A child, like your stomach, doesn't need all you can afford to give it.

Clark’s aphorism cautions against equating love or good parenting with maximal provision. The comparison to the stomach implies that excess—whether food, money, gifts, or indulgence—can be harmful rather than helpful: what is affordable is not necessarily what is needed. The line also gestures toward the idea that children require limits, proportion, and discernment more than abundance. In a broader moral sense, it critiques consumerist or status-driven childrearing, suggesting that character, resilience, and well-being are better served by thoughtful sufficiency than by unchecked giving.