The collection / 12,725 fragments

Happiness.

Explore passages mentioning happiness, happy. Topic suggestions use transparent word matching, not scholarly classification. Reviewed editorial meanings may also connect entries to this topic; those assignments are labelled separately from word matching.

SearchTypeEraCulture / collection labelCountry attributionTraditionOrder

Author

Leave empty for every voice. Browse all authors ↗

Culture labels and country attributions follow the source collections; earliest origins may be unknown.

12,725 results · Page 2 of 531Play this collection ▷

01c. 1666 AD

Happy who in his verse can gently steer From grave to light, from pleasant to severe.

John Dryden / quote

02c. 1666 AD

Happy the man, and happy he alone, He who can call to-day his own; He who, secure within, can say, To-morrow, do thy worst, for I have liv'd to-day.

John Dryden / quote

03c. 1706 AD

The reason why so few marriages are happy is because young ladies spend their time in making nets, not in making cages.

Jonathan Swift / quote

04c. 1706 AD

'T is happy for him that his father was before him.

Jonathan Swift / quote

05c. 1716 AD

O happiness! our being's end and aim! Good, pleasure, ease, content! whate'er thy name: That something still which prompts the eternal sigh, For which we bear to live, or dare to die.

Alexander Pope / quote

06c. 1716 AD

Know then this truth (enough for man to know),— "Virtue alone is happiness below."

Alexander Pope / quote

07c. 1716 AD

But let a lord once own the happy lines, How the wit brightens! how the style refines!

Alexander Pope / quote

08c. 1716 AD

Ye Gods! annihilate but space and time, And make two lovers happy.

Alexander Pope / quote

09c. 1716 AD

To happy convents bosom'd deep in vines, Where slumber abbots purple as their wines.

Alexander Pope / quote

10c. 1716 AD

How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting, by the world forgot.

Alexander Pope / quote

11c. 1716 AD

Happy the man whose wish and care A few paternal acres bound.

Alexander Pope / quote

12c. 1716 AD

Oh, pity human woe! 'T is what the happy to the unhappy owe.

Alexander Pope / quote

13c. 1710 AD

How happy could I be with either, Were t' other dear charmer away!

John Gay / quote

14c. 1747 AD

If solid happiness we prize, Within our breast this jewel lies, And they are fools who roam. The world has nothing to bestow; From our own selves our joys must flow, And that dear hut, our home.

Nathaniel Cotton / quote

15c. 1746 AD

"I fly from pleasure," said the prince, "because pleasure has ceased to please; I am lonely because I am miserable, and am unwilling to cloud with my presence the happiness of others."

Samuel Johnson / quote

16c. 1746 AD

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 Johnson / quote

17c. 1743 AD

Ah, happy hills! ah, pleasing shade! Ah, fields beloved in vain! Where once my careless childhood stray'd, A stranger yet to pain! I feel the gales that from ye blow A momentary bliss bestow.

Thomas Gray / quote

18c. 1743 AD

To each his suff'rings; all are men, Condemn'd alike to groan,— The tender for another's pain, Th' unfeeling for his own. Yet ah! why should they know their fate, Since sorrow never comes too late, And happiness too swiftly flies? Thought would destroy their paradise. No more; where ignorance is bliss, 'T is folly to be wise.

Thomas Gray / quote

19c. 1751 AD

It has been a thousand times observed, and I must observe it once more, that the hours we pass with happy prospects in view are more pleasing than those crowned with fruition.

Oliver Goldsmith / quote

20c. 1751 AD

To what happy accident is it that we owe so unexpected a visit?

Oliver Goldsmith / quote

21c. 1765 AD

Happiness depends, as Nature shows, Less on exterior things than most suppose.

William Cowper / quote

22c. 1765 AD

Domestic happiness, thou only bliss Of Paradise that has survived the fall!

William Cowper / quote

23c. 1784 AD

We hold these truths to be self-evident,—that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Thomas Jefferson / quote

24c. 1777 AD

To make a happy fireside clime To weans and wife,— That 's the true pathos and sublime Of human life.

Robert Burns / quote