Quotes About Contentment

That I can read and be happy while I am reading, is a great blessing. Could I have remembered, as some men do, what I read, I should have been able to call myself an educated man.

Everything smiled on her with gilded dimples, and these were the smiles she valued. As

But there came across his heart a feeling that he had reached a time of life in which it was no longer comfortable for him to live as a poor man with men who were rich. It had been his lot to do so when he was younger, and there had been some pleasure in it; but now he would rather live alone and dwell upon the memories of the past. He, too, might have been rich, and have had horses at command, had he chosen to sacrifice himself for money.

Eating is an occupation from which I think a man takes the more pleasure the less he considers it. A rural labourer who sits on the ditch-side with his bread and cheese and an onion has more enjoyment out of it than any Lucullus

Lucy, indeed, was not demonstrative: and she was, moreover, one of those few persons — for they are very few — who are contented to go on with their existence without making themselves the centre of any special outward circle. To the ordinary run of minds it is impossible not to do this.

As for money," continued the father, not caring to notice this interruption, "if it be regarded in any other light than as a shield against want, as a rampart under the protection of which you may carry on your battle, it will fail you. I was born a rich man." "Few people have cared so little about it as you," said the elder son.

If he should wish it, she would make no difficulty of parting with the things around her. Of what concern were the prettinesses of life to one whose inner soul was hampered with such ugliness?

That was all there was, and that had not been very bad. During

You never tried it, sir. I fear it, father; I fear that I may fail to teach myself to sit contented at Count Upsel's feet, and greet long years of gilded idleness with constant smiles.

After all," said he, "money is a fine thing." "Very fine, when it is well come by," she answered; "that is, without detriment to the heart or soul.

Who were the happy people that were driven neither by ambition, nor poverty, nor greed, nor the cross purposes of unhappy love, to stifle and trample upon their feelings?

But, as I have said, Alice had become quite comfortable at Matching Priory. Perhaps she was already growing upwards towards the light.

You millionnaires always talk of Christian resignation, because you never are called on to resign anything.

That some repent no one can doubt; but I am inclined to believe that most men and women take their lots as they find them, marrying as the birds do by force of nature, and going on with their mates with a general, though not perhaps an undisturbed satisfaction, feeling inwardly assured that Providence, if it have not done the very best for them, has done for them as well as they could do for themselves with all the thought in the world.

Mrs. Harold Smith, whatever may have been her faults, could boast of this virtue — that she loved her brother. He was probably the only human being that she did love. Children she had none; and as for her husband, it had never occurred to her to love him. She had married him for a position; and being a clever woman, with a good digestion and command of her temper, had managed to get through the world without much of that unhappiness which usually follows ill-assorted marriages.

But she was not a woman to be unhappy because she was growing old. Her happiness, like that of most of us, was ever in the future, — never reached but always coming. She, however, had not looked for happiness to love and loveliness, and

Lucy found that nothing would occur to her at that moment worthy of being spoken. There she sat, still and motionless, afraid to take up a book, and thinking in her heart how much happier she would have been at home at the parsonage. She was not made for society; she felt sure of that;

The fact is, he never was wrong. He couldn't go wrong. He lacked guile, and he feared God, — and a man who does both will never go far astray. I don't think he ever coveted aught in his life, — except a new case for his violoncello and somebody to listen to him when he played it.

Mr Alf never made enemies, for he praised no one, and, as far as the expression of his newspaper went, was satisfied with nothing.

pensé en todos los que habitan en las ciudades y en quienes van de una ciudad a otra, de un país a otro, de un planeta a otro planeta, como si en algún lado las cosas fueran a ser mejor, como si en algún lado uno pudiera sacarse los zapatos, y sin temer nunca más, equilibrado en su destino, manejándolo en el puño, palpando directamente el valor y la gallardía en los latidos calientes de la esperanza, decir aquí me quedo y nada me moverá

I don't go for people who lead full and satisfying lives.

Look, bimba—In my country we have a—how you say?—a proverb. Amare, cantare, mangiare.—Loving, singing, eating—these are God's three gifts. You don' need more.

I wanted what she [her mother] had wanted, what we all want: everything. We want a mate who feels like family and a lover who is exotic, surprising. We want to be youthful adventurers and middle aged mothers. We want intimacy and autonomy, safely and stimulation, reassurance and novelty, coziness and thrills. But we can't have it all.

I asked if she'd ever wanted children. She told me, "Everybody doesn't get everything." It sounded depressing to me at the time, a statement of defeat. Now admitting it seems like the obvious and essential work of growing up. Everybody doesn't get everything: as natural and unavoidable as mortality.