Be Merry Quotes & Sayings

Gilgamesh, where are you hurrying to? You will never find that life for which you are looking. When the gods created man they allotted to him death, but life they retained in their own keeping. As for you, Gilgamesh, fill your belly with good things; day and night, night and day, dance and be merry, feast and rejoice. Let your clothes be fresh, bathe yourself in water, cherish the little child that holds your hand, and make your wife happy in your embrace; for this too is the lot of man. — Anonymous

If she has been called a woman of the town, a tart, a bawd, a wanton, a bawdy-basket, a bird-of-the-game, a bit of stuff, a buttered bun, a cockatrice, a cock-chafer, a cow, a crack, a cunt, a daughter of Eve, a gay-girl, a gobble-prick, a high-flyer, a high-roller, a hussy, a hurry-whore, a jill, a jude, a judy, a jug, laced mutton, lift-skirts, light o' love, merry legs, minx, moll, moonlighter, morsel, mutton-broker, mount, nestcock, night-bird, night-piece, night-walker, nymph of darkness, nymph of the pavement, petticoat, pick-up, piece, pillow-mate, pinch-prick, pole-climber, prancer, quail, quiet mouse, or even Queen - it is not surprising. A woman of lively parts is as likely to be slandered as she is to be praised. — Erica Jong

There is something beginning to be wrong with the mortals, a certain lack of interest and ability. The birth rate has plummeted all over the world. There are millions of inner children and fewer and fewer real ones. I remember seeing a holo feature on a certain famous amusement park: roller coasters and merry-go-rounds packed with forty-year-olds clutching the wonder of childhood to themselves like harpies, and not one little face in the crowd. Neverland has been invaded by the grownups, no children allowed. It's better than having lots of real kids starving in gutters, at least. Mind — Kage Baker

Ll the merry little elves can go hang themselves
My faith is as cold as can be
I'm stacked high to the roof, and I'm not without proof
If you don't believe me, come see.
You think i'm blue I think so too
In my words you'll find no guile
The game's gotten old The deck's gone cold
And i'm gonna have to put you down for a while
The game's gotten old The deck's gone cold
I'm gonna have to put you down for a while
-Bob Dylan, Huck's Tune — Bob Dylan

The sensation felt like spinning too fast on a merry-go-round. Each fraction of a second her eyes focused on a new face in a crowd. Within seconds the face was gone, whisked to a blur, replaced by another face that would just as soon be lost. — Heidi Julavits

Merry Christmas me bollocks. The words of the Pogues's 'Fairytale of New York' also came to mind: surrounded by scumbags and maggots, I prayed God it would be my last in Los Teques. — Paul Keany

Our loving God wills that we eat, drink and be merry. — Martin Luther

All of the pleasures of this present physical life can be continued into the next life as well, since we will have a body which is similar to our present physical body, but so much more glorious and wonderful and supernatural. We will be able to eat, drink, be merry and have fun without ever suffering pain or sickness or weariness or death. — David Berg

Caspian felt sure that he would hate the new Tutor, but when the new Tutor arrived about a week later he turned out to be the sort of person it is almost impossible not to like. He was the smallest, and also the fattest, man Caspian had ever seen. He had a long, silvery, pointed beard which came down to his waist, and his face, which was brown and covered with wrinkles, looked very wise, very ugly, and very kind. His voice was grave and his eyes were merry so that, until you got to now him really well, it was hard to know when he was joking and when he was serious. His name was Doctor Cornelius. — C.S. Lewis

Merry hearts are vulnerable to death, don't be over-joyed to the state of oblivion, lest the enemy poison your meal. — Michael Bassey Johnson

The only way to do good soil science is to put a splitter and a lumper together in the soil pit and let them fight it out until they achieve something that they both know must be correct because neither of them feels satisfied. Left to her own devices, the lumper will dig for three hours, mark the horizons in ten minutes, and then go on her merry way. Left to his own devices, the splitter will dig a hole and crawl inside, never to be seen again. Thus splitters and lumpers are both productive only when forced into bickering collaboration, and though together they produce great maps, they rarely return from field trips still on speaking terms. Once — Hope Jahren

He seemed particularly cheerio, you know," said the Hon. Freddy.
"Particularly what?" inquired the Lord High Steward.
"Cheerio, my lord," said Sir Wigmore, with a deprecatory bow.
"I do not know whether that is a dictionary word," said his lordship entering it upon his notes with a meticulous exactness, "but I take it to be synonymous with cheerful."
The Hon. Freddy, appealed to, said he thought he meant more than just cheerful, more merry and bright, you know.
"May we take it that he was in exceptionally lively spirits?" suggested Counsel.
"Take it in any spirit you like," muttered the witness, adding, more happily, "Take a peg of John Begg. — Dorothy L. Sayers

We have become a throwaway society. Instead of honoring and preserving our past, we tear it down, shove it aside, and just go on our merry way. Well, I won't have it. We have to stand firm for what we believe in. Only in the most dire circumstances should a structure of historical significance be demolished. — Beth Hoffman

Well, I am no village cunning woman, no frightened merry-begot, but a woman born to riches, and
educated from the time I can remember, and given all that I could possibly desire. And now in my
twenty-second year, already a mother and soon perhaps to be a widow, I rule in this place. I ruled
before my mother gave to me all her secrets, and her great familiar, Lasher, and I mean to study this
thing, and make use of it, and allow it to enhance my considerable strength. — Anne Rice

I knew how to sing in choirs and sing in church, but I didn't know how to sing in a studio. That's what Darlene and the Blossoms taught me to do - to be a studio singer. — Merry Clayton

My dear Princess, if you could creep unseen about your City, peeping at will through the curtain-shielded windows, you would come to think that all the world was little else than a big nursery full of crying children with none to comfort them. The doll is broken: no longer it sweetly sqeaks in answer to our pressure, "I love you, kiss me." The drum lies silent with the drumstick inside, no longer do we make a brave noise in the nursery. The box of tea-things we have clumsily put out foot upon; there will be no more merry parties around the three-legged stool. The tin trumpet will not play the note we want to sound; the wooden bricks keep falling down; the toy has exploded and burnt our fingers. Never mind, little man, little woman, we will try and mend things to-morrow — Jerome K. Jerome

Come live, and be merry, and join with me, To sing the sweet chorus of 'Ha ha he! — William Blake

One day, The road came. The road brought with it beer and cigarettes. The road brought Coca-Cola and disposable razors. The road brought all the wonderful things that we westerners know and hold close. But where did the road go? A few of the younger men decided to find out. They rode a buffalo cart along the road until they came to a town and then a train station. They hid in a bunch of rice sacks and took the train to the city, to the lights, to the jobs. There was this thing called money, with it you could buy stuff. You could gamble, drink, and be merry. After a period of two years, one of the young men returned to the village driving a new car. He showed the villagers all the beautiful things that he had bought. He said that there was work for everyone in the cities. He took another young man and two young women with him. They were pretty in a rural way and very hungry for money. Money was good. They liked it. It was a great adventure. — James A. Newman

Strew your gladness on earth's bed,
So be merry, so be dead. — Charles Sorley

Girls should be strong together. Strong like steel, merry like the tinkling of chimes dancing in the wind. — Kristin Halbrook

To all the Callahan's Places there ever were or ever will be, whatever they may be called - and to all the merry maniacs and happy fools who are fortunate enough to stumble into one: may none of them arrive too late! — Spider Robinson

No man can be merry unless he is serious. — Gilbert K. Chesterton

Boy, it sure was some strange Christmas, she told herself as she opened the living room door. And then she stopped dead. Because her present wasn't under the huge lighted Christmas tree. It was sitting on the sofa, looking toward her furiously, with a glass of whiskey in one lean hand. "Merry Christmas," Winthrop said curtly.
Her mouth flew open. He had a bow stuck on the pocket of his gray vested suit, and he looked hung over and pale and a little disheveled. But he was so handsome that her heart skipped wildly, and she looked into his dark eyes with soft dreams in her own.
"You've got a bow on your pocket," she said in a voice that sounded too high-pitched to be her own.
"Of course I've got a bow on my pocket. I'm your damned Christmas present. Didn't you listen to your father? — Diana Palmer

If there's one thing I could wish for right now, it would be to have one of those horses from the merry-go-round - they were the most exciting thing to go on as a kid. — Deborah Mailman

Come, Ye Women: Oh, come, ye women of the Isles, And listen to my song, For if ye be but thirteen years, Ye've not been women long. And if ye be threescore and ten, No longer women be, Or so say all the merry men Who count so cruel-ly. But women we be from our birth, And will be till we die. Our counte is made so differently To give the men that lie. Oh, come, ye women of the Isles, And listen to my song, For we be women all through life, Where life and love are long. — Jane Yolen

There was no anger in his voice, no disappointment even. It was as if he'd given up on me. He pulled his keys out of his pocket. I should be going now. Merry Christmas, Nick — Carl Deuker

You are tired of being alone. You told me."
"You don't know," he said in a low, almost hostile voice. He shook his head. "I don't even know what
I'm doing with you. You're not like anyone else who's in my life - " He stopped abruptly. "Did you ever
drink too much wine,Alice ?" He held up the glass in his hand and waggled it idly, making the ruby
contents swirl.
"I'm not one to overindulge."
"No, you wouldn't be,Allow me to explain, then, that the more you drink, the more thirsty you become. Not all the wine in the world can assuage the thirst for water. Water. Wine makes
you merry, but a man needs water to keep him alive. Pure, clean, sweet water. I am parched,Alice , scorched like a wasteland, burning
like a damned soul in hell. I thirst. — Gaelen Foley

You have to be a dead-eyed dirty-souled maniac to want to spend your extended life trading punches with other maniacs. Once you've seized that power, there's no getting off the merry-go-round. You fight like hell just to hold on or you get shoved off. — Scott Lynch

No two people will ever see or feel things in the same way, Merry. The challenge is to be truthful when you write. Don't approximate. Don't settle for the easiest combination of words. Go searching instead for those that explain exactly what you think. What you feel. — Kate Morton

No, not of course at all - it is really all hocus-pocus. The days lengthen in the winter-time, and when the longest comes, the twenty-first of June, the beginning of summer, they begin to go downhill again, toward winter. You call that 'of course'; but if one once loses hold of the fact that it is of course, it is quite frightening, you feel like hanging on to something. It seems like a practical joke - that spring begins at the beginning of winter, and autumn at the beginning of summer. You feel you're being fooled, led about in a circle, with your eye fixed on something that turns out to be a moving point. A moving point in a circle. For the circle consists of nothing but such transitional points without any extent whatever; the curvature is incommensurable, there is no duration of motion, and eternity turns out to be not 'straight ahead' but 'merry-go-round'! — Thomas Mann

Although your staff may be exposed to the message "work longer and harder" while they're at the office, they're getting a very different message at home. The message at home is, "Life is passing you by. Your laundry is piling up in the closet, your babies are uncuddled, your spouse is starting to look elsewhere. There is only one time around on this merry-go-round called life, only one shot at the brass ring. And if you use your life up on C++ . . . — Tom DeMarco

Don't worry; always be merry. — Debasish Mridha

Be merry if you are wise. — Martial

Hop along, my little friends, up the Withywindle! Tom's going on ahead candles for to kindle. Down west sinks the Sun: soon you will be groping. When the night-shadows fall, then the door will open, Out of the window-panes light will twinkle yellow. Fear no alder black! Heed no hoary willow! Fear neither root nor bough! Tom goes on before you. Hey now! merry dol! We'll be waiting for you! — J.R.R. Tolkien

Eat, drink, and be merry is perfectly good in itself; nothing is wrong in it. But it is not enough. Soon you will get tired of it. One cannot just go on eating, drinking, and merrying. Soon the merry-go-round turns into a sorry-go-round - because it is repetitive. Only a very mediocre mind can go on being happy with it. — Rajneesh

To be merry best becomes you; for, out of question, you were born in a merry hour. — William Shakespeare

Tis well to be merry and wise,
'Tis well to be honest and true;
It is best to be off with the old love,
Before you are on with the new. — Charles Robert Maturin

A man bumps me on his busy way without so much as an apology. But that is all right. I forgive you, busy man about town with the sharp elbows. Hail and farewell to you! For I, Gemma Doyle, am to have a splendid Christmas in London town. All shall be well.
God rest us merry gentlemen. And gentlewomen. — Libba Bray

My Christmas present? That's nice. But I'm not really in the mood to - "
"Open the goddamn thing or I'll kill you where you stand."
"Sir! Opening it." She ripped the paper, stuffed it hurriedly in her pocket, and pulled off the lid. "It's a key code."
"That's right. It's to the ground transpo that'll be at the airport over in that foreign country. Air transpo's been arranged, for two, on one of Roarke's private shuttles. Round trip. Merry fricking Christmas. Do what you want with it."
"I - you - one of the shuttles? Free?" Peabody's cheeks went pink as a summer rose. "And - and - and - a vehicle when we get there? It's so ... It's so seriously mag."
"Great. Can we go now?"
"Dallas!"
"No. No. No hugs. No hugs. No. Oh, shit," she muttered as Peabody threw her arms around her and squeezed. "We're on duty, we're in public. Let me go or I swear I'll kick your ass so hard that extra five pounds you're whining about will end up in Trenton. — J.D. Robb

My bright and merry star,
Things I would tell our child if I could-

1. Love matters.
2. So does friendship.
3. Everyone makes mistakes, including you. Be generous with others' errors, and honest about your own.
4.Your mother is the truest, kindest, sweetest soul I've ever know. I love her. And I love you-for your own sake, not solely for your mother's.
Dominic
Only then did she break. sinking to the floor, covering her head with her arms, Minuette huddled and wept. — Laura Anderson

And everything soon must change. Men would set their watches by other suns than this. Or time would vanish. We would need no personal names of the old sort in the sidereal future, nothing being fixed. We would be designated by other nouns. Days and nights would belong to the museums. The earth a memorial park, a merry-go-round cemetery. The seas powdering our bones like quartz, making sand, grinding our peace for us by the aeon. Well, that would be good - a melancholy good. — Saul Bellow

As I was waiting, a man came out of a side room, and at a glance I was sure he must be Long John. His left leg was cut off close by the hip, and under the left shoulder he carried a crutch, which he managed with wonderful dexterity, hopping about upon it like a bird. He was very tall and strong, with a face as big as a ham - plain and pale, but intelligent and smiling. Indeed, he seemed in the most cheerful spirits, whistling as he moved about among the tables, with a merry word or a slap on the shoulder for the more favoured of his guests. — Robert Louis Stevenson

There is something joyful about storms that interrupt routine. Snow or freezing rain suddenly releases you from expectations, performance demands, and the tyranny of appointments and schedules. And unlike illness, it is largely a corporate rather than individual experience. One can almost hear a unified sigh rise from the nearby city and surrounding countryside where Nature has intervened to give respite to the weary humans slogging it out within her purview. All those affected this way are united by a mutual excuse, and the heart is suddenly and unexpectedly a little giddy. There will be no apologies needed for not showing up to some commitment or other. Everyone understands and shares in this singular justification, and the sudden alleviation of the pressure to produce makes the heart merry. — Wm. Paul Young

JAMES HALE sat at a side-street noodle-stall. The stall was set-up underneath the shade of a row of fruit trees. He watched a pair of pigeons courting beneath a fig tree. The male's tail feathers were pushed up in self-promotion and his plumage was arrogantly puffed up. He danced his elaborate dance of love. The female didn't look impressed. She turned her back to him. Birds were like gangster rappers, Hale thought. They sang songs about how tough they were and how many other birds they'd nested. They were egomaniacs with inferiority complexes. Posers in a leafy street. The bastards flew at the first sign of danger. They couldn't make it on the ground. Hale hated birds with their merry chirps and their flimsy nests. Tweet. Tweet. Fucking. Tweet. The only thing Hale admired about them was the fact that they could fly. That would be cool. Right now, flying would be good. — James A. Newman

There is something about Christmas that requires a rug rat. Little kids make Christmas fun. I wonder if could rent one for the holidays. When I was tiny we would by a real tree and stay up late drinking hot chocolate and finding just the right place for the special decorations. It seems like my parents gave up the magic when I figured out the Santa lie. Maybe I shouldn't have told them I knew where the presents really came from. It broke their hearts.
I bet they'd be divorced by now if I hadn't been born. I'm sure I was a huge disappointment. I'm not pretty or smart or athletic. I'm just like them- an ordinary drone dressed in secrets and lies. I can't believe we have to keep playacting till I graduate. It's a shame we just can't admit that we have failed at family living, sell the house, split up the money, and get on with our lives. Merry Christmas. — Laurie Halse Anderson

Sea-fever
I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.
I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.
I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over. — John Masefield

And I leave the children the long, long days to be merry in in a thousand ways, and the Night, and the trail of the Milky Way to wonder at ... — Williston Fish

I wish that all those, who on this night are not merry enough to speak before they think, may ever after be grave enough to think before they speak! — Ann Radcliffe

I started with Bobby Darin. He signed me to Capitol when I was 15. I was 14, getting ready to be 15. Then the next encounter I had was with I think Peggy Lee. I sang background with The Blossoms with Darlene Love. — Merry Clayton

Often he declined invitations, because to accept meant that he had to dust off his brogues, iron a shirt, brush down his best suit, take a bath, and splash on some cologne. He had also to be affable, to drink and be merry, to talk to strangers with whom he had no inclination to talk and with whom he was not being paid to talk. In other words, he resented having to play the part of a normal human animal. — Ian Rankin

Be merry all, be merry all,
With holly dress the festive hall;
Prepare the song, the feast, the ball,
To welcome merry Christmas. — William Spencer

NORA: No; only merry. And you were always so friendly and kind to me. But our house has been nothing but a nursery. Here I have been your doll-wife, just as at home I used to be papa's doll-child. And my children were, in their turn, my dolls. I was exceedingly delighted when you played with me, just as children were whenever I played with them. That has been our marriage, Torvald. — Henrik Ibsen

Who wants to be a hundred? What's the point of it? A short life and a merry one is far better than a long one sustained by fear, caution, and perpetual medical surveillance. — Henry Miller

What you seek you shall never find.
For when the Gods made man,
They kept immortality to themselves.
Fill your belly.
Day and night make merry.
Let Days be full of joy.
Love the child who holds your hand.
Let your wife delight in your embrace.
For these alone are the concerns of man. — The Epic Of Gilgamesh

Maybe mistakes are what make our fate ... without them what would shape our lives? Maybe if we had never veered off course we wouldn't fall in love, have babies, or be who we are. After all, things change, so do cities, people come into your life and they go. But it's comforting to know that the ones you love are always in your heart ... and if you're very lucky, a plane ride away — Candace Bushnell

Women know the way to rear up children (to be just). They know a simple, merry, tender knack of tying sashes, fitting baby-shoes, and stringing pretty words that make no sense. And kissing full sense into empty words. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

All too soon will Childhood gay Realise Life's sober sadness. Let's be merry while we may, Innocent and happy Fay! Elves were made for gladness! — Lewis Carroll

Elsewhere the world may be blustering or sleeping, wars are fought, people live and die, some nations disintegrate, while others are born, soon to be swallowed up in turn - and in all this sound and fury, amidst eruptions and undertows, while the world goes its merry way, bursts into flames, tears itself apart and is reborn: human life continues to throb. — Muriel Barbery

Words can mean different things to different people. It is important to understand what people mean when they use a certain word. Let's make an example. Take the word gay. Fifty years ago, gay meant exclusively cheerfulness, lighthearted excitement, merry or bright colors. Today this word has a different meaning. You won't call a cheerful person gay because it could be understood as something else. — Ali Sina

It was a curiously happy picture: a dark-haired girl...sternly cautioning her bare-kneed younger brother not to be so loud in church, then bending down to whisper with a mischievous smile, 'If you can only sit still for five more minutes, once we are out of here I will play a great game with you. You will enjoy it.' Flash of merry dark eyes. 'There will be worms involved. — Lauren Baratz-Logsted

I will, I do, Amen, Here Here, Let's
eat, drink and be merry. Marriage is
the public spectacle of private
parts:
cheque-books and genitals, house-wares, fainthearts,
all doubts becalmed by kissing
aunt, a priest's
safe homily, those tinkling glasses
tightening those ties that truly bind
us together forever, dressed to the nines.

Darling, I reckon maybe thirty years,
given our ages and expectancies.
Barring the tragic or untimely, say,
ten thousand mornings, ten thousand evenings,
please God, ten thousand moistened nights like this,
when, mindless of these vows, our opposites,
nonetheless, attract. Thus, love's subtactraction:
the timeless from the ordinary times --
nine thousand nine hundred ninety-nine. — Thomas Lynch

Write, drink and be merry! — Maureen A. Miller

This better be shit you can handle without Merry gettin' a pissed off look, Cher. 'Cause you pissed off gives me a quiver. Merry pissed off might mean I'm in the dark with a shovel and a flashlight, coverin' a brother's ass by buryin' bodies. — Kristen Ashley

If you'd have told me two weeks ago that one day I'd be part of a not-so-merry band of Necros seeking to exterminate a couple of other magic-born gangs, I'd have given you directions to the strait-jacket factory. — David Estes

O be not anxious, comrades, fear ye not! The siuation here hath been controll'd. All merry 'tis in the detention block! ...
That conversation did my spirits bore! Now Luke, prepare thyself for company. — Ian Doescher

I shall never be very merry or very sad, for I am more prone to analyse than to feel. — H.P. Lovecraft

I lost myself immediately in one of the books, only emerging when the phone rang.
"Dashiell?" my father intoned. As if someone else with my voice might be answering the phone at my mother's apartment.
"Yes, Father?"
"Leeza and I would like to wish you a merry Christmas."
"Thank you, Father. And to you, as well."
[awkward pause]
[even more awkward pause]
"I hope your mother isn't giving you any trouble."
Oh, Father, I love it when you play this game.
"She told me if I clean all the ashes out of the grate, then I'll be able to help my sisters get ready for the ball."
"It's Christmas, Dashiell. Can't you give that attitude a rest?"
"Merry Christmas, Dad. And thanks for the presents."
"What presents?"
"I'm sorry - those were all from Mom, weren't they?"
"Dashiell ... "
"I gotta go. The gingerbread men are on — Rachel Cohn

Let kindness go from us to others with every gift, and good desires with every Christmas greeting. Deliver us from evil by the blessing which Christ brings, and teach us to be merry with a clear heart. May the Christmas morning make us happy to be Thy children, and the Christmas evening bring us to our beds with grateful thoughts, forgiving and forgiven, for Jesus' sake. Amen. - ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON — David P. Gushee

The [Jewish] Sabbath was not intended to be simply a desert of prohibitions, but rather an oasis for moral restoration and seemly pleasure-one was to eat, drink, even be merry. — Israel Shenker

Size 8 is great! That is my new motto. I was a 14 and 6 and 12. I think it's healthy. I like to eat, drink and be merry! — Monica Potter

Come on, forget your troubles and enjoy yourself. Tonight, there is no tomorrow. Eat, drink and be merry. — Diana Palmer

She told me if I clean all the ashes out of the grate, then I'll be able to help my sisters get ready for the bal." "It's Christmas, Dashiel. Can't you give that atitude a rest?"
"Merry Christmas, Dad. And thanks for the presents."
"What presents?"
"I'm sorry - those were all from Mom, weren't they? — Rachel Cohn

Phoebe stared into his blue eyes. "What would you do if you ran away from a wedding in a car that didn't belong to you and discovered a body in the trunk about the time a sheriff's deputy rolled up behind you?" She flung her hand in the air, and assumed a high-pitched, sarcastic tone. "Hi, I'm a rich man's daughter with a dead man in my trunk. Could you help me get him out so I can be on my merry way? — Elle James

Without the door let sorrow lie,
And if for cold it hap to die,
We'll bury 't in a Christmas pie,
And evermore be merry. — George Wither

No," I said, raising my voice to be heard over the piano chords. "I didn't lie to you, Puck. I meant what I said - at least, I did back then. But it's not the same as what I feel for Ash, you knew that."
"Did I?" Puck's voice was ugly. "Maybe I did, but you sure led me on a merry chase, princess. Just like a pro. When were you going to tell me I didn't have a cold chance in hell? — Julie Kagawa

We all had parts to play, we all had costumes to wear, we all had to be as merry as we could be, for the King was always laughing this winter and the Queen never stopped smiling. — Philippa Gregory

Your path is not my path. Should we meet at the crossroads and ye be a friend, tarry a while, drink some wine and let us laugh for a while. If ye be foe, continue on your merry way and may our paths never cross again. — Virginia Alison

Thou mak'st me merry: I am full of pleasure; let us be jocund — William Shakespeare

The Voice of Christ: MY CHILD, do not trust in your present feeling, for it will soon give way to another. As long as you live you will be subject to changeableness in spite of yourself. You will become merry at one time and sad at another, now peaceful but again disturbed, at one moment devout and the next indevout, sometimes diligent while at other times lazy, now grave and again flippant. But the man who is wise and whose spirit is well instructed stands superior to these changes. He pays no attention to what he feels in himself or from what quarter the wind of fickleness blows, so long as the whole intention of his mind is conducive to his proper and desired end. — Thomas A Kempis

There are all kinds of ways and reasons that mothers can and should be praised. But for cultivating a sense of invisibility, martyrdom and tirelessly working unnoticed and unsung? Those are not reasons. Praising women for standing in the shadows? Wrong. Where is the greeting card that praises the kinds of mothers I know? Or better yet, the kind of mother I was raised by? I need a card that says: "Happy Mother's Day to the mom who taught me to be strong, to be powerful, to be independent, to be competitive, to be fiercely myself and fight for what I want." Or "Happy Birthday to a mother who taught me to argue when necessary, to raise my voice for my beliefs, to not back down when I know I am right." Or "Mom, thanks for teaching me to kick ass and take names at work. Get well soon." Or simply "Thank you, Mom, for teaching me how to make money and feel good about doing it. Merry Christmas. — Shonda Rhimes

Waste not your Hour, nor in the vain pursuit
Of This and That endeavor and dispute;
Better be merry with the fruitful Grape
Than sadden after none, or bitter, fruit. — Omar Khayyam

You can be merry with the king, you can share a joke with him. But as Thomas More used to say, it's like sporting with a tamed lion. You tousle its mane and pull its ears, but all the time you're thinking, those claws, those claws, those claws. — Hilary Mantel

It 's guid to be merry and wise, It 's guid to be honest and true, It 's guid to support Caledonia's cause, And bide by the buff and the blue. — Robert Burns

As long as you live, you will be subject to change, whether you will it or not - now glad, now sorrowful; now pleased, now displeased; now devout, now undevout; now vigorous, now slothful; now gloomy, now merry. But a wise man who is well taught in spiritual labor stands unshaken in all such things, and heeds little what he feels, or from what side the wind of instability blows. — Thomas A Kempis

I seem to feel ashamed of going out and getting merry - I find it oddly humiliating - but I'm quite happy to sit here like some dipsomaniac and become maudlin. For me, that is cool behaviour. Once you realise you're going to be on your own for the next few decades, it seems as pleasurable a way as any to pass the years. — Dave Franklin

Martin Sloan, age thirty-six, vice-president in charge of media. Successful in most things but not in the one effort that all men try at some time in their lives - trying to go home again. And also like all men perhaps there'll be an occasion, maybe a summer night sometime, when he'll look up from what he's doing and listen to the distant music of a calliope, and hear the voices and the laughter of the people and the places of his past. And perhaps across his mind there'll flit a little errant wish, that a man might not have to become old, never outgrow the parks and the merry-go-rounds of his youth. And he'll smile then too because he'll know it is just an errant wish, some wisp of memory not too important really, some laughing ghosts that cross a man's mind, that are a part of the Twilight Zone. — Rod Serling

You will live to love again. You know you have lost your springtime girl, your Molly on the beach with the wind in her brown hair and red cloak. You have been gone too long from her, and too much has befallen you both. And what you loved, what both of you truly loved, was not each other. It was the time of your life. It was the spring of your years, and life running strong in you, and war on your doorstep and your strong, perfect bodies. Look back, in truth. You will find you recall fully as many quarrels and tears as you do lovemaking and kisses. Fitz. Be wise. Let her go, and keep those memories intact. Save what you can of her, and let her keep what she can of the wild and daring boy she loved. Because both he and that merry little miss are no more than memories anymore." She shook her head. "No more than memories. — Robin Hobb

It's "Merry Christmas" at our house. Whatever it is at yours, have a happy one. And be good to somebody. — Stephen King

Go, eat your bread with joy, and drink your wine with a merry heart, for God has already approved what you do. Let your garments be always white. Let not oil be lacking on your head. Enjoy life with the wife whom you love, all the days of your vain life that he has given you under the sun, because that is your portion in life and in your toil at which you toil under the sun. — Solomon

Has the Sperm Whale ever written a book, spoken a speech? No, his great genius is declared in his doing nothing particular to prove it. It is moreover declared in his pyramidical silence. And this reminds me that had the great Sperm Whale been known to the young Orient World, he would have been deified by their child-magian thoughts. They deified the crocodile of the Nile, because the crocodile is tongueless; and the Sperm Whale has no tongue, or at least it is so exceedingly small, as to be incapable of protrusion. If hereafter any highly cultured, poetical nation shall lure back to their birth-right, the merry May-day gods of old; and livingly enthrone them again in the now egotistical sky; in the now unhaunted hill; then be sure, exalted to Jove's high seat, the great Sperm Whale shall lord it. — Herman Melville

But as in wailing there's nought availing, And Death unfailing will strike the blow, Then for that reason, and for a season, Let us be merry before we go. — John Philpot Curran

Joy, not grit, is the hallmark of holy obedience. We need to be lighthearted in what we do to avoid taking ourselves too seriously. It is a cheerful revolt against self and pride. Our work is jubilant, carefree, merry. Utter abandonment to God is done freely and with celebration. And so I urge you to enjoy this ministry of self-surrender. Don't push too hard. Hold this work lightly, joyfully. — Richard J. Foster

Wine works the heart up, wakes the wit;
There is no cure 'gainst age but it. and
'Tis late and cold, stir up the fire;
Sit close and draw the table nigher;
Be merry and drink wine that is old,
A hearty medicine 'gainst the cold. — John Fletcher

Glad and merry and sweet is the blessed and lovely demeanour of our Lord towards our souls, for he saw us always living in love-longing, and he wants our souls to be gladly disposed toward him ... by his grace he lifts up and will draw our outer disposition to our inward, and will make us all at unity with him, and each of us with others in the true, lasting joy which is Jesus. — Julian Of Norwich

You should regard each meeting with a friend as a sitting he is unwillingly giving you for a portrait - a portrait that, probably, when you or he die, will still be unfinished. And, though this is an absorbing pursuit, nevertheless, the painters are apt to end pessimists. For however handsome and merry may be the face, however rich may be the background, in the first rough sketch of each portrait, yet with every added stroke of the brush, with ever modification of the chiaroscuro, the eyes looking out at you grow more disquieting. And, finally, it is your own face that you are staring at in terror, as in a mirror by candlelight, when all the house is still. — Hope Mirrlees

For the Europeans there really is a peace dividend, because we provide the peace. They can afford social democracy without the capacity to defend themselves because they can always depend on the United States.
So why not us as well? Because what for Europe is decadence--decline, in both comfort and relative safety--is for us mere denial. Europe can eat, drink and be merry for America protects her. But for America it's different. If we choose the life of ease, who stands guard for us? — Charles Krauthammer

A Miami judge issued Florida's first gay marriage license yesterday, which makes it the 36th state to legally perform gay marriages. Of course, most Florida residents are too old to understand what that means. They'll say, 'Well, I think all marriages should be gay, and merry.' — Jimmy Fallon

If all the skies were sunshine Our faces would be fain To feel once more upon them The cooling splash of rain. If all the world were music, Our hearts would often long For one sweet strain of silence, To break the endless song If life were always merry, Our souls would seek relief, And rest from weary laughter In the quiet arms of grief. — Henry Van Dyke

Child of the kindly West, I have come to know, if more of us valued your ways - food and cheer above hoarded gold - it would be a merrier world. But sad or merry, I must leave it now. Farewell. — J.R.R. Tolkien

Live, Life, and Be Merry. — Unknown