“Happiness in the ordinary sense is not what one needs in life, though one is right to aim at it.”

— E. M. Forster, Letter to Florence Barger (11 February 1922)

About E. M. Forster

1879 – 1970

English novelist, author of "A Room with a View" and "A Passage to India".

“Either life entails courage, or it ceases to be life.”

“Poetry is a spirit; and they that would worship it must worship in spirit and in truth.”

“Music is the deepest of the arts and deep beneath the arts.”

Attribution note: Source disputed or unverified.

“Happiness is the meaning and the purpose of life, the whole aim and end of human existence.”

Attribution note: Source disputed or unverified.

“If you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not to people or things.”

“Why does this magnificent applied science which saves work and makes life easier bring us so little happiness?”

“We think a happy life consists in tranquility of mind.”

“The happiness of men consists in life. And life is in labor.”

“There is only one enduring happiness in life—to live for others.”