A child is a young boy or girl in the care of parents, older than a suckling or an infant, but not yet an adolescent. "Children" are sometimes used as a name for a large group of descendants of one person, such as the Children of Israel, or even all human beings as the Children of Men. A child represents innocence and charity, where innocence is the willingness to be led, and charity is love. This is why Jesus blessed them and suggested that we all become like children in order to enter heaven.

142. Verse 15. So thou hast them that hold the doctrine of the Nicolaitans, which thing I hate, signifies those who separate good from truth, or charity from faith, which is against Divine order. This is evident from what was said and shown above n. 107, where similar words occur. To which this is to be added: That those who separate truth from good, or faith from charity, turn away from themselves all influx of heaven into the goods they do, in consequence of which their goods are not good; for heaven flows in, that is, the Lord through heaven, into the good of man's love; he, therefore, that rejects the good of charity from the doctrine of the church, and receives instead only those things that are called matters of faith, is shut out of heaven; truths with such have no life; and it is the life of truth, which is good, that conjoins, but not truth without life, or faith without charity. (But more on these subjects in The Doctrine of the New Jerusalem where it treats of Charity 84-107, and of Faith, n 108-122)