Love and fear. Everything the father of a family says must inspire one or the other.

Joubert reduces domestic authority to two fundamental levers: affection and intimidation. The line implies that parental speech is never neutral; it either draws children toward the parent through trust and warmth, or compels compliance through anxiety and dread. Read as counsel, it urges fathers to recognize the emotional force of their words and to prefer love as the more humane and durable basis for guidance. Read as diagnosis, it acknowledges a hard truth about hierarchy: where one person has power over another, communication tends to carry either reassurance or threat. The aphorism’s starkness is meant to sharpen moral responsibility—especially for those whose everyday remarks shape a child’s inner life.