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Happiness quotes

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“Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.” Franklin D. Roosevelt, “Looking Forward” - 1933

“I was liked, and what a difference it made.” Maya Angelou, “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” - 1969

“Happiness is a hard master—particularly other people's happiness.” Aldous Huxley, “Brave New World” - 1932

“I suppose all great happiness is a little sad.” F. Scott Fitzgerald, “This Side of Paradise” - 1920

“BRIDE, n. A woman with a fine prospect of happiness behind her.” Ambrose Bierce, “The Devil's Dictionary” - 1911

“It’s so hard to forget pain, but it’s even harder to remember sweetness. We have no scar to show for happiness.” Chuck Palahniuk, “Diary” - 2003

“A man can be happy with any woman, as long as he does not love her.” Oscar Wilde, “The Picture of Dorian Gray” - 1890

“The bitter past, more welcome is the sweet.” William Shakespeare, “All's Well That Ends Well” - 1623

“Happiness in marriage is entirely a matter of chance.” Jane Austen, “Pride and Prejudice” - 28 January 1813

“Do anything rather than marry without affection.” Jane Austen, “Pride and Prejudice” - 28 January 1813

“They were expressions of life, and life is always happy when it is expressing itself.” Jack London, “White Fang” - 1906

“Happiness is self-contained and self-sufficient. Happy men have no time and no use for you. Happy men are free men.” Ayn Rand, “The Fountainhead” - 1943

“The supreme happiness of life consists in the conviction that one is loved; loved for one's own sake—let us say rather, loved in spite of one's self; this conviction the blind man possesses.” Victor Hugo, “Les Misérables” - 1862

“A happy life must be to a great extent a quiet life, for it is only in an atmosphere of quiet that true joy can live.” Bertrand Russell, “The Conquest of Happiness” - 1930

“All the conditions of happiness are realised in the life of the man of science.” Bertrand Russell, “The Conquest of Happiness” - 1930

“The secret of happiness is this: let your interests be as wide as possible, and let your reactions to the things and persons that interest you be as far as possible friendly rather than hostile.” Bertrand Russell, “The Conquest of Happiness” - 1930

“The secret of happiness is to see all the marvels of the world, and never to forget the drops of oil on the spoon.” Paulo Coelho, “The Alchemist” - 1988

“Human felicity is produced not so much by great pieces of good fortune that seldom happen, as by little advantages that occur every day.” Benjamin Franklin, “The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin” - 1791

“Now it is evident that the form of government is best in which every man, whoever he is, can act best and live happily.” Aristotle, “Politics”

“Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.” Leo Tolstoy, “Anna Karenina” - 1877

“The more you know the more unhappy you are.” Henry James, “The Portrait of a Lady” - 1881

“I think you are wrong to want a heart. It makes most people unhappy. If you only knew it, you are in luck not to have a heart.” L. Frank Baum, “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” - 1900

“It has ever been my fate to give pain to those whose happiness I should have promoted.” Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, “The Sorrows of Young Werther” - 1774

“There is no greater sorrow Than to be mindful of the happy time In misery, and that thy Teacher knows.” Dante Alighieri, “Divine Comedy” - 1320

“Happiness is the poetry of woman, as the toilette is her tinsel.” Honoré de Balzac, “Father Goriot” - 1835

“He did not care if she was heartless, vicious and vulgar, stupid and grasping, he loved her. He would rather have misery with the one than happiness with the other.” W. Somerset Maugham, “Of Human Bondage” - 1915

“Of happiness the chiefest part is a wise heart: And to defraud the gods in aught with peril's fraught.” Sophocles, “Antigone” - c. 441 BC

“Lovers who love truly do not write down their happiness.” Anatole France, “The Crime of Sylvestre Bonnard” - 1881

“Nothing is more idle than to inquire after happiness which Nature has kindly placed within our reach.” Samuel Johnson, “The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia” - 1759

“We have everything we need to be happy, but we aren't happy. Something's missing.” Ray Bradbury, “Fahrenheit 451” - 1953

“I have no money, no resources, no hopes. I am the happiest man alive. A year ago, six months ago, I thought that I was an artist. I no longer think about it, I am.” Henry Miller, “Tropic of Cancer” - 1934

“Humanity does not ask us to be happy. It merely asks us to be brilliant on its behalf. Survival first, then happiness as we can manage it.” Orson Scott Card, “Ender's Game” - 1985

“None of us could be happy for long, doing nothing.” Orson Scott Card, “Ender's Game” - 1985

“People don't know when they are happy. They're never so unhappy as they think they are.” Marcel Proust, “Swann's Way” - 1913

“I was benevolent and good; misery made me a fiend. Make me happy, and I shall again be virtuous.” Mary Shelley, “Frankenstein” - 1818

“If, for example, you come at four o'clock in the afternoon, then at three o'clock I shall begin to be happy.” Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, “The Little Prince” - 1943

“The natural thing to do is to work—to recognize that prosperity and happiness can be obtained only through honest effort.” Henry Ford, “My Life and Work” - 1922

“The happiness you feel is in direct proportion to the love you are able to give.” Oprah Winfrey, “What I Know For Sure” - 2014

“I must learn to brook being happier than I deserve.” Jane Austen, “Persuasion” - 1816

“With freedom, flowers, books, and the moon, who could not be perfectly happy?” Oscar Wilde, “De Profundis” - 1905

“Are you so unobservant as not to have found out that sanity and happiness are an impossible combination?” Mark Twain, “The Mysterious Stranger” - 1916

“Know your own happiness. You want nothing but patience—or give it a more fascinating name, call it hope.” Jane Austen, “Sense and Sensibility” - 1811

“A large income is the best recipe for happiness I ever heard of.” Jane Austen, “Mansfield Park” - 1814

“You must be the best judge of your own happiness.” Jane Austen, “Emma” - 1815

“I am not proud, but I am happy, and happiness blinds, I think, more than pride.” Alexandre Dumas, “The Count of Monte Cristo” - 1845

“It’s like the people who believe they’ll be happy if they go and live somewhere else, but who learn it doesn’t work that way. Wherever you go, you take yourself with you.” Neil Gaiman, “The Graveyard Book” - 2008

“Actual happiness always looks pretty squalid in comparison with the over-compensations for misery. And, of course, stability isn't nearly so spectacular as instability. And being contented has none of the glamour of a good fight against...” Aldous Huxley, “Brave New World” - 1932

“A person who longs to leave the place where he lives is an unhappy person.” Milan Kundera, “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” - 1984

“My happiness is not the means to any end. It is the end.” Ayn Rand, “Anthem” - 1938

“Drink because you are happy, but never because you are miserable.” G. K. Chesterton, “Heretics” - 1905

Related topics

love life unhappiness misery heart God sadness virtue desire freedom pain action marriage truth knowledge world wealth art others science

Related authors

Jane Austen (15)
Bertrand Russell (9)
Aldous Huxley (6)
Ayn Rand (5)
Paulo Coelho (5)
Fyodor Dostoyevsky (5)
Leo Tolstoy (5)
William Shakespeare (4)
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (4)
Honoré de Balzac (4)
Anne Frank (4)
Milan Kundera (4)
Orson Scott Card (4)
F. Scott Fitzgerald (3)
W. Somerset Maugham (3)
Alexandre Dumas (3)
Samuel Johnson (3)
Albert Camus (3)
Chuck Palahniuk (3)
Neil Gaiman (3)

Related sources

The Conquest of Happiness (9)
Brave New World (6)
Pride and Prejudice (5)
The Sorrows of Young Werther (4)
The Diary of a Young Girl (4)
The Unbearable Lightness of Being (4)
Ender's Game (4)
Emma (4)
The Fountainhead (3)
The Alchemist (3)
Anna Karenina (3)
The Count of Monte Cristo (3)
The History of Rasselas, Prince of Abissinia (3)
Madame Bovary (3)
The Idiot (3)
Sense and Sensibility (2)
Vanity Fair (2)
Mere Christianity (2)
Les Misérables (2)
The Brothers Karamazov (2)