Quotes about happiness (5345 quotes, page 30)

“I have worked like a galley slave throughout these eight years, morning till night, and I have given all I could to this work. I am happy with the results.”

Vladimir Putin (1952) President of Russia, former Prime Minister

Quoted in The Truth About Putin and Medvedev http://www.nybooks.com/articles/21353, last annual press conference.
2006- 2010

Night , Happiness

“I kept looking [at wife Katie Holmes] and thinking, 'This woman's amazing.' I'm happy that I'm with her. She's amazing, and I'd think the same of her even if she wasn't with me -- she's just amazing.”

Tom Cruise (1962) American actor and film producer

Loving Life http://www.oprah.com/oprahshow/Loving-Life. Oprah.com. May 23, 2005.

Thinking , Happiness

“And I go to my room and stretch out my arms to the West—that it is far away [from here], that I will someday return. Outside those painful sensations—it is horrible to be before these people and their lives. Service and family troubles -a hard beginning, pay raise, promotion - sweet dreams, scandal - daily bread, [This is a figurative reference to Our Lord's Prayer, "give us this day our daily bread.."] and their happiness reminds me sweetly, of those who buy "for the people," and whose food you wouldn't put in your mouth. I think of Munich and of my health. All that is here is suffering and this horror of beauty and this horrible life and this overbearing literature, and the complete superfluousness of art.”

Marianne von Werefkin (1860–1938) expressionist painter

1906 - 1911
Source: a letter to Alexej von Jawlensky, between December 1909 and Spring 1910; as quoted in 'Ambiguity of Home: Identity and Reminiscence in Marianne Werefkin's Return Home, c. 1909', Adrienne Kochman http://www.19thc-artworldwide.org/spring06/52-spring06/spring06article/171-ambiguity-of-home-identity-and-reminiscence-in-marianne-werefkins-return-home-c-1909

Life , Pain , People , Health

“Maybe he didn't do a good job and I was unsatisfied with his work … On occasion, four times, we used certain laws that are there. And when Secretary Clinton talks about people that didn't get paid, first of all, they did get paid a lot, but taken advantage of the laws of the nation. Now, if you want to change the laws, you've been there a long time, change the laws. But I take advantage of the laws of the nation because I'm running a company. My obligation right now is to do well for myself, my family, my employees, for my companies. And that's what I do. … She [Hillary Clinton] doesn't say is that tens of thousands of people that are unbelievably happy and that love me.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

About not having paid to some of his employees.
2010s, 2016, September, First presidential debate (September 26, 2016)

Love , People , Family , Law

“I am happy at Newcastle. I love the city and the people. Our fans are the best in the world. Even if we are losing or not playing well there are still 52,000 backing us and I respect that.”

Obafemi Martins (1984) Nigerian footballer

On life at Newcastle. [April 22, 2007, http://home.skysports.com/list.aspx?hlid=462540&CPID=8&clid=4&lid=3&title=Martins:+Best+is+yet+to+come, Martins: Best is yet to come, Sky Sports, 2007-04-22]

Love , People , World , Happiness

“If you are not happy here and now, you never will be.”

Taisen Deshimaru (1914–1982) Japanese Buddhist monk

As quoted in The Book of Positive Quotations (2007) by John Cook, Steve Deger and Leslie Ann Gibson, p. 279

Happy , Happiness

“The Maharaja of Mysore (then Governor of Mysore), ayachamarajendra Wodeyar, visited Berkeley for a day. I took him around. He was really impressed when he saw the accelerators in the Radiation Laboratory on the hill. He was happy to speak to me in Kannada and even more happy that I knew a little Sanskrit.”

C. N. R. Rao (1934) Indian chemist

Source: Climbing the Limitless Ladder: A Life in Chemistry (2010), p. 35

Happiness

“Sometimes I think Johnson´s Lives of the English Poets is all I need to be happy.”

Adolfo Bioy Casares (1914–1999) Argentine novelist

"A veces pienso que La vida de los poetas de Johnson es todo lo que necesito para ser feliz."
Descanso de caminantes, 2001.

Thinking , Happiness

“Historians desiring to write the actions of men, ought to set down the simple truth, and not say anything for love or hatred; also to choose such an opportunity for writing as it may be lawful to think what they will, and write what they think, which is a rare happiness of the time.”

Walter Raleigh (1554–1618) English aristocrat, writer, poet, soldier, courtier, spy, and explorer

Source: The Cabinet Council (published 1658), Chapter 25

Love , Men , Truth , Law

“The security and happiness of all minority groups in South Africa depend on the Afrikaner. Whether they are English- or German- or Portuguese- or Italian-speaking, or even Jewish-speaking, makes no difference.”

P. W. Botha (1916–2006) South African prime minister

Speaking to the House of Assembly on February 20, 1981, as cited by Andrew Donaldson, Sunday Times, 5 November 2006

Dependency , Happiness

“Friendship is the greatest of worldly goods. Certainly to me it is the chief happiness of life. If I had to give a piece of advice to a young man about a place to live, I think I shd. say, 'sacrifice almost everything to live where you can be near your friends.”

Clive Staples Lewis (1898–1963) Christian apologist, novelist, and Medievalist

Letter to Arthur Greeves (29 December 1935) — in They Stand Together: The Letters of C. S. Lewis to Arthur Greeves (1914–1963) (1979), p. 477

Life , Friendship , Thinking , Happiness

“Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945) 32nd President of the United States

1930s, First Inaugural Address (1933)

Money , Effort , Joy , Happiness

“Even if victory were possible, it still couldn’t provide meaning or genuine happiness, because saying “I want to be the best” is simply the polite way of saying “I want everyone else to be worse.””

Malcolm Azania book From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain

Source: From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain (2007), Chapter 2 “Facing the Ultimate Archenemy” (p. 58)

Way , Victory , Happiness

“GENTLEMEN OF THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES: I may be allowed this occasion to say that, in undertaking to discharge the duties of the Chair, I relied for success rather upon your forbearance and kindly aid than upon any poor abilities of my own. That reliance, I am happy to say, has not failed me. On the contrary, the untiring efforts I feel I have made to perform the task in a becoming manner, have been met and sustained with a degree of liberality seldom equaled in any deliberative body. A striking illustration of this is seen in the fact, that notwithstanding the multiplied questions of parliamentary law and usage which have arisen, and in despite of errors into which I may have fallen, each and all the decisions of the Chair, with a single exception, (and that upon a question of minor importance,) have been generously sustained by this body. And as a further mark of respect and kindness, you have been pleased to adopt a resolution approving of my general conduct as the Presiding Officer of this body. In all this, I feel that I have been peculiarly fortunate; and for it all I beg you will accept my most sincere thanks.Allow me to congratulate you, gentlemen, upon the harmony and personal kindness which have so generally prevailed throughout this Hall. It must remain a source of unmixed pleasure to us all, that our conflicts of opinion here, however fierce they may occasionally have been, were not allowed materially to disturb our social relations; and that now, having finished our work, we part in peace. This House stands adjourned sine die.”

Linn Boyd (1800–1859) American politician

Journal Of the House of Representatives the United States: Second Session of the Thirty-Second Congress (1853-03-03)

Pleasure , Peace , Law , Error

“Ambassador Zhou Wenzhong, welcome! Your great country [of China] makes our Happy Meals possible!”

Stephen Colbert (1964) American political satirist, writer, comedian, television host, and actor

White House Correspondents' Association Dinner (2006)

Country , Happiness

“This year I’m planning on hibernating from October until the Olympics next August. It’s that important to me. It drives me. And it’s very addictive. One of the cruellest things about the sport is that you’re never fulfilled or completely happy with your performance. You’re running against a clock so you always want to go faster and think that you can. That becomes an addiction.”

Jo Ankier (1982) British athlete and television personality

Jewish Chronicle, 17 August 2007, p. 11-12: "The calendar girl who's going for gold"

Thinking , Sport , Happiness

“As man is so constituted that it is utterly impossible for him to attain happiness save by seeking the happiness of others, so does it seem to be of the nature of things that individuals and classes can obtain their own just rights only by struggling for the rights of others.”

Henry George (1839–1897) American economist

Source: Social Problems (1883), Ch. 21 : Conclusion

Nature , Happiness

“About happiness he said not a word, I suppose because he considered it something strictly private and perhaps, how shall I say, treacherous or elusive.”

Roberto Bolaño (1953–2003) Chilean author

2666: A Novel (2008)

Happiness

“117. Let me repeat this saying of mine that I once expressed on some other occasions: Happy is the spirit that attains to the perfect formlessness at the time of prayer.”

Evagrius Ponticus (345–399) Christian monk

Chapters on Prayer

Time , Perfection , Happiness

“When I was young, I was very energetic and strong – just too hyperactive. So when I went to the boxing club, everything seemed normal to me. I enjoyed it, I liked punching things, hitting the boxing bag, fighting people in the boxing ring and in school I was naughty as well; but when I started boxing, I totally changed everything – you know, my whole life changed, I was good, I didn’t misbehave, I was always behaving in school. The teacher was happy with my behaviour.”

Amir Khan (boxer) (1986) British boxer

Boxing as a schoolkid during childhood, Interview http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVM9mW7gglI&feature=channel (Aik Din Geo Kay Sath), GEO News. (September 2009)

Life , People , School , Strong

“It is regrettable that some Tibetan officials, who lack the wisdom and competence required for promoting basic human happiness and the short and long term welfare of their own people, indulge in flattering Chinese officials and, collaborate with these Chinese officials who know nothing about Tibetans and work simply for their temporary fame indulging in fabricating impressive reports. In reality, the Tibetan people have not only undergone immeasurable sufferings, but large numbers have also unnecessarily lost their lives.”

Tenzin Gyatso (1935) spiritual leader of Tibet

Letter to Deng Xiaoping (1981)

Wisdom , People , Reality , Suffering

“Whilst my country remains in sorrow and subjection, it would be indelicate of me to participate in the festivities you propose. When she lifts her head and nerves her arm for a bolder struggle — when she goes forth like Miriam, with song and trimble, to celebrate her victory — I too shall lift up my head, and join in the hymn of freedom. Till then, the retirement I seek will best accord with the love I bear her, and the sadness which her present fate inspires. Nor do I forget the companions of my exile. The freedom that has been restored to me is embittered by the recollection of their captivity. My heart is with them at this hour, and shares the solitude in which they dwell. Whilst they are in prison a shadow rests upon my spirit, and the thoughts that otherwise might be free throb heavily within me. It is painful for me to speak. I should feel happy in being permitted to be silent for these reasons you will not feel displeased with me for declining the honours you solicit me to accept.”

Thomas Francis Meagher (1823–1867) Irish nationalist & American politician

Declining to accept any public entertainment in his honour, after his escape (1852)

Love , Pain , Fate , Sadness

“The difference between me and Bono is that he's quite happy to go and flatter people to get what he wants and he's very good at it, but I just can't do it. I'd probably end up punching them in the face rather than shaking their hand, so it's best that I stay out of their way. I can't engage with that level of bullshit. Which is a shame, really, and in a way it would help if I could, but I just can't. I admire the fact that Bono can, and can walk away from it smelling of roses.”

Thom Yorke (1968) English musician, philanthropist and singer-songwriter

source http://www.licc.org.uk/culture/thom-yorke-interview

People , Way , Help , Happiness

“What are wanted for the Indian as for the Englishman, the Frenchman, the German, and the Russian, are not Constitutions and Revolutions, nor all sorts of Conferences and Congresses, nor the many ingenious devices for submarine navigation and aerial navigation, nor powerful explosives, nor all sorts of conveniences to add to the enjoyment of the rich, ruling classes; nor new schools and universities with innumerable faculties of science, nor an augmentation of papers and books, nor gramophones and cinematographs, nor those childish and for the most part corrupt stupidities termed art — but one thing only is needful: the knowledge of the simple and clear truth which finds place in every soul that is not stupefied by religious and scientific superstitions — the truth that for our life one law is valid — the law of love, which brings the highest happiness to every individual as well as to all mankind. Free your minds from those overgrown, mountainous imbecilities which hinder your recognition of it, and at once the truth will emerge from amid the pseudo-religious nonsense that has been smothering it: the indubitable, eternal truth inherent in man, which is one and the same in all the great religions of the world. It will in due time emerge and make its way to general recognition, and the nonsense that has obscured it will disappear of itself, and with it will go the evil from which humanity now suffers.”

Leo Tolstoy A Letter to a Hindu

A Letter to a Hindu (1908)

Love , Life , Truth , Books

“We have been given a gift that is really, really precious. It’s simple. It isn’t going to get us anything. It isn’t there to augment anything. It’s there for us to be able to experience something that is within ourselves. It is not there to change our religions, our practices, our daily lives. But it is only there for one reason, for one reason alone. Simple happiness. Simple joy.”

Prem Rawat (1957) controversial spiritual leader

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia April 2, 1987
1980s

Religion , Change , Joy , Happiness

“That happy age when a man can be idle with impunity.”

Washington Irving book The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent.

"Rip Van Winkle".
The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon (1819–1820)

Age , Happiness

“The seven dwarfs were each on different little trips. Happy was into grass and grass alone … Happy, that's all he did. Sleepy was into reds. Grumpy, too much speed. Sneezy was a full blown coke freak. Doc was a connection. Dopey was into everything. Any old orifice will do for Dopey. He's always got his arm out and his leg up. And then, the one we always forget, because he was Bashful. Bashful didn't use drugs. He was paranoid on his own. Didn't need any help on that ladder.”

George Carlin (1937–2008) American stand-up comedian

Toledo Window Box (1974)
Source: Carlin, George, perf. Toledo Window Box. Rec. 20 Jul 1974. Monte Kay, Jack Lewis, 1974. Vinyl recording.

Grass , Help , Speed , Forgetting

“I'm all for women who get plastic surgery, because plastic surgery allows you to make your outer appearance resemble your inner appearance — fake… We have shows like Extreme Make-Over: "I don't want to develop a personality, just cut my face! Stretch it and staple it. Now I'm happy, or at least I look like it."”

Daniel Tosh (1975) American stand-up comedian

True Stories I Made Up (2005)

Women , Appearance , Personality , Happiness

“The writer's only responsibility is to his art. He will be completely ruthless if he is a good one. He has a dream. It anguishes him so much that he can't get rid of it. He has no peace until then. Everything goes by the board: honor, pride, decency, security, happiness, all, to get the book written. If a writer has to rob his mother, he will not hesitate; the “Ode on a Grecian Urn” is worth any number of old ladies.”

William Faulkner (1897–1962) American writer

Paris Review interview (1958)

Books , Peace , Dreams , Art

“From my tenderest youth I have considered the union of Ireland with Great-Britain as the scourge of the Irish nation. And that the people of this country can have neither happiness nor freedom whilst that connection endures. Every day's experience, and every fact that arose, convinced me of this truth; and I resolved, if I could, to separate the two countries. But as I knew Ireland could not of herself, throw off the yoke, I sought for help wherever I could find it.”

Theobald Wolfe Tone (1763–1798) Irish politician

Speech to the Court-Martial, assembled to pass sentence on his life (November 10, 1798) http://rewinn.com/8043.html

People , Truth , Youth , Freedom

“If in your own experience you haven't yet learned the truth of the deception of feelings, then you just have to go on believing and thinking, having faith in the past and hope in the future, being happy today and unhappy tomorrow, but never being in command of your own life for long.”

Barry Long (1926–2003) Australian spiritual teacher and writer

Love is not a feeling ~ The Article (1995)

Life , Truth , Faith , Hope

“Timely blossom, Infant fair,
Fondling of a happy pair.”

Ambrose Philips (1674–1749) Anglo-Irish poet and politician

To Miss Charlotte Pulteney in Her Mother’s Arms (1724)

Time , Happiness

“The true love is a state of half-madness, of some kind of soft obsession, ruling a so delicate kind of feeling that can lead a person from the greatest happiness to the most dreadful pain.”

Lima Barreto book Clara dos Anjos

Clara dos Anjos (1948)

Love , Pain , Feeling , Personality

“No one can be happy without virtue.”
Beatus autem esse sine virtute nemo potest

Marcus Tullius Cicero (-106–-43 BC) Roman philosopher and statesman

Book I, section 48
De Natura Deorum – On the Nature of the Gods (45 BC)

Happiness

“[Happiness is] The exercise of vital powers, along lines of excellence, in a life affording them scope.”

Edith Hamilton (1867–1963) American teacher and writer

The Greek Way (1930)

Life , Exercises , Happiness

“We call the mind that wants to make the way of the Universe clear and to put it into practice the mind that seeks truth. However clever a dog or a monkey may be, they cannot realize the universal mind. Only human beings have the privilege and capacity to realize it. If you have a mind that seeks truth, you are happy because this is the proof that you are a real human being.”

Koichi Tohei (1920–2011) Japanese aikidoka

18 : The mind that seeks truth
Ki Sayings (2003)

Truth , Dogs , Way , Universe

“My arrangement of my shelves may earn me a reputation for untidiness among the unthinking, but I am indifferent to these. From natural laziness – if you like – from sheer inability to discover any congruity between one book and another – I will not classify. There they are – as they come – as they go – in serried shelves – all happy with the fortuity of things – there are my books from the lowest shelf – to reach which the seeker must go (as he ought) on bended knees – to "the dust and silence of the upper shelf," as Lord Macaulay put it – there they are – awaiting the touch of the discerning hand and the light of the critical eye.
The Bankrupt Bookseller by Will Y. Darling, Robert Grant & Son Ltd, Edinburgh, 1947, p. 28.”

William Darling (politician) (1885–1962) Scottish politician

The Bankrupt Bookseller (1947)

Books , Nature , Light , Silence

“Love in the abstract is not enough for a great man in poverty; he has need of its utmost devotion… She who is really a wife, one in heart, flesh, and bone, must follow wherever he leads, in whom her life, her strength, her pride, and happiness are centered.”

Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850) French writer

L'amour abstrait ne suffit pas à un homme pauvre et grand, il en veut tous les dévouements... La véritable épouse en cœur, en chair et en os, se laisse traîner là où va celui en qui réside sa vie, sa force, sa gloire, son bonheur.
The Wild Ass’s Skin (1831), Part II: A Woman Without a Heart

Love , Life , Heart , Happiness

“Libertarianism is not libertinism or hedonism. It is not a claim that "people can do anything they want to, and nobody else can say anything." Rather, libertarianism proposes a society of liberty under law, in which individuals are free to pursue their own lives so long as they respect the equal rights of others. The rule of law means that individuals are governed by generally applicable and spontaneously developed legal rules, not by arbitrary commands; and that those rules should protect the freedom of individuals to pursue happiness in their own ways, not aim at any particular result or outcome.”

David Boaz (1953) libertarian, author and editor

"Key Concepts of Libertarianism" (1 January 1999)

People , Law , Way , Freedom

“Resolve not to be poor: whatever you have, spend less. Poverty is a great enemy to human happiness; it certainly destroys liberty, and it makes some virtues impracticable, and others extremely difficult.”

Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) English writer

Letter to James Boswell, December 7, 1782, p. 494
Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol IV

Happiness

“Until now, neither the distinction between “worthy, since durable” and “vain, since transient,” nor the unbridgeable abyss separating the two, has disappeared for a moment from reflections on human happiness. Nonentity, the demeaning and humiliating insignificance of the individual bodily presence in the world by comparison with the unperturbed eternity of the world itself, has haunted philosophers (and non-philosophers, during their brief spells of falling into and staying in a philosophical mood) for more than two millennia. In the Middle Ages it was raised to the rank of the highest purpose and supreme concern of mortals, and deployed to promote spiritual values over the pleasures of the flesh—as well as to explain (and, hopefully argue away) the pain and misery of the brief earthly existence as a necessary and therefore welcome prelude to the endless bliss of the afterlife. It returned with the advent of the modern era in a new garb: that of the futility of individual interests and concerns, shown to be abominably short-lived, fleeting and vagrant when juxtaposed with the interests of “the social whole”—the nation, the state, the cause.”

Zygmunt Bauman (1925–2017) Polish philosopher and sociologist

Source: The Art of Life (2008), p. 31.

Pain , Pleasure , Age , World

“Neither life nor happiness can be achieved by the pursuit of irrational whims. Just as man is free to attempt to survive by any random means, as a parasite, a moocher or a looter, but not free to succeed at it beyond the range of the moment—so he is free to seek his happiness in any irrational fraud, any whim, any delusion, any mindless escape from reality, but not free to succeed at it beyond the range of the moment nor to escape the consequences.”

Ayn Rand book The Virtue of Selfishness

Sometimes paraphrased as "You can ignore reality, but you cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring reality."
The Virtue of Selfishness (1964)

Life , Fraud , Reality , Happiness

“I am not sick. I am broken. But I am happy to be alive as long as I can paint.”

Frida Kahlo (1907–1954) Mexican painter

Quoted in Time Magazine, "Mexican Autobiography" (27 April 1953)
1946 - 1953

Painting , Happiness

“The meaning of the word “feminist” has not really changed since it first appeared in a book review in the Athenaeum of April 27, 1895, describing a woman who “has in her the capacity of fighting her way back to independence.” It is the basic proposition that, as Nora put it in Ibsen's A Doll's House a century ago, “Before everything else I'm a human being.” It is the simply worded sign hoisted by a little girl in the 1970 Women's Strike for Equality: I AM NOT A BARBIE DOLL. Feminism asks the world to recognize at long last that women aren't decorative ornaments, worthy vessels, members of a “special-interest group”. They are half (in fact, now more than half) of the national population, and just as deserving of rights and opportunities, just as capable of participating in the world's events, as the other half. Feminism's agenda is basic It asks that women not be forced to “choose” between public justice and private happiness. It asks that women be free to define themselves — instead of having their identity defined for them, time and again, by their culture and their men.”

Susan Faludi book Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women

Backlash (1992)

Women , Men , Books , World

“Life and mind are continuously in conflict with each other. I want happiness, security. I won’t reach that by considerations of my mind; on the contrary they will lead to a certain despair of the inner person. Not what he thinks engages the artist, but what he feels.”

Bram van Velde (1895–1981) Dutch painter

Letter to H.P. Bremmer, 17-11-1930, City Archive The Hague, as quoted in Bram van Velde, A Tribute, Municipal Museum De Lakenhal Leiden, Municipal Museum Schiedam, Museum de Wieger, Deurne 1994 (English translation: Charlotte Burgmans)
1930's

Life , Feeling , Thinking , Personality

“"I wish I had never been born," she said. "What are we born for?" "For infinite happiness," said the Spirit. "You can step out into it at any moment…"”

Clive Staples Lewis book The Great Divorce

Source: The Great Divorce (1944–1945), Ch. 8

Happiness

“I want you to know, that I am happy for you
I wish nothing but the best for you both
An older version of me,
Is she perverted like me?
Would she go down on you in a theatre?”

Alanis Morissette (1974) Canadian-American singer-songwriter

You Oughta Know
Jagged Little Pill (1995)

Happiness

“Yoga teaches that whatever we want in life we can have if we are willing to provide it for others. So if yogis want to be free, they understand that to deprive others of freedom will ultimately not benefit their project—to be free themselves. Following that logic, yogis abhor slavery and examine their own lives to find ways that they themselves might be condoning slavery and then eradicate those ways of acting. The fact is that animals who are raised for food are slaves. Making kind choices when it comes to the food we eat is one of the most basic ways to begin to ensure our own happiness and freedom. The cause for our own happiness, health, and freedom lies in how happy and free we can make the lives of others. The definition of others includes other animals.”

Sharon Gannon (1951) American yoga teacher

Simple Recipes for Joy (2014)

Life , Health , Food , Way

“Elysian beauty, melancholy grace,
Brought from a pensive though a happy place.”

William Wordsworth Laodamia

Stanza 16.
Laodamia (1814)

Beauty , Happiness

“[I decided to go vegan] three and a half years ago. At first, I approached it from a scientific standpoint. However, I then came to have some ethical views about this diet. I love happy, living animals! … There are so many [benefits]. First, I no longer eat the suffering and pain of defenceless animals. Secondly, my body has become lighter, so to say “clearer”. Thirdly, in my profession, flexibility and elasticity are incredibly important, and I increased both of these. And fourthly, now I almost never suffer from a cold or flu.”

Alexey Voyevoda (1980) bobsledder

"Alexey Voyevoda: Russia’s Vegan Olympian" https://www.peta.org.uk/blog/alexei-voyevoda-russias-vegan-olympian/, interview with PETA (17 February 2014).

Love , Pain , Suffering , Animals

“What enormous potential for intermittent happiness the world offered.”

James K. Morrow book Only Begotten Daughter

Source: Only Begotten Daughter (1990), Chapter 2 (p. 37)

World , Happiness

“To disgust men with their work is a serious blunder on the part of human society; what could be more natural than their liking for what they do? Work keeps off boredom, vice, and poverty. It is the remedy for all imagined evils. "The souls' joy lies in doing," said Shelly. Active work saves man from himself; indolence make shim a prey to useless regrets, dangerous reveries, enviousness, and hate. Also the first rule of the art of governing is, at all costs, to keep a nation at work. A bored nation is impossible to govern, but a nation occupied by work which it believes to be useful and accomplishes on its own initiative is already a happy one.”

André Maurois (1885–1967) French writer

Un Art de Vivre (The Art of Living) (1939), The Art of Working

Men , Hate , Art , Soul

“I can treat all with decency and civility, and converse with them, when it is necessary, on points of business. But I am never happy in their company.”

John Adams (1735–1826) 2nd President of the United States

As quoted in Complete Book of U.S. Presidents (1984), by William A. DeGregorio, pp. 19–20

Business , Happiness

“And uncontrollable laughter broke from the happy gods
as they watched the god of fire breathing hard
and bustling through the halls.”

Homér Iliad

I. 599–600 (tr. Robert Fagles); hence the expression "Homeric laughter".
Iliad (c. 750 BC)

God , Laughter , Happiness

“It pleased the great Creator of the world to make three sorts of living creatures. Angels he made pure spirits, without flesh, and therefore he made them only for heaven and not to dwell on earth. Beasts were made flesh, without immortal souls, and therefore they were made only for the earth and not for heaven: Man is of a middle nature between both, as partaking of both flesh and spirit, so is he made for earth, but as his passage or way to heaven, and not that this should be his home or happiness. The blessed state that man was made for was to behold the glorious majesty of the Lord and to praise him among his holy angels; and to love him, and to be filled with his love forever.”

Richard Baxter book A Call to the Unconverted to Turn and Live

A Call to the Unconverted to Turn and Live, Sermon 1

Love , World , Angels , Way

“That virtue was sufficient of herself for happiness.”

Diogenes Laërtius (180–240) biographer of ancient Greek philosophers

Plato, 42.
The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (c. 200 A.D.), Book 3: Plato

Happiness

“Happiness is like a butterfly: the more you chase it, the more it will elude you. But if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder.”

Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862) 1817-1862 American poet, essayist, naturalist, and abolitionist

According to The Quote Investigator http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/04/17/butterfly/, "the earliest instance of this saying was crafted by the enigmatic “L” for “The Daily Crescent” newspaper in New Orleans [in June 1848]. ... The linkage to Henry David Thoreau is unsupported."
Misattributed

Motivational , Deep , Happy , Inspirational

“Tis strange how the heart can create
Or colour from itself its fate;
We make ourselves our own distress,
We are ourselves our happiness.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

Canto IV
The Troubadour (1825)

Fate , Heart , Happiness

“A man forced to spend his life without ever having the right, without ever finding the time, to shut himself up all alone, no matter where, to think, to reflect, to work, to dream? Ah! my dear boy, a key, the key of a door which one can lock — this is happiness, mark you, the only happiness!”

Guy De Maupassant (1850–1893) French writer

"The Question of Latin"

Life , Dreams , Boy , Thinking

“Institutionalized desublimation thus appears to be an aspect of the “conquest of transcendence” achieved by the one-dimensional society. Just as this society tends to reduce, and even absorb opposition (the qualitative difference!) in the realm of politics and higher culture, so it does in the instinctual sphere. The result is the atrophy of the mental organs for grasping the contradictions and the alternatives and, in the one remaining dimension of technological rationality, the Happy Consciousness comes to prevail.”

Herbert Marcuse book One-Dimensional Man

Source: One-Dimensional Man (1964), p. 79

Appearance , Happiness

“Happy who in his verse can gently steer
From grave to light, from pleasant to severe.”

John Dryden (1631–1700) English poet and playwright of the XVIIth century

The Art of Poetry, canto i, line 75.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Light , Happiness

“If someone were to expound that godliness is to belong to childhood in the temporal sense and thus dwindle and die with the years as childhood does, is to be a happy frame of mind that cannot be preserved but only recollected; if someone were to expound that repentance as a weakness of old age accompanies the decline of one’s powers, when the senses are dulled, when sleep no longer strengthens but increases lethargy-this would be ungodliness and foolishness.”

Sören Kierkegaard (1813–1855) Danish philosopher and theologian, founder of Existentialism

Upbuilding Discourses in Various Spirits, Hong p. 12
1840s

Age , Sense , Sleep , Childhood

“Dear friend! I am still staying in Oosterbeek as you can see but I will now leave in 2 days. The last days I spent on two small paintings ordered by Mr. de Visser. I painted them in a happy atmosphere... I send them to you because they were still wet when I sent them away and I could hardly do that to Mr. de Visser. Please, do you want to give them a layer of egg-varnish and when you discover here or there a badly seen dash, or you see a chance to make a witty thing in the paintings, oh chap, I pray you do so, because if he doesn't like them, I'll get no bread and have nasty problems, because I need the money so badly..”

Anton Mauve (1838–1888) Dutch painter (1838–1888)

translation from the original Dutch, Fons Heijnsbroek, 2018
(version in original Dutch / origineel citaat van Anton Mauve's brief, in het Nederlands:) Waarde Vriend! Ik zit zoo als gij ziet nog altijd te Oosterbeek doch zal nu over 2 dagen vertrekken de laatste tijd heb ik aan twee kleine schilderijtjes besteed voor den Heer de Visser, ik heb ze onder een gelukkige atmosfeer geschilderd.. ..ik zend ze jou omdat ze nat waren toen ik ze afzond en ik dat moeyelijk aan den Heer de Visser kon doen, wilt gij ze s.v.p. met een eivernisje bestrijken en vindt gij ze hier of daar eene slecht geziene greep, of ziet gij gemakkelijk kans er nog eene geestige zet in te doen, och kerel ik bid je doe het, want als ze hem niet bevielen en ik krijg geen duiten dan zit ik er leelijk mee in, ik heb ze hoog noodig..
In a letter of Mauve from Oosterbeek 4 Nov. 1867, to Willem Maris in The Hague; from the original letter https://rkd.nl/explore/excerpts/109, RKD Archive, The Hague
1860's

Money , Problem , Chance , Painting

“Nature has willed that man should, by himself, produce everything that goes beyond the mechanical ordering of his animal existence, and that he should partake of no other happiness or perfection than that which he himself, independently of instinct, has created by his own reason.”

Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) German philosopher

Third Thesis
Idea for a Universal History from a Cosmopolitan Point of View (1784)

Nature , Animals , Perfection , Happiness

“When I am with old friends… We recount what we have seen what we have felt the good and the evil that the Revolution has done all the assaults the days the nights the punishments and the fate of our unfortunate friends who perished in the time of Terror when good men feared for their lives We are beginning to see the twilight of the times in which our families were happy.”

Jacques-Louis Ménétra (1738–1812) glazier, tradesman

quoted in Warren Roberts (2000). Jacques-Louis David and Jean-Louis Prieur, Revolutionary. p. 321.

Men , Fate , Fear , Family

“To be able to come out of that mess as I did is special. To be able to improve my relations with my dad is special. I'm happy with the way my life's going, the way I'm growing up as a person. Skating has changed me. I've had a lot of chances, and this is my time to shine.”

Apolo Anton Ohno (1982) American short track speed skating competitor

Prior to the 2002 Winter Olympics
Price, S.L. (2002) "Launch of Apolo" http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/si_online/news/2002/02/13/launch_of_apolo/ Sports Illustrated. (accessed May 24, 2007)

Life , Way , Change , Chance

“The one for whom the day of ‘Āshūrā is a day of tragedy, grief and weeping, Allah The Mighty, The Glorious, shall make the Day of Judgment, a day of joy and happiness for him.”

Ali al-Rida (770–818) eighth of the Twelve Imams

Majlisi, Bihārul Anwār, vol.44, p. 284.
Religious Wisdom

Joy , Happiness

“And I think that that’s one of the best things you can give somebody – the chance to show them what it feels like to make other people get excited and happy.”

Randy Pausch book The Last Lecture

The Last Lecture (2007)

People , Feeling , Thinking , Chance

“I'm happier than a pig eating bacon!" Count Olaf cried. "I'm tickled pinker than a sun-burned Caucasian! I'm in higher spirits than a brand-new graveyard! I'm so happy-go-lucky that lucky and happy people are going to beat me with sticks out of pure, unbridled jealousy!”

Daniel Handler book The Grim Grotto

The Grim Grotto (2004)

People , Jealousy , Sun , Happiness

“Families, I hate you! Shut-in homes, closed doors, jealous possessions of happiness.”

André Gide (1869–1951) French novelist and essayist

Familles, je vous hais! foyers clos; portes refermées; possessions jalouses du bonheur.
Les Nourritures Terrestres (1897), book IV

Hate , Family , Home , Happiness

“At the conclusion of Hollywood disaster movies and epics, time moves backward, piecing together like a jigsaw the elements that had come apart. The Titanic resumes its journey; Russell Crowe is reunited with his murdered wife and son. It's not a happy ending; it's a convention created for the purposes of an impossible sense of uplift at the end of death and tragedy: the happy beginning. Technology makes Hades unnecessary.”

Amit Chaudhuri (1962) contemporary Indian-English novelist

Friend of My Youth (2017)

Death , Sense , Time , Happiness

“Someone who has thought rationally and deeply about how the body works is likely to arrive at better ideas about how to be healthy than someone who has followed a hunch. Medicine presupposes a hierarchy between the confusion the layperson will be in about what is wrong with him, and the more accurate knowledge available to doctors reasoning logically. … At the heart of Epicureanism is the thought that we are as bad at answering the question “What will make me happy?” as “What will make me healthy?””

Alain de Botton book The Consolations of Philosophy

… Our souls do not spell out their troubles.
Source: The Consolations of Philosophy (2000), pp. 53-54.

Soul , Idea , Question , Knowledge

“So he's got to have happiness,
he's got to have truth, too,
he's got to have eternity —
did you ever!”

Wisława Szymborska (1923–2012) Polish writer

"No End of Fun"
Poems New and Collected (1998), No End of Fun (1967)

Truth , Happiness

“The self is a simplification of the notion of soul, created to serve the purposes of the modern sciences of psychology and economics, both of which want you to be happy in a simple, straightforward way they can count.”

Harvey Mansfield (1932) Author, professor

How to Understand Politics: What the Humanities Can Say to Science (2007)

Way , Soul , Science , Happiness

“Behold, whiles she before the altar stands,
Hearing the holy priest that to her speakes,
And blesseth her with his two happy hands.”

Edmund Spenser (1552–1599) English poet

Epithalamion, line 223; reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

Happiness

“I think it’s important for anyone who takes cinema seriously not to limit yourself to just optimistic or happy movies. I think that’s a problem. You’ve got to be willing to let the art of cinema take you into some darker places if you’re going to make full use of it. There are some people who shouldn’t watch horror films, and I’m all right with that. It’s not about putting something evil in the world. It’s about reckoning with evil. We don’t need any more evil in the world. We need a lot more reckoning with it.”

Scott Derrickson (1966) American screenwriter and film director

Interview: Filmmaker Scott Derrickson on Horror, Faith, Chesterton and His New Movie http://www.ncregister.com/daily-news/interview-scott-derrickson (July 1, 2014)

People , World , Art , Problem

“At the end of the day I'm maybe clean of cancer right now, but that doesn't mean it won't come back at 100%. So I'm not leaving here going: "Oh my God my life is over, cuz I don't know…" I'm sitting here, I'm happy I'm at Rove, I'm happy I'm in Australia, I'm pleased I finished an album, I'm just grateful. If it comes back I will kick it in the butt as much as I could. But it's not about winning, it's just about fighting, and that's all you got to on this earth. It's just fight for what your right is, and that's to live.”

Anastacia (1968) American singer-songwriter

from an interview https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUsb1LCn5l4 at The Rove Live, Australia, 2004
General Quotes

Life , God , Fight , Happiness

“By Christianity I do not mean charity, mercy, kindness, forgiveness. I mean no natural virtue, because all the natural virtues existed and had been practiced by hundreds and thousands of millions before Christ was born. There certainly were some good men even in the days of Christ in Jerusalem, before his death. By Christianity I mean the ideas of redemption, atonement, a good man dying for a bad man, and the bad man getting a receipt in full. By Christianity I mean that system that insists that in the next world a few will be forever happy, while the many will be eternally miserable. Christianity, as I have explained it, must be protected, guarded, and sustained by law. It was founded by the sword that is to say, by physical force,—and must be preserved by like means.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

Interview with the Chicago Times, Feb. 14, 1881.

Death , Men , World , Law

“The man of system, on the contrary, is apt to be very wise in his own conceit; and is often so enamoured with the supposed beauty of his own ideal plan of government, that he cannot suffer the smallest deviation from any part of it. He goes on to establish it completely and in all its parts, without any regard either to the great interests, or to the strong prejudices which may oppose it. He seems to imagine that he can arrange the different members of a great society with as much ease as the hand arranges the different pieces upon a chess-board. He does not consider that the pieces upon the chess-board have no other principle of motion besides that which the hand impresses upon them; but that, in the great chess-board of human society, every single piece has a principle of motion of its own, altogether different from that which the legislature might choose to impress upon it. If those two principles coincide and act in the same direction, the game of human society will go on easily and harmoniously, and is very likely to be happy and successful. If they are opposite or different, the game will go on miserably, and the society must be at all times in the highest degree of disorder.”

Adam Smith book The Theory of Moral Sentiments

Section II, Chap. II.
The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759), Part VI

Beauty , Imagination , Game , Strong

“Take responsibility for your own happiness, rather than claiming telepathy you don’t have (unless you are telepathic) or ascribing to others ugly thoughts you can’t verify, and aiming endless, nonspecific blame for your mediocrity at the Trilateral Commission, “the media,” SKULL, the RAND Corporation, the long-disbanded Treemasons, the MAN, the Black Helicopter Legion, or the perennial favorite of paranoiacs, “Them.””

Malcolm Azania book From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain

Source: From the Notebooks of Dr. Brain (2007), Chapter 5 “Limited Series” (p. 151)

Happiness

“Let us see delineated before us the true map of man. Let us hear the dignity of his nature, and the noble rank he holds among the works of God—that consenting to slavery is a sacrilegious breach of trust, as offensive in the sight of God as it is derogatory from our own honor or interest or happiness.”

John Adams (1735–1826) 2nd President of the United States

1760s, A Dissertation on the Canon and Feudal Law (1765)

God , Nature , Happiness

““You’ve got to do something!” insisted Fani. “I saw Father talking to them! He looked happy, and he never looks happy unless he’s planning some skulduggery!””

Murray Leinster book The Pirates of Zan

Source: The Pirates of Zan (1959), Chapter 6

Happiness

“Eight-fifteen in the morning in Washington is not a happy time.”

Ross Thomas (1926–1995) 1926-1995 American writer

Cast a Yellow Shadow (1967)

Time , Happiness

“No more, America, in mournful strain
Of wrongs, and grievance unredress'd complain,
No longer shalt thou dread the iron chain,
Which wanton Tyranny with lawless hand
Had made, and with it meant t' enslave the land.
Should you, my lord, while you peruse my song,
Wonder from whence my love of Freedom sprung,
Whence flow these wishes for the common good,
By feeling hearts alone best understood,
I, young in life, by seeming cruel fate
Was snatch'd from Afric's fancy'd happy seat:
What pangs excruciating must molest,
What sorrows labour in my parent's breast?
Steel'd was that soul and by no misery mov'd
That from a father seiz'd his babe belov'd:
Such, such my case. And can I then but pray
Others may never feel tyrannic sway?”

Phillis Wheatley (1753–1784) American poet

"To The Right Honorable William, Earl of Dartmouth" st. 2-3, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral (1773)

Love , Life , Fate , Feeling

“We have learned coordination of mind and body and the "ki breathing methods". Therefore we can bring the ki of the universe into our bodies at anytime. When a water pump is dried out, no water can flow from the well up through the pump. To start this flow again we must put some water back into the pump. In the same way, ki does not flow strongly in a person suffering from illness or misfortune. Let us practice "kiatsuho" to put back into these people, stimulate their own flow of ki, and give them a fresh start to happiness.”

Koichi Tohei (1920–2011) Japanese aikidoka

16. Kiatsuho - pressing with ki
Ki Sayings (2003)

People , Way , Suffering , Learning

“All agree that under the Constitution slavery in the States is beyond the reach of any human power except that of the respective States themselves wherein it exists. May we not, then, hope that the long agitation on this subject is approaching its end, and that the geographical parties to which it has given birth, so much dreaded by the Father of his Country, will speedily become extinct? Most happy will it be for the country when the public mind shall be diverted from this question to others of more pressing and practical importance. Throughout the whole progress of this agitation, which has scarcely known any intermission for more than twenty years, whilst it has been productive of no positive good to any human being it has been the prolific source of great evils to the master, to the slave, and to the whole country. It has alienated and estranged the people of the sister States from each other, and has even seriously endangered the very existence of the Union. Nor has the danger yet entirely ceased. Under our system there is a remedy for all mere political evils in the sound sense and sober judgment of the people. Time is a great corrective. Political subjects which but a few years ago excited and exasperated the public mind have passed away and are now nearly forgotten. But this question of domestic slavery is of far graver importance than any mere political question, because should the agitation continue it may eventually endanger the personal safety of a large portion of our countrymen where the institution exists. In that event no form of government, however admirable in itself and however productive of material benefits, can compensate for the loss of peace and domestic security around the family altar. Let every Union-loving man, therefore, exert his best influence to suppress this agitation, which since the recent legislation of Congress is without any legitimate object.”

James Buchanan (1791–1868) American politician, 15th President of the United States (in office from 1857 to 1861)

Inaugural address (4 March 1857).

Love , People , Family , Peace

“In general, scientific progress calls for no more than the absorption and elaboration of new ideas — and this is a call most scientists are happy to heed.”

Werner Heisenberg (1901–1976) German theoretical physicist

Physics and Beyond : Encounters and Conversation (1971)

Idea , Happiness

“Freedom of thought and the right of private judgment, in matters of conscience, driven from every other corner of the earth, direct their course to this happy country as their last asylum.”

Samuel Adams (1722–1803) American statesman, Massachusetts governor, and political philosopher

Speech in Philadelphia (1776)
Variant: Driven from every other corner of the earth, freedom of thought and the right of private judgment in matters of conscience, direct their course to this happy country as their last asylum.

Freedom , Country , Happiness

“Who does not see that we are likely to ascertain the distinctive significance of religious melancholy and happiness, or of religious trances, far better by comparing them as conscientiously as we can with other varieties of melancholy, happiness, and trance, than by refusing to consider their place in any more general series, and treating them as if they were outside of nature's order altogether?”

William James (1842–1910) American philosopher, psychologist, and pragmatist

Lecture I, "Religion and Neurology"
1900s, The Varieties of Religious Experience (1902)

Nature , Happiness

“I felt comparatively happy, but I can assure the reader that I had had a far worse time of it than I have told him; and I strongly recommend him to remain in Europe if he can; or, at any rate, in some country which has been explored and settled, rather than go into places where others have not been before him. Exploring is delightful to look forward to and back upon, but it is not comfortable at the time, unless it be of such an easy nature as not to deserve the name.”

Samuel Butler (1835–1902) novelist

Source: Erewhon (1872), Ch. 4

Nature , Time , Country , Happiness

“What we should desire creeps silently inside us and replaces what we really desire. … We take jobs, make compromises, and settle down for the long wait, for the arrival of the future that will bring the reward of happiness we so justly deserve for our sacrifice of the pleasures of the moment. The process is so slow we scarcely notice the substitution of plastic for flesh. We forget how the body sang when it ran free; how it rejoiced in stretching, rolling, skipping, dancing, walking, eating, loving, bounding, leaping, resting.
Gradually the body beings to change to protect itself against the intrusion of joy or sorrow. It armors itself against the threat of playfulness and spontaneity. … The working body is complete when it is thus armed against those emotions that would threaten the primacy of the work ethic and the pattern of delayed gratification upon which it rests.”

Sam Keen (1931) author, professor, and philosopher

Source: The Passionate Life (1983), pp. 102-103

Love , Pleasure , Change , Waiting

“Perhaps there is no happiness in life so perfect as the martyr's.”

O. Henry (1862–1910) American short story writer

"The Country of Elusion" in The Trimmed Lamp http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext03/8tlmp11h.htm (1907)

Life , Perfection , Happiness

“Perhaps the secret of being happy is about letting go of fear, embracing energy that enriches us. Ignoring those who drain us and diminish, channeling ourselves towards goodness and positive acts”

Michael Elmore-Meegan (1959) British humanitarian

All Will be Well (2004)

Secret , Fear , Happiness

“Comedy is filled with surprise, so when I cross a line… I like to find out where the line might be and then cross it deliberately, and then make the audience happy about crossing the line with me.”

George Carlin (1937–2008) American stand-up comedian

The Onion A.V. Club, November 10, 1999 http://www.avclub.com/articles/george-carlin,13629/
Interviews, Print Interviews

Happiness

“There's just one thing that's permanent in this world, and that's change. And when a man gets too old to change, why, then, he dies. And after that, who knows? Do we go on somewhere else? We'd all like to think so; it seems sometimes as though something inside us was telling us that we do. But if we do live on, then one thing is sure: The fellows who are afraid all the time that they may lose what they've got will lose out over there just the way they lose out here. And the big prizes will keep right on going to the fellows who do their duty and have faith. That's all there is to happiness, according to my way of thinking—just doing your duty and having faith.”

Henry Ford (1863–1947) American industrialist

Interview with Bruce Barton, "It Would Be Fun To Start Over Again," The American Magazine https://books.google.com/books?id=CspZAAAAYAAJ&dq=Henry%20Ford%20Bruce%20Barton%20american%20Magazine&pg=RA3-PA7#v=onepage&q=Henry%20Ford%20Bruce%20Barton%20american%20Magazine&f=false, April 1921

World , Faith , Way , Thinking

“In a vacuum all photons travel at the same speed. They slow down when travelling through air or water or glass. Photons of different energies are slowed down at different rates. If Tolstoy had known this, would he have recognised the terrible untruth at the beginning of Anna Karenina? 'All happy families are alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own particular way.' In fact it's the other way around. Happiness is a specific. Misery is a generalisation. People usually know exactly why they are happy. They very rarely know why they are miserable.”

Jeanette Winterson (1959) English writer

Written on the Body (1992)

People , Family , Way , Travel

“Do not consider either the security of your personal lives or the transitory happiness of your wives, husbands, children, parents and relatives; for the security of all of your children and their children is in jeopardy.”

Mohamed Nasheed (1967) Maldivian politician, 4th president of the Maldives

After his arrest, and getting dragged into court, quoted on The guardian, "Former Maldives president Mohamed Nasheed jailed for 13 years" http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/14/former-maldives-president-mohamed-nasheed-jailed-for-13-years, March 14, 2015.

Children , Parent , Personality , Happiness