Quotes about happiness (5345 quotes, page 32)

“When I look at the man at the head of the French monarchy, surrounded as he is with all the pomp of power, and all the pride of victory, distributing kingdoms to his family, and principalities to his followers; seeming, as he sits upon his throne, to have reached the summit of human ambition, the pinnacle of earthly happiness; and when I follow him into his closet, or to his bed, and contemplate the anguish with which his solitude must be tortured, by recollections of the blood he has spilt, and the oppressions he has committed.”

Samuel Romilly (1757–1818) British politician

Slave Trade Bill speech (1807)

Family , Solitude , Victory , Happiness

“There will be no real content among American women unless they are made and kept more ignorant or unless they are given equal opportunity with men to use what they have been taught. And American men will not be really happy until their women are.”

Pearl S. Buck (1892–1973) American writer

Harper’s Magazine (August 1938), p. 232

Women , Men , Happiness

“We call “happiness” a certain set of circumstances that makes joy possible. But we call joy that state of mind and emotions that needs nothing to feel happy.”

André Gide (1869–1951) French novelist and essayist

“An Unprejudiced Mind,” p. 326
Pretexts: Reflections on Literature and Morality (1964)

Feeling , Joy , Happiness

“I now realized the imprudence of landing without a large body of marines; and yet this seemed to me, after all, the fittest way for Mr. Lincoln to come among the people he had redeemed from bondage. What an ovation he had, to be sure, from those so-called ignorant beings! They all had their souls in their eyes, and I don't think I ever looked upon a scene where there were so many passionately happy faces.”

David Dixon Porter (1813–1891) United States Navy admiral

Source: 1880s, Incidents and Anecdotes of the Civil War (1885), p. 297

People , Way , Soul , Thinking

“When the attack happened I was in Cuba, visiting my daughter, and I felt happiness. It didn’t hurt me at all, because, as I always say in my speeches, our dead children will be avenged the day when people, any people, are happy.”

Hebe de Bonafini (1928) President of the Association of Mothers of Plaza de Mayo

Source: Argentina: Hebe de Bonafini and "Las Madres…" (Carlos López, US; ex-Chile) http://cgi.stanford.edu/group/wais/cgi-bin/?p=8609; Some rights groups have misguided agendas http://www.cubanet.org/CNews/y01/oct01/15e9.htm (in spanish language: Los aplausos al terrorismo http://www.lanacion.com.ar/nota.asp?nota_id=343519, La Nación, 2001).

Children , People , Hurt , Daughters

“Supreme happiness is gained via contentment.”

Patañjali (-200–-150 BC) ancient Indian scholar(s) of grammar and linguistics, of yoga, of medical treatises

§ 2.42
Yoga Sutras of Patañjali

Happiness

“So, come all you young men. with your wicked, wicked ways. Sow your wild oats in your younger days. So that we may be happy when we grow old. Yes! happy and happy when we grow old. For the day's getting on and the night's getting long. Darling please gimme your arm and we'll joggle along, yes, we'll joggle and joggle and joggle along.”

Errol Flynn (1909–1959) Australian actor

From his autobiography My Wicked Wicked Ways - 1959

Men , Way , Night , Happiness

“Every living creature is happy when he fulfills his destiny, that is, when he realizes himself, when he is being that which in truth he is. For this reason, Schlegel, inverting the relationship between pleasure and destiny, said, “We have a genius for what we like.” Genius, man’s superlative gift for doing something, always carries a look of supreme pleasure.”

José Ortega Y Gasset (1883–1955) Spanish liberal philosopher and essayist

Source: What is Philosophy? (1964), pp. 16-17

Pleasure , Truth , Happiness

“I could not lead a happy, peaceful life when the working population was so terribly enslaved.”

Alexandra Kollontai (1872–1952) Soviet diplomat

The Autobiography of a Sexually Emancipated Communist Woman (1926)

Life , Peace , Happiness

“Technologists are not noted for learning from the errors of the past. They look forward, not behind, so they repeat the same problems over and over again. […] As each new technology matures, customers are no longer happy with the flashy promises of the technology but instead demand understandable and workable designs. Slowly the manufacturers relearn the same basic principles and apply them to their products. The most egregious failures always come from the developers of the most recent technologies.”

Donald A. Norman book The Design of Everyday Things

Introduction to the 2002 Edition, p. xv.
The Design of Everyday Things (1988, 2002)

Error , Failure , Understanding , Problem

“Sir, if you are as happy in entering the White House as I shall feel on returning to Wheatland, you are a happy man indeed.”

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

Said to Abraham Lincoln on the ride back from Lincoln's inauguration as president (4 March 1861); as quoted in James Buchanan (2004) by Jean H. Baker, Pg 140; This or slightly paraphrased variants or abbreviated versions have also been been reported as having been said before the inauguration:
Sir, if you are as happy in entering the White House as I shall feel on returning [home], you are a happy man indeed.
If you are as happy entering the presidency as I am in leaving it, then you are truly a happy man.
As quoted in Presidential Leadership : Rating the Best and the Worst in the White House (2004) edited by James Taranto and Leonard Leo
Earlier variant: Some knave or fool got up a lie from the whole cloth and it was telegraphed over the country that I was about to purchase or had purchased a place somewhere else and would not return to Wheatland. If my successor should be as happy in entering the White House as I shall feel on returning to Wheatland he will indeed be a happy man. I am just now in my own mind chalking out the course of my last message. In it, should Providence continue his blessing, I shall have nothing to record but uninterrupted success for my country. The trouble about the slavery question would all have been avoided, had the Country submitted to the decision of the Supreme Court delivered two or three days after my inaugural.
Letter to William Carpenter (13 September 1860); as published in Historical Papers and Addresses of the Lancaster County Historical Society.

Feeling , Housing , Happiness

“Security is a thing to be earned rather than bestowed. It should be the reward of adventure and effort…. So our education, if it is to inspire our youth to face life with courage and happiness, must concern itself with the ideals of duty and service rather than with securing an easy shelter from all risks.”

Hugh Macmillan, Baron Macmillan (1873–1952) British judge

Source: A Man of Law's Tale (1952), In London, p. 293

Life , Youth , Education , Courage

“I find that many men and women are troubled by the thought that they are too small and inconsequential in the scheme of things. But that is not our real trouble—we are actually too big and too complex, for God made us in His image and we are too big to be satisfied with what the world offers us! … Man is bored, because he is too big to be happy with that which sin is giving him. God has made him too great, his potential is too mighty.”

Aiden Wilson Tozer (1897–1963) American missionary

Who Put Jesus on the Cross, p. 170

Women , Men , God , World

“A distinguished agnostic once observed that in these days Christianity was not refuted, it was explained. Doubtless the difference between the two operations was, in his view, a matter rather of form than of substance. That which was once explained needed, he thought, no further refutation. And certainly we are all made happy when a belief, which seems to us obviously absurd, is shown nevertheless to be natural in those who hold it. But we must be careful. True beliefs are effects no less than false. In this respect magic and mathematics are on a level. Both demand scientific explanation; both are susceptible of it. Manifestly, then, we cannot admit that explanation may be treated as a kind of refutation. /…/ This way lies universal scepticism. Thus would all intellectual values be utterly destroyed.”

Arthur James Balfour (1848–1930) British Conservative politician and statesman

Theism and humanism

Way , Mathematics , Nature , Universe

“"I was quite happy standing there thundering about, playing whatever I could - that's "fun". And I see young bands occasionally now doing the same thing. I think it's called "thrash" now. It's the same thing: It's just kids who can't play, pissing about. It's terrific. That's all we were doing. I mean, Dave could play a little bit, but none of the rest of us could."”

Roger Waters (1943) English songwriter, bassist, and lyricist of Pink Floyd

Musician, December 1992
Music

Thinking , Happiness

“If more people recognized the difference between friendship and mere attraction, and how love must partake of both to prosper, I expect there'd be more happy people.”

Sherwood Smith book Crown Duel

Crown Duel (Crown & Court #1 - 2, 1997)

Love , Friendship , People , Happiness

“To insist on racial divisions, on racial differences, in an already divided people, is to place obstacles in the way of public and individual happiness, which can only be obtained by bringing people together as a nation.”

José Martí (1853–1895) Poet, writer, Cuban nationalist leader

My Race (1893)

People , Way , Happiness

“Transformation: Compassion and loving kindness can transform an enemy into a friend, while right view and wisdom can transform suffering into happiness.”

Thich Nhat Tu (1969) Vietnamese philosopher

Buddhist Socteriological Ethics: A Study of the Buddha’s Central Teachings (1999)

Love , Wisdom , Suffering , Happiness

“Why don’t you believe in God? I get that question all the time. I always try to give a sensitive, reasoned answer. This is usually awkward, time consuming and pointless. People who believe in God don’t need proof of his existence, and they certainly don’t want evidence to the contrary. They are happy with their belief. They even say things like “it’s true to me” and “it’s faith.” I still give my logical answer because I feel that not being honest would be patronizing and impolite. It is ironic therefore that “I don’t believe in God because there is absolutely no scientific evidence for his existence and from what I’ve heard the very definition is a logical impossibility in this known universe” comes across as both patronizing and impolite.”

Ricky Gervais (1961) English comedian, actor, director, producer, musician, writer, and former radio presenter

"Ricky Gervais: Why I’m an Atheist," WSJ, 2010 http://blogs.wsj.com/speakeasy/2010/12/19/a-holiday-message-from-ricky-gervais-why-im-an-atheist/

God , People , Faith , Feeling

“Didn't I tell you?
They will accuse you of all the wrongdoings,
they will call you ugly names,
they will make you forget
it is me, who is the source of your happiness.”

Rumi (1207–1273) Iranian poet

Hush Don't Say Anything to God (1999)

Forgetting , Happiness

“When your mother has grown old
and with her so have you,
When that which once came easy
has at last become a burden,
When her loving, true eyes
no longer see life as once they did
When her weary feet
no longer want to wear her as she stands,
then reach an arm to her shoulder,
escort her gently, with happiness and passion
The hour will come, when you, crying,
must take her on her final walk.
And if she asks you, then give her an answer
And if she asks you again, listen!
And if she asks you again, take in her words
not impetuously, but gently and in peace!
And if she cannot quite understand you,
explain all to her gladly
For the hour will come, the bitter hour
when her mouth will ask for nothing more.”

Georg Runsky

Source: The poem was originally titled "Habe Geduld". It was first published in Blüthen des Herzens around 1906. https://www.bartfmdroog.com/droog/dd/bluthen_des_herzens_scans.html#front

Adolf Hitler used this poem with the title "Deine Mutter" in the handwritten manuscript he signed and dated in 1923. For this reason, this poem is sometimes misattributed to him. Adolf Hitler, "Denk' es!" (Be Reminded!) 1923, first published in Sonntag-Morgenpost (14 May 1933).

Life , Cry , Understanding , Passion

“At its heart, the libertarian message is an American message. We love our country, we care for our neighbors, and we want everyone to be happy, healthy and prosperous. We want people to be free to raise their children in peace. We’re only different because we’re not afraid to stand by the principles upon which our nation was founded. We’re only different because we believe, as our Founding Fathers did, that individual initiative and creativity, and voluntary cooperation and mutual assistance among people is best way to solve any problem or overcome any difficulty we face.”

R. Lee Wrights (1958–2017) American gubernatorial candidate

" Libertarians Can Make a Difference by Being Different http://www.libertyforall.net/?p=7323," Liberty For All (8 February 2012, retrieved 25 February 2012).
Republished http://www.independentpoliticalreport.com/2012/02/lee-wrights-libertarians-can-make-a-difference-by-being-different/ by Independent Political Report (18 February 2012).
2012

Love , Children , People , Peace

“The only way to make people good, is to make them happy.”

Dinah Craik (1826–1887) English novelist and poet

Ch 11
A Woman's Thoughts About Women (1858)

People , Way , Happiness

“Indolence is a delightful but distressing state; we must be doing something to be happy.”

William Hazlitt (1778–1830) English writer

"On the Pleasure of Painting"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

Happiness

““I’ve been on my own before, Mather.” And I hadn’t been happy a moment. But happiness is a fleeting creature. It’s no birthright. Not anything I expect but something I accept when I tumble into it. Meantime, power will do nicely.”

Glen Cook Dreams of Steel

Source: Dreams of Steel (1990), Chapter 14 (p. 276)

Happiness

“Happiness is a by-product. It is not a primary product of life. It is a thing which you suddenly realize you have because you're so delighted to be doing something which perhaps has nothing whatever to do with happiness.”

Robertson Davies (1913–1995) Canadian journalist, playwright, professor, critic, and novelist

"Sunday Morning".
Conversations with Robertson Davies (1989)

Life , Happiness

“The soul may sleep and the body still be happy, but only in youth.”

Mignon McLaughlin (1913–1983) American journalist

The Complete Neurotic's Notebook (1981), Unclassified

Youth , Soul , Sleep , Happiness

“I don't think about (being) the face of the NHL - I just enjoy my time right now. Playing in the NHL was my dream come true and I'm playing with great players. I feel trust and I'm happy because I'm having the time of my life.”

Alexander Ovechkin (1985) Russian ice hockey player

Kevin McGran (October 28, 2006) "'Having the time of my life' - Capitals' Alexander Ovechkin says he loves to deliver hits and isn't averse to taking a few, either Rangers' Lundqvist's experiencing problems keeping the puck out this season, by Kevin McGran", The Toronto Star, p. E05.

Life , Dreams , Feeling , Thinking

“I'm happy in the every day Way
Among the mist and vines and caves
The wilderness is boundless
My companions are lazy white clouds
There are roads but they do not reach the world
My mind has come to rest and nothing can stir my thought
On a bed of rock I sit alone in the night
While a round moon climbs up Cold Mountain”

Han-shan Chinese monk and poet

Cold Mountain Transcendental Poetry

World , Way , Mountain , Night

“The desktop hasn't really taken over the world like Linux has in many other areas, but just looking at my own use, my desktop looks so much better than I ever could have imagined. Despite the fact that I'm known for sometimes not being very polite to some of the desktop UI people, because I want to get my work done. Pretty is not my primary thing. I actually am very happy with the Linux desktop, and I started the project for my own needs, and my needs are very much fulfilled. That's why, to me, it's not a failure. I would obviously love for Linux to take over that world too, but it turns out it's a really hard area to enter. I'm still working on it. It's been 25 years. I can do this for another 25. I'll wear them down.”

Linus Torvalds (1969) Finnish-American software engineer and hacker

Torvalds, Linus, 2016-04-07, <nowiki>Linus Torvalds still wants Linux to take over the desktop</nowiki>, 2016-04-07 http://www.cio.com/article/3053507/linux/linus-torvalds-still-wants-linux-to-take-over-the-desktop.html,
2010s, 2016

Love , People , World , Imagination

“My wife, my child, my music, Nature and the sun; they are my happiness.”

Richard Strauss (1864–1949) German composer and orchestra director

written on the sketches for his Domestic Symphony. Charles Youmans, Mahler and Strauss in Dialogue, Indiana University press (2016), found on page 60.
Other sources

Music , Nature , Sun , Happiness

“I really believe that the general, happy mood of the people here [in Elberfeld, Germany] is largely caused by nature. At least I am experiencing that in places like these people are much more natural than in regions where nature offers them little or nothing to subtract their heart for some time from the hypocrisy of the world, and to taste a not-deceitful delight.”

Barend Cornelis Koekkoek (1803–1862) painter from the Northern Netherlands

(original Dutch, citaat van B.C. Koekkoek:) Ik geloof dat de algemeene, hier heerschende gelukkige gemoedsstemming der menschen [in Elberfeld, Germany] grotendeels door den natuur wordt veroorzaakt. Ik ten minste ben van gevoelen, dat in oorden, zooals deze de mensch natuurlijker is, dan in streken waar de natuur hem weinig of niets aanbiedt, om zijn hart eenige tijd van de huichelarij der wereld af te trekken, en een niet bedrieglijk genot te smaken.
Source: Herinneringen aan en Mededeelingen van…' (1841), p. 47

People , World , Mood , Nature

“Now, as an embittered cynic, I should be almost programmed to vomit all over the screen at the mere sight of this, but instead, I find it strangely moving. You see, as I stare into their happy smiling faces filled with naive joie de vivre, I know they're just blissfully unaware of the crushing despair that awaits them as they venture further into adulthood. The myriad disappointments, the yawning chasms of pain, the slow gnawing descent into physical decay, the sheer unrelenting horror of it all.”

Charlie Brooker (1971) journalist, broadcaster and writer from England

Screenwipe S4E4
Discussing the High School Musical series
Screenwipe

Pain , Smile , Disappointment , Adulthood

“[Aphrodite] set out, and after searching up and down Olympus for her boy, found him far away in the fruit-laden orchard of Zeus. With him was Ganymede, whose beauty had so captivated Zeus that he took him up to heaven to live with the immortals. The two lads, who had much in common, were playing with golden knuckle-bones. Eros, the greedy boy, was standing there with a whole handful of them clutched to his breast and a happy flush mantling his cheeks. Near by sat Ganymede, hunched up, silent and disconsolate, with only two left. He threw these for what they were worth in quick succession and was furious when Eros laughed. Of course he lost them both immediately – they joined the rest. So he went off in despair with empty hands and did not notice the goddess's approach. Aphrodite came up to her boy, took his chin in her hand, and said: 'Why this triumphant smile, you rascal?”

Apollonius of Rhodes book Argonautica

I do believe you won the game unfairly by cheating a beginner…
Argonautica (3rd century BC), Book III. Jason and Medea

Smile , Beauty , Search , Boy

“This is the Imus in the Morning program, We're not happy 'till you're not happy.”

Don Imus (1940–2019) Radio personality

Imus in the Morning, (15 June 2006)

Happiness

“A great god is Ahuramazda, who created this excellent thing which is seen, who created happiness for man, who set wisdom and capability down upon King Darius. … By the grace of Ahuramazda I am of such a sort, I am a friend of the right, of wrong I am not a friend. It is not my wish that the weak should have harm done him by the strong, nor is it my wish that the strong should have harm done him by the weak. … To the man who is a follower of the lie I am no friend. I am not hot-tempered. What things develop in my anger, I hold firmly under control by my thinking power. … What a man does or performs, according to his ability, by that I become satisfied with him.”

Darius I of Persia (-550–-486 BC) 3rd king of the Persian Achaemenid Empire (550–486 BC)

DNb inscription http://www.livius.org/aa-ac/achaemenians/DNb.html

Wisdom , God , Lie , Thinking

“I would like to stress that, we would be happy to see normal cross-strait exchanges based on equality and dignity, openness and transparency, and no political talks.”

Tsai Ing-wen (1956) President of the Republic of China

Tsai sees ‘manipulation’ in play, Taipei Times, 1, November 5, 2015, 5 November 2015 http://www.taipeitimes.com/News/front/archives/2015/11/05/2003631718,

Happiness

“We fall short when we ascribe all the modes of happiness to walking in paths of rectitude. There are joys which only tramps and thieves know.”

Henry S. Haskins (1875–1957)

Source: Meditations in Wall Street (1940), p. 116

Joy , Happiness

“It appeared as if the whole nation stood up to greet me in Ahmedabad on my taking the 432nd wicket. The country was proud and that made me really happy…This was the first time in my life I realized what it is to be the number 1 in the world. It is a heady feeling almost out of the world.”

Kapil Dev (1959) Indian cricketer

Quoted in [Dev, Romi, Kapil Dev: Triumph of the Spirit, http://books.google.com/books?id=EF_jESQMqTgC, 1994, Allied Publishers, 978-81-7023-402-9]

Life , World , Feeling , Appearance

“The family is the cradle of the world’s misinformation. There must be something in family life that generates factual error. Over-closeness, the noise and heat of being. Perhaps even something deeper like the need to survive. Murray says we are fragile creatures surrounded by a world of hostile facts. Facts threaten our happiness and security. The deeper we delve into things, the looser our structure may seem to become. The family process works towards sealing off the world. Small errors grow heads, fictions proliferate. I tell Murray that ignorance and confusion can’t possibly be the driving forces behind family solidarity. What an idea, what a subversion. He asks me why the strongest family units exist in the least developed societies. Not to know is a weapon of survival, he says. Magic and superstition become entrenched as the powerful orthodoxy of the clan. The family is strongest where objective reality is most likely to be misinterpreted. What a heartless theory, I say. But Murray insists it’s true.”

Don DeLillo book White Noise

White Noise (1984)

Life , Hostility , World , Family

“I wake up in the morning and seem to hear some one in the house sighing and saying that last night some one died. I immediately ask to find out who it is, and learn that it is the sharpest, most calculating fellow in town. Ah, is this not happiness?”

Jin Shengtan (1610–1661) Chinese writer

"Thirty-three Happy Moments"

Learning , Housing , Night , Happiness

“Oh would I were a boy again,
When life seemed formed of sunny years,
And all the heart then knew of pain
Was wept away in transient tears!
When every tale Hope whispered then,
My fancy deemed was only truth.
Oh, would that I could know again,
The happy visions of my youth.”

Mark Lemon (1809–1870) British magazine editor

Oh would I were a Boy again, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

Life , Pain , Truth , Youth

“Today, the countries that had kept up a civilised relationship with Modi despite the US’s strictures—these include Japan, Singapore, Canada, Australia, Israel[, ] and even China—are happy with the knowledge that their transition to a new regime will be extra smooth. Nor will the others who changed their tune midway feel disadvantaged. It is only the US that invested politically in the witch-hunt against Modi that feels seriously threatened.”

Swapan Dasgupta (1955) Indian politician, journalist and columnist

"A mighty fall from a moral high ground", 2014

Feeling , Knowledge , Change , Country

“To me it seems that those who are happy in this world are better and more lovable people than those who are not.”

Samuel Butler book The Way of All Flesh

Source: The Way of All Flesh (1903), Ch. 26

People , World , Happiness

“Back to him she would never go, but in her lonely life still lived the sweet memory of that happy time when she believed in him and he was all in all to her.”

Louisa May Alcott A Long Fatal Love Chase

A Long Fatal Love Chase (1866)

Life , Memory , Time , Happiness

“There is, in lovers, a certain infatuation of egotism; they will have a witness of their happiness, cost that witness what it may.”

Charlotte Brontë book Villette

Source: Villette (1853), Chapter XXXVII: Sunshine

Lovers , Happiness

“You don't appreciate home until you leave it and, let me tell you, you can't appreciate life till you've almost left it! Some people hope and die with their song still in them. I used to think that happiness resulted when my earnings matched my yearnings! But not anymore!”

Patsy Cline (1932–1963) American country music singer

To her mother following the 1961 car accident
[Nassour, Ellis, Patsy Cline, 1980, unidentified edition, unidentified pages]

Life , People , Hope , Home

“Now as I was young and easy under the apple boughs
About the lilting house and happy as the grass was green,
The night above the dingle starry,
Time let me hail and climb
Golden in the heydays of his eyes.
And honoured among wagons I was prince of the apple towns.”

Dylan Thomas Fern Hill

St. 1
Fern Hill (1946)

Grass , Time , Housing , Night

“Another change in the constitution relates to the length of the tenure of the presidential office. In the new constitution it is six years instead of four, and the President rendered ineligible for a re-election. This is certainly a decidedly conservative change. It will remove from the incumbent all temptation to use his office or exert the powers confided to him for any objects of personal ambition. The only incentive to that higher ambition which should move and actuate one holding such high trusts in his hands, will be the good of the people, the advancement, prosperity, happiness, safety, honor, and true glory of the confederacy.”

Alexander H. Stephens (1812–1883) Vice President of the Confederate States (in office from 1861 to 1865)

The Cornerstone Speech (1861)

People , Confidence , Change , Personality

“I see those pretended politicians who place all their subtlety, and who think they serve their country best, in circumventing those with whom they treat, interpreting the conditions of a treaty in such a manner, that all the advantage results to their own country. Far from blushing at conduct so contrary to equity, to right, and to national honesty, they boast of their dexterity, and pretend that they deserve the name of great negociators. How long shall public men boast of conduct which would disgrace a private individual? …Shall powerful states abandon openly that which is honest, for that which may appear useful? It often happens for the happiness of the human race, that this pretended utility is fatal to the powers who follow it, and that, even among sovereigns, candour and right are found to be the safest policy.”

Henry Temple, 3rd Viscount Palmerston (1784–1865) British politician

Speech in the House of Commons (16 July 1832), quoted in George Henry Francis, Opinions and Policy of the Right Honourable Viscount Palmerston, G.C.B., M.P., &c. as Minister, Diplomatist, and Statesman, During More Than Forty Years of Public Life (London: Colburn and Co., 1852), p. 206.
1830s

Men , Thinking , Appearance , Country

“When you look at your life the greatest happinesses are family happinesses.”

Joyce Brothers (1927–2013) Joyce Brothers

As quoted in Three Hundred and Twenty-Five Prompts for Personal Journals (1995) by James A. Senn, p. 44

Life , Family , Happiness

“WE MUST INVENT FUTURIST CLOTHES, hap-hap-hap-hap-happy clothes, daring clothes with brilliant colours and dynamic lines. They must be simple, and above all they must be made to last for a short time only in order to encourage industrial activity and to provide constant and novel enjoyment for our bodies.”

Giacomo Balla (1871–1958) Italian artist

(Manuscript, 1913); as quoted at dekorera.tumblr: futurist manifesto of men's clothing http://dekorera.tumblr.com/post/3212646425/futurist-manifesto-of-mens-clothing-by-giacomo
Futurist Manifesto of Men's clothing,' 1913/1914

Time , Clothes , Happiness

“If I look in the mirror when I get up, or before going to bed a night, i see a man of average ugliness…But I also see a man who's completely happy with the figure staring back at him. Who's proud of every single second of his past.”

Andrea Pirlo (1979) Italian footballer

Ibid [p. 147]

Past , Night , Happiness

“Just remember that it’s your effort that’s going to really bring it together for you…. You will be happy because you will have then realized and fulfilled the destiny. That little speck, then will have become everything because it will have merged with infinity. It will have merged with the most incredible, most indescribable thing there is!”

Prem Rawat (1957) controversial spiritual leader

Wembley Hall, London, England, 5 March 1978
1970s

Effort , Happiness

““Everybody rich and happy.” She smiled. “Also complacent and rather stupid, you may have noticed.””

Joe Haldeman book The Accidental Time Machine

Source: The Accidental Time Machine (2007), Chapter 15 (p. 181)

Stupidity , Smile , Happiness

“26. And [the Messiah] said unto them, "If a man told God that he wanted most of all to help the suffering world, no matter the price to himself, and God answered and told him what he must do, should the man do as he is told?"27. "Of course, Master!" cried the many. "It should be pleasure for him to suffer the tortures of hell itself, should God ask it!"28. "No matter what those tortures, no matter how difficult the task?"29. "Honor to be hanged, glory to be nailed to a tree and burned, if so be that God has asked," said they.30. "And what would you do," the Master said unto the multitude, "if God spoke directly to your face and said, 'I COMMAND THAT YOU BE HAPPY IN THE WORLD, AS LONG AS YOU LIVE.' What would you do then?"31. And the multitude was silent, not a voice, not a sound was heard upon the hillsides, across the valleys where they stood.”

Richard Bach (1936) American spiritual writer

Illusions : The Adventures of a Reluctant Messiah (1977)

God , Pleasure , World , Hell

“Liberty and equality are not only destructive to the morals, but to the happiness of society.”

George Fitzhugh (1806–1881) American activist

Source: Sociology For The South: Or The Failure Of A Free Society (1854), p. 236

Happiness

“[Francois Bernier, late in the seventeenth century, talks of originally “real Mongols”, “White men, foreigners”. He also says] “that children of the third and fourth generation, who have the brown complexion… are held in much less respect than new comers, and are seldom invested with official situations: they consider themselves happy, if permitted to serve as private soldiers in the infantry or cavalry.””

François Bernier (1620–1688) French physician and traveller

Quoted from Lal, K. S. (1990). Indian muslims: Who are they.
Travels in the Mogul Empire (1656-1668)

Men , Children , Happiness

“I know I pretend to be the apolitical businessman a lot, but the reality is that like anybody who’s interested in getting people together with the things they need and want, I have an agenda. I want people to get what they want, and I want them ideally to get it fro me, but most of all I want them to be free to want it and to make offers to get it. Those poor stupid fanatics have ben sold on the idea that what they want is the ability to give themselves a little priggish congratulations over having done the right thing. They’d rather be right than happy. More importantly, they’d rather that I be right than happy and they’re not about to leave the choice up to me. I say, let ‘em die, and I hope it’s slow and it hurts.”

John Barnes book A Million Open Doors

A Million Open Doors (1992)

People , Stupidity , Hope , Idea

“The end and aim of the Cynic philosophy, as indeed of every philosophy, is happiness, but happiness that consists in living according to nature, and not according to the opinions of the multitude.”

Julian (emperor) (331–363) Roman Emperor, philosopher and writer

As quoted in The Works of the Emperor Julian (1923) by Wilmer Cave France Wright, p. 39; also in The Missing Jesus: Rabbinic Judaism and the New Testament (2003) by Craig Alan Evans, Carl A. Elliott, Bruce Chilton, Jacob Neusner
General sources

Nature , Happiness

“You may rejoice to think yourselves secure,
You may be grateful for the gift divine,
That grace unsought which made your black hearts pure
And fits your earthborn souls in Heaven to shine.
But is it sweet to look around and view
Thousands excluded from that happiness,
Which they deserve at least as much as you,
Their faults not greater nor their virtues less?”

Anne Brontë book Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell

Poems by Currer, Ellis, and Acton Bell (1846), A Word to the Calvinists (1843)

Soul , Thinking , Heart , Happiness

“Because in spite of this longing, I know that I shall purchase happiness at high price if I return; that new falsehood may betray me, new tyranny oppress me, and above all I feel that with this man I must lose more and more the love of all good things, so strong is his influence, so unprincipled his nature. My only hope is that I may save his soul and yet not lose my own. Can I, dare I do this?”

Louisa May Alcott A Long Fatal Love Chase

A Long Fatal Love Chase (1866)

Love , Hope , Feeling , Soul

“American doesn’t need any more professional political punks in D. C., unless you believe sticking a red hot crowbar in your eye is an excellent treatment for cataracts. It’s professional political punks who have created the pus-filled infected wound of fundamental transformation, not Donald Trump. They are the ones calling for a bigger bureaucratic shovel for the hole they have already dug, not Donald Trump. They are the ones who have lied to Americans or intentionally hidden the truth from us, not Donald Trump. It’s professional politicians who are the enemy of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, not Donald Trump.”

Ted Nugent (1948) American rock musician

Give Trump the Medal of Freedom (August 7, 2015)

Life , Truth , Happiness

“There is something intrinsically upside down and counter-intuitive in the relationship between money and happiness.”

David Orrell (1962) Canadian mathematician

Source: The Other Side Of The Coin (2008), Chapter 2, Odd Versus Even, p. 70

Money , Happiness

“But don’t you think,” I persist, “that it’s better to be extremely happy for a short while, even if you lose it, than to be just okay for your whole life?”

Audrey Niffenegger book The Time Traveler's Wife

Source: The Time Traveler’s Wife (2003), p. 239

Life , Thinking , Happiness

“What is the worth of any thing,
But for the happiness 'twill bring?”

Richard Owen Cambridge (1717–1802) British poet

"Learning: A Dialogue", line 23; in The Works of Richard Owen Cambridge (1803), Miscellaneous Verses, p. 10

Happiness

“The fields and the flowers and the beautiful faces are not ours, as the stars and the hills and the sunlight are not ours, but they give us fresh and happy thoughts.|”

John Lancaster Spalding (1840–1916) Catholic bishop

Source: Aphorisms and Reflections (1901), p. 15

Beauty , Star , Flowers , Happiness

“With that she went and fetched the box in which she kept her many drugs, healing or deadly, and putting it on her knees she wept. Tears ran unchecked in torrents down her cheeks and drenched her lap as she bemoaned her own sad destiny. She was determined now to take a poison from the box and swallow it; and in a moment she was fumbling with the fastening of the lid in her unhappy eagerness to reach the fatal drug. But suddenly she was overcome by the hateful thought of death, and for a long time she stayed her hand in silent horror. Visions of life and all its fascinating cares rose up before her. She thought of the pleasures that the living can enjoy. She thought of her happy playmates, as a young girl will. And now, setting its true value on all this, it seemed to her a sweeter thing to see the sun than it had ever been before. So, prompted by Hera, she changed her mind and put the box away.”

Apollonius of Rhodes book Argonautica

Source: Argonautica (3rd century BC), Book III. Jason and Medea, Lines 802–818

Life , Death , Hate , Pleasure

“Heroes have filled the zodiac of beneficent labors, and then given up their mortal part to the fire without a murmur. Sages and lawgivers have bent their whole nature to the search for truth, and thought themselves happy if they could buy, with the sacrifice of all temporal ease and pleasure, one seed for the future Eden. Poets and priests have strung the lyre with heart-strings, poured out their best blood upon the altar which, reare'd anew from age to age, shall at last sustain the flame which rises to highest heaven. What shall we say of those who, if not so directly, or so consciously, in connection with the central truth, yet, led and fashioned by a divine instinct, serve no less to develop and interpret the open secret of love passing into life, the divine energy creating for the purpose of happiness; — of the artist, whose hand, drawn by a preexistent harmony to a certain medium, moulds it to expressions of life more highly and completely organized than are seen elsewhere, and, by carrying out the intention of nature, reveals her meaning to those who are not yet sufficiently matured to divine it; of the philosopher, who listens steadily for causes, and, from those obvious, infers those yet unknown; of the historian, who, in faith that all events must have their reason and their aim, records them, and lays up archives from which the youth of prophets may be fed. The man of science dissects the statement, verifies the facts, and demonstrates connection even where he cannot its purpose·”

Margaret Fuller book Woman in the Nineteenth Century

Woman in the Nineteenth Century (1845)

Love , Life , Pleasure , Truth

“If you want external happiness, it can be an elusive desire. Internal happiness needs only to be revealed. It is not elusive because it is within you. It is your treasure. If you take someone else's treasure, it is stealing, but if you turn to your own, it is not. Happiness is your own treasure because it lies within you.”

Prem Rawat (1957) controversial spiritual leader

Fernbank, London, England October, 1971
1970s
Variant: If you want external happiness, it can be an elusive desire. Internal happiness needs only to be revealed. It is not elusive because it is within you. It is your treasure. If you take someone else's treasure, it is stealing, but if you turn to your own, it is not. Happiness is your own treasure because it lies within you.

Happiness

“The end of the government being the good of mankind points out its great duties: it is above all things to provide for the security, the quiet, the happy enjoyment of life, liberty, and property.”

James Otis Jr. (1725–1783) Lawyer in colonial Massachusetts

Argument Against the Writs of Assistance (1761)

Life , Happiness

“Can any man say with certainty that he was happy at a particular moment of time which he remembers as being delightful? Remembering it certainly makes him happy, because he realizes how happy he could have been, but at the actual moment when the alleged happiness was occurring, did he really feel happy? He was like a man owning a piece of ground in which, unknown to himself, a treasure lay buried.”

Eugène Delacroix (1798–1863) French painter

28 April 1854 (p. 227)
1831 - 1863, Delacroix' 'Journal' (1847 – 1863)

Feeling , Time , Happiness

“What can man know about happiness except how to write it?”

Waldemar Łysiak book Statek

Statek (1994)

Happiness

“How important are the responsibilities, which now devolve upon me I fully realise, and it is my intention to prove by performance rather than by words. The inhertitance to which I succeed is no ordinary one, and I appreciate what Mysore owes to the administration of wise statesmen, and the care of British Government under the regency of my revered mother…. may heaven grant me the ability as well the ambition to make a full and wise use of the great opportunities of my position, and to govern, without fear or favour for the lasting happiness of my people.”

Krishna Raja Wadiyar IV (1884–1940) King of Mysore

In his speech on being installed as the Maharaja of Mysroe at the age of 18Quoted in [Vikram Sampath, SPLENDOURS OF ROYAL MYSORE (PB), http://books.google.com/books?id=3aFmtr4MdLQC&pg=PT492, Rupa & Company, 978-81-291-1535-5, 492–]

People , Fear , Happiness

“In this city I must visit the abodes of sorrow: but as yet no way has opened: no person offered to go along with me, which has made me determine to do nothing but what connot be avoided of a public nature. O that my little labour of love were finished, and comfortably completed to the joy of such who might hail me a welcome stranger on Zion's happy Coast, where my mansion of bliss awaits me, after all the storms of life are past.”

Dorothy Ripley (1767–1832) missionary

Letter to Abigail Eames (14 October 1805), p. 204
The Bank of Faith and Works United (1819)

Love , Life , Way , Nature

““Is he then an unhappy man?”
Poirot said:
“So unhappy that he has forgotten what happiness means. So unhappy that he does not know he is unhappy.”
The nun said softly:
“Ah, a rich man…””

Agatha Christie book The Labours of Hercules

The Labours of Hercules (1967)

Happiness

“The faculty of moral will, developed in the child, is a new element of his nature. It is a new power brought upon the scene, and a ruling power, delegated from Heaven. Never was a human being sunk so low that he had not, by God's gift, the power to rise. Because God commands him to rise. it is certain that he ran rise. Every man has the power, and should use it, to make all situations, trials, and temptations instruments to promote his virtue and happiness; and is so far from being the creature of circumstances, 'that he creates and controls them, making them to be all that they are, of evil or of good, to him as a moral being.”

Albert Pike book Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry

Source: Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry (1871), Ch. XXII : Grand Master Architect, p. 192

God , Nature , Evil , Happiness

“Being a Disney VoluntEAR reinforces my belief in Walt's vision for The Walt Disney Company to bring happiness to every family in the world.”

Newton Lee American computer scientist

Disney Consumer Products News (Summer 1998)

World , Family , Happiness

“The Philippines is where Asia wears a smile. Beautiful products can only be made by happy people.”

Imelda Marcos (1929) Former First Lady of the Philippines

At a press conference in Bloomingdale's, at the opening of the Philippine exhibit, cited in Ang Katipunan (May 1982).

People , Smile , Beauty , Happiness

“Industry is not a collection of machines and tools and buildings. It is a social entity that has the responsibility of realizing the happiness of those who work in it.”

Luis A. Ferré (1904–2003) American politician

Quoted by TIME Magazine on May 11, 1962 Time Magazine http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,939385,00.html

Happiness

“During the summer of 1765 the happy phrase of Isaac Barré—"these sons of liberty"—was everywhere repeated, and was put on as a kind of protective coloring by strong patriots, who henceforth thought of themselves as Sons of Liberty and no traitors at all. Rather were they traitors who would in any way justify an act of tyranny; most of all those so-called Americans, accepting the office of Stamp Master, who cunningly aspired to make a farthing profit out of the hateful business of enslaving their own countrymen.”

Carl L. Becker (1873–1945) American historian

The Eve of the Revolution (1918)

Hate , Color , Way , Business

“I have to mime at parties when everyone sings Happy Birthday... mime or mumble and rumble and growl and grunt so deep that only moles, manta rays and mushrooms can hear me.”

Stephen Fry (1957) English comedian, actor, writer, presenter, and activist

on his frustrating inability to sing
1990s, Moab is My Washpot (autobiography, 1997)

Birthday , Singing , Happiness

“And be desired, she said while holding me in her arms:
because happy are the desired, each and all, she said with eyes
closed, in a desperate embrace. And our bodies cuddled up
to each other. Happy are those who want to love, she said,
today happy are the desired ones. I want you, she said,
want your movements, because they all are good for me,
want your caresses, because they all are good for me.
Give you my untouched young body, because I’m yearning
now for your embrace. I give you my vulnerable young body,
because I am yearning --- even for pain. Desired you are,
and I desire your desire, and do with me whatever you want
to do, she said, for happy are the desired ones, each and all,
and what I want to be is: desired-for-ever.”

András Petőcz (1959) Hungarian writer

THE DESIRE FOR DESIRÉE http://www.c3.hu/~mediumar/PETVERS1.HTM (1993).
András Petőcz: In Praise of the Sea (1999, ISBN 963 9101 51 6).
Poems

Love , Pain , Happiness

“When one is already happy it is important not to lose the virtues which have produced happiness. When they are successful, many men and women forget prudence, moderation, and kindness - qualities which were instrumental in their success. They are arrogant or thoughtless; an excessive self-confidence prevents them from accomplishing difficult tasks, and they soon become unworthy of their good fortune. They are surprised when their luck changes from good to bad. The ancient practice of sacrifice to the gods in return for happiness was a wise one. Polycrates, Tyrant of Samos, threw his precious ring into the sea as a sacrifice, and there are several ways of throwing the ring of Polycrates into the sea. The simplest is to be modest.”

André Maurois (1885–1967) French writer

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

Women , Men , God , Way

“A few months ago I read an interview with a critic; a well-known critic; an unusually humane and intelligent critic. The interviewer had just said that the critic “sounded like a happy man”, and the interview was drawing to a close; the critic said, ending it all: “I read, but I don’t get any time to read at whim. All the reading I do is in order to write or teach, and I resent it. We have no TV, and I don’t listen to the radio or records, or go to art galleries or the theater. I’m a completely negative personality.”
As I thought of that busy, artless life—no records, no paintings, no plays, no books except those you lecture on or write articles about—I was so depressed that I went back over the interview looking for some bright spot, and I found it, one beautiful sentence: for a moment I had left the gray, dutiful world of the professional critic, and was back in the sunlight and shadow, the unconsidered joys, the unreasoned sorrows, of ordinary readers and writers, amateurishly reading and writing “at whim”. The critic said that once a year he read Kim, it was plain, at whim: not to teach, not to criticize, just for love—he read it, as Kipling wrote it, just because he liked to, wanted to, couldn’t help himself. To him it wasn’t a means to a lecture or an article, it was an end; he read it not for anything he could get out of it, but for itself. And isn’t this what the work of art demands of us? The work of art, Rilke said, says to us always: You must change your life. It demands of us that we too see things as ends, not as means—that we too know them and love them for their own sake. This change is beyond us, perhaps, during the active, greedy, and powerful hours of our lives, but during the contemplative and sympathetic hours of our reading, our listening, our looking, it is surely within our power, if we choose to make it so, if we choose to let one part of our nature follow its natural desires. So I say to you, for a closing sentence: Read at whim! read at whim!”

Randall Jarrell (1914–1965) poet, critic, novelist, essayist

“Poets, Critics, and Readers”, pp. 112–113
A Sad Heart at the Supermarket: Essays & Fables (1962)

Love , Life , Books , World

“America will not die. As the time demands them, great men will appear, and by their combined efforts render liberty and happiness more secure. The people will be ready and answer in every emergency that may arise.”

Charles E. Nash (1844–1913) American politician

As quoted in Congressional Record https://web.archive.org/web/20160528155427/http://history.house.gov/People/Detail/18846, House, 44th Cong., 1st sess. (7 June 1876): p. 3,669
Speech to the U.S. House of Representatives (1876)

Men , People , Effort , Appearance

“[W]hy are Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and Norway not that far behind us, ranking in the top twelve countries for antidepressant use? Is it just the long winters? Why are their drug-related deaths booming? Isn’t it possible that a generous, far-reaching welfare state depletes people’s sense of drive, purpose, and self-respect, and enables them to explore chemical forms of happiness?”

Jim Geraghty (1975) American journalist

Ten Reasons We Can't, and Shouldn't, Be Nordic (2018)

Death , People , Sense , Winter

“In cases which concern private revelations, it is better to believe than not to believe, for, if you believe, and it is proven true, you will be happy that you have believed, because our Holy Mother asked it. If you believe, and it should be proven false, you will receive all blessings as if it had been true, because you believed it to be true.”

Pope Urban VIII (1568–1644) Pope

Pope Urban VIII on Private Revelation http://www.medjugorje.org/purban.htm (2001).
Whether or not Urban VIII said this is debated. He did make a public statement about private revelations and their dissemination in the Catholic Church in his Constitution, Sanctissimus Dominus Noster of 1625-03-13.
Misattributed quotes

Falseness , Happiness

“Happy bridegroom, Hesper brings
All desired and timely things.
All whom morning sends to roam,
Hesper loves to lead them home.
Home return who him behold,
Child to mother, sheep to fold,
Bird to nest from wandering wide:
Happy bridegroom, seek your bride.”

A.E. Housman (1859–1936) English classical scholar and poet

No. 24 ("Epithalamium"), st. 3.
Last Poems http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext05/8lspm10.txt (1922)

Love , Home , Bird , Time

“The desire to serve the common good must without fail be a requisite of the soul, a necessity for personal happiness; if it issues not from there, but from theoretical or other considerations, it is not at all the same thing.”

Anton Chekhov (1860–1904) Russian dramatist, author and physician

Note-Book of Anton Chekhov (1921)

Soul , Personality , Happiness

“Have you ever seen a one trick pony in the field so happy and free/
If you've ever seen a one trick pony then you've seen me.
Have you ever seen a one legged dog makin' his way down the street?
If you've ever seen a one legged dog then you've seen me.”

Bruce Springsteen (1949) American singer and songwriter

"The Wrestler"
Song lyrics, Working on a Dream (2009)

Dogs , Way , Happiness

“When we consider the positive evil caused to the disqualified half of the human race by their disqualification — first in the loss of the most inspiriting and elevating kind of personal enjoyment, and next in the weariness, disappointment, and profound dissatisfaction with life, which are so often the substitute for it; one feels that among all the lessons which men require for carrying on the struggle against the inevitable imperfections of their lot on earth, there is no lesson which they more need, than not to add to the evils which nature inflicts, by their jealous and prejudiced restrictions on one another. Their vain fears only substitute other and worse evils for those which they are idly apprehensive of: while every restraint on the freedom of conduct of any of their human fellow-creatures (otherwise than by making them responsible for any evil actually caused by it), dries up pro tanto the principal fountain of human happiness, and leaves the species less rich, to an inappreciable degree, in all that makes life valuable to the individual human being.”

John Stuart Mill The Subjection of Women

Source: The Subjection of Women (1869), Ch. 4

Life , Men , Fear , Disappointment

“Once wine was the means to artificial happiness; now things are much more sophisticated, and what was one of the great secrets of medicine has become the only bliss many find in this life.”

Nick Drake (poet) (1961) British writer

Ch 10
The Rahotep series, Book 2: Tutankhamun

Life , Secret , Wine , Happiness

“If I seem happy to you… You could never say anything that would please me more. For men are made for happiness, and anyone who is completely happy has a right to say to himself, 'I am doing God's will on earth.' All the righteous, all the saints, all the holy martyrs were happy.”

Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1821–1881) Russian author

Book II, ch. 4 (trans. Constance Garnett)
The Brothers Karamazov (1879–1880)

Men , God , Happiness

“Life-affirming people are a bit creepy and self-consciously life-affirming art is usually awful.
My books tend to have happy endings, or at least that’s one way of reading them. My characters are exuberant and funny as well as dark. Duality is the essence of my voice so it’s appropriate for me to have an evil twin to blame things on.”

Carole Morin British writer

Chin Wag At The Slaughterhouse (2013)

Life , People , Books , Art

“By Christ's purchasing redemption, two things are intended, His satisfaction, and His merit. All is done by the price that Christ lays down, which does two things: it pays our debt, and so it satisfies; by its intrinsic value, and by the agreement between the Father and the Son it procures our title, and so it merits. The satisfaction of Christ is to free us from misery, and the merit of Christ is to purchase happiness for us.”

Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758) Christian preacher, philosopher, and theologian

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), p. 489.

Christ , Happiness

“[Stendhal] was small, ugly and obsessed by physical beauty in others, and he spent most of his time in salons and opera houses, pursuing aristocratic hostesses and singers. After the fall of Napoleon, he retired to Italy, adopted his pseudonym and began to write. He was a sexual freebooter who “found a notion of obtaining happiness from a virtuous woman wholly inconceivable.””

Anthony Burgess (1917–1993) English writer

At 59, unmarried, syphilitic and obscure, he dropped dead in a Paris street.
"Homage to QWERT YUIOP".
Non-Fiction, Homage to QWERT YUIOP: Selected Journalism 1978-1985 (1986)

Beauty , Time , Housing , Dead