Quotes about feeling

Philosophy Quotes About Happiness

Happiness in philosophy often means flourishing (eudaimonia) rather than a fleeting mood. These quotations ask what kind of life is worth wanting, and which goods are stable enough to count as happiness.

22 quotations on happiness

  1. The human good is activity of soul in accordance with virtue.
  2. Pleasure is the beginning and end of the happy life — not the pleasures of profligates, but freedom from pain in the body and from disturbance in the soul.
  3. Of all that wisdom provides for the happiness of a whole life, by far the greatest is the possession of friendship.
  4. It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied; better to be Socrates dissatisfied than a fool satisfied.
  5. The struggle itself toward the heights is enough to fill a man's heart. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.
  6. The secret of happiness is this: let your interests be as wide as possible, and let your reactions…be as far as possible friendly rather than hostile.
  7. To abandon the struggle for private happiness…to burn with passion for eternal things — this is emancipation.
  8. Next to worry, probably one of the most potent causes of unhappiness is envy.
  9. Envy is itself a terrible obstacle to happiness.
  10. The Master said: Is it not a pleasure to learn and to practice what one has learned in due time? Is it not a joy to have friends come from afar? Is it not the mark of a gentleman to remain unresentful when others fail to appreciate one?
  11. It is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong.
  12. I say that the noble and good man and woman are happy, and the unjust and wicked are miserable.
  13. For one swallow does not make a spring, nor does one day.
  14. It is perhaps also strange to make the happy person a solitary.
  15. Felicity is a continual progress of the desire, from one object to another.
  16. One must imagine Sisyphus happy.
  17. All things are already complete in me. There is no greater delight than to turn within and find sincerity.
  18. Before joy, anger, sorrow, and pleasure are issued, that is called the Mean; when issued and all hit due measure, that is called Harmony.
  19. Nothing is miserable unless you think it so.
  20. What a person is contributes more to his happiness than what he has.
  21. It is better to be a human being dissatisfied than a pig satisfied.
  22. There is no greater pain than to recall happy times in misery.

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