All who joy would win
Must share it--Happiness was born a twin.
--_Byron_.
Happiness is not a fixed quantity, like the world's gold supply: so
that the more one man has the less his neighbor is likely to have.
Real happiness is an infection. You can never force it upon any one.
Each individual must "take" it. I have heard people say, as explaining
the misery of many, that there is not enough happiness to go around.
But the comment misses the very nature of happiness. The more there is
in the world, the more there is likely to be. The larger the number
of happy people the faster the infection will spread. But each must
invite it. One child is happy with the crudest sort of toy, whereas
another child is unhappy with an armful of toys. To the latter kind
of soul, grown or ungrown, you can never give happiness, for there are
not enough toys to supply everybody. Happiness is of the heart not of
circumstances.
After reading a poem about a little boy who was so happy because there
were lovely flowers, beautiful birds, blue sky and running brooks,
eight-year-old William remarked:
"Those things would never make me happy, Miss Jones."
"Why, William," replied his teacher, "what would it take to make you
happy?"
"Saturdays!" was the prompt reply.
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