Enjoyment, Secret of
Illustration★★Life is made up of minutes, and its happiness of corresponding little pleasures: the wise man secures the atoms as they flit past him, and thus becomes owner of the aggregate. Making every cir cumstance of life—sensuous, moral, and intellectual—and every day and hour, contribute a little something, he finds that though a brilliant and memorable pleasure may come but twice or thrice, the sectet of a happy life is nevertheless his own.
That fine secret is not so much to lay plans for acquiring happy days, as to pluck our enjoyment on the spot; in other words, to spend that time in being happy, which so many lose in deliberating and scheming how to become so. Grindon. $377. ENJOYMENTS, Temporary. Every comfortable enjoyment, whether it be in relations, estate, health, or friends, is a candle lighted by Providence for our comfort in this world: and they are but candles, which will not always last: and those that last longest will at length be consumed and wasted.
But oftentimes it falls out with them as with candles—they are blown out before they are half consumed. Flavel,
The point
Two spliced sayings: happiness is found by seizing small daily pleasures, and every earthly comfort is a candle from Providence that will eventually burn out.