“Schools are not meant to make boys happy, Cécile, but to teach them to do without happiness.”

“One cannot divine nor forecast the conditions that will make happiness; one only stumbles upon them by chance, in a lucky hour, at the world's end somewhere, and hold fast to the days...”

“And that's what makes men happy, believing in the mystery and importance of their own individual lives.”

“That is happiness, to be dissolved into something complete and great. ”

“I was entirely happy. Perhaps we feel like that when we die and become a part of something entire, whether it is sun and air. or goodness and knowledge. At any rate, that is happiness; to be dissolved into something complete and great. When it comes to one, it comes as naturally as sleep.”

“People have to snatch at happiness when they can, in this world. It is always easier to lose than to find.”

“I did not want to be anything more. I was entirely happy. Perhaps we feel like that when we die and become a part of something entire, whether it is sun and air, or goodness and knowledge. At any rate, that is happiness; to be dissolved into something complete and great. When it comes to one, it comes as naturally as sleep.”