only to peer into the uncertain future, with ear on the stretch for
the footfall of sorrow that never may come--but deaf to the whirr of
the wings of the happiness that fills all space?

Let us not look to renouncement for happiness till we have sought it
elsewhere in vain. It is easy to be wise if we be content to regard
as happiness the void that is left by the absence of happiness. But
it was not for unhappiness the sage was created; and it is more
glorious, as well as more human, to be happy and still to be wise.
The supreme endeavour of wisdom is only to seek in life for the
fixed point of happiness; but to seek this fixed point in
renouncement and farewell to joy, is only to seek it in death. He
who moves not a limb is persuaded, perhaps, he is wise; but was this
the purpose wherefor mankind was created? Ours is the choice--
whether wisdom shall be the honoured wife of our passions and
feelings, our thoughts and desires, or the melancholy bride of
death. Let the tomb have its stagnant wisdom, but let there be
wisdom also for the hearth where the fire still burns.

56. It is not by renouncing the joys that are near us that we shall
grow wise; but as we grow wise we unconsciously abandon the joys
thatt now are beneath us. Even so does the child, as years come to
him, give up one by one without thinking the games that have ceased
to amuse. And just as the child learns far more from his play than
from work that is given him, so does wisdom progress far more
quickly in happiness than in misfortune. It is only one side of
morality that unhappiness throws into light; and the man whom sorrow
has taught to be wise, is like one who has loved and never been
loved in return. There must always be something unknown to the love
whereto no other love has made answer; and this, too, will remain