_is_.

But content is not happiness; neither is pleasure. Pleasure is
temporary, happiness is continuous; pleasure is a note, happiness is a
symphony; pleasure may exist when conscience utters protests;
happiness,--never. Pleasure may have its dregs and its lees; but none
can be found in the cup of happiness.

Man is the only animal that can be really happy. To the rest of the
creation belong only weak imitations of the understudies. Happiness
represents a peaceful attunement of a life with a standard of living.
It can never be made by the individual, by himself, for himself. It is
one of the incidental by-products of an unselfish life. No man can make
his own happiness the one object of his life and attain it, any more
than he can jump on the far end of his shadow. If you would hit the
bull's-eye of happiness on the target of life, aim above it. Place
other things higher than your own happiness and it will surely come to
you. You can buy pleasure, you can acquire content, you can become
satisfied,--but Nature never put real happiness on the bargain-counter.
It is the undetachable accompaniment of true living. It is calm and
peaceful; it never lives in an atmosphere of worry or of hopeless
struggle.

The basis of happiness is the love of something outside self. Search
every instance of happiness in the world, and you will find, when all
the incidental features are eliminated, there is always the constant,
unchangeable element of love,--love of parent for child; love of man
and woman for each other; love of humanity in some form, or a great
life work into which the individual throws all his energies.