Gladness

“ And so with the gladness of manhood. It is a deeper, graver, more fastidious, yet a more reasonable and higher feeling than the gladness of the child. The sparkle, and bubble, and glitter, and singing have gone; but in their stead is a strength, an earnestness, an undercurrent not easily stayed or stemmed or turned aside. The gladness which is intelligent is better than the gladness which is instinctive.
56 And the sadness of experience (for we cannot live long in this world without discovering that life is exquisitely sad) —the sadness which comes with experience—is this also a gain? ”

“ They who will can surround themselves with persistent gladness, and they who will can gather about them the thick folds of an everbrooding and enveloping sorrow. Courage, cheerfulness, thankfulness, buoyancy, resolution, are all closely connected with a sane estimate of the relative proportions of the bright and the dark in a human life. ”

“ This is not life’s inevitable law,—
But that the gladness we are called to know,
Is an increasing gladness, that the soil
Of the human heart, tilled rightly, will become
Richer and deeper, fitter to bear fruit{103}
Of an immortal growth, from day to day,
Fruit of love life and indeficient joy. ”

“ When God puts grace in the heart, he puts gladness in the heart; nor is any joy comparable to that which gracious souls have in the communications of the divine favour, no, not the joy of harvest, of a plentiful harvest, when the corn and wine increase. This is gladness in the heart, inward, solid, substantial, joy. The mirth of worldly people is but a flash, a shadow; even in laughter their heart is sorrowful, Prov. xiv. 13. "Thou hast given gladness in my heart; so the word is. True joy is God's gift, not as the world giveth, John xiv. ”

“ Gladness is sown for the upright. The joy of the Lord is your strength. Manifest your joy and gladness by wearing the smile of contentment and love. It includes a sparkle in the eye, a little ripple on the cheek and the kind word that "never dies." ”

“ Gladness and sighs brighten and dim the mirror of daily life. Tears and laughter are twin-born. Like two children sleeping in one cradle, when one wakes and stirs the other wakes also.
Be not dismayed at the trials of life; they are sent for your good. God knows what keys in the human soul to touch in order to draw out its sweetest and most perfect harmonies. These may be the strains of sadness and sorrow as well as the loftier notes of joy and gladness. Think not that uninterrupted joy is good. The sunshine lies upon the mountain top all day, and lingers there latest and longest at eventide. ”

“ Everybody knows what joy is,—a certain sense of gladness and of pleasure, a contentment and a satisfaction, sometimes noisily breaking into transient surges of rapture, sometimes rolling with the tranquil swell of calm delight. It is a state which comes upon any particular faculty, when that finds its natural gratification. So there may be a partial joy of any one faculty, or a total joy of the whole man, all the faculties normally developed and normally gratified. ”

“ I can dream the glad dreams over, greet the old familiar friends
In a land where there's no parting and the laughter never ends.
All the gladness life has given from a grate fire I reclaim,
And I'm sorry for the fellow-who sees nothing there but flame. ”

“ But remember, although I cannot say to myself, ‘Now I will be glad,’ and cannot attain to joy by a movement of the will or direct effort, although it is of no use to say to a man—which is all that the world can ever say to him—‘Cheer up and be glad,’ whilst you do not alter the facts that make him sad, there is a way by which we can bring about feelings of gladness or of gloom. ”

“ Then you would win the worship of all worthy men, and from none would you receive the least offence. Gladness, madam, is the lot of the happy, and sadness the portion of souls condemned to everlasting pains. ”

“ Let the light and gladness be faithfully cultivated, and they will multiply themselves till the whole body shall be full of light, and the whole soul full of happiness. But it is the righteous only for whom the light is sown; and the upright in heart alone for whom the gladness is sown. ”

“ and that which made our heart ache shall fill us with gladness; and we shall then feel that there, as here, the only true happiness is to learn, to advance, and to improve; which could not happen unless we had commenced with error, ignorance, and imperfection. We must pass through the darkness, to reach the light. ”

“ And, using this comparison, we may say that the string of gladness in the body wakes the glad string in the soul, and the sad string the string of sadness. This is that wonderful and noteworthy sympathy which unites the heterogeneous principles in man so as to form one being. ”

“ And gladness springs up within him on his realizing that, and joy arises to him thus gladdened, and so rejoicing all his frame becomes at ease, and being thus at ease he is filled with a sense of peace, and in that peace his heart is stayed. ”

“ I repeat it, I distinctly believe this elusive, thrilling gladness-element of mind and nerve, is the joy-power, the intellectual vigor of that Vital One, the being whom we call God; who is the breath of our lives, and of whom we are competent to know more and more eternally. ”

“ One universal smile it seem'd of all things, Joy past compare, gladness unutterable, Imperishable life of peace and love, Exhaustless riches and unmeasur'd bliss. ”

“ Felicity is a philosophical term, colder and more formal than happiness. Gladness is happiness that overflows, expressing itself in countenance, voice, manner, and action. Joy is more intense than happiness, deeper than gladness, to which it is akin, nobler and more enduring than pleasure. ”

“ To those who take part with all their heart and all their might in the struggle, there comes, at last, a great peace, a purified gladness. Gladness, in some instances, springs from a natural buoyancy of temperament,{41} and is quite consistent with shallowness and superficiality of character. ”

“ But though we may never know why we are here, we may know, by taking a little thought and studying the manifestations of the life around us, what aspects of it make us glad that we are here. And gladness is as good a guide as any that I know to the true values of life. ”

“ It is the gladness of the heart rising superior to all conditions.
Happiness has a number of under-studies,—gratification, satisfaction, content and pleasure,—clever imitators that simulate its appearance rather than emulate its method. ”

“ And then the last petition is—'Rejoice the soul of Thy servant.' The series begins with 'hearing,' passes through 'preserving,' 'saving,' showing 'mercy,' and comes at last to 'rejoice the soul' that has been so harassed and troubled. Gladness is God's purpose for us all; joy we all have a right to claim from Him. It is the intended issue of every sorrow, and it can only be had when we cleave to Him, and pass through the troubles of life with continual dependence on and aspiration towards Himself. ”

“ You must endeavour always to appear cheerful and willing to be pleased. Every effort that I make to render your life an enjoyment to you, you must respond to by showing the gladness it ought to produce. You must be attentive to my instructions, obedient to my wishes, be gratified with my attentions, and satisfied with the exertions I shall make to insure your happiness. ”

“ If the word happy seems too trivial, suggesting ideas of levity, of turbulence, of possible change, then I do not know that we can find any better word than that which is already employed in my text, if only we remember that it means the solemn, calm, restful, perpetual gladness that fills the heart of God. ”

“ How easy it is for one benevolent being to diffuse pleasure around him; and how truly is a kind heart a fountain of gladness, making everything in its vicinity to freshen into smiles! ”

“ And the gladness which is wholesome and blessed, and is 'joy in the Lord,' will manifest itself by efflorescing into all holiness and all loftiness and largeness of obedience. You may try to frighten men into righteousness, you will never succeed. ”

“ These pleasures and pains of achievement, discharge, or fruition exist, no matter what the original spring of action be. We are glad when we have successfully got ourselves out of a danger, though the thought of the gladness was surely not what suggested to us to escape. To have compassed the steps towards a proposed sensual indulgence also makes us glad, and this gladness is a pleasure additional to the pleasure originally proposed. On the other hand, we are chagrined and displeased when any activity, however instigated, is hindered whilst in process of actual discharge. ”

“ Times of plenty are commonly times of joy; yet the favour of God puts gladness into the heart more than those who have corn, and wine, and oil increase. But especially be glad them, you children of Zion, and rejoice in the Lord your God, v. ”

“ And therefore come with gladness as to the receiving of so great a mercy, and with desire after it, and with hope to speed, and not with unwillingness, as to an unpleasant task, as carnal hearts that love not God, or his grace or service, and are weary of all they do, and glad when it is done, as the ox that is unyoked. ”

“ Let the righteous be glad, that are now in sorrow; let them rejoice before God in his favourable presence. God is the joy of his people; let them rejoice whenever they come before God, yea, let them exceedingly rejoice, let them rejoice with gladness." Note, Those who rejoice in God have reason to rejoice with exceeding joy; and this joy we ought to wish to all the saints, for it belongs to them. Light is sown for the righteous. ”

“ In heaven above,
And earth below, they best can serve true gladness
Who meet most feelingly the calls of sadness. ”

“ It commands us to be thankful for what we have received. And whether or not the tenets of theology appeal to you, the thought presented is of the greatest value. If you can be thrilled each day with gladness because of the remembrance of pleasures that you have enjoyed the previous day the mental influence will be invaluable. ”

“ We weep for gladness, weep for grief; The tears they are the same; We sigh for longing, and relief; The sighs have but one name, And mingled in the dying strife, Are moans that are not sad The pangs of death are throbs of life, Its sighs are sometimes glad. The face is very strange and white: It is Earth’s only spot That feebly flickers back the light The living seeth not. ”

“ When it becomes my duty to be happy, and I have an express command to be glad, I must indeed be foolish if I refuse my own joys, and turn aside from my own bliss. O, what a God we have, who has made it our duty to be happy! What a gracious God, who accounts no obedience to be so worthy of his acceptance as a glad [87] some obedience rendered by a joyous heart. "Delight thyself in the Lord." ”

“ Therese, ever happy, smiling, and joyous in the midst of pain, in spite of your extreme sensitiveness to suffering, I rejoice with you in the glorious triumph which you have won over self through your tender love of God. Obtain for me the grace to walk in your footsteps, that I may always find a sincere delight in that which gives joy to God, even though it be the very fact of my being utterly deprived of all sensible joy. ”

“ Thus shalt thou be—ah, and thou deem'st, indeed,
That thou shalt gain thereby no happy meed
[Pg 302] Reft of the world's joys? nor canst understand
How thou art come into a happy land?—
Love, in thy world the priests of heaven still sing,
And tell thee of it many a joyous thing;
But think'st thou, bearing the world's joy and pain,
Thou couldst live there? nay, nay, but born again
Thou wouldst be happy with the angels' bliss;
And so with us no otherwise it is,
Nor hast thou cast thine old life quite away
Even as yet, though that shall be to-day. ”

“ Are you not young, and fair, and good? Why should you despair? Or if you must for yourself, why for others? If you can never be happy, can you never bestow happiness [?] Oh! believe me, if you beheld on lips pale with grief one smile of joy and gratitude, and knew that you were parent of that smile, and that without you it had never been, you would feel so pure and warm a happiness that you would wish to live for ever again and again to enjoy the same pleasure [.] ”

“ For I have found a joy that is full, and more than full. For when heart, and mind, and soul, and all the man, are full of that joy, joy beyond measure will still remain. Hence, not all of that joy shall enter into those who rejoice; but they who rejoice shall wholly enter into that joy. ”

“ I CAN truly say, that I would with joy devote all I have, and all I am to God, and gladly spend every hour in his service, But the difficulties I find in the way are indeed insuperable to me, though not so I think to every one, at least if I may judge from some few instances I have seen since my acquaintance with you.—You yourself, even outwardly, appear to me to spend every hour to the glory of God; and for this reason I look upon you to be the happiest of mankind. ”

“ I bring you good tidings of great joy, for that there is born a Redeemer from all misery, a Saviour of sinners, a Governor of His faithful ones; there is born a Comforter of the sorrowful, and there is given to us the Son of God that we may have great joy, and that there may be glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to men of goodwill. May it please God, born this day, to grant to us this goodwill, this peace, and withal this joy! ”

“ Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord. Note, (1.) The state of the blessed is a state of joy, not only because all tears shall then be wiped away, but all the springs of comfort shall be opened to them, and the fountains of joy broken up. Where there are the vision and fruition of God, a perfection of holiness, and the society of the blessed, there cannot but be a fulness of joy. (2.) This joy is the joy of their Lord; the joy which he himself has purchased and provided for them; the joy of the redeemed, bought with the sorrow of the Redeemer. ”