Enjoyment

“ With a nature ardent and impetuous, but at the same time delicate, sensitive to the least restraint, and excessively fond of the comforts of life, how would he endure the horrors of this new prospect—he whose very object in his studies, and in the gratification of his tastes and passions, was only enjoyment? ”

“ People clamor for Enjoyment as though Enjoyment consisted in being foolish. I find enjoyment in the powerful and terrible struggles of life; and the capability of experiencing something, of learning something, gives me pleasure. ”

“ The particular moment when hope and certainty combined reward the day's toil is the very quintessence of joy and delight. Nothing in the shape of enjoyment can come near it. What a strange power has that helpless-looking mass—the brain! ”

“ Who would be content to forego the pleasures hourly crowding upon him? Each new thought, perception, or judgment is a sufficient reward in itself for his past labours, and all the future is pure enjoyment. ”

“ If mere enjoyment were all that could be desired in life, where could we expect to find it better than in the light-hearted skylark as she rises in the early summer morning to trill forth her song of joy, or in the happy chuckle of the hen as her little ones gather around her. ”

“ Enjoyment the most absolute, that bodily ease, intellectual excitement, or the more innocent pleasures of sense can supply to man’s craving, brought in close contact with the most unmitigated misery! Wealth, from its bright saloons, laughing—an insolently heedless laugh—at the unknown wounds of want! ”

“ All forms of subjective enjoyment, all pleasures that begin and end with self, unrelated to external things, are insane and unwholesome, destructive alike to rational enjoyment and to effectiveness in life. ”

“ We have set forth on preceding pages the chief sources of happiness and of suffering to the human mind. Now in the history of our race we find that each one of these modes of enjoyment have been selected by different individuals as the chief end of their existence—as the mode of seeking enjoyment, to which they sacrifice every other. Some persons have chosen the pleasures of eating, drinking, and the other grosser enjoyments of sense. Others have chosen those more elevated and refined pleasures that come indirectly from the senses in the emotions of taste. ”

“ What is meant by prejudices?”
“Pleasure is the actual enjoyment of our senses; it is a complete satisfaction given to all our natural and sensual appetites; and, when our worn-out senses want repose, either to have breathing time, or to recover strength, pleasure comes from the imagination, which finds enjoyment in thinking of the happiness afforded by rest. ”

“ For my part I prefer a little enjoyment to a great deal of philosophy. It is these gifted minds that enliven our habitations, and contribute so largely to those every-day delights, which constitute, after all, the chief part of mortal happiness. ”

“ It tells of enjoyment, but that enjoyment springs from causes which myriads cannot comprehend, and the whole appears to be mystical, incomprehensible, or unreal. Such pleasure as the world can yield, the worldly mind can understand at once and cordially relish. ”

“ So much that we shall see and taste the higher pleasure that comes from the intellectual and spiritual, and which is always more simple, more wholesome and less expensive than the material enjoyment which it replaces. ”

“ In the same manner, when we enjoy the greatest pleasure, we shall always find that the bodily sensation, the sensation of the present instant, makes but a small part of our happiness, that our enjoyment chiefly arises either from the cheerful recollection of the past, or the still more joyous anticipation of the future, and that the mind always contributes by much the largest share of the entertainment. ”

“ Surely happiness is reflective, like the light of heaven; and every countenance, bright with smiles, and glowing with innocent enjoyment, is a mirror transmitting to others the rays of a supreme and ever shining benevolence. ”

“ The very pain this reflection causes weans her away from pleasure. She judges, and judges rightly, that a small enjoyment neglected for so high a motive, will bring a higher and better happiness. We all know this in every-day affairs. ”

“ But, in that in which we live and with which we must be content, do not enjoyment and excess go hand in hand, and can one separate them or limit them, unless one is a sage of the first class? And if one is a sage, farewell temptation which is the father of real joys. ”

“ As it respects the nature of mind, then, as exhibited by experience, we learn, in the first place, that it is constituted with desires and propensities for various kinds of enjoyment. These are the gratifications secured by the senses, the pleasures of taste, the happiness of giving and receiving affection, the various intellectual pleasures, and the still higher enjoyment resulting from our moral nature. ”

“ On the other hand, it seems quite plain, that we do regard as very desirable, many complicated states of mind in which the consciousness of pleasure is combined with consciousness of other things—states which we call ‘enjoyment of’ so and so. ”

“ To this simple primary and immediate pleasure in certain pure sensations and harmonious combinations of them, there may, it is true, be added secondary pleasures; and in the practical enjoyment of works of art by the masses of mankind these secondary pleasures play a great part. ”

“ If we opened our minds to enjoyment, we might find tranquil pleasures spread about us on every side. We might live with the angels that visit us on every sunbeam, and sit with the fairies who wait on every flower. ”

“ Happiness or satisfaction consists only in the enjoyment of those objects which are by nature suited to our several particular appetites, passions, and affections. ”

“ The first cause of enjoyment at the commencement of existence is that of sensation. [2] This, at first, is small in amount compared with what it becomes when association lends its aid to heighten sensitive enjoyment. The light of day, the brilliancy of color, the sweetness of perfume, the gratification of taste and touch, the magic influence of sound, and the pleasure resulting from muscular activity, are probably the {110} chief sources of enjoyment to the infant mind. ”

“ The indulgence in the activities of life comprises not only ultimate accomplishment, but is productive of present enjoyment as well. And not infrequently does the pursuit of an object give more pleasure than the possession of it. ”

“ In the original teaching it seems rather to have been a contradiction to the stoic and cynical doctrines, establishing enjoyment as the chief end of man, allied to moral freedom—a philosophical enjoyment, which consists in using all the good things which Providence has showered upon us. ”

“ To enjoy a thing exclusively is commonly to exclude yourself from the true enjoyment of it. ”

“ Pleasure, while offering excitement, should not depend on excitement; it should not involve a fellow-creature’s loss or pain, nor lay its foundation on greed or gain.
2. Pleasure should not only give enjoyment, it should also increase capacities for enjoyment. It should strengthen a man’s whole being, enrich memory and call forth effort. ”

“ I have always said and felt that real enjoyment was not to be described. ”

“ To become a joy-giving medium, individual experience of joy is, he claims, essential, and to be best acquired through a free and grateful acceptance, and a reasonable enjoyment of the blessings of earth. ”

“ I have often experienced an inward conscious satisfaction in realizing the pleasure and enjoyment, which I found in the same pursuits and labors, which were the most painful drudgery to others, equally qualified to pursue them with myself. ”

“ You 46 were made for enjoyment, and the world was filled with things which you will enjoy, unless you are too proud to be pleased by them, or too grasping to care for what you cannot turn to other account than mere delight. Remember that the most beautiful things in the world are the most useless; ”

“ “But that’s just the aim of civilization—to make everything a source of enjoyment.” ”

“ Nevertheless, the singular phenomenon of evident, unmistakable Happiness enjoyed, in despite of circumstances, never seems to teach us how entirely secondary all objective circumstances needs must be to the subjective side of the question, and how much more rational it would be on our part to look first to securing for ourselves the longest and completest tenure of the internal elements of enjoyment before we turn our attention to the attainment of those which are external. ”

“ Verily, much learning hath made you mad; else would ye have assigned the human soul a better than a merely sensual heaven, where lust should be freely sated, and where appetite and its varied gratifications constitute the sum total of enjoyment. ”

“ It may be said—it must be said—that, if they be human beings (as they are) , they are meant for something more than mere enjoyment of life. Well and good: but are they not meant for enjoyment likewise? ”

“ enjoyment was separated from labor, the means from the end, the effort from the reward. ”

“ In such a case it is plain that the ‘enjoyment’ does not owe its value solely to the pleasure it contains, although it might easily have appeared to do so, when we only considered the other constituents of the enjoyment, and seemed to see that, without the pleasure, they would have had no value. ”

“ Pleasure and Social Instinct.—Out of his relations with other men, man obtains a new [Pg 97] species of pleasure in addition to those pleasurable sensations which he derives from himself; whereby he greatly increases the scope of enjoyment. ”

“ You have gained a new source of enjoyment, and it is well to have as many holds upon happiness as possible. ”

“ His own enjoyment, or his own ease, was, in every particular, his ruling principle." ”

“ It is to say that he must seek in due amounts the various pleasures which life offers. For beyond the effect these have in raising the tide of life and maintaining constitutional vigor, there is the effect they have in preserving and increasing a capacity for receiving enjoyment. ”

“ Men and women read, and wanted more. These garden letters began to blossom every week; and many hands were glad to gather pleasure from them. A sign it was of wisdom. In our feverish days it is a sign of health or of convalescence that men love gentle pleasure, and enjoyments that do not rush or roar, but distill as the dew. ”

“ "Going into company purely as a relaxation, I enjoyed it,—to enjoy yourself is the easy method to give enjoyment to others; ”

“ But, better than all, how many enjoyments which to the glitter of wealth or the grandeur of a high position would seem insignificant and valueless, are to the humble man sources of hourly delight! And is our happiness anything but an aggregate of these grains of pleasure? ”

“ You must be in the midst of every pleasure that can seduce or intoxicate the senses of man; and you must see, and taste all, without allowing yourself to feel it enjoyment. To derive enjoyment, is to yield independence ”

“ But if our desires for material enjoyments be carefully and intelligently analyzed, we can arrive at only one conclusion, and that is that in hankering for material pleasures we are in fact practically hunting for that happiness which, once attained, is ever full, ever satisfying; which, once enjoyed, lays all hankerings for material enjoyments forever at rest. ”

“ As this world was not intended to be a state of any great satisfaction or high enjoyment, so neither was it intended to be a mere scene of unhappiness and sorrow. ”