Kevin Stilley

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December 8, 2012 by kevinstilley

Happiness – select quotes

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True happiness… arises, in the first place, from the enjoyment of one’s self.
~ Joseph Addison

To love is to suffer. To avoid suffering, one must not love. But then, one suffers from not loving. Therefore, to love is to suffer; not to love is to suffer; to suffer is to suffer. To be happy is to love. To be happy, then, is to suffer, but suffering makes one unhappy. Therefore, to be happy, one must love or love to suffer or suffer from too much happiness. I hope you’re getting this down.
~ Woody Allen

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts; therefore guard accordingly.
~ Marcus Aurelius

The strength and the happiness of a man consists in finding out the way in which God is going and going in that way, too.
~ Henry Ward Beecher

One of the keys to happiness is a bad memory.
~ Rita Mae Brown

Remember, happiness doesn’t depend on who you are or what you have; it depends solely on what you think.
~ Dale Carnegie

Seek to do good and you will find that happiness will run after you.
~ James Freeman Clarke

The happiness of most people we know is not ruined by great catastrophes or fatal errors, but by the repetition of slowly destructive little things.
~ Ernest Dimnet

Happy is the man, and happy he alone,
He who can call today his own;
He who, secure within, can say,
Tomorrow, do thy worst, for I have liv’d today.
~ John Dryden, in “Translation of Horace”

I have never looked upon ease and happiness as ends in themselves — such an ethical basis I call more proper for a herd of swine.
~ Albert Einstein, in The World As I See It

We all live with the objective of being happy; our lives are all different and yet the same.
~ Anne Frank

Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.
~ Mahatma Gandhi

Being miserable is a habit. Being happy is a habit. The choice is yours.
~ Tom Hopkins

It is pretty hard to tell what does bring happiness; poverty and wealth have both failed.
~ Kin Hubbard

The greatest happiness of life is the conviction that we are loved—loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves.
~ Victor Hugo

Many persons have a wrong idea of what constitutes true happiness. It is not attained through self-gratification but through fidelity to a worthy purpose.
~ Helen Keller

Most folks are as happy as they make up their minds to be.
~ Abraham Lincoln

There is a wonderful mythical law of nature that the three things we crave most in life — happiness, freedom, and peace of mind — are always attained by giving them to someone else.
~ Peyton Conway March

Ask yourself whether you are happy and you cease to be so.
~ John Stuart Mill

How happy a person is depends upon the depth of his gratitude.
~ John Miller

As the astronauts soar into the vast eternities of space, on earth the garbage piles higher; as the groves of academe extend their domain, the alumni’s arms reach lower; as the phallic cult spreads, so does impotence. In great wealth, great poverty; in health, sickness; in numbers deception. Gorging, left hungry; sedated, left restless; telling all, hiding all; in flesh united, forever separate. So we press on through the valley of abundance that leads to the wasteland of stiety, passing through the gardens of fantasy; seeking happiness every more ardently, and finding despair even more surely.
~ Malcolm Muggeridge, in “The Great Liberal Deathwish”

Happiness is neither within or without us—it is in God and only when God is in us is happiness within and without us.
~ Blaise Pascal

All men seek happiness. This is without exception. Whatever different means they employ, they all tend to this end. The cause of some going to war, and of others avoiding it, is the same desire in both, attended with different views. The will never takes the least step but to this object. This is the motive of every action of every man, even of those who hang themselves.
~ Blaise Pascal

If thou wouldst be happy, bring thy mind to thy condition, and have an indifferency for more than what is sufficient.
~ William Penn

Happiness is that state of consciousness which proceeds from the achievement of one’s values.
~ Ayn Rand

Happiness is not a goal; it is a by-product.
~ Eleanor Roosevelt

Happiness is nothing more than good health and a bad memory.
~ Albert Schweitzer

Happiness is essentially a state of going somewhere, wholeheartedly, one-directionally, without regret or reservation.
~ William Sheldon

Happiness is mostly a byproduct of doing what makes us feel fulfilled.
~ Benjamin Spock

Happy are those who dream dreams and are ready to pay the price to make them come true.
~ Leon Suenens

The happiness of a man in this life does not consist in the absence but in the mastery of his passions.
~ Alfred Lord Tennyson

I am still determined to be cheerful and happy, in whatever situation I may be; for I have also learned from experience that the greater part of our happiness or misery depends upon our dispositions, and not upon our circumstances.
~ Martha Washington

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Filed Under: Blog, Quotes Tagged With: attitude, Blog, demeanor, depression, happiness, joy, Quotes, Worldview

June 10, 2012 by kevinstilley

Henry Ward Beecher – select quotes

The worst thing in the world next to anarchy, is government.
~ in Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit, 1867

Ignorance is the womb of monsters.
~ in Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit, 1867

A traitor is good fruit to hang from the boughs of the tree of liberty.

Every tomorrow has two handles. We can take hold of it with the handle of anxiety or the handle of faith.

Gratitude is the fairest blossom which springs from the soul.

Remember God’s bounty in the year. String the pearls of His favor. Hide the dark parts, except so far as they are breaking out in light! Give this one day to thanks, to joy, to gratitude!

The mother’s heart is the child’s schoolroom.

The strength and the happiness of a man consists in finding out the way in which God is going and going in that way, too.

Troubles are the tools by which God fashions us for better things.

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Filed Under: Blog, Quotes Tagged With: Beecher, Blog, Christianity, happiness, ignorance, Plymouth, Preachers & Preaching, pulpit, quips, Quotes, wisdom

February 18, 2012 by kevinstilley

Happiness in Aristotle’s Ethics

Aristotle opens this work with the claim that “Every art and every inquiry, and similarly, every action and every intention is thought to aim at some good.”  Is he right? (page 1)

There are three major streams of inquiry in western philosophy; (1) metaphysics, (2) epistemology, (3) axiology.   What questions/answers do these streams represent?  Which of these is illustrated in Aristotle’s Ethics? (page 1)

When Aristotle speaks of virtue, to what is he referring?

What, according to Aristotle, is “the good”? (page 1)  How does his terminology relate to that of Plato?  (pages 5-6) Do they both have the same definition of “The Good”?

Why does Aristotle say that a young man is not a proper student of politics?  (page 3)  Do you agree with Aristotle?

What does Aristotle believe to be “the highest of all goods achievable by action”? (page 3)  How comfortable are you with this truth claim?

Describe Aristotle’s concept of “happiness.” (page 3, 8) Building on his definition of happiness he writes, “then the good for a man turns out to be an activity of the soul according to virtue, and if the virtues are many, then according to the best and most complete virtue.  And we should add ‘in a complete life’, for one swall does not make a spring, nor does one day; and so too one day or a short time does not make a man blessed or happy.”  What is his point(s)? (page 10)

We will be reading about Plato’s ethical system later in the course.  For now, it is sufficient to note that while “happiness” was at the center of Aristotle’s system of ethics, “justice” was at the center of Plato’s system of ethics (and, of course “The Good”).   Around what would you build your own system of ethics?

Aristotle describes “three kinds of life [people].”  What are they?  Can you describe them?  (pages 4-5) 

Why does the life of a money-maker not make a fourth category?  (page 5)

When describing his disagreement with the Platonists, Aristotle says that “it is sacred to honor truth above friendship.”  Have you ever been put in a position where you had to make this choice? How does this tension exist in the various elements of your life?  Family?  Academic?  Theology?

What does Aristotle mean when he says that man is by nature political?  (page 9)

Would Aristotle participate in a small-group ministry?

Aristotle notes three kinds of good?  What are they?  Which does he say is the most important?  (page 11)

Aristotle’s ethical sytem emphasizes action.   Why?  (page 12)  How does this compare and contrast with a New Testament ethic?

Aristotle puts forward the question as to “whether happiness is acquired by learning or by habit or by some other form of training, or wheter it comes to us by some divine providence or even by luck.”  Do theologians agree on the answer to this question?  What do you think?

Why do you have to wait till the end of a man’s life to determine whether or not he is happy?  Who is the Solon that Aristotle is referring to? (page 14)  Do we then base happiness on a man’s fortunes?  (page 15)  Would Aristotle approve of the premises behind the Sermon on the Mount?

When comparing justice and happiness, which does Aristotle say is more praised and which is more godlike or better? 

What does Aristotle believe about the relationship between religion and politics?  (page 18)

Filed Under: Blog, Books, History, Philosophy Tagged With: Aristotle, Blessed, happiness, Plato, Politics, virtue

October 11, 2009 by kevinstilley

Marcus Tullius Cicero – select quotes

Marcus Tullius Cicero

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Of all the gifts of the gods to the human race, philosophy is the richest, the most beautiful, the most exalted.
~ in De Legibus

Philosophy is the best medicine for the mind.

History, the evidence of time, the light of truth, the life of memory, the directress of life, the herald of antiquity, committed to immortality.
~ in De Oratore [Read more…]

Filed Under: Blog, Quotes Tagged With: ancient, antiquity, Blog, Cicero, civ, civiliation, death, happiness, History, law, Philosophy, proverbs, quips, Quotes, Western, wisdom

March 8, 2009 by kevinstilley

Epictetus – Select Quotes

Only the educated are free.
~ in Discourses

To accuse others for one’s own misfortune is a sign of want of education; to accuse oneself shows that one’s education has begun; to accuse neither oneself nor others shows that one’s education is complete.
~ in The Encheiridion

We must not believe the many, who say that only free people ought to be educated, but we should rather believe the philosophers who say that only the educated are free.
~ in Discourses

Keep before your eyes from day to day death and exile and all things that seem terrible, but death most of all, and then you will never set your thoughts on what is low and will never desire anything beyond measure.
~ in The Encheiridion

Appearances to the mind are of four kinds. Things either are what they appear to be; or they neither are, nor appear to be; or they are, and do not appear to be; or they are not, and yet appear to be. Rightly to aim in all these cases is the wise man’s task.
~ Epictetus, in Discourses

If you would be a reader, read; if a writer, write.

No great thing is created suddenly.

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Book Cover

Filed Under: Blog, Quotes Tagged With: Education, Epictetus, Freedom, happiness, Quotes

May 30, 2008 by kevinstilley

Girls Shouldn’t Just Wanna Have Fun

Parker & KevinGirls shouldn’t just wanna have fun, and neither should anyone else. Consider this story told by J.P. Moreland in The Lost Virtue Of Happiness which he co-authored with Klaus Issler;

When my daughter’s eight-grade team was being creamed in a soccer game, the coach said at halftime, “Girls, don’t worry about the score. The reason we play soccer is to have fun; so let’s try to have a blast during the second half and go home happy whatever the final result.” That coach reminds me of Cyndi Lauper’s song “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun.” He was mindlessly parroting the cultural mantra that pleasurable satisfaction is the goal of life. The reasons my wife and I wanted our daughter to play soccer where to learn how to win and to lose, to cooperate with others, to sacrifice for a long-term goal, which requires delaying instant gratification, and — well, you get the picture. What was really sad was not simply the coach’s speech, but the fact than none of the parents so much as batted an eye at his counsel.

[Read more…]

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: Blog, character, citizenship, Cub Scouts, Cyndi Lauper, Family, fitness, fun, goals, happiness, J. P. Moreland, training, Worldview

May 13, 2008 by kevinstilley

What Is Happiness?

Yesterday I had lunch with a friend at a Thai restaurant. He mentioned that he has family members who have been serving as missionaries in Hungary. It made me think of a poem I had read in Carl Sandburg’s Harvest Poems: 1910-1960. I shared the poem with him and he said he might agree if he could change the accordion for an acoustical guitar. Here it is for your consideration:

Happiness

 

I asked professors who teach the meaning of life to tell me what is happiness.
And I went to famous executives who boss the work of thousands of men.
They all shook their heads and gave me a smile as though I was trying to fool them.
And then one Sunday afternoon I wandered out along the Desplaines river.
And I saw a crowd of Hungarians under the trees with their women and children and a keg of beer and an accordion.

So I guess happiness is having women, children, beer and an accordion (or an acoustical guitar).

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: accordion, beer, Blog, Carl Sandburg, children, happiness, harvest, Philosophy, poems, Praxis, women

March 24, 2008 by kevinstilley

Can Money Buy Happiness?

I wish I had enough money to test this out for myself scientifically…

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: Blog, charity, giving, happiness, Money, Philanthropy

March 2, 2008 by kevinstilley

Depression / The Blues

Most folks are as happy as they make up their minds to be.
~ Abraham Lincoln

Ten rules for getting rid of the blues: Go out and do something for someone else – and repeat it nine times.
~ Unknown

Filed Under: Blog Tagged With: Blog, blues, depression, dismay, grief, happiness, mental health, Quotes, sorrow, Worldview

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