quotations about Happiness
We take less pains to be happy, than to appear so.
FRANÇOIS DE LA ROCHEFOUCAULD
Moral Maxims
And what is happy? It is a going always on. There is something better to be done than I have done, and spurred by the fair delusion of progress, I will seek to progress, to whip myself on, to more and more -- to learning. Always.
SYLVIA PLATH
The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath
Do you know what I think happiness is really? Lookin' forward.
JOHN HARTLEY MANNERS
Happiness and Other Plays
Happiness is an imaginary condition, formerly attributed by the living to the dead, now usually attributed by adults to children, and by children to adults.
THOMAS SZASZ
The Second Sin
He that thinks himself the happiest man, really is so.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON
Lacon
Like all happiness, it did not last long.
LOUISA MAY ALCOTT
Little Women
Unconditional happiness is the one that is innate in human beings, that is permanent, that has no end, which exists when we reach a stage of acceptance of everything that surrounds us.
LUIS ALVES
Happiness Is Possible: Towards Unconditional Happiness
Happiness isn't something you experience; it's something you remember.
OSCAR LEVANT
attributed, TIME Magazine, August 28, 1972
He who has once been happy is for aye
Out of destruction's reach. His fortune then
Holds nothing secret; and Eternity,
Which is a mystery to other men,
Has like a woman given him its joy.
WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT
With Esther
The problem with the concept of happiness is trying to make it do enough without making it do too much. If we define it narrowly as a certain type of feeling or physiological state, then we can, in principle, measure it objectively, but it is too trivial a thing to be the foundation of all public life and private decisions. On the other hand, if we define it broadly as something like 'the elements of a good life', then it is so broad as to beg the question, and certainly too broad to be measured in national statistics. Yet we intuitively feel that there is something called happiness, something unitary but not trivial, concrete enough to strive for yet broad enough to be worth striving for.
DANIEL NETTLE
Happiness: The Science Behind Your Smile
The duty of happiness becomes clearer when we see how it affects others. It is the merry heart that makes the cheerful countenance, and it is the cheerful countenance that spreads cheer to make other hearts merry. The sunny soul brings sunshine everywhere. A bright and happy temperament is a great social asset, adding to the happiness of the world.
HUGH BLACK
Happiness
One of the world's greatest mistakes is that of supposing that complete happiness can be found in the attainment of some one thing, whereas the helps to happiness are very numerous. Man is a compound being, possessing physical, intellectual, and spiritual natures, each of which have many wants which must be supplied if man is to be a happy being.
NICIAS BALLARD COOKSEY
Helps to Happiness
To be caught happy in a world of misery was for an honest man the most despicable of crimes.
VIRGINIA WOOLF
To the Lighthouse
Your successes and happiness are forgiven you only if you generously consent to share them.
ALBERT CAMUS
The Fall
We have all had the experience of being happy and of being unhappy, and we have all observed happiness and unhappiness in other people. As a result, many people feel they are experts on the topic of happiness. This claimed expertise, however, is often illusory. There is a natural tendency for us to assume that what is true of our lives is generally true of other people's lives. Thus, if someone has discovered that he is happier in the married state than he was when he was single, he may conclude that marriage increases human happiness. On the other hand, someone whose level of happiness has gone down after marriage may well decide that marriage is an outmoded happiness-demolishing institution. The fallacy in attempting to draw general conclusions solely on the basis of one's own experience is obvious.
MICHAEL W. EYSENCK
Happiness: Facts and Myths
A somewhat depressing lesson that we learn from life is that there is no guaranteed sure-fire formula for happiness.
MICHAEL W. EYSENCK
Happiness: Facts and Myths
He that is discontented in one place will seldom be happy in another.
AESOP
Fables
False happiness is like false money, it passes for a time as well as the true, and serves some ordinary occasions; but when it is brought to the touch, we find the lightness and allay, and feel the loss.
ALEXANDER POPE
"Thoughts on Various Subjects"
The happiest people are the people with the best attitudes, not the best lives.
BOB LONSBERRY
A Various Language
It is good sometimes that the happy of this world should learn, were it only to humble their foolish pride for an instant, that there are higher, wider, and rarer joys than theirs.
CHARLES BAUDELAIRE
"Crowds"