The Pursuit of Happiness Quotes

“In The Federalist Papers, Madison and Hamilton made clear that the Constitution was designed to foster deliberation so that citizens could avoid retreating into the angry mobs and partisan factions that can be inflamed by demagogues.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“Salus populi suprema lex esto,” they”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“we are what we think, and life is shaped by the mind; that happiness requires virtue, and virtue requires the cultivation of daily habits of self-mastery and mental tranquility; that we should think and act mindfully rather than impulsively, using our powers of reason to moderate our ego-based passions; and that we should do good for its own sake rather than acting with any expectations about the reactions of others.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“Today, of course, the idea that new media technologies might be deployed by an enlightened class of literati to calm and refine public opinion seems quaint. In an age of social media, the opposite dynamic occurs, as journalists, scholars, and public officials pander to the most extreme and passionate voices on social media rather than slowly diffuse reason across the land. Madison believed the print media should promote cool deliberation; the social media model is “enrage to engage.” At the same time, new media are undermining the speed bumps of time and space that Madison thought would make it difficult for mobs to mobilize and act impulsively. The passions, hyper-partisanship, and split-second decision-making that Madison and Hamilton feared from large, concentrated groups meeting face-to-face have proved to be even more dangerous from exponentially larger, dispersed groups that meet online.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“Madison followed Condorcet in expressing faith that a class of enlightened journalists and public officials, whom he, too, called the literati, could serve as “cultivators of the human mind,” using the new media to teach the public how to pursue happiness through reason rather than passion. As Madison put it in a crucial passage: “The class of literati is not less necessary than any other. They are the cultivators of the human mind—the manufacturers of useful knowledge—the agents of the commerce of ideas—the censors of public manners—the teachers of the arts of life and the means of happiness.”68 When he wrote about the literati, Madison had in mind elite journalists such as Benjamin Franklin’s Poor Richard or his own essays in The Federalist; the modern equivalent would be essays in the Atlantic or the New Yorker. Madison was confident that the literati could teach the public to converge around shared principles—such as a national attachment to republicanism, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights—rather than descending into “prejudices, local, political, and occupational, that may prevent or disturb a general coalition of sentiments.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“Washington warned against “the baneful effects of the Spirit of Party,” or political factions. “This spirit, unfortunately, is inseparable from our nature, having its root in the strongest passions of the human Mind,” Washington explained. In addition to agitating the community “with ill founded jealousies and false alarms,” Washington warned, the Spirit of Party “kindles the animosity of one part against another, foments occasionally riot & insurrection,” and “opens the door to foreign influence & corruption.”67”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“The ancient wisdom that defined happiness as self-mastery, emotional self-regulation, tranquility of mind, and the quest for self-improvement was distilled in the works of Cicero,”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“Today we think of happiness as the pursuit of pleasure. But classical and Enlightenment thinkers defined happiness as the pursuit of virtue—as being good, rather than feeling good.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“our opinions are the involuntary result of the evidence contemplated by our reasoning minds.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“He that is slow to anger is better than the Mighty, and he that ruleth his Spirit than he that taketh a city.”10”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“A reading list that Jefferson first drafted in 1771, five years before he wrote the Declaration, provided an answer. Jefferson sent the list to his friend Robert Skipwith, who had asked for books to include in a private library, and revised it over the years. Under the category of “religion,” Jefferson’s reading list includes Cicero’s Tusculan Disputations, as well as a top ten list of other works of classical and Enlightenment moral philosophy:11 Locke’s Conduct of the Understanding in the Search of Truth. Xenophon’s memoirs of Socrates, translated by Sarah Fielding. Epictetus, translated by Elizabeth Carter. Marcus Aurelius, translated by Collins. Seneca, translated by Roger L’Estrange. Cicero’s Offices, by Guthrie. Cicero’s Tusculan questions. Ld.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“The soul that’s tranquil, calm, restrained, at rest The happy soul, the subject of our quest”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“5:00”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“Lincoln said that the spread of “mob law” and the “mobocratic spirit” were destroying what the Founders considered the bulwark of self-government: namely, the “attachment of the People,” or their belief in the government’s legitimacy.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“individual citizens have a responsibility to think for themselves, mastering their own passions, resisting groupthink, and taking the time for sober second thoughts in order to achieve private and public happiness.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“The greatest threat to public virtue, Washington emphasized, was American greed, which led speculators and war profiteers to circumvent the boycott or sell supplies to the army at monopoly prices.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“I’ve had the privilege of a wonderful liberal arts education and have studied literature, history, political philosophy, and law with great teachers at great universities. But despite my elaborate education, I’d never encountered the great works of Greek, Roman, and Enlightenment moral philosophy that offered guidance about how to live a good life”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America

“If you had to sum it up in one sentence, the classical definition of the pursuit of happiness meant being a lifelong learner, with a commitment to practicing the daily habits that lead to character improvement, self-mastery, flourishing, and growth.”
― Jeffrey Rosen, The Pursuit of Happiness: How Classical Writers on Virtue Inspired the Lives of the Founders and Defined America