Joy

Joy came always after pain.
~ Guillaume Apollinaire (Wilhelm-Apollinaris de Kostrowitzky), Le Pont Mirabeau (1912)

There is one joy of reading, another of painting, and another of writing, but none to compare with the thrill which comes to one who, loving Nature in all her moods, is about to start on a voyage of discovery to a land familiar in dreams alone.
~ Charles William ("Will") Beebe, Two Bird Lovers in Mexico (1905).

The supreme joy of learning, of discovering, of adding our tiny facts to the foundation of the everlasting why of the universe; all this makes life for us -- Milady and me -- one never-ending delight.
~ Charles William ("Will") Beebe, Our Search For a Wilderness (1910).

And I wrote my happy songs
Every child may joy to hear.
~ William Blake, Songs of Innocence (1789). Introduction

As the caterpillar chooses the fairest leaves to lay her eggs on, so the priest lays his curse on the fairest joys.
~ William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790-93). Proverbs of Hell

Come live, and be merry, and join with me,
To sing the sweet chorus of 'Ha ha he!'
~ William Blake, from Songs of Innocence (1789). Laughing Song

Energy is eternal delight!
~ William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790-93). The Voice of the Devil

He who bends to himself a Joy
Doth the wingèd life destroy;
But he who kisses the Joy as it flies
Lives in Eternity's sunrise.
~ William Blake, Gnomic Verses. xvii: Several Questions Answered. 1. Eternity

"Pipe a song about a Lamb!"
So I piped with merry cheer.
~ William Blake, from Songs of Innocence (1789). Introduction

Pretty joy! . . .
Sweet joy I call thee:
Thou dost smile,
I sing the while,
Sweet joy befall thee!
~ William Blake, Songs of Experience (1794). Infant Joy

The soul of sweet delight, can never be defil'd.
~ William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790-93). Proverbs of Hell

The more you learn what to do with yourself, and the more you do for others, the more you will enjoy the abundant life.
~ William J.H. Boetcker

Think -- since this life is but a span,
Of joys that have no end.
~ William Lisle Bowles, from The Little Villager's Verse Book (1826). Child and Blind Grandfather

I am glad daylong for the gift of song,
For time and change and sorrow;
For the sunset wings and the world-end things
Which hang on the edge of tomorrow.
~ William Stanley Braithwaite, from Lyrics of Life and Love (1904). Rhapsody

Mind free, step free,
Days to follow after,
Joys of life sold to me
For the price of laughter.
~ William Stanley Braithwaite, in The Little Book of Modern Verse (1913). Sic Vita

Set me a task in which I can put something of my very self, and it is task no longer; it is joy; it is art.
~ (William) Bliss Carman, The Kinship of Nature (1904). The Art of Life

I am enjoying to the full that period of reflection which is the happiest conclusion to a life of action.
~ Willa Sibert Cather, Death Comes for the Archbishop (1927).

Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life. Security is an insipid thing, and the overtaking and possessing of a wish, discovers the folly of the chase.
~ William Congreve, Love for Love (1695). Act 4, scene 20

I crown thee king of intimate delights,
Fire-side enjoyments, home-born happiness.
~ William Cowper, The Task (1785). Book IV. The Winter Evening

[L]iberty, like day,
Breaks on the soul, and by a flash from heaven
Fires all the faculties with glorious joy.
~ William Cowper, The Task (1785). Book V. The Winter Morning Walk

'Tis a sight to engage me, if anything can,
To muse on the perishing pleasures of man;
Short-lived as we are, our enjoyments, I see,
Have a still shorter date, and die sooner than we.
~ William Cowper, Published in the Gentleman's Magazine (January 1785). The Poplar Field

I was not born to joy
Till this late hour.
~ William Henry (W.H.) Davies, Foliage (1913). My Youth

Our customers should take joy in our products and services.
~ W. Edwards Deming

Don't you know what I'm saying!
Yeah! Every body knows I'm him!
Said I'm your hoochie coochie man
You'd better believe I'm him!
~ Willie Dixon, Hoochie Coochie Man (song)

I learned early that the richness of life is found in adventure. Adventure calls on all the faculties of mind and spirit. It develops self-reliance and independence. Life then teems with excitement. But man is not ready for adventure unless he is rid of fear. For fear confines him and limits his scope. He stays tethered by strings of doubt and indecision and has only a small and narrow world to explore.
~ William Orville Douglas, Of Men and Mountains (1950).

There are souls in this world which have the gift of finding joy everywhere and of leaving it behind them when they go.
~ Frederick William Faber

. . . [but] next to doing a good job yourself, the greatest joy is in having someone else do a first-rate job under your direction.
~ William Feather

Researchers have continued to examine the physical, emotional and psychological changes occurring during mirthful experiences. These include physiologic activities involving the muscular, respiratory, cardiovascular, endocrine, immune and central nervous systems. In most cases, mirthful responses are positive and beneficial.
~ William F. Fry, Jr., MD, The Journal of the American Medical Association (April 1992).

The joy of this life is nothing, and the joy of the after life is everlasting.
~ William Hart (letter written to his mother; 10 March 1583), Quoted in Concertatio Ecclesiae Catholicae in Anglia (1588).

My friends, I loved the art of making motion pictures. It is as the breath of life to me . . . the rush of the wind that cuts your face, the pounding hooves of the pursuing posse, and then the clouds of dust! Through the cloud of dust comes the faint voice of the director, 'Now, Bill, OK! Glad you made it! Great stuff, Bill, great stuff! . . . Oh, the thrill of it all!
~ William S. "Two Gun Bill" Hart, Tumbleweeds (1939 movie reissue). Prologue

The perfect joys of heaven do not satisfy the cravings of nature.
~ William Hazlitt, from The Round Table (1817). On The Literary Character

I know, indeed, of nothing more subtly satisfying and cheering than a knowledge of the real good will and appreciation of others. Such happiness does not come with money, nor does it flow from a fine physical state. It cannot be brought. But it is the keenest joy, after all, and the toiler's truest and best reward.
~ William Dean Howells, in Little Visits with Great Americans; Or Success Ideals and How to Attain Them (1903). A Printer's Boy, Self-Taught, Becomes the Dean of American Letters

True enjoyment comes from activity of the mind and exercise of the body; the two are ever united.
~ Wilhelm von Humboldt

The joy of life is made up of obscure and seemingly mundane victories that gives us our own small satisfactions.
~ Billy Joel

At the time, I didn't understand the impact it would have. It was just a lot of fun, and there was a lot of spontaneity. To think that the way that people celebrate end zone dances today as a result of what I did? I want to be associated with it in a good way, not a negative way.
~ Billy "White Shoes" Johnson (on his end zone dance called the "Funky Chicken"), Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (9 December 1998). Let's dance: End zone celebrations go way back

Joy is a constituent of life, a necessity of life; it is an element of life's value and life's power. As every person has need of joy, so too, every person has a right to joy. . . .
~ Paul Wilhelm von Keppler, More Joy (1911).

Great people have not been concerned with fame. The joy of achievement that comes from finding something new in the universe is by far their greatest joy.
~ William P. King

Receive every day as a resurrection from death, as a new enjoyment of life; meet every rising sun with such sentiments of God's goodness, as if you had seen it, and all things, new-created upon your account: and under the sense of so great a blessing, let your joyful heart praise and magnify so good and glorious a Creator.
~ William Law, A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life (1728).

A great deal of the joy of life consists in doing perfectly, or at least to the best of one's ability, everything which we attempt to do.
~ William Matthews

How happy life would be if an undertaking retained to the end the delight of its beginning, if the dregs of a cup of wine were as sweet as the first sip.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, from A Writer's Notebook (1949).

I thought I should be a fool to allow work to interfere with a delight in the passing moment that I might never enjoy again so fully.
~ W. Somerset Maugham, The Razor's Edge (1944).

I enjoy what I do. . . . I think it shows.
~ Billy Mays, The Seattle Times (25 December 2002). Pitchman Billy Mays gives Orange its Glo

There is no ideal Christmas; only the one Christmas you decide to make as a reflection of your values, desires, affections, traditions.
~ Bill McKibben, Hundred Dollar Holiday: The Case For a More Joyful Christmas (1998).

Forget days past, heart broken, put all memory by!
No grief on the green hillside, no pity in the sky,
Joy that may not be spoken fills mead and flower and tree.
~ William Morris

The mother of dissipation is not joy but joylessness.
~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

We lose the duty in the joy.
~ William Morley (W.M.) Punshon, in Sabbath Chimes, or, Meditations in Verse for the Sundays of a Year (1867). Sweet Is the Sunlight After Rain

A happy life must be to a great extent a quiet life, for it is only in an atmosphere of quiet that true joy dare live.
~ Bertrand Arthur William Russell, The Conquest of Happiness (1930).

Knowing how things work is the basis for appreciation, and is thus a source of civilized delight.
~ William L. Safire

Joy is the feeling that comes from the fulfillment of one's potential. Fulfillment brings to an individual the feeling that he can cope with his environment; the sense of confidence in himself as a significant, competent, lovable person who is capable of handling situations as they arise, able to use fully his own capacities, and free to express his feelings.
~ William C. ("Will") Schutz, Joy: Expanding Human Awareness (1967).

A kind overflow of kindness.
There are no faces truer than those that are so wash'd.
How much better is it to weep at joy
than to joy at weeping!
~ William Shakespeare, Much Ado About Nothing

All things that are,
Are with more spirit chased than enjoy'd.
~ William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice. Act II, scene vi

He makes a July's day short as December,
And with his varying childness cures in me
Thoughts that would thick my blood.
~ William Shakespeare, The Winter's Tale. Act I, scene i

It is meat and drink to me to see a clown.
~ William Shakespeare, As You Like It. Act V, scene i

I wish you all the joy you can wish.
~ William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice. Act III, scene ii

O wonderfull, wonderful!! and most wonderfull wonderfull! and yet againe wonderful! and after that out of all hooping!
~ William Shakespeare, As You Like It. Act III, scene ii

Poor fellow never joyed since the price of oats rose, it was the death of him.
~ William Shakespeare, King Henry IV, Part I. Act II, scene i

Still constant in a wondrous excellence.
~ William Shakespeare, Sonnet 105

Sweets grown common lose their dear delight.
~ William Shakespeare, Sonnet 102

These most brisk and giddy-paced times.
~ William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night. Act II, scene iv

Things won are done; joy's soul lies in the doing.
~ William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida

'Tis merry in hall when beards wag all.
~ William Shakespeare, King Henry IV, Part II

Welcome ever smiles,
And farewell goes out sighing.
~ William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida

Where is our usual manager of mirth?
What revels are in hand? Is there no play,
To ease the anguish of a torturing hour?
~ William Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream. Act V, scene i

Our cares are the mothers not only of our charities and virtues, but of our best joys, and most cheering and enduring pleasures.
~ William Gilmore Simms

Return, my joys! and hither bring
A tongue not made to speak, but sing.
~ William Strode, in Wit Restored (1658). Answer to "The Lover's Melancholy"

A real patriot is the fellow who gets a parking ticket and rejoices that the system works.
~ William E. "Bill" Vaughan

I'm ready to start enjoying things. It will be nice to take it slower and not have anything to do for a change.
~ Andy Williams

Some might call me crazy. I call it a surplus of joy. And I just happen to believe you should have enough of a surplus to fill a Wal-Mart.
~ Pat Williams, How to Be Like Mike: Life Lessons about Basketball's Best (2001). Two: The Joy

It's a Rum Go!
~ Ralph Vaughan Williams, Quoted in The Wit of Music (1966).

Joy is what happens to us when we allow ourselves to recognize how good things really are.
~ Marianne Williamson

Joy, has no cost.
~ Marianne Williamson

You don't have to be a thing of beauty to be a joy forever.
~ Clerow "Flip" Wilson

And often, glad no more,
We wear a face of joy because
We have been glad of yore.
~ William Wordsworth, from Poems of Sentiment and Reflection (1800). The Fountain. A Conversion (written in 1799)

I hear, I hear, with joy I hear!
~ William Wordsworth, Heaven Lies About Us

Surprised by joy -- impatient as the wind
I wished to share the transport.
~ William Wordsworth, Surprised by joy -- impatient as the wind (1815)

Whence I come or whither I go,
I little question, for well I know
What I am, 't is joy to be;
Laughter is my vesture,
And a god of revelry
Beckons in my gesture.
~ William Bull Wright, in An American Anthology, 1787-1900 (1900). From "The Brook"

Joy is of the will which labours, which overcomes obstacles, which knows triumph.
~ William Butler Yeats, from The Autobiography of William Butler Yeats (c. 1915).

Their Land of Heart's Desire,
Where beauty has no ebb, decay no flood,
But joy is wisdom, time an endless song.
~ William Butler Yeats, The Land of Heart's Desire (1894).