivaji who brought up the child to shine on the national horizon. She told him the folklores of chivalry. She taught him the basic lessons of patriotism. That is why he rose against the Muslim rulers and defeated them. He shook even the throne of Aurangzeb. Even in the modem age fathers are too busy to look after the child. The children of working mothers are always at a disadvantage. The wise mother who rocks the cradle makes her son great and energetic.

So strong is the impression of mother’s teachings upon man that Thackeray in his famous novel Vanity Fair declared that ‘Mother is the name of God in the lips and hearts of little children.’ Ann Taylor was more emphatic when she wrote about her reverence for her mother

who ran to help me when I fell,

And would some pretty story tell,

or kiss the place to make it well? My mother.

Brown remembers the caresses of his mother for him and considers her rocking of the cradle bliss when he says.

The sweetest sounds to mortals given,

Are heard in Mother, Home and Heaven.