“Mirth is like a flash of lightning, that breaks through a gloom of clouds, and glitters for a moment; cheerfulness keeps up a kind of daylight in the mind, and fills it with a steady and perpetual serenity
“Cheerfulness, it would appear, is a matter which depends fully as much on the state of things within, as on the state of things without and around us
“How good is man's life, the mere living! How fit to employ all the heart and the soul and the senses forever in joy!
“One should never risk a joke, even of the mildest and most unexceptional charters, except among people of culture and wit
“I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought, and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder