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Quotes about happiness

248 quotes from 159 people

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A cheerful temper joined with innocence will make beauty attractive, knowledge delightful and wit good-natured.
Joseph Addison1672–1719The Tatler, No. 192 (1 July 1710)
- Character
Whoever increases the sum of human joy, is a worshiper. He who adds to the sum of human misery, is a blasphemer.
Robert G. Ingersoll1833–1899The trial of Charles B. Reynolds for blasphemy (1887)
- Religion
One feels inclined to say that the intention that man should be “happy” is not included in the plan of “Creation.”
Sigmund Freud1856–1939Civilization and Its Discontents (1929), Ch. 2, as translated by James Strachey, p.53
Happiness is not achieved by the conscious pursuit of happiness; it is generally the by-product of other activities.
Aldous Huxley1894–1963“Religion and Time” in C. Isherwood (ed.) Vedanta for the Western World (1945)
There is nothing which has yet been contrived by man, by which so much happiness is produced as by a good tavern or inn.
Samuel Johnson1709–1784Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), Vol II (21 March 1776) p. 287
Ah, happiness courts the light, so we deem the world is gay, but misery hides aloof, so we deem that misery there is none.
Herman Melville1819–1891Bartleby, the Scrivener (1853)
There is a limit to enjoyment, though the sources of wealth be boundless
And the choicest pleasures of life lie within the ring of moderation.
Martin Farquhar Tupper1810–1889Proverbial Philosophy (1838-1849), Of Compensation.
We’re all alive, but we don’t know why or what for; we’re all searching for happiness; we’re all leading lives that are different and yet the same.
Anne Frank1929–1945The Diary of a Young Girl (1942—1944), 6 July 1944 (A version)
- Life & Death
To make a goal of comfort or happiness has never appealed to me; a system of ethics built on this basis would be sufficient only for a herd of cattle.
Albert Einstein1879–1955What I Believe (1930)
- Morality
The good life, as I conceive it, is a happy life. I do not mean that if you are good you will be happy; I mean that if you are happy you will be good.
Bertrand Russell1872–1970New Hopes for a Changing World (1951), Part I: Man and Nature, Ch. 1: Current Perplexities, p. 10
- Virtue
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 Gide1869–1951“An Unprejudiced Mind,” p. 326
Man’s unhappiness, as I construe, comes of his greatness; it is because there is an Infinite in him, which with all his cunning he cannot quite bury under the Finite.
Thomas Carlyle1795–1881Sartor Resartus (1833–1834), Bk. II, ch. 9
All explorers are seeking something they have lost. It is seldom that they find it, and more seldom still that the attainment brings them greater happiness than the quest.
Arthur C. Clarke1917–2008The City and the Stars (1956), Ch. 23, p. 174
- Motivation & Goals
Happiness in the ordinary sense is not what one needs in life, though one is right to aim at it. The true satisfaction is to come through and see those whom one loves come through.
E. M. Forster1879–1970Selected Letters (1983-1985), Letter 216, to Florence Barger, 11 February 1922
It is very important to generate a good attitude, a good heart, as much as possible. From this, happiness in both the short term and the long term for both yourself and others will come.
Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lamaborn 1935Kindness, Clarity, and Insight (1984).