Celebrities, Ancient and modern, Speak about Happiness

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Different men seek after happiness in different ways and by different means, and so make for themselves different modes of life and forms of government.

~ Aristotle

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Happiness depends upon ourselves.

~ Aristotle

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Indeed, man wishes to be happy even when he so lives as to make happiness impossible.

~ St. Augustine

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He who binds to himself a joy
Does the winged life destroy;
But he who kisses the joy as it flies
Lives in eternity's sun rise.

~ William Blake

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You are forgiven for your happiness and your successes only if you generously consent to share them.

~ Albert Camus

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Happiness, that grand mistress of the ceremonies in the dance of life, impels us through all its mazes and meanderings, but leads none of us by the same route.

~ Charles Caleb Colton

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Of mortals there is no one who is happy.
If wealth flows in upon one, one may be perhaps
Luckier than one's neighbor, but still not happy.

~ Euripedes

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A great obstacle to happiness is to anticipate too great a happiness.

~ Fontenelle

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What we call happiness in the strictest sense comes from the (preferably sudden) satisfaction of needs which have been dammed up to a high degree.


~ Sigmund Freud


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No man can be happy without a friend, nor be sure of his friend till he is unhappy.


~ Thomas Fuller


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We are long before we are convinced that happiness is never to be found, and each believes it possessed by others, to keep alive the hope of obtaining it for himself.


~ Samuel Johnson


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No matter how dull, or how mean, or how wise a man is, he feels that happiness is his indisputable right.


~ Helen Keller


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When one door of happiness closes, another opens; but often we look so long at the closed door that we do not see the one which has been opened for us.


~ Helen Keller


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it is better to be happy
for a moment
and be burned up with beauty
than to live a long time
and be bored all the while

~ Don Marquis

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We should consider every day lost on which we have not danced at least once. And we should call every truth false which was not accompanied by at least one laugh.


~ Friedrich Nietzsche


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Even if happiness forgets you a little bit, never completely forget about it.


~ Jacques Prévert


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The happy man is not he who seems thus to others, but who seems thus to himself.


~ Publilius Syrus


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Italy, and the spring and first love all together should suffice to make the gloomiest person happy.


~ Bertrand Russell


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Man needs, for his happiness, not only the enjoyment of this or that, but hope and enterprise and change.


~ Bertrand Russell


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A string of excited, fugitive, miscellaneous pleasures is not happiness; happiness resides in imaginative reflection and judgment, when the picture of one's life, or of human life, as it truly has been or is, satisfies the will, and is gladly accepted.


~ George Santayana


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There are people who can do all fine and heroic things but one--keep from telling their happiness to the unhappy.


~ Mark Twain


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When I was a child people simply looked about them and were moderately happy; today they peer beyond the seven seas, bury themselves waist deep in tidings, and by and large what they see and hear makes them unutterably sad.


~ E. B. White


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True happiness arises, in the first place, from the enjoyment of one's self, and in the next, from the friendship and conversation of a few select companions.



~ Joseph Addison ~


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Happiness is a positive cash flow.



~ Fred Adler ~


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Now and then it's good to pause in our pursuit of happiness and just be happy.



~ Guillaume Apollinaire ~


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Happiness is a sort of action.



~ Aristotle ~


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The really happy man never laughs -- seldom -- though he may smile. He does not need to laugh, for laughter, like weeping is a relief of mental tension -- and the happy are not over strung.



~ Prof. F. A. P. Aveling ~


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Happiness is a conscious choice, not an automatic response.



~ Mildred Barthel ~


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When one is happy there is no time to be fatigued; being happy engrosses the whole attention.



~ Edward Frederic Benson ~


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Happiness is good health and a bad memory.



~ Ingrid Bergman ~


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The world's literature and folklore are full of stories that point out how futile it can be to seek happiness. Rather, happiness is a blessing that comes to you as you go along; a treasure that you incidentally find.



~ Louis Binstock ~


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It is the paradox of life that the way to miss pleasure is to seek it first. The very first condition of lasting happiness is that a life should be full of purpose, aiming at something outside self.



~ Hugo Black ~


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The truth is that all of us attain the greatest success and happiness possible in this life whenever we use our native capacities to their greatest extent.



~ Smiley Blanton ~


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They say a person needs just three things to be truly happy in this world. Someone to love, something to do, and something to hope for.


~ Allan K. Chalmers ~


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We all want to be happy, and we're all going to die. You might say those are the only two unchallengeably true facts that apply to every human being on this planet.


~ William Boyd ~


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Celebrate the happiness that friends are always giving, make every day a holiday and celebrate just living!


~ Amanda Bradley ~


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Happiness comes more from loving than being loved; and often when our affection seems wounded it is only our vanity bleeding. To love, and to be hurt often, and to love again -- this is the brave and happy life.


~ J.E Buckrose ~


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Happiness and virtue rest upon each other; the best are not only the happiest, but the happiest are usually the best.


~ Edward G. Bulwer-Lytton ~


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The secret of happiness is something to do.


~ John Burroughs ~


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To have joy one must share it. Happiness was born a twin.


~ Lord Byron ~


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When you have once seen the glow of happiness on the face of a beloved person, you know that a man can have no vocation but to awaken that light on the faces surrounding him; and you are torn by the thought of the unhappiness and night you cast, by the mere fact of living, in the hearts you encounter.


~ Albert Camus ~


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Did you ever see an unhappy horse? Did you ever see bird that had the blues? One reason why birds and horses are not unhappy is because they are not trying to impress other birds and horses.


~ Dale Carnegie ~


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In order to have great happiness, you have to have great pain and unhappiness-otherwise how would you know when you're happy?


~ Leslie Caron ~


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The creed of a true saint is to make the best of life, and to make the most of it.


~ Edwin Hubbel Chapin ~


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Happiness is a continuation of happenings which are not resisted.


~ Deepak Chopra ~


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We think a happy life consists in tranquility of mind.


~ Marcus T. Cicero ~


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Happiness is a hard thing because it is achieved only by making others happy.


~ Stuart Cloete ~


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A happy person is not a person in a certain set of circumstances, but rather a person with a certain set of attitudes.


~ Hugh Downs ~


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Happiness is like those palaces in fairy tales whose gates are guarded by dragons: we must fight in order to conquer it.


~ Alexandre Dumas ~


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To fill the hour -- that is happiness.


~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~


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Whoever does not regard what he has as most ample wealth, is unhappy, though he be master of the world.


~ Epictetus ~


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If thou wilt make a man happy, add not unto his riches but take away from his desires.


~ Epicurus ~


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Farms and in castles, in homes, studies, and cloisters -- where sensible people manage to live relatively lusty and decent lives, as moral as they must be, as free as they may be, and as masterly as they can be. If we only knew it, this elusive arrangement is happiness.


~ Erik H. Erikson ~


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Enjoy your happiness while you have it, and while, you have it do not too closely scrutinize its foundation.


~ Joseph Farrall ~


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Some of us might find happiness if we quit struggling so desperately for it.


~ William Feather ~


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A great obstacle to happiness is to expect too much happiness.


~ Bernard Le Bovier Fontenelle ~


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Happy were men if they but understood There is no safety but in doing good


~ John Fountain. ~


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There are two ways of being happy: We must either diminish our wants or augment our means -- either may do -- the result is the same and it is for each man to decide for himself and to do that which happens to be easier.


~ Benjamin Franklin ~


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The hardest habit of all to break is the terrible habit of happiness.


~ Theodosia Garrison ~


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Do you want my one-word secret of happiness -- It's growth -- mental, financial, you name it.


~ Harold S. Geneen ~


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There's a hope for every woe, and a balm for every pain, but the first joys of our heart come never back again!


~ Robert Gilfillan ~


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Happiness... is not a destination: it is a manner of traveling. Happiness is not an end in itself. It is a by-product of working, playing, loving and living.


~ Haim Ginott ~


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A person is never happy till their vague strivings has itself marked out its proper limitations.


~ Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe ~


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What makes people happy is activity; changing evil itself into good by power, working in a moral manner.


~ Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe ~


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If frugality were established in the state, and if our expenses were laid out to meet needs rather than superfluities of life, there might be fewer wants, and even fewer pleasures, but infinitely more happiness.


~ Oliver Goldsmith ~


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Remember that happiness is a way of travel, not a destination.


~ Roy Goodman ~


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Happiness... she loves, to see men at work. She loves sweat, weariness, self sacrifice. She will be found not in places but lurking in cornfields and factories; and hovering over littered desks; she crowns the unconscious head of the busy child.


~ David Grayson ~


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Point me out the happy man and I will point you out either egotism, selfishness, evil --or else an absolute ignorance.


~ Graham Greene ~


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Happiness held is the seed; Happiness shared is the flower-Author Unknown People need your love the most when they appear to deserve it the least.


~ John Harrigan ~


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Happiness is a butterfly, which, when pursued, is always just beyond your grasp, but which, if you will sit down quietly, may alight upon you.


~ Nathaniel Hawthorne ~


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Look up, laugh loud, talk big, keep the color in your cheek and the fire in your eye, adorn your person, maintain your health, your beauty and your animal spirits.


~ William Hazlitt ~


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Happiness is not a destination. It is a method of life.


~ Burton Hills ~


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Happiness requires problems…


~ H. L. Hollingworth ~


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Happiness in the present is only shattered by comparison with the past.


~ Doug Horton ~


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You have succeeded in life when all you really want is only what you really need.


~ Vernon Howard ~


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Life's greatest happiness is to be convinced we are loved.


~ Victor Hugo ~


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Happiness is not a reward -- it is a consequence. Suffering is not a punishment -- it is a result.


~ Robert Green Ingersoll ~


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The really happy person is the one who can enjoy the scenery, even when they have to take a detour.


~ Sir James Jeans ~


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To strive with difficulties, and to conquer them, is the highest human felicity.


~ Samuel Johnson ~


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Even a happy life cannot be without a measure of darkness, and the word happy would lose its meaning if it were not balanced by sadness. It is far better take things as they come along with patience and equanimity.


~ Carl Jung ~


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My happiness derives from knowing the people I love are happy.


~ Holly Ketchel ~


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The secret of happiness and prosperity in this world, as in the world to come, lies in thinking of the welfare of others first, and not taking one's self too seriously.


~ J. Kindleberger ~


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We tend to forget that happiness doesn't come as a result of getting something we don't have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have.


~ Frederick Koenig ~


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No thoroughly occupied man was ever yet very miserable.


~ Letitia Elizabeth Landon ~


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We cannot be contented because we are happy, and we cannot be happy because we are contented.


~ Walter Savage Landor ~


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Happiness is something that comes into our lives through doors we don't even remember leaving open.


~ Rose Wilder Lane ~


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Seek not happiness too greedily, and be not fearful of unhappiness.


~ Lao-Tzu ~


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I am learning to understand rather than immediately judge or to be judged. I cannot blindly follow the crowd and accept their approach. I will not allow myself to indulge in the usual manipulating game of role creation. Fortunately for me, my self-knowledge has transcended that and I have come to understand that life is best to be lived and not to be conceptualized. I am happy because I am growing daily and I am honestly not knowing where the limit lies. To be certain, every day there can be a revelation or a new discovery. I treasure the memory of the past misfortunes. It has added more to my bank of fortitude.


~ Bruce Lee ~


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Many search for happiness as we look for a hat we wear on our heads.


~ Nikolaus Lenus ~


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The happy think a lifetime short, but to the unhappy one night can be an eternity.


~ Lucian ~


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Realize that true happiness lies within you. Waste no time and effort searching for peace and contentment and joy in the world outside. Remember that there is no happiness in having or in getting, but only in giving. Reach out. Share. Smile. Hug. Happiness is a perfume you cannot pour on others without getting a few drops on yourself.


~ Og Mandino ~


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Happiness is the interval between periods of unhappiness.


~ Don Marquis ~


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Happiness is not a possession to be prized. It is a quality of thought, a state of mind.


~ Daphne Du Maurier ~


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Happiness is the light on the water. The water is cold and dark and deep.


~ William Maxwell ~


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Success is getting and achieving what you want. Happiness is wanting and being content with what you get.


~ Bernard Meltzer ~


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Act happy, feel happy, be happy, without a reason in the world. Then you can love, and do what you will.


~ Dan Millman ~


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If one only wished to be happy, this could be easily accomplished; but we wish to be happier that other people, and this is always difficult, for we believe others to be happier than they are.


~ Charles De Montesquieu ~


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No burden is so heavy for a man to bear as a succession of happy days.


~ Max Muller ~


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Happiness is a matter of one's most ordinary everyday mode of consciousness being busy and lively and unconcerned with self. To be damned is for one's ordinary everyday mode of consciousness to be unremitting agonizing preoccupation with self.


~ Iris Murdoch ~


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Most of us experience happiness when we are enjoying life and feeling free, enjoying the process and products of our creative and intellectual processes, enjoying the ecstasy of transcendent oneness with the universe.


~ James Muriel ~


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What a man really wants is creative challenge with sufficient skills to bring him within the reach of success so that he may have the expanding joy of achievement.


~ Fay B. Nash ~


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Happiness adds and multiplies, as we divide it with others.


~ A. Nielsen ~


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Men can only be happy when they do not assume that the object of life is happiness


~ George Orwell ~


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Happiness is a by product of an effort to make someone else happy.


~ Gretta Brooker Palmer ~


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As happy a man as any in the world, for the whole world seems to smile upon me!


~ Samuel Pepys ~


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Happiness doesn't come from doing what we like to do but from liking what we have to do.


~ Wilferd A. Peterson ~


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The happiest people are those who think the most interesting thoughts. Those who decide to use leisure as a means of mental development, who love good music, good books, good pictures, good company, good conversation, are the happiest people in the world. And they are not only happy in themselves, they are the cause of happiness in others.


~ William Lyon Phelps ~


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Do not speak of your happiness to one less fortunate than yourself.


~ Plutarch ~


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Happiness is a sunbeam which may pass through a thousand bosoms without losing a particle of its original ray; nay, when it strikes on a kindred heart, like the converged light on a mirror, it reflects itself with redoubled brightness. It is not perfected till it is shared.


~ Jane Porter ~


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Our happiness in this world depends on the affections we are able to inspire.


~ Duchess Prazlin ~


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Let us be grateful to people who make us happy; they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.


~ Marcel Proust ~


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If you want to be happy for a year, plant a garden; If you want to be happy for life, plant a tree.


~ English Proverb ~


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If you cannot renounce the world the genius of happiness will never salute you.


~ Prutz ~


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It is not easy to find happiness in ourselves, and it is not possible to find it elsewhere.


~ Agnes Repplier ~


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Happiness is not something you postpone for the future; it is something you design for the present.


~ Jim Rohn ~


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The journey to happiness involves finding the courage to go down into ourselves and take responsibility for what's there: all of it.


~ Richard Rohr ~


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Happiness is not a goal, it is a by-product.


~ Eleanor Roosevelt ~


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Happiness lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort.


~ Franklin D. Roosevelt ~


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Happiness does not come from doing easy work but from the afterglow of satisfaction that comes after the achievement of a difficult task that demanded our best.


~ Theodore I. Rubin ~


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Most people ask for happiness on condition. Happiness can only be felt if you don't set any condition.


~ Arthur Rubinstein ~


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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 Russell ~


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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 ~


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Happiness lies neither in vice nor in virtue; but in the manner we appreciate the one and the other, and the choice we make pursuant to our individual organization.


~ Marquis De Sade ~


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True happiness comes from the joy of deeds well done, the zest of creating things new.


~ Antoine De Saint-Exupery ~


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Happiness is not having what you want, but wanting what you have.


~ Rabbi H. Schachtel ~


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Joy comes from using your potential.


~ Will Schultz ~


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Life at its noblest leaves mere happiness far behind; and indeed cannot endure it. Happiness is not the object of life: life has no object: it is an end in itself; and courage consists in the readiness to sacrifice happiness for an intenser quality of life.


~ George Bernard Shaw ~


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If you pursue happiness you never find it.


~ C(harles) P(ercy) Snow ~


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Like swimming, riding, writing, or playing golf, happiness can be learned.


~ Boris Sokoloff ~


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Happiness is never stopping to think if you are.


~ Palmer Sondreal ~


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It is not how much we have, but how much we enjoy, that makes happiness.


~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon ~


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Happiness comes when we test our skills towards some meaningful purpose.


~ John Stossel ~


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Happiness consumes itself like a flame. It cannot burn for ever, it must go out, and the presentiment of its end destroys it at its very peak.


~ J. August Strindberg ~


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The best advice on the art of being happy is about as easy to follow as advice to be well when one is sick.


~ Anne Sophie Swetchine ~


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Happiness is an imaginary condition, formerly often attributed by the living to the dead, now usually attributed by adults to children, and by children to adults.


~ Thomas Szasz ~


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You never enjoy the world aright, till the sea itself floweth in your veins, till you are clothed with the heavens and crowned with the stars.


~ Thomas Traherne ~


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There are people who can do all fine and heroic things but one: keep from telling their happiness to the unhappy.


~ Mark Twain ~


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It is kind of happiness to know to what extent we may be unhappy.


~ Source Unknown ~


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Next to temperance, a quiet conscience, a cheerful mind and active habits, I place early rising as a means of health and happiness.


~ Benjamin Franklin ~


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The thing that counts most in the pursuit of happiness is choosing the right companion.


~ Source Unknown ~


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Happiness cannot be traveled to, owned, earned, worn or consumed. Happiness is the spiritual experience of living every minute with love, grace, and gratitude.


~ Denis Waitley ~


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Happiness is understanding that friendship is more precious than mere things, more precious than getting your own way, more precious than being in situations where true principles are not at stake.


~ J. Donald Walters ~


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Happiness is not in having been; it is in doing.


~ Lilian Eichler Watson ~


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If you observe a really happy man you will find him building a boat, writing a symphony, educating his son, growing Double Dahlias in his garden.


~ W Wolfe ~


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Happiness is neither virtue nor pleasure nor this thing nor that but simply growth, We are happy when we are growing.


~ William Butler Yeats ~


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Happiness radiates like the fragrance from a flower, and draws all good things toward you. Allow your love to nourish yourself as well as others. Do not strain after the needs of life. It is sufficient to be quietly alert and aware of them. In this way life proceeds more naturally and effortlessly. Life is here to Enjoy!


~ Maharishi Mahesh Yogi ~


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Often people attempt to live their lives backwards; they try to have more things, or more money, in order to do more of what they want, so they will be happier.


~ Margaret Young ~


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Happiness is perfume, you can't pour it on somebody else without getting a few drops on yourself


~ James Van Der Zee ~


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Happiness is not pleasure, it is victory.


~ Zig Ziglar ~


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People who never achieve happiness are the ones who complain whenever they're awake, and whenever they're asleep, they are thinking about what to complain about tomorrow.


~ Adam Zimbler ~


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