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Know your own happiness. You want nothing but patience—or give it a more fascinating name: call it hope.
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“Know your own happiness. You want nothing but patience—or give it a more fascinating name: call it hope.”

Jane Austen

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Source
Sense and Sensibility
Date
1811
Local voice
Fictional character · Mrs. Dashwood
Meaning

Meaning of “Know your own happiness. You want nothing but…”

Happiness can depend less on dramatic change than on recognizing what is already possible and waiting without giving up.

Source context

Where does it come from?

Sense and Sensibility.

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Speaker context

Why the local voice matters

Mrs. Dashwood says this to Edward Ferrars in Sense and Sensibility while answering his despondency.

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Themes

Ideas connected with this quotation

HappinessHope Quotes About Possibility in Uncertain TimesInspirational Quotes About Hope, Courage & PossibilityJoyLifeLife AdviceMotivation For LifeOptimism Quotes About Constructive ExpectationPatiencePositive Quotes About a Constructive OutlookWisdom Quotes About Judgment & Living WellWaitingWords of Wisdom: Practical & Philosophical Counsel
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Source identified
All human wisdom is summed up in these two words,—‘Wait and hope.’
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“All human wisdom is summed up in these two words,—‘Wait and hope.’”

Alexandre Dumas · The Count of Monte Cristo · 1846
Meaning & context

At the novel’s close, the Count reduces his hard-earned counsel to patience joined with hope rather than certainty about what the future will bring.

Source details

The Count of Monte Cristo, closing letter, Project Gutenberg #1184, in the represented public-domain English translation. Edmond Dantès writes the advice to Morrel and Valentine; the English wording is translation-specific and is fictional counsel, not a direct English-language aphorism authored by Dumas.

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Source identified
With the first word I used intelligently, I learned to live, to think, to hope.
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“With the first word I used intelligently, I learned to live, to think, to hope.”

Helen Keller · Optimism: An Essay · 1903
Meaning & context

Language is remembered as opening several capacities at once—thought, hope and a fuller experience of living—rather than merely adding a vocabulary item.

Source details

Optimism: An Essay (1903), Project Gutenberg #31622. Keller is reflecting on her own early experience of language and education.

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Life is a boundless privilege.
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“Life is a boundless privilege.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson · The Conduct of Life · 1860
Meaning & context

The sentence frames existence as abundant possibility rather than mere duration, encouraging attention to what can still be learned, attempted, appreciated, and created.

Source details

The Conduct of Life; Emerson uses the line while describing life as an expanding field of experience rather than a narrowly fixed allotment.

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Sweet are the uses of adversity.
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“Sweet are the uses of adversity.”

William Shakespeare · As You Like It · c. 1599
Voice: Fictional character · Duke Senior
Meaning & context

Adversity is presented as capable of yielding insight or value even when the experience itself is unwelcome.

Source details

As You Like It, Act II, Scene 1, Duke Senior; 1919 Yale Shakespeare edition edited by Jack R. Crawford, printed page 24 / Wikisource scan leaf 36. “Sweet are the uses of adversity” occurs in Duke Senior’s Forest of Arden reflection on exile, winter and the lessons he claims to find outside court life. It remains fictional dramatic speech rather than Shakespeare’s autobiographical advice or a modern psychological claim about hardship.

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