{ "type": "topic", "site": { "name": "Leafy Quotes", "language": "en", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com" }, "formats": "Every page has two versions with the same data: JSON (the page address + .json) and markdown (the page address + .md). Append .json or .md to any `url` in this document.", "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy", "heading": "Quotes about joy", "json": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy.json", "markdown": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy.md", "quotes_count": 98, "authors_count": 67, "parent": { "name": "happiness", "slug": "happiness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/happiness", "heading": "Quotes about happiness" }, "children": [ { "name": "enthusiasm", "slug": "enthusiasm", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/enthusiasm", "heading": "Quotes about enthusiasm" } ], "quotes": [ { "id": "47821215-0199-4904-827a-9d0e50e5f33d", "slug": "youre-doing-nothing", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/frederic-gros/a-philosophy-of-walking/youre-doing-nothing", "text": "You’re doing nothing when you walk, nothing but walking. But having nothing to do but walk makes it possible to recover the pure sensation of being, to rediscover the simple joy of existing, the joy that permeates the whole of childhood. So that walking, by unburdening us, prising us from the obsession with doing, puts us in touch with that childhood eternity once again. I mean that walking is so to speak child’s play. To marvel at the beauty of the day, the brightness of the sun, the grandeur of the trees, the blue of the sky: to do that takes no experience, no ability.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Frederic Gros", "slug": "frederic-gros", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/frederic-gros" }, "book": { "title": "A Philosophy of Walking", "slug": "a-philosophy-of-walking", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/frederic-gros/a-philosophy-of-walking" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "childhood", "slug": "childhood", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/childhood" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Fr%C3%A9d%C3%A9ric_Gros#A_Philosophy_of_Walking_(2008)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-26T07:49:58" }, { "id": "6ac7fbcf-e068-4d44-9231-d7e4d27e4d25", "slug": "the-things-that", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-eisenstein/the-more-beautiful-world-our-hearts-know-is-possible/the-things-that", "text": "The things that we think we want are often substitutes for what we really want, and the pleasures we seek are less than the joy that they distract us from. From the normal vantage point, it certainly seems that only with discipline can we withstand the temptations that surround us: overeating, drugs, video games, mindless internet surfing, and everything else we consume. These things are undeniably destructive to our own lives and beyond; therefore, it would seem, we cannot always trust desire at all. But when we recognize that these are not really what we desire, our goal becomes not to suppress desire but to identify the true want or need, and to fulfill it. That is no trivial task; it is a profound path of self-realization.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Charles Eisenstein", "slug": "charles-eisenstein", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-eisenstein" }, "book": { "title": "The More Beautiful World Our Hearts Know Is Possible", "slug": "the-more-beautiful-world-our-hearts-know-is-possible", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-eisenstein/the-more-beautiful-world-our-hearts-know-is-possible" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "desire", "slug": "desire", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/desire" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Charles_Eisenstein#The_More_Beautiful_World_Our_Hearts_Know_Is_Possible._The_Vision_and_Practice_of_Interbeing_(2013)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-26T07:02:10" }, { "id": "4c87b6de-60b6-428a-92bc-048a04738f6e", "slug": "it-is-of-the", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/soren-kierkegaard/eitheror/it-is-of-the", "text": "It is of the essence of joy to reveal itself, while grief tries to hide, sometimes even to deceive. Joy is communicative, social, open-hearted, and desires expression; grief is secretive, silent, solitary, and seeks to retire into itself. The truth of this remark will surely not be denied by anyone who has even a moderate acquaintance with life. There are men so constituted that under the stress of emotion, the blood rushes to the surface, making the inner emotion outwardly visible; others are so constituted that the blood flows backward, seeking the inner parts of the chambers of the heart. A somewhat similar relation exists as to the mode of expression, between joy and grief.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Sören Kierkegaard", "slug": "soren-kierkegaard", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/soren-kierkegaard" }, "book": { "title": "Either/Or", "slug": "eitheror", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/soren-kierkegaard/eitheror" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 167, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "sadness", "slug": "sadness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/sadness" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Either/Or#Shadowgraphs", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-26T07:01:54" }, { "id": "1d2257bb-05e6-4bd2-823b-d359820994a4", "slug": "there-are-as-is-known", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/soren-kierkegaard/eitheror/there-are-as-is-known", "text": "There are, as is known, insects that die in the moment of fertilization. So it is with all joy: life's highest, most splendid moment of enjoyment is accompanied by death.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Sören Kierkegaard", "slug": "soren-kierkegaard", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/soren-kierkegaard" }, "book": { "title": "Either/Or", "slug": "eitheror", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/soren-kierkegaard/eitheror" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 20, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "death", "slug": "death", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/death" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Either/Or#Diapsalmata", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-26T07:01:54" }, { "id": "ffe0c24c-1b14-4207-839e-cfbb7747eb1d", "slug": "but-wait-my-eyes", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/brian-keenan/an-evil-cradling/but-wait-my-eyes", "text": "But wait. My eyes are almost burned by what I see. There’s a bowl in front of me that wasn’t there before. A brown button bowl and in it some apricots, some small oranges, some nuts, cherries, a banana. The fruits, the colours, mesmerize me in a quiet rapture that spins through my head. I am entranced by colour. I lift an orange into the flat filthy palm of my hand and feel and smell and lick it. The colour orange, the colour, the colour, my God the colour orange. Before me is a feast of colour. I feel myself begin to dance, slowly, I am intoxicated by colour. I feel the colour in a quiet somnambulant rage. Such wonder, such absolute wonder in such an insignificant fruit. I cannot, I will not eat this fruit. I sit in quiet joy, so complete, beyond the meaning of joy. My soul finds its own completeness in that bowl of colour. The forms of each fruit. The shape and curl and bend all so rich, so perfect. I want to bow before it. Loving that blazing, roaring, orange colour...Everything meeting in a moment of colour and form, my rapture no longer abstract euphoria. It is there in that tiny bowl, the world recreated in that broken bowl. I feel the smell of each fruit leaping into me and lifting me and carrying me away. I am drunk with something that I understand but cannot explain. I am filled with a sense of love. I am filled and satiated by it. What I have waited and longed for has without my knowing come to me, and taken all of me. For days I sit in a kind of dreamy lethargy, in part contemplation and in part worship. The walls seem to be singing. I focus all of my attention on the bowl of fruit. At times I fondle the fruits, at times I rearrange them, but I cannot eat them. I cannot hold the ecstasy of the moment and its passionate intensity. It seems to drift slowly from me as the place in which I am being held comes back to remind me of where I am and of my condition. But my containment does not oppress me. I sit and look at the walls but now this room seems so expansive, it seems I can push the walls away from me. I can reach out and touch them from where I sit and yet they are so far from me.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Brian Keenan", "slug": "brian-keenan", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/brian-keenan" }, "book": { "title": "An Evil Cradling", "slug": "an-evil-cradling", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/brian-keenan/an-evil-cradling" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 68, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "beauty", "slug": "beauty", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/beauty" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Brian_Keenan_(writer)#An_Evil_Cradling_(1992)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:05:57" }, { "id": "d5cf9908-8fc7-46f5-bf32-8b334fc0942b", "slug": "the-earth-is-all", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-wordsworth/the-prelude/the-earth-is-all", "text": "The earth is all before me. With a heart Joyous, nor scared at its own liberty, I look about; and should the chosen guide Be nothing better than a wandering cloud, I cannot miss my way.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "William Wordsworth", "slug": "william-wordsworth", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-wordsworth" }, "book": { "title": "The Prelude", "slug": "the-prelude", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-wordsworth/the-prelude" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "freedom", "slug": "freedom", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/freedom" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Prelude#Book_I", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:05:54" }, { "id": "b5252b86-4f8e-411b-9291-5f20630ee293", "slug": "bliss-was-it-in-that", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-wordsworth/the-prelude/bliss-was-it-in-that", "text": "Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, But to be young was very heaven!", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "William Wordsworth", "slug": "william-wordsworth", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-wordsworth" }, "book": { "title": "The Prelude", "slug": "the-prelude", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-wordsworth/the-prelude" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "youth", "slug": "youth", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/youth" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Prelude#Book_XI", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:05:54" }, { "id": "1f256d26-fb40-401d-875d-5ca6e3e29f1b", "slug": "many-are-our", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-wordsworth/the-prelude/many-are-our", "text": "Many are our joys In youth, but oh! what happiness to live When every hour brings palpable access Of knowledge, when all knowledge is delight, And sorrow is not there!", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "William Wordsworth", "slug": "william-wordsworth", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-wordsworth" }, "book": { "title": "The Prelude", "slug": "the-prelude", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-wordsworth/the-prelude" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "knowledge", "slug": "knowledge", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/knowledge" }, { "name": "youth", "slug": "youth", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/youth" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Prelude#Book_II", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:05:54" }, { "id": "ef4ca27d-ba9a-40e3-864d-fa30c05a2482", "slug": "i-smiled-and", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/chris-cleave/the-other-hand/i-smiled-and", "text": "I smiled and watched Charlie running away with the children , with his head down and his happy arms spinning like propellers, and I cried with joy when the children all began to play together in the sparkling foam of the waves that broke between worlds at the point. It was beautiful […] and that is a word I do not need to explain to you, because now we are all speaking the same language", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Chris Cleave", "slug": "chris-cleave", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/chris-cleave" }, "book": { "title": "The Other Hand", "slug": "the-other-hand", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/chris-cleave/the-other-hand" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "children", "slug": "children", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/children" }, { "name": "language", "slug": "language", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/language" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Other_Hand#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:05:27" }, { "id": "0fc83727-f635-43f4-9c91-e292991f4c6c", "slug": "i-feel-a-free", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/abi-dare/the-girl-with-the-louding-voice/i-feel-a-free", "text": "I feel a free that I didn't feel in long time. And when I smile, it climb from inside my stomach and spread itself on my teeth.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Abi Dare", "slug": "abi-dare", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/abi-dare" }, "book": { "title": "The Girl with the Louding Voice", "slug": "the-girl-with-the-louding-voice", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/abi-dare/the-girl-with-the-louding-voice" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "freedom", "slug": "freedom", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/freedom" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Abi_Dar%C3%A9#The_Girl_with_the_Louding_Voice_(2020)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:05:21" }, { "id": "b204717a-6db1-43c4-9f82-9f178a3a8470", "slug": "reconciling-the-opposites", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/paula-gunn-allen/the-sacred-hoop/reconciling-the-opposites", "text": "Reconciling the opposites of life and death, of celebration and grief, of laughter and rage is no simple task, yet it is one worthy of our best understanding and our best effort. If, in all these centuries of death, we have continued to endure, we must celebrate that fact and the fact of our vitality in the face of what seemed, to many, inevitable extinction. For however painful and futile our struggle becomes, we have but to look outside at the birds, the deer, and the seasons to understand that change does not mean destruction, that life, however painful and even elusive it is at times, contains much joy and hilarity, pleasure and beauty for those who live within its requirements with grace.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Paula Gunn Allen", "slug": "paula-gunn-allen", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/paula-gunn-allen" }, "book": { "title": "The Sacred Hoop", "slug": "the-sacred-hoop", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/paula-gunn-allen/the-sacred-hoop" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "death", "slug": "death", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/death" }, { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Paula_Gunn_Allen#Chapter_Two", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:04:38" }, { "id": "018ca6a5-f255-4f3a-bb2d-498132844a21", "slug": "until-we-can", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robin-wall-kimmerer/braiding-sweetgrass/until-we-can", "text": "Until we can grieve for our planet we cannot love it—grieving is a sign of spiritual health. But it is not enough to weep for our lost landscapes; we have to put our hands in the earth to make ourselves whole again. Even a wounded world is feeding us. Even a wounded world holds us, giving us moments of wonder and joy. I choose joy over despair. Not because I have my head in the sand, but because joy is what the earth gives me daily and I must return the gift.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Robin Wall Kimmerer", "slug": "robin-wall-kimmerer", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robin-wall-kimmerer" }, "book": { "title": "Braiding Sweetgrass", "slug": "braiding-sweetgrass", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robin-wall-kimmerer/braiding-sweetgrass" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 327, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "ecology", "slug": "ecology", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/ecology" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "grief", "slug": "grief", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/grief" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Robin_Wall_Kimmerer#Braiding_Sweetgrass_(2013)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:04:32" }, { "id": "1fe87e96-6f4b-4877-8321-c09a606a87a1", "slug": "with-the-strong", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/zitkala-sa/american-indian-stories/with-the-strong", "text": "With the strong, happy sense that both great and small are so surely enfolded in His magnitude that, without a miss, each has his allotted individual ground of opportunities, I am buoyant with good nature.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Zitkala-Sa", "slug": "zitkala-sa", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/zitkala-sa" }, "book": { "title": "American Indian Stories", "slug": "american-indian-stories", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/zitkala-sa/american-indian-stories" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "god", "slug": "god", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/god" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Zitkala-%C5%A0a#%22The_Great_Spirit%22", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:04:18" }, { "id": "929c89ba-3146-4a40-9d0f-ee65c28581c7", "slug": "we-pray-for", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ana-castillo/i-ask-the-impossible/we-pray-for", "text": "We pray for joy and love to fill our hearts, our days and our nights", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Ana Castillo", "slug": "ana-castillo", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ana-castillo" }, "book": { "title": "I Ask the Impossible", "slug": "i-ask-the-impossible", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ana-castillo/i-ask-the-impossible" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "prayer", "slug": "prayer", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/prayer" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ana_Castillo#I_Ask_The_Impossible_(2000)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:02:45" }, { "id": "52ba486c-7981-4f2c-9258-cec6b0eaea0f", "slug": "when-you-face", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rebecca-solnit/hope-in-the-dark/when-you-face", "text": "when you face a politics that aspires to make you fearful, alienated and isolated, joy is a fine act of insurrection. (\"False Hope and Easy Despair\" in 2016 edition)", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Rebecca Solnit", "slug": "rebecca-solnit", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rebecca-solnit" }, "book": { "title": "Hope In The Dark", "slug": "hope-in-the-dark", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rebecca-solnit/hope-in-the-dark" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "rebellion", "slug": "rebellion", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/rebellion" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Rebecca_Solnit#Hope_in_the_Dark:_The_Untold_History_of_People_Power_(2004)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:01:51" }, { "id": "5247daad-3e0c-4cb7-9a1c-eae44568e20c", "slug": "joy-doesnt-betray", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rebecca-solnit/hope-in-the-dark/joy-doesnt-betray", "text": "Joy doesn't betray but sustains activism. (p17)", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Rebecca Solnit", "slug": "rebecca-solnit", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rebecca-solnit" }, "book": { "title": "Hope In The Dark", "slug": "hope-in-the-dark", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rebecca-solnit/hope-in-the-dark" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Rebecca_Solnit#Hope_in_the_Dark:_The_Untold_History_of_People_Power_(2004)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:01:51" }, { "id": "33dbbbf0-8d85-4fbf-b58f-35ace25a51b9", "slug": "nothing-fills-us-with", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/victoria-moran/the-good-karma-diet/nothing-fills-us-with", "text": "Nothing fills us with deep and lasting joy the way that doing a good turn for someone else does. Saving somebody's life, human or animal, is that “good turn” in spades.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Victoria Moran", "slug": "victoria-moran", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/victoria-moran" }, "book": { "title": "The Good Karma Diet", "slug": "the-good-karma-diet", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/victoria-moran/the-good-karma-diet" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "kindness", "slug": "kindness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/kindness" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "veganism", "slug": "veganism", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/veganism" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Victoria_Moran#The_Good_Karma_Diet_(2015)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:01:42" }, { "id": "9b89a219-24f9-4e7c-bf4d-314fcf5a9145", "slug": "always-believe-in-things", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/pat-conroy/the-great-santini/always-believe-in-things", "text": "Always believe in things and people that bring you pleasure. What good does it do to throw those things out the window?", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Pat Conroy", "slug": "pat-conroy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/pat-conroy" }, "book": { "title": "The Great Santini", "slug": "the-great-santini", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/pat-conroy/the-great-santini" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 376, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Pat_Conroy#The_Great_Santini_(1976)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:01:33" }, { "id": "213be8ec-1308-4df5-bbbf-9d0608262fa1", "slug": "it-was-strange", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/elizabeth-kostova/the-historian/it-was-strange", "text": "It was strange, I reflected, as we went out into the golden evening of the Byzantine streets, that even in the weirdest circumstances, the most troubling episodes of one’s life, the greatest divides from home and familiarity, there were these moments of undeniable joy.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Elizabeth Kostova", "slug": "elizabeth-kostova", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/elizabeth-kostova" }, "book": { "title": "The Historian", "slug": "the-historian", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/elizabeth-kostova/the-historian" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Kostova#The_Historian_(2005)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:01:28" }, { "id": "0ab54f29-289a-4dd7-8bc8-7ced5c69b8c2", "slug": "and-i-to-have", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-hope-hodgson/the-night-land/and-i-to-have", "text": "And I to have gained Honour; yet to have learned that Honour doth be but as the ash of Life, if that you not to have Love. And I to have Love. And to have Love is to have all; for that which doth be truly LOVE doth mother Honour and Faithfulness; and they three to build the House of Joy.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "William Hope Hodgson", "slug": "william-hope-hodgson", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-hope-hodgson" }, "book": { "title": "The Night Land", "slug": "the-night-land", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/william-hope-hodgson/the-night-land" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "love", "slug": "love", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/love" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "honour", "slug": "honour", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/honour" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/William_Hope_Hodgson#The_Night_Land_(1912)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:01:09" }, { "id": "57d1b098-b454-483b-9760-fd7a27b717b2", "slug": "pleasure-is-always", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/eckhart-tolle/the-power-of-now/pleasure-is-always", "text": "Pleasure is always derived from something outside you, whereas joy arises from within. p. 24", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Eckhart Tolle", "slug": "eckhart-tolle", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/eckhart-tolle" }, "book": { "title": "The Power of Now", "slug": "the-power-of-now", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/eckhart-tolle/the-power-of-now" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "pleasure", "slug": "pleasure", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/pleasure" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Power_of_Now#Chapter_1._You_Are_Not_Your_Mind", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:01:00" }, { "id": "c4447b6a-eb52-4fae-b099-47c43f0768ff", "slug": "everything-filled-me-with", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/andre-gide/the-immoralist/everything-filled-me-with", "text": "Everything filled me with the joy of being alive until my whole being seemed no more than a hovering rapture: memories or regrets, hope or desire, future and past fell silent; I knew nothing of life but what the moment brought to it, took from it.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "André Gide", "slug": "andre-gide", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/andre-gide" }, "book": { "title": "The Immoralist", "slug": "the-immoralist", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/andre-gide/the-immoralist" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 61, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "the present moment", "slug": "the-present-moment", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/the-present-moment" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Immoralist#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:00:58" }, { "id": "a16858ad-d51d-45db-8a05-577dafab91eb", "slug": "each-joy-is-like", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/andre-gide/the-immoralist/each-joy-is-like", "text": "Each joy is like manna in the desert, which spoils from one day to the next.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "André Gide", "slug": "andre-gide", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/andre-gide" }, "book": { "title": "The Immoralist", "slug": "the-immoralist", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/andre-gide/the-immoralist" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 112, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Immoralist#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:00:58" }, { "id": "d0ee1c28-006d-4c95-8a60-b7474921ebfe", "slug": "the-bitterness-of-joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/tanith-lee/delusions-master/the-bitterness-of-joy", "text": "The bitterness of joy lies in the knowledge that it cannot last. Nor should joy last beyond a certain season, for, after that season, even joy would become merely habit.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Tanith Lee", "slug": "tanith-lee", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/tanith-lee" }, "book": { "title": "Delusion’s Master", "slug": "delusions-master", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/tanith-lee/delusions-master" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 159, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "transience", "slug": "transience", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/transience" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Tanith_Lee#Delusion's_Master_(1981)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:00:23" }, { "id": "33606e70-ce7a-4d93-aa70-40de8e936961", "slug": "man-is-more", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton/orthodoxy/man-is-more", "text": "Man is more himself, man is more manlike, when joy is the fundamental thing in him, and grief the superficial. Melancholy should be an innocent interlude, a tender and fugitive frame of mind; praise should be the permanent pulsation of the soul.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "G. Chesterton", "slug": "g-chesterton", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton" }, "book": { "title": "Orthodoxy", "slug": "orthodoxy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton/orthodoxy" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "sadness", "slug": "sadness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/sadness" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Orthodoxy_(book)#Chapter_IX._%22Authority_and_the_Adventurer%22", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:00:14" }, { "id": "1e8bcf5d-5536-42f4-95f6-3eaeadf5531c", "slug": "joy-which-was", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton/orthodoxy/joy-which-was", "text": "Joy, which was the small publicity of the pagan, is the gigantic secret of the Christian. And as I close this chaotic volume I open again the strange small book from which all Christianity came; and I am again haunted by a kind of confirmation. The tremendous figure which fills the Gospels towers in this respect, as in every other, above all the thinkers who ever thought themselves tall. His pathos was natural, almost casual. The Stoics, ancient and modern, were proud of concealing their tears. He never concealed His tears; He showed them plainly on His open face at any daily sight, such as the far sight of His native city. Yet He concealed something. Solemn supermen and imperial diplomatists are proud of restraining their anger. He never restrained His anger. He flung furniture down the front steps of the Temple, and asked men how they expected to escape the damnation of Hell. Yet He restrained something. I say it with reverence; there was in that shattering personality a thread that must be called shyness. There was something that He hid from all men when He went up a mountain to pray. There was something that He covered constantly by abrupt silence or impetuous isolation. There was some one thing that was too great for God to show us when He walked upon our earth; and I have sometimes fancied that it was His mirth.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "G. Chesterton", "slug": "g-chesterton", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton" }, "book": { "title": "Orthodoxy", "slug": "orthodoxy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton/orthodoxy" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Orthodoxy_(book)#Chapter_IX._%22Authority_and_the_Adventurer%22", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:00:14" }, { "id": "bd618fbe-e397-404f-a999-e06297e5d70d", "slug": "now-the-fairy-tale", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton/orthodoxy/now-the-fairy-tale", "text": "Now, the fairy-tale philosopher is glad that the leaf is green precisely because it might have been scarlet. He feels as if it had turned green an instant before he looked at it. He is pleased that snow is white on the strictly reasonable ground that it might have been black. Every colour has in it a bold quality as of choice; the red of garden roses is not only decisive but dramatic, like suddenly spilt blood. He feels that something has been done. But the great determinists of the nineteenth century were strongly against this native feeling that something had happened an instant before. In fact, according to them, nothing ever really had happened since the beginning of the world. Nothing ever had happened since existence had happened; and even about the date of that they were not very sure.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "G. Chesterton", "slug": "g-chesterton", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton" }, "book": { "title": "Orthodoxy", "slug": "orthodoxy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/g-chesterton/orthodoxy" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Orthodoxy_(book)#Chapter_IV._'The_Ethics_of_Elfland%22", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T23:00:13" }, { "id": "b23c6b81-8eef-4ce2-a2a4-1a591036c105", "slug": "it-is-a-long", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/laurie-lee/i-cant-stay-long/it-is-a-long", "text": "It is a long time now since I knew that acute moment of bliss that comes from putting parched lips to a cup of cold water. The springs are still there to be enjoyed - all one needs is the original thirst.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Laurie Lee", "slug": "laurie-lee", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/laurie-lee" }, "book": { "title": "I Can't Stay Long", "slug": "i-cant-stay-long", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/laurie-lee/i-cant-stay-long" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 66, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Laurie_Lee#I_Can't_Stay_Long_(1975)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:59:57" }, { "id": "e71abd28-cd6f-4063-94a2-e0e5447ec253", "slug": "without-amusement-there", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/blaise-pascal/pensees/without-amusement-there", "text": "Without amusement there is no joy; with amusement there is no sadness.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Blaise Pascal", "slug": "blaise-pascal", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/blaise-pascal" }, "book": { "title": "Pensees", "slug": "pensees", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/blaise-pascal/pensees" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "sadness", "slug": "sadness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/sadness" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Pens%C3%A9es#Section_II:_The_Misery_of_Man_without_God_(60-183)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:59:47" }, { "id": "f28a0e65-11be-4bbc-8455-0753b11653f0", "slug": "the-living-should", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/george-rr-martin/a-clash-of-kings/the-living-should", "text": "The living should smile, for the dead cannot.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "George RR Martin", "slug": "george-rr-martin", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/george-rr-martin" }, "book": { "title": "A Clash of Kings", "slug": "a-clash-of-kings", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/george-rr-martin/a-clash-of-kings" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/A_Song_of_Ice_and_Fire#A_Clash_of_Kings_(1999)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:58:47" }, { "id": "6f1e90dd-49ea-4451-9e83-96fe99cc51b9", "slug": "it-is-something", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/barnaby-rudge/it-is-something", "text": "It is something to look upon enjoyment, so that it be free and wild and in the face of nature, though it is but the enjoyment of an idiot. It is something to know that Heaven has left the capacity of gladness in such a creature's breast; it is something to be assured that, however lightly men may crush that faculty in their fellows, the Great Creator of mankind imparts it even to his despised and slighted work. Who would not rather see a poor idiot happy in the sunlight, than a wise man pining in a darkened jail!", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Charles Dickens", "slug": "charles-dickens", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens" }, "book": { "title": "Barnaby Rudge", "slug": "barnaby-rudge", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/barnaby-rudge" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "happiness", "slug": "happiness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/happiness" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Barnaby_Rudge#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:58:37" }, { "id": "5e7e33a0-944c-40b3-a152-6e1553fc50de", "slug": "ye-men-of-gloom", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/barnaby-rudge/ye-men-of-gloom", "text": "Ye men of gloom and austerity, who paint the face of Infinite Benevolence with an eternal frown; read in the Everlasting Book, wide open to your view, the lesson it would teach. Its pictures are not in black and sombre hues, but bright and glowing tints; its music—save when ye drown it—is not in sighs and groans, but songs and cheerful sounds. Listen to the million voices in the summer air, and find one dismal as your own. Remember, if ye can, the sense of hope and pleasure which every glad return of day awakens in the breast of all your kind who have not changed their nature; and learn some wisdom even from the witless, when their hearts are lifted up they know not why, by all the mirth and happiness it brings.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Charles Dickens", "slug": "charles-dickens", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens" }, "book": { "title": "Barnaby Rudge", "slug": "barnaby-rudge", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/barnaby-rudge" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "hope", "slug": "hope", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/hope" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Barnaby_Rudge#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:58:37" }, { "id": "839a04cf-4ea0-4e66-b952-62f33dcce728", "slug": "the-very-highest", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/susan-cain/bittersweet/the-very-highest", "text": "The very highest states—of awe and joy, wonder and love, meaning and creativity—emerge from this bittersweet nature of reality. We experience them not because life is perfect—but because it's not.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Susan Cain", "slug": "susan-cain", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/susan-cain" }, "book": { "title": "Bittersweet", "slug": "bittersweet", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/susan-cain/bittersweet" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 92, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Susan_Cain#Bittersweet", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:58:32" }, { "id": "6e6d02b9-5eeb-4f5d-bce1-90bda90c133b", "slug": "he-had-walked", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lois-lowry/the-giver/he-had-walked", "text": "He had walked through woods, and sat at night beside a campfire. Although he had through the memories learned about the pain of loss and loneliness, now he gained, too, an understanding of solitude and its joy.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Lois Lowry", "slug": "lois-lowry", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lois-lowry" }, "book": { "title": "The Giver", "slug": "the-giver", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lois-lowry/the-giver" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 122, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "loneliness", "slug": "loneliness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/loneliness" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Giver#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:57:43" }, { "id": "4b3f76ee-53a6-4828-b8a7-b3735cf052e0", "slug": "every-day-i-see", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/mary-oliver/why-i-wake-early/every-day-i-see", "text": "Every day I see or hear something that more or less kills me with delight, that leaves me like a needle in the haystack of light.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Mary Oliver", "slug": "mary-oliver", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/mary-oliver" }, "book": { "title": "Why I Wake Early", "slug": "why-i-wake-early", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/mary-oliver/why-i-wake-early" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Mary_Oliver#Why_I_Wake_Early_(2004)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:57:19" }, { "id": "f907091c-8426-448b-8371-2c594ed0c4e8", "slug": "it-seems-like", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lucy-maud-montgomery/anne-of-green-gables/it-seems-like", "text": "\"It seems like disloyalty to Matthew, somehow, to find pleasure in these things now that he has gone,\" she said wistfully to Mrs. Allan one evening when they were together in the manse garden. \"I miss him so much—all the time—and yet, Mrs. Allan, the world and life seem very beautiful and interesting to me for all. Today Diana said something funny and I found myself laughing. I thought when it happened I could never laugh again. And it somehow seems as if I oughtn't to.\"", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Lucy Maud Montgomery", "slug": "lucy-maud-montgomery", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lucy-maud-montgomery" }, "book": { "title": "Anne of Green Gables", "slug": "anne-of-green-gables", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lucy-maud-montgomery/anne-of-green-gables" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "grief", "slug": "grief", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/grief" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Anne_of_Green_Gables#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:57:18" }, { "id": "971de326-3c2f-4f09-addc-e91f5b8b197a", "slug": "im-so-glad", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lucy-maud-montgomery/anne-of-green-gables/im-so-glad", "text": "\"I'm so glad I live in a world where there are Octobers. It would be terrible if we just skipped from September to November, wouldn't it? Look at these maple branches. Don't they give you a thrill—several thrills? I'm going to decorate my room with them.\"", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Lucy Maud Montgomery", "slug": "lucy-maud-montgomery", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lucy-maud-montgomery" }, "book": { "title": "Anne of Green Gables", "slug": "anne-of-green-gables", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lucy-maud-montgomery/anne-of-green-gables" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "nature", "slug": "nature", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/nature" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Anne_of_Green_Gables#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:57:18" }, { "id": "4b1f7a6a-44e5-49bc-8c64-964a8f087f6f", "slug": "what-a-splendid", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lucy-maud-montgomery/anne-of-green-gables/what-a-splendid", "text": "\"What a splendid day!\" said Anne, drawing a long breath. \"Isn't it good just to be alive on a day like this? I pity the people who aren't born yet for missing it. They may have good days, of course, but they can never have this one.\"", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Lucy Maud Montgomery", "slug": "lucy-maud-montgomery", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lucy-maud-montgomery" }, "book": { "title": "Anne of Green Gables", "slug": "anne-of-green-gables", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lucy-maud-montgomery/anne-of-green-gables" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Anne_of_Green_Gables#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:57:18" }, { "id": "a5f942ce-3ac6-42fa-9c0b-775bd442fdf2", "slug": "life-is-art", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ai-weiwei/ai-weiwei/life-is-art", "text": "Life is art. Art is life. I never separate it. I don’t feel that much anger. I equally have a lot of joy.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Ai Weiwei", "slug": "ai-weiwei", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ai-weiwei" }, "book": { "title": "Ai Weiwei", "slug": "ai-weiwei", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ai-weiwei/ai-weiwei" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "art", "slug": "art", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/art" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ai_Weiwei#Ai_Weiwei:_%E2%80%98Shame_on_Me.%E2%80%99,_2011", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:57:06" }, { "id": "d98029c8-d69f-4c9f-88fc-e9cde42a720a", "slug": "each-day-will", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/og-mandino/the-greatest-salesman-in-the-world/each-day-will", "text": "Each day will be triumphant only when your smiles bring forth smiles from others.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Og Mandino", "slug": "og-mandino", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/og-mandino" }, "book": { "title": "The Greatest Salesman in the World", "slug": "the-greatest-salesman-in-the-world", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/og-mandino/the-greatest-salesman-in-the-world" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 86, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "smiling", "slug": "smiling", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/smiling" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Og_Mandino#The_Greatest_Salesman_in_the_World_(1968)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:56:22" }, { "id": "e546548d-2aad-4d7b-8e35-ea9f10b3ee92", "slug": "if-i-fret", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lloyd-alexander/taran-wanderer/if-i-fret", "text": "If I fret over tomorrow, I'll have little joy today.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Lloyd Alexander", "slug": "lloyd-alexander", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lloyd-alexander" }, "book": { "title": "Taran Wanderer", "slug": "taran-wanderer", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/lloyd-alexander/taran-wanderer" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "the future", "slug": "the-future", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/the-future" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "the present", "slug": "the-present", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/the-present" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Lloyd_Alexander#Book_IV:_Taran_Wanderer_(1967)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:56:07" }, { "id": "6067895d-4d24-4e41-a2e6-a01ce77b47e2", "slug": "though-i-am-long", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ted-chiang/exhalation/though-i-am-long", "text": "Though I am long dead as you read this, explorer, I offer to you a valediction. Contemplate the marvel that is existence, and rejoice that you are able to do so. I feel I have the right to tell you this because, as I am inscribing these words, I am doing the same.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Ted Chiang", "slug": "ted-chiang", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ted-chiang" }, "book": { "title": "Exhalation", "slug": "exhalation", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ted-chiang/exhalation" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 57, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ted_Chiang#Exhalation:_Stories_(2019)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:55:58" }, { "id": "a1d76e57-a692-4f9c-a839-61c0cd25a08b", "slug": "im-dying-and", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/randy-pausch/the-last-lecture/im-dying-and", "text": "I'm dying and I'm having fun. And I'm going to keep having fun every day I have left. Because there's no other way to play.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Randy Pausch", "slug": "randy-pausch", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/randy-pausch" }, "book": { "title": "The Last Lecture", "slug": "the-last-lecture", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/randy-pausch/the-last-lecture" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "death", "slug": "death", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/death" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Randy_Pausch#The_Last_Lecture_(2007)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:55:46" }, { "id": "129de58f-f6e0-4a8d-af06-9db81713f19f", "slug": "and-i-think", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/randy-pausch/the-last-lecture/and-i-think", "text": "And I think that that’s one of the best things you can give somebody – the chance to show them what it feels like to make other people get excited and happy.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Randy Pausch", "slug": "randy-pausch", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/randy-pausch" }, "book": { "title": "The Last Lecture", "slug": "the-last-lecture", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/randy-pausch/the-last-lecture" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "kindness", "slug": "kindness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/kindness" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Randy_Pausch#The_Last_Lecture_(2007)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:55:46" }, { "id": "696ec552-308a-48bb-9a85-52ea92f0408f", "slug": "it-is-quite", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/anne-bronte/the-tenant-of-wildfell-hall/it-is-quite", "text": "It is quite possible to be a good Christian without ceasing to be a happy, merry-hearted man.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Anne Brontë", "slug": "anne-bronte", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/anne-bronte" }, "book": { "title": "The Tenant of Wildfell Hall", "slug": "the-tenant-of-wildfell-hall", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/anne-bronte/the-tenant-of-wildfell-hall" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "faith", "slug": "faith", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/faith" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Anne_Bront%C3%AB#The_Tenant_of_Wildfell_Hall_(1848)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:54:28" }, { "id": "e2562f0f-013a-46f6-8d85-5fb44a370ee8", "slug": "i-am-mad", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-gardner/grendel/i-am-mad", "text": "I am mad with joy.--At least I think it's joy.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "John Gardner", "slug": "john-gardner", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-gardner" }, "book": { "title": "Grendel", "slug": "grendel", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-gardner/grendel" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "humor", "slug": "humor", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/humor" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Grendel#Chapter_Eleven", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:54:23" }, { "id": "68443efc-216e-429d-8edf-ad0f0bae81a6", "slug": "only-by-living", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-clavell/shogun/only-by-living", "text": "Only by living at the edge of death can you understand the indescribable joy of life.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "James Clavell", "slug": "james-clavell", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-clavell" }, "book": { "title": "Shogun", "slug": "shogun", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-clavell/shogun" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "death", "slug": "death", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/death" }, { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Sh%C5%8Dgun_(novel)#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:53:58" }, { "id": "7a01620a-cde1-4d1b-b251-60974204667d", "slug": "it-is-a-fair", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/a-christmas-carol/it-is-a-fair", "text": "It is a fair, even-handed, noble adjustment of things, that while there is infection in disease and sorrow, there is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good-humor.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Charles Dickens", "slug": "charles-dickens", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens" }, "book": { "title": "A Christmas Carol", "slug": "a-christmas-carol", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/a-christmas-carol" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "laughter", "slug": "laughter", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/laughter" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/A_Christmas_Carol#Stave_3:_The_Second_of_the_Three_Spirits", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:53:45" }, { "id": "57d805be-1233-4c7c-98cf-42f98b01e32d", "slug": "merry-christmas-what", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/a-christmas-carol/merry-christmas-what", "text": "\"Merry Christmas! What right have you to be merry? What reason have you to be merry? You're poor enough.\" \"Come, then,\" returned the nephew gaily. \"What right have you to be dismal? What reason have you to be morose? You're rich enough.\"", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Charles Dickens", "slug": "charles-dickens", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens" }, "book": { "title": "A Christmas Carol", "slug": "a-christmas-carol", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/a-christmas-carol" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/A_Christmas_Carol#Stave_1:_Marley's_Ghost", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:53:44" }, { "id": "0c0904da-9b05-49e3-9e1d-6ef085e30e35", "slug": "any-man-may", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/martin-chuzzlewit/any-man-may", "text": "Any man may be in good spirits and good temper when he's well dressed. There an't much credit in that. If I was very ragged and very jolly, then I should begin to feel I had gained a point, Mr Pinch.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Charles Dickens", "slug": "charles-dickens", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens" }, "book": { "title": "Martin Chuzzlewit", "slug": "martin-chuzzlewit", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/martin-chuzzlewit" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "poverty", "slug": "poverty", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/poverty" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Martin_Chuzzlewit#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:53:43" }, { "id": "19b5a589-22e2-455d-8122-fdd0a977d35d", "slug": "the-pain-of-parting", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/nicholas-nickleby/the-pain-of-parting", "text": "The pain of parting is nothing to the joy of meeting again. Kate will be a beautiful woman, and I so proud to hear them say so, and mother so happy to be with us once again, and all these sad times forgotten.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Charles Dickens", "slug": "charles-dickens", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens" }, "book": { "title": "Nicholas Nickleby", "slug": "nicholas-nickleby", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/nicholas-nickleby" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "separation", "slug": "separation", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/separation" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Nicholas_Nickleby#Quotes", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:53:42" }, { "id": "42520792-ea63-4272-b763-4fe83031daef", "slug": "true-virtue-is-not", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/josemaria-escriva/the-way/true-virtue-is-not", "text": "True virtue is not sad or disagreeable, but pleasantly cheerful.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Josemaría Escrivá", "slug": "josemaria-escriva", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/josemaria-escriva" }, "book": { "title": "The Way", "slug": "the-way", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/josemaria-escriva/the-way" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "kindness", "slug": "kindness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/kindness" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Josemar%C3%ADa_Escriv%C3%A1#The_Way_(1950)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:52:08" }, { "id": "6dd53d33-16fa-402d-ae6b-d36a5dd466ab", "slug": "he-smiled-because", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/stephen-donaldson/the-power-that-preserves/he-smiled-because", "text": "He smiled because he was alive.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Stephen Donaldson", "slug": "stephen-donaldson", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/stephen-donaldson" }, "book": { "title": "The Power That Preserves", "slug": "the-power-that-preserves", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/stephen-donaldson/the-power-that-preserves" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 480, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Stephen_R._Donaldson#The_Power_that_Preserves_(1977)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:52:05" }, { "id": "e13c03e6-4ee1-4c4a-8fd7-257a6eb14f94", "slug": "waste-not-your", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/omar-khayyam/rubaiyat-of-omar-khayyam/waste-not-your", "text": "Waste not your Hour, nor in the vain pursuit Of This and That endeavour and dispute; Better be jocund with the fruitful Grape Than sadden after none, or bitter, Fruit.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Omar Khayyam", "slug": "omar-khayyam", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/omar-khayyam" }, "book": { "title": "Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam", "slug": "rubaiyat-of-omar-khayyam", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/omar-khayyam/rubaiyat-of-omar-khayyam" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "the present", "slug": "the-present", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/the-present" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Omar_Khayy%C3%A1m#FitzGerald,_Rub%C3%A1iy%C3%A1t_of_Omar_Khayy%C3%A1m_(1859,_'68,_'72,_'79,_'89)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:52:00" }, { "id": "9a901dc1-d6b6-41dc-84ff-7392ecbfb723", "slug": "christmas-time-that", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/sketches-by-boz/christmas-time-that", "text": "Christmas time! That man must be a misanthrope indeed, in whose breast something like a jovial feeling is not roused — in whose mind some pleasant associations are not awakened — by the recurrence of Christmas. There are people who will tell you that Christmas is not to them what it used to be; that each succeeding Christmas has found some cherished hope, or happy prospect, of the year before, dimmed or passed away; that the present only serves to remind them of reduced circumstances and straitened incomes — of the feasts they once bestowed on hollow friends, and of the cold looks that meet them now, in adversity and misfortune. Never heed such dismal reminiscences. There are few men who have lived long enough in the world, who cannot call up such thoughts any day in the year. Then do not select the merriest of the three hundred and sixty-five for your doleful recollections, but draw your chair nearer the blazing fire — fill the glass and send round the song — and if your room be smaller than it was a dozen years ago, or if your glass be filled with reeking punch, instead of sparkling wine, put a good face on the matter, and empty it off-hand, and fill another, and troll off the old ditty you used to sing, and thank God it’s no worse. Look on the merry faces of your children (if you have any) as they sit round the fire. One little seat may be empty; one slight form that gladdened the father’s heart, and roused the mother’s pride to look upon, may not be there. Dwell not upon the past; think not that one short year ago, the fair child now resolving into dust, sat before you, with the bloom of health upon its cheek, and the gaiety of infancy in its joyous eye. Reflect upon your present blessings — of which every man has many — not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some. Fill your glass again, with a merry face and contented heart. Our life on it, but your Christmas shall be merry, and your new year a happy one!", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Charles Dickens", "slug": "charles-dickens", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens" }, "book": { "title": "Sketches by Boz", "slug": "sketches-by-boz", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dickens/sketches-by-boz" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "gratitude", "slug": "gratitude", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/gratitude" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Charles_Dickens#Sketches_by_Boz_(1836-1837)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:51:40" }, { "id": "b8f7a602-f7eb-47e7-b8e1-3a7761913ece", "slug": "to-own-a-bit", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dudley-warner/my-summer-in-a-garden/to-own-a-bit", "text": "To own a bit of ground, to scratch it with a hoe, to plant seeds and watch, their renewal of life, this is the commonest delight of the race, the most satisfactory thing a man can do.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Charles Dudley Warner", "slug": "charles-dudley-warner", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dudley-warner" }, "book": { "title": "My Summer in a Garden", "slug": "my-summer-in-a-garden", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/charles-dudley-warner/my-summer-in-a-garden" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "garden", "slug": "garden", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/garden" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Charles_Dudley_Warner#My_Summer_in_a_Garden_(1870)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:51:35" }, { "id": "fa1ea47a-8d60-4483-8350-99c1dab52ef5", "slug": "as-you-cannot", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-allen/as-a-man-thinketh/as-you-cannot", "text": "As you cannot have a sweet and wholesome abode unless you admit the air and sunshine freely into your rooms, so a strong body and a bright, happy, or serene countenance can only result from the free admittance into the mind of thoughts of joy and good will and serenity.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "James Allen", "slug": "james-allen", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-allen" }, "book": { "title": "As a Man Thinketh", "slug": "as-a-man-thinketh", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-allen/as-a-man-thinketh" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "peace of mind", "slug": "peace-of-mind", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/peace-of-mind" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "health", "slug": "health", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/health" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/James_Allen#Effect_of_Thought_on_Health_and_the_Body", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:51:08" }, { "id": "07e1f724-813e-4b75-91e7-53ec2abe649a", "slug": "it-is-because", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/amy-tan/the-joy-luck-club/it-is-because", "text": "It is because I had so much joy that I came to have so much hate.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Amy Tan", "slug": "amy-tan", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/amy-tan" }, "book": { "title": "The Joy Luck Club", "slug": "the-joy-luck-club", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/amy-tan/the-joy-luck-club" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "hatred", "slug": "hatred", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/hatred" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Amy_Tan#The_Joy_Luck_Club_(1989)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:51:03" }, { "id": "04bf73c0-489a-46ff-9939-92d9fa322b2f", "slug": "it-will-be-a-great", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-baldwin/the-fire-next-time/it-will-be-a-great", "text": "It will be a great day for America, incidentally, when we begin to eat bread again, instead of the blasphemous and tasteless foam rubber that we have substituted for it. And I am not being frivolous here, either. Something very sinister happens to the people of a country when they begin to distrust their own reactions as deeply as they do here, and become as joyless as they have become.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "James Baldwin", "slug": "james-baldwin", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-baldwin" }, "book": { "title": "The Fire Next Time", "slug": "the-fire-next-time", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/james-baldwin/the-fire-next-time" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "America", "slug": "america", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/america" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/James_Baldwin#The_Fire_Next_Time_(1963)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:50:59" }, { "id": "9fd565cd-4887-431d-a087-ec05642c3438", "slug": "for-the-first", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/paulo-coelho/manuscript-found-in-accra/for-the-first", "text": "For the first time, I will smile without feeling guilty, because joy is not a sin... For the first time, I will avoid anything that makes me suffer, because suffering is not a virtue.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Paulo Coelho", "slug": "paulo-coelho", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/paulo-coelho" }, "book": { "title": "Manuscript Found in Accra", "slug": "manuscript-found-in-accra", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/paulo-coelho/manuscript-found-in-accra" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "suffering", "slug": "suffering", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/suffering" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Paulo_Coelho#Manuscript_Found_in_Accra_(2012)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:49:35" }, { "id": "819ffe38-7263-4b4b-88a9-e3e4f4547946", "slug": "joy-that-is-one", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/paulo-coelho/manuscript-found-in-accra/joy-that-is-one", "text": "Joy. That is one of the main blessings of the All-Powerful. If we are happy, we are on the right road.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Paulo Coelho", "slug": "paulo-coelho", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/paulo-coelho" }, "book": { "title": "Manuscript Found in Accra", "slug": "manuscript-found-in-accra", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/paulo-coelho/manuscript-found-in-accra" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Paulo_Coelho#Manuscript_Found_in_Accra_(2012)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:49:35" }, { "id": "d96a186b-ad00-4496-b145-83c88d80fa7e", "slug": "there-come-moments", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-buchan/salute-to-adventurers/there-come-moments", "text": "There come moments to every man when he is thankful to be alive, and every breath drawn is a delight; so at that hour I praised my Maker for His good earth, and for sparing me to rejoice in it.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "John Buchan", "slug": "john-buchan", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-buchan" }, "book": { "title": "Salute to Adventurers", "slug": "salute-to-adventurers", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-buchan/salute-to-adventurers" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "gratitude", "slug": "gratitude", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/gratitude" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Buchan#Salute_to_Adventurers_(1915)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:49:21" }, { "id": "ba8822f2-e48a-4fef-ae28-c9f7b8f3f0ec", "slug": "we-do-ourselves", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/nathaniel-hawthorne/the-marble-faun/we-do-ourselves", "text": "We do ourselves wrong, and too meanly estimate the Holiness above us, when we deem that any act or enjoyment, good in itself, is not good to do religiously.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Nathaniel Hawthorne", "slug": "nathaniel-hawthorne", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/nathaniel-hawthorne" }, "book": { "title": "The Marble Faun", "slug": "the-marble-faun", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/nathaniel-hawthorne/the-marble-faun" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "religion", "slug": "religion", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/religion" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Nathaniel_Hawthorne#The_Marble_Faun_(1860)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:49:08" }, { "id": "2453c93c-9ecf-4306-841d-16e5811e5021", "slug": "as-it-is-so-strangely", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/nikolai-gogol/dead-souls/as-it-is-so-strangely", "text": "As it is so strangely ordained in this world, what is amusing will turn into being gloomy, if you stand too long before it, and then God knows what ideas may not stray into the mind... Why is it that even in moments of unthinking, careless gaiety a different and strange mood comes upon one?", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Nikolai Gogol", "slug": "nikolai-gogol", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/nikolai-gogol" }, "book": { "title": "Dead Souls", "slug": "dead-souls", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/nikolai-gogol/dead-souls" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "sadness", "slug": "sadness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/sadness" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Nikolai_Gogol#Dead_Souls_(1842)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:47:37" }, { "id": "debeb9f7-b999-4473-a37d-31218fe1e35f", "slug": "a-great-thirst", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/edward-abbey/desert-solitaire/a-great-thirst", "text": "A great thirst is a great joy when quenched in time.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Edward Abbey", "slug": "edward-abbey", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/edward-abbey" }, "book": { "title": "Desert Solitaire", "slug": "desert-solitaire", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/edward-abbey/desert-solitaire" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 104, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Edward_Abbey#Desert_Solitaire_(1968)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:47:30" }, { "id": "768bbcb9-a050-4fce-b1a2-f540801a6601", "slug": "has-joy-any", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/edward-abbey/desert-solitaire/has-joy-any", "text": "Has joy any survival value in the operations of evolution? I suspect that it does; I suspect that the morose and fearful are doomed to quick extinction. Where there is no joy there can be no courage; and without courage all other virtues are useless.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Edward Abbey", "slug": "edward-abbey", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/edward-abbey" }, "book": { "title": "Desert Solitaire", "slug": "desert-solitaire", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/edward-abbey/desert-solitaire" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 113, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "courage", "slug": "courage", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/courage" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Edward_Abbey#Desert_Solitaire_(1968)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:47:30" }, { "id": "ce8a8719-bf85-4a64-85a3-783cb46c2b85", "slug": "but-you-see", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ayn-rand/the-fountainhead/but-you-see", "text": "\"But you see, I have, let's say, sixty years to live. Most of that time will be spent working. I've chosen the work I want to do. If I find no joy in it, then I'm only condemning myself to sixty years of torture. And I can find the joy only if I do my work in the best way possible to me. But the best is a matter of standards—and I set my own standards. I inherit nothing. I stand at the end of no tradition. I may, perhaps, stand at the beginning of one.\"", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Ayn Rand", "slug": "ayn-rand", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ayn-rand" }, "book": { "title": "The Fountainhead", "slug": "the-fountainhead", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ayn-rand/the-fountainhead" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 24, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "work", "slug": "work", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/work" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Fountainhead#Part_I_(_Peter_Keating_)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:47:08" }, { "id": "59e01dc6-e425-471b-a6c5-6a2647afeb0d", "slug": "as-we-did", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ursula-k-le-guin/the-winds-twelve-quarters/as-we-did", "text": "As we did without clergy, let us do without soldiers. The joy built upon successful slaughter is not the right kind of joy; it will not do; it is fearful and it is trivial. A boundless and generous contentment, a magnanimous triumph felt not against some outer enemy but in communion with the finest and fairest in the souls of all men everywhere and the splendor of the world’s summer: this is what swells the hearts of the people of Omelas, and the victory they celebrate is that of life.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Ursula K. Le Guin", "slug": "ursula-k-le-guin", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ursula-k-le-guin" }, "book": { "title": "The Wind’s Twelve Quarters", "slug": "the-winds-twelve-quarters", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ursula-k-le-guin/the-winds-twelve-quarters" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 255, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "peace", "slug": "peace", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/peace" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ursula_K._Le_Guin#The_Wind%E2%80%99s_Twelve_Quarters_(1975)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:46:50" }, { "id": "9e751399-f128-40cc-96f6-2da791f9c54e", "slug": "im-youth-im-joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jm-barrie/peter-pan/im-youth-im-joy", "text": "I'm youth, I'm joy, I'm a little bird that has broken out of the egg.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "J.M. Barrie", "slug": "jm-barrie", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jm-barrie" }, "book": { "title": "Peter Pan", "slug": "peter-pan", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jm-barrie/peter-pan" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "youth", "slug": "youth", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/youth" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/J._M._Barrie#Peter_Pan_(1904)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:46:49" }, { "id": "3882411a-4288-4adc-90f1-303d78f19002", "slug": "there-is-no-necessity", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ayn-rand/atlas-shrugged/there-is-no-necessity", "text": "There is no necessity for pain—why, then, is the worst pain reserved for those who will not accept its necessity?—we who hold the love and the secret of joy, to what punishment have we been sentenced for it, and by whom?", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Ayn Rand", "slug": "ayn-rand", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ayn-rand" }, "book": { "title": "Atlas Shrugged", "slug": "atlas-shrugged", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ayn-rand/atlas-shrugged" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 67, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "suffering", "slug": "suffering", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/suffering" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Atlas_Shrugged#Chapter_Four:_The_Immovable_Movers", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:45:50" }, { "id": "bcd59322-f7e5-4251-9ab3-49e8932b783b", "slug": "sometimes-a-kind", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-steinbeck/east-of-eden/sometimes-a-kind", "text": "Sometimes a kind of glory lights up the mind of a man. It happens to nearly everyone. You can feel it growing or preparing like a fuse burning toward dynamite. It is a feeling in the stomach, a delight of the nerves, of the forearms. The skin tastes the air, and every deep-drawn breath is sweet. Its beginning has the pleasure of a great stretching yawn; it flashes in the brain and the whole world glows outside your eyes. A man may have lived all his life in the gray, and the land and trees of him dark and somber. The events, even the important ones, may have trooped by faceless and pale. And then — the glory — so that a cricket song sweetens the ears, the smell of the earth rises chanting to his nose, and dappling light under a tree blesses his eyes. Then a man pours outward, a torrent of him, and yet he is not diminished…", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "John Steinbeck", "slug": "john-steinbeck", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-steinbeck" }, "book": { "title": "East of Eden", "slug": "east-of-eden", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-steinbeck/east-of-eden" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/John_Steinbeck#East_of_Eden_(1952)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:44:59" }, { "id": "e4824449-58ac-464b-b16a-c2f78f6ecc65", "slug": "compulsion-is-not", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rabindranath-tagore/sadhana/compulsion-is-not", "text": "Compulsion is not indeed the final appeal to man, but joy is. And joy is everywhere; it is in the earth's green covering of grass; in the blue serenity of the sky; in the reckless exuberance of spring; in the severe abstinence of grey winter; in the living flesh that animates our bodily frame; in the perfect poise of the human figure, noble and upright; in living; in the exercise of all our powers; in the acquisition of knowledge; in fighting evils; in dying for gains we never can share. Joy is there everywhere; it is superfluous, unnecessary; nay, it very often contradicts the most peremptory behests of necessity. It exists to show that the bonds of law can only be explained by love; they are like body and soul. Joy is the realisation of the truth of oneness, the oneness of our soul with the world and of the world-soul with the supreme lover.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Rabindranath Tagore", "slug": "rabindranath-tagore", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rabindranath-tagore" }, "book": { "title": "Sadhana", "slug": "sadhana", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rabindranath-tagore/sadhana" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Rabindranath_Tagore#S%C4%81dhan%C4%81_:_The_Realisation_of_Life_(1916)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:44:32" }, { "id": "a5fd98c5-2cb1-40bb-945e-56cc35945a44", "slug": "no-it-is-in-the", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robertson-davies/the-cornish-trilogy/no-it-is-in-the", "text": "\"No, it is in the story. I saw it in New York. The kings say, We bring you Gold, Frank Innocence, and Mirth.\" \"Sancta simplicitas,\" said Darcourt. \"If only there were more Mirth in the message He has left to us. We miss it sadly, in the world we have made.\"", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Robertson Davies", "slug": "robertson-davies", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robertson-davies" }, "book": { "title": "The Cornish Trilogy", "slug": "the-cornish-trilogy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robertson-davies/the-cornish-trilogy" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "religion", "slug": "religion", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/religion" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Cornish_Trilogy#The_Rebel_Angels", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:44:16" }, { "id": "cde7cfbe-3658-4baf-9679-5241e5a805ab", "slug": "i-am-full", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robertson-davies/the-salterton-trilogy/i-am-full", "text": "\"I am full of holy joy and free booze,\" said Cobbler. \"I feel moved to sing. It is very wrong to resist an impulse to sing; to hold back a natural evacuation of joy is as injurious as to hold back any other natural issue. It makes a man spiritually costive, and plugs him up with hard, caked, thwarted merriment. This, in the course of time, poisons his whole system and is likely to turn him into that most detestable of beings, a Dry Wit. God grant that I may never be a Dry Wit. Let me ever be a Wet Wit! Let me pour forth what mirth I have until I am utterly empty -- a Nit Wit.\"", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Robertson Davies", "slug": "robertson-davies", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robertson-davies" }, "book": { "title": "The Salterton Trilogy", "slug": "the-salterton-trilogy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/robertson-davies/the-salterton-trilogy" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "humor", "slug": "humor", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/humor" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Salterton_Trilogy#Tempest-Tost", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:44:14" }, { "id": "6e85a26d-2420-43b1-a3bb-aadcec2f309e", "slug": "as-the-caterpillar", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/orson-scott-card/seventh-son/as-the-caterpillar", "text": "As the caterpillar chooses the fairest leaves to her eggs on, so the priest lays his curse on the fairest joys.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Orson Scott Card", "slug": "orson-scott-card", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/orson-scott-card" }, "book": { "title": "Seventh Son", "slug": "seventh-son", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/orson-scott-card/seventh-son" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "religion", "slug": "religion", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/religion" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Orson_Scott_Card#Seventh_Son_(1987)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:42:11" }, { "id": "81ee25dd-e4dc-40b4-8df3-74cbc8244e7b", "slug": "he-had-never", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/willa-cather/the-professors-house/he-had-never", "text": "He had never learned to live without delight. And he would have to learn to, just as, in a Prohibition country, he supposed he would have to learn to live without sherry. Theoretically he knew that life is possible, maybe even pleasant, without joy, without passionate griefs. But it had never occurred to him that he might have to live like that.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Willa Cather", "slug": "willa-cather", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/willa-cather" }, "book": { "title": "The Professor's House", "slug": "the-professors-house", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/willa-cather/the-professors-house" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "old age", "slug": "old-age", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/old-age" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Willa_Cather#The_Professor's_House_(1925)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:42:03" }, { "id": "98f74459-6c54-4558-8c31-86b69491a7fe", "slug": "all-feelings-that", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rainer-maria-rilke/letters-to-a-young-poet/all-feelings-that", "text": "All feelings that concentrate you and lift you up are pure; only that feeling is impure which grasps just one side of your being and thus distorts you. Everything you can think of as you face your childhood, is good. Everything that makes more of you than you have ever been, even in your best hours, is right. Every intensification is good, if it is in your entire blood, if it isn't intoxication or muddiness, but joy which you can see into, clear to the bottom.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Rainer Maria Rilke", "slug": "rainer-maria-rilke", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rainer-maria-rilke" }, "book": { "title": "Letters to a Young Poet", "slug": "letters-to-a-young-poet", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/rainer-maria-rilke/letters-to-a-young-poet" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "emotions", "slug": "emotions", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/emotions" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Rainer_Maria_Rilke#Letters_to_a_Young_Poet_(1934)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:41:55" }, { "id": "118e3e86-d863-4da1-84bf-fb2db1a9ff89", "slug": "it-is-not", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ayn-rand/anthem/it-is-not", "text": "It is not good to feel too much joy, nor to be glad that our body lives. For we matter not and it must not matter to us whether we live or die, which is to be as our brothers will it. But we, Equality 7-2521, are glad to be living. If this is a vice, then we wish no virtue.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Ayn Rand", "slug": "ayn-rand", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ayn-rand" }, "book": { "title": "Anthem", "slug": "anthem", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/ayn-rand/anthem" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "individualism", "slug": "individualism", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/individualism" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ayn_Rand#Anthem_(1937)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:41:51" }, { "id": "4935a22d-e210-4fcd-8cac-78d19d3bef1a", "slug": "ah-life-is-a-gate", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jack-kerouac/big-sur/ah-life-is-a-gate", "text": "Ah, life is a gate, a way, a path to Paradise anyway, why not live for fun and joy and love or some sort of girl by a fireside, why not go to your desire and LAUGH...", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Jack Kerouac", "slug": "jack-kerouac", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jack-kerouac" }, "book": { "title": "Big Sur", "slug": "big-sur", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jack-kerouac/big-sur" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Jack_Kerouac#Big_Sur_(1962)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:41:32" }, { "id": "92b7aadc-7a9c-4e9a-b692-71dff3191cb6", "slug": "every-now-and", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jack-kerouac/on-the-road/every-now-and", "text": "Every now and then a clear harmonic cry gave new suggestions of a tune that would someday be the only tune in the world and would raise men's souls to joy.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Jack Kerouac", "slug": "jack-kerouac", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jack-kerouac" }, "book": { "title": "On the Road", "slug": "on-the-road", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jack-kerouac/on-the-road" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "music", "slug": "music", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/music" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/On_the_Road#Part_three", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:41:30" }, { "id": "4e7dcd0c-0c1a-405d-9c75-7d7a51515267", "slug": "why-think-about", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jack-kerouac/on-the-road/why-think-about", "text": "Why think about that when all the golden land's ahead of you and all kinds of unforeseen events wait lurking to surprise you and make you glad you're alive to see?", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Jack Kerouac", "slug": "jack-kerouac", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jack-kerouac" }, "book": { "title": "On the Road", "slug": "on-the-road", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jack-kerouac/on-the-road" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "the future", "slug": "the-future", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/the-future" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/On_the_Road#Part_two", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:41:30" }, { "id": "c283f49b-29f8-48bc-8e37-7c9e7e4ded11", "slug": "the-greater-part", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/alan-w-watts/the-wisdom-of-insecurity/the-greater-part", "text": "The greater part of human activity is designed to make permanent those experiences and joys which are only lovable because they are changing.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Alan W. Watts", "slug": "alan-w-watts", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/alan-w-watts" }, "book": { "title": "The Wisdom of Insecurity", "slug": "the-wisdom-of-insecurity", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/alan-w-watts/the-wisdom-of-insecurity" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 32, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "change", "slug": "change", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/change" }, { "name": "transience", "slug": "transience", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/transience" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Alan_Watts#The_Wisdom_of_Insecurity_(1951)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:41:11" }, { "id": "433e75e9-0b88-428d-a773-cd1a436b8c56", "slug": "you-know-its", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/frank-herbert/god-emperor-of-dune/you-know-its", "text": "\"You know it's love when you want to give joy and damn the consequences.\"", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Frank Herbert", "slug": "frank-herbert", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/frank-herbert" }, "book": { "title": "God Emperor of Dune", "slug": "god-emperor-of-dune", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/frank-herbert/god-emperor-of-dune" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "love", "slug": "love", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/love" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Dune#God_Emperor_of_Dune_(1981)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:40:53" }, { "id": "01713114-6e09-4ff8-bf81-dad2104a82ad", "slug": "much-that-was", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/frank-herbert/dune/much-that-was", "text": "Much that was called religion has carried an unconscious attitude of hostility toward life. True religion must teach that life is filled with joys pleasing to the eye of God, that knowledge without action is empty. All men must see that the teaching of religion by rules and rote is largely a hoax. The proper teaching is recognized with ease. You can know it without fail because it awakens within you that sensation which tells you this is something you've always known.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Frank Herbert", "slug": "frank-herbert", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/frank-herbert" }, "book": { "title": "Dune", "slug": "dune", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/frank-herbert/dune" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "religion", "slug": "religion", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/religion" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Dune#Appendices", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:40:49" }, { "id": "17f5294f-2c10-4fb6-8ffe-b067573284df", "slug": "amid-the-tornadoed", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/herman-melville/moby-dick/amid-the-tornadoed", "text": "Amid the tornadoed Atlantic of my being, do I myself still for ever centrally disport in mute calm; and while ponderous planets of unwaning woe revolve round me, deep down and deep inland there I still bathe me in eternal mildness of joy.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Herman Melville", "slug": "herman-melville", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/herman-melville" }, "book": { "title": "Moby-Dick", "slug": "moby-dick", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/herman-melville/moby-dick" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 433, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "suffering", "slug": "suffering", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/suffering" }, { "name": "peace of mind", "slug": "peace-of-mind", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/peace-of-mind" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Moby-Dick#The_Grand_Armada_(87)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:40:41" }, { "id": "5da1aebf-2007-425b-8367-9494fc8a5ad6", "slug": "but-oh-shipmates", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/herman-melville/moby-dick/but-oh-shipmates", "text": "But oh! shipmates! on the starboard hand of every woe, there is a sure delight; and higher the top of that delight, than the bottom of the woe is deep. Is not the main-truck higher than the kelson is low? Delight is to him—a far, far upward, and inward delight—who against the proud gods and commodores of this earth, ever stands forth his own inexorable self.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Herman Melville", "slug": "herman-melville", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/herman-melville" }, "book": { "title": "Moby-Dick", "slug": "moby-dick", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/herman-melville/moby-dick" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": 53, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "independence", "slug": "independence", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/independence" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Moby-Dick#The_Sermon_(9)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:40:40" }, { "id": "92eb71b8-86a5-4659-9592-ba1d95333a19", "slug": "among-the-tales", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/j-r-r-tolkien/the-silmarillion/among-the-tales", "text": "Among the tales of sorrow and of ruin that come down to us from the darkness of those days there are yet some in which amid weeping there is joy and under the shadow of death light that endures. And of these histories most fair still in the ears of the Elves is the tale of Beren and Lúthien.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "J. R. R. Tolkien", "slug": "j-r-r-tolkien", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/j-r-r-tolkien" }, "book": { "title": "The Silmarillion", "slug": "the-silmarillion", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/j-r-r-tolkien/the-silmarillion" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "sadness", "slug": "sadness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/sadness" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Silmarillion#Quenta_Silmarillion", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:40:36" }, { "id": "72ebb411-e63e-4a9c-90fd-3ba4098a486a", "slug": "its-the-great", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/fyodor-dostoyevsky/the-brothers-karamazov/its-the-great", "text": "It's the great mystery of human life that old grief passes gradually into quiet tender joy.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Fyodor Dostoyevsky", "slug": "fyodor-dostoyevsky", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/fyodor-dostoyevsky" }, "book": { "title": "The Brothers Karamazov", "slug": "the-brothers-karamazov", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/fyodor-dostoyevsky/the-brothers-karamazov" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "grief", "slug": "grief", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/grief" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Fyodor_Dostoyevsky#The_Brothers_Karamazov_(1879%E2%80%931880)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:40:24" }, { "id": "02c4ac6a-014a-4b09-b886-6cf4d000aab1", "slug": "there-is-more", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/j-r-r-tolkien/the-hobbit/there-is-more", "text": "\"There is more in you of good than you know, child of the kindly West. Some courage and some wisdom, blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world. But sad or merry, I must leave it now. Farewell!\"", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "J. R. R. Tolkien", "slug": "j-r-r-tolkien", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/j-r-r-tolkien" }, "book": { "title": "The Hobbit", "slug": "the-hobbit", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/j-r-r-tolkien/the-hobbit" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "greed", "slug": "greed", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/greed" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/The_Hobbit#Chapter_XVIII:_The_Return_Journey", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:40:19" }, { "id": "b77072eb-0db4-4bd9-8be8-85a793cc7c85", "slug": "all-animals-except", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/samuel-butler/the-way-of-all-flesh/all-animals-except", "text": "All animals, except man, know that the principal business of life is to enjoy it.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Samuel Butler", "slug": "samuel-butler", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/samuel-butler" }, "book": { "title": "The Way of All Flesh", "slug": "the-way-of-all-flesh", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/samuel-butler/the-way-of-all-flesh" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "animals", "slug": "animals", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/animals" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Samuel_Butler_(novelist)#The_Way_of_All_Flesh_(1903)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:39:54" }, { "id": "8fbc2f5c-41eb-4af2-9f39-951af4f56678", "slug": "it-is-in-these", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/george-eliot/middlemarch/it-is-in-these", "text": "It is in these acts called trivialities that the seeds of joy are forever wasted, until men and women look round with haggard faces at the devastation their own waste has made, and say, the earth bears no harvest of sweetness—calling their denial knowledge.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "George Eliot", "slug": "george-eliot", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/george-eliot" }, "book": { "title": "Middlemarch", "slug": "middlemarch", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/george-eliot/middlemarch" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/George_Eliot#Middlemarch_(1871-72)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:39:52" }, { "id": "efc7215f-7e9e-4cdd-ba19-09c194daaef8", "slug": "in-relation-to-any", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/emil-cioran/the-trouble-with-being-born/in-relation-to-any", "text": "In relation to any act of life, the mind acts as a killjoy.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Emil Cioran", "slug": "emil-cioran", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/emil-cioran" }, "book": { "title": "The Trouble With Being Born", "slug": "the-trouble-with-being-born", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/emil-cioran/the-trouble-with-being-born" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "life", "slug": "life", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life" }, { "name": "thinking", "slug": "thinking", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/thinking" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Emil_Cioran#The_Trouble_With_Being_Born_(1973)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:39:42" }, { "id": "e0c2456c-d0ad-41d9-955e-d59313e434b2", "slug": "i-pride-myself", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/emil-cioran/the-trouble-with-being-born/i-pride-myself", "text": "I pride myself on my capacity to perceive the transitory character of everything. An odd gift which has spoiled all my joys; better: all my sensations.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Emil Cioran", "slug": "emil-cioran", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/emil-cioran" }, "book": { "title": "The Trouble With Being Born", "slug": "the-trouble-with-being-born", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/emil-cioran/the-trouble-with-being-born" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "transience", "slug": "transience", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/transience" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" }, { "name": "pessimism", "slug": "pessimism", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/pessimism" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Emil_Cioran#The_Trouble_With_Being_Born_(1973)", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:39:42" }, { "id": "e20b5466-2446-44a5-acc0-0613255cec4c", "slug": "so-we-do-not", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau/emile-or-on-education/so-we-do-not", "text": "So we do not travel like couriers but like explorers. We do not merely consider the beginning and the end, but the space between. The journey itself is a delight. We do not travel sitting, dismally imprisoned, so to speak, in a tightly closed cage. We do not travel with the ease and comfort of ladies. We do not deprive ourselves of the fresh air, nor the sight of the things about us, nor the opportunity of examining them at our pleasure. Emile will never enter a post-chaise, nor will he ride post unless in a great hurry. But what cause has Emile for haste? None but the joy of life. Shall I add to this the desire to do good when he can? No, for that is itself one of the joys of life.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Jean Jacques Rousseau", "slug": "jean-jacques-rousseau", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau" }, "book": { "title": "Emile; or On Education", "slug": "emile-or-on-education", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau/emile-or-on-education" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "travel", "slug": "travel", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/travel" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Emile,_or_On_Education#Book_V", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:39:38" }, { "id": "97dd30c5-5e38-4b7c-bf96-abca216ebce3", "slug": "what-varied-pleasures", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau/emile-or-on-education/what-varied-pleasures", "text": "What varied pleasures we enjoy in this delightful way of travelling, not to speak of increasing health and a cheerful spirit. I notice that those who ride in nice, well-padded carriages are always wrapped in thought, gloomy, fault-finding, or sick; while those who go on foot are always merry, light-hearted, and delighted with everything. How cheerful we are when we get near our lodging for the night! How savoury is the coarse food! How we linger at table enjoying our rest! How soundly we sleep on a hard bed! If you only want to get to a place you may ride in a post-chaise; if you want to travel you must go on foot.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Jean Jacques Rousseau", "slug": "jean-jacques-rousseau", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau" }, "book": { "title": "Emile; or On Education", "slug": "emile-or-on-education", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau/emile-or-on-education" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "travel", "slug": "travel", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/travel" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Emile,_or_On_Education#Book_V", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:39:38" }, { "id": "96fe44ad-d3b5-44e0-9c4c-14f980cdd369", "slug": "take-from-our", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau/emile-or-on-education/take-from-our", "text": "Take from our hearts this love of what is noble and you rob us of the joy of life. The mean-spirited man in whom these delicious feelings have been stifled among vile passions, who by thinking of no one but himself comes at last to love no one but himself, this man feels no raptures, his cold heart no longer throbs with joy, and his eyes no longer fill with the sweet tears of sympathy, he delights in nothing; the wretch has neither life nor feeling, he is already dead.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Jean Jacques Rousseau", "slug": "jean-jacques-rousseau", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau" }, "book": { "title": "Emile; or On Education", "slug": "emile-or-on-education", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau/emile-or-on-education" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "selfishness", "slug": "selfishness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/selfishness" }, { "name": "empathy", "slug": "empathy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/empathy" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Emile,_or_On_Education#Book_IV", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:39:35" }, { "id": "92d13542-58cd-48e5-b258-8ca982c99f23", "slug": "is-there-anything", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau/emile-or-on-education/is-there-anything", "text": "Is there anything better worth seeing, anything more touching or more delightful, than a pretty child, with merry, cheerful glance, easy contented manner, open smiling countenance, playing at the most important things, or working at the lightest amusements?", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Jean Jacques Rousseau", "slug": "jean-jacques-rousseau", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau" }, "book": { "title": "Emile; or On Education", "slug": "emile-or-on-education", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau/emile-or-on-education" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "children", "slug": "children", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/children" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Emile,_or_On_Education#Book_II", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:39:33" }, { "id": "59851b9a-c592-4bc9-bd41-51f4db3ec562", "slug": "men-be-kind", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau/emile-or-on-education/men-be-kind", "text": "Men, be kind to your fellow-men; this is your first duty, kind to every age and station, kind to all that is not foreign to humanity. What wisdom can you find that is greater than kindness? Love childhood, indulge its sports, its pleasures, its delightful instincts. Who has not sometimes regretted that age when laughter was ever on the lips, and when the heart was ever at peace? Why rob these innocents of the joys which pass so quickly, of that precious gift which they cannot abuse? Why fill with bitterness the fleeting days of early childhood, days which will no more return for them than for you? Fathers, can you tell when death will call your children to him? Do not lay up sorrow for yourselves by robbing them of the short span which nature has allotted to them. As soon as they are aware of the joy of life, let them rejoice in it, go that whenever God calls them they may not die without having tasted the joy of life.", "language": "en", "author": { "name": "Jean Jacques Rousseau", "slug": "jean-jacques-rousseau", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau" }, "book": { "title": "Emile; or On Education", "slug": "emile-or-on-education", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/jean-jacques-rousseau/emile-or-on-education" }, "character": null, "chapter": null, "chapter_parent": null, "page": null, "verified": false, "original": null, "other_languages": [], "topics": [ { "name": "kindness", "slug": "kindness", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/kindness" }, { "name": "childhood", "slug": "childhood", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/childhood" }, { "name": "joy", "slug": "joy", "url": "https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/joy" } ], "source": { "name": "Wikiquote", "url": "https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Emile,_or_On_Education#Book_II", "license": { "label": "CC BY-SA 4.0", "url": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/" } }, "added_at": "2026-09-25T22:39:31" } ] }