#pines

There is neither happiness nor misery in the world; there is only the comparison of one state with another, nothing more. He who has felt the deepest grief is best able to experience supreme happiness... ↗

— Alexandre Dumas

#experience

Life is such unutterable hell, solely because it is sometimes beautiful. If we could only be miserable all the time, if there could be no such things as love or beauty or faith or hope, if I could be absolutely certain that my love would never be returned: how much more simple life would be. One could plod through the Siberian salt mines of existence without being bothered about happiness. Unfortunately the happiness is there. There is always the chance (about eight hundred and fifty to one) that another heart will come to mine. I can't help hoping, and keeping faith, and loving beauty. Quite frequently I am not so miserable as it would be wise to be. ↗

— T.H. White

#faith #happiness #hope #life #love

Take all that you can of this book upon reason, and the balance on faith, and you will live and die a happier man. (When a skeptic expressed surprise to see him reading a Bible) ↗

— Abraham Lincoln

#faith #happiness #faith

Friendship is thinking of the other person first. ↗

— George Alexiou

#happiness #inspirational #integrity #joy #love

Yes, faith; it is my cousin's duty to make curtsy and say 'Father, as it please you.' But yet for all that, cousin, let him be a handsome fellow, or else make another curtsy and say 'Father, as it please me. ↗

— William Shakespeare

#courtship #dignity #empowerment #happiness #husbands

Drained of faith, I kneel and hail thee as my Lord, I ask not life, thou need not swerve the bullet, I ask but strength to ride the wave, and one more thing, teach me to hate ↗

— Henry G. Lee

#philippines #world-war-ii #faith

Liberty is the act of making the Government Fear what you KNOW! ↗

— Faith Brashear

#faith #happiness #justice #liberty-s-crusade #life-lessons

Duty comes in many forms; at times duty to country may conflict with duty to family. Yet, with a lucid mind the guises can be torn away and in the end, duty becomes but one, and that duty is to value justice above everything--to do what is right not because someone ordains it, but because the heart which is the seat of truth decrees it so. ↗

— F. Sionil José

#filipiniana #heroism #justice #philippines #family

The truly revolutionary promise of our nation's founding document is the freedom to pursue happiness-with-a-capital-H. ↗

— Dan Savage

#happiness #politics #freedom

Education doesn’t make you happy. Nor does freedom. We don’t become happy just because we’re free – if we are. Or because we’ve been educated – if we have. But because education may be the means by which we realize we are happy. It opens our eyes, our ears, tells us where delights are lurking, convinces us that there is only one freedom of any importance whatsoever, that of the mind, and gives us the assurance – the confidence – to walk the path our mind, our educated mind, offers. ↗

— Iris Murdoch

#happiness #knowledge #education