A cheerful life is what the Muses love,
A soaring spirit is their prime delight.William Wordsworth (1770-1850) English poet
“From the Dark Chambers of Dejection Freed,” ll. 13-14 (1814)
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Quotations about:
good cheer
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There are no exact directions. There are probably no directions at all. The only things that I am able to recommend at this moment are: a sense of humour; an ability to see the ridiculous and the absurd dimensions of things; an ability to laugh about others as well as about ourselves; a sense of irony; and, of everything that invites parody in this world. In other words: rising above things, or looking at them from a distance; sensibility to the hidden presence of all the more dangerous types of conceit in others, as well as in ourselves; good cheer; an unostentatious certainty of the meaning of things; gratitude for the gift of life and courage to assume responsibility for it; and, a vigilant mind.
Václav Havel (1936-2011) Czech playwright, essayist, dissident, politician
Speech, accepting the “Open Society” Prize, Central European University (24 Jun 1999)
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A cheerful temper joined with innocence will make beauty attractive, knowledge delightful and wit good-natured. It will lighten sickness, poverty and affliction, convert ignorance into an amiable simplicity, and render deformity itself agreeable.
A good laugh overcomes more difficulties and dissipates more dark clouds than any other one thing.
Laura Ingalls Wilder (1867-1957) American writer
“‘Thoughts are Things,'” Missouri Ruralist (5 Nov 1917)
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Reprinted in Stephen Hines, ed., Laura Ingalls Wilder - Farm Journalist (2007).
To laughter! The bright coinage of the bank of good will.
Minna Antrim (1861-1950) American epigrammatist, writer
Naked Truth and Veiled Allusions (1901)
How easy it is to be amiable in the midst of happiness and success!
Anne Sophie Swetchine (1782-1857) Russian-French author and salonist [Madame Swetchine]
Life and Letters of Madam Swetchine, ch. 5 [8th ed., 1875] (ed. de Falloux; tr. Preston]
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While there is a chance of the world getting through its troubles I hold that a reasonable man has to behave as though he was sure of it. If at the end your cheerfulness is not justified, at any rate you will have been cheerful.
H.G. Wells (1866-1946) British writer [Herbert George Wells]
Apropos of Dolores (1938)
Good humor may be said to be one of the very best articles of dress one can wear in society.
William Makepeace Thackeray (1811-1863) English novelist
Sketches and Travels in London, “On Tailoring — and Toilets in General” (1856)
He made her melancholy, sad, and heavy,
And so she died. Had she been light like you,
Of such a merry, nimble, stirring spirit,
She might ha’ been a grandam ere she died.
And so may you, for a light heart lives long.William Shakespeare (1564-1616) English dramatist and poet
Love’s Labour’s Lost, Act 5, sc. 2, l. 15ff [Katherine] (c. 1595)
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Mirth is God’s medicine. Everybody ought to bathe in it. Grim care, moroseness, anxiety — all this rust of life ought to be scoured off by the oil of mirth. It is better than emery. Every man ought to rub himself with it.
