Happiness...

Happiness lies in thinking or doing that which one considers beautiful.

Bowl of Saki, December 31, by Hazrat Inayat Khan

Commentary by Pir-o-Murshid Inayat Khan:

What is really good? The answer is, there is no such thing as good or evil.
There is beauty. That which is beautiful, we call good. That which is ugly
compared with the beautiful, we call evil: whether it is custom, idea, thought
or action. This shows that this whole phenomenon of the universe is the
phenomenon of beauty. Every soul has an inclination to admire beauty, to seek
for beauty, to love beauty, and to develop beauty. Even God loves beauty.

In all ages the various religions have given different standards of good and
evil, calling them virtue and sin. The virtue of one nation has been the sin of
another. The virtue of the latter is the sin of the former. Travel as we may
through the world, or read the histories and traditions of nations as we may, we
shall still find that what one calls evil, another calls good. That is why no
one can succeed in making a universal standard for good and evil. The
discrimination between good and evil is in man's soul. Every man can judge that
for himself, because in every man is the sense of admiration of beauty. But he
is not satisfied with what he does himself, he feels a discomfort, a disgust
with his own efforts. There are many people who continue some weakness or some
mistake, or who are intoxicated by some action which the world calls evil or
which they themselves call evil, yet go on doing it. But a day comes when they
also are disgusted. Then they wish for suicide. There is no more happiness for
them. Happiness only lies in thinking or doing that which one considers
beautiful. Such an act becomes a virtue or goodness. That goodness is beauty.

Man is always seeking for beauty, and yet he is unaware of the treasure of
beauty that is hidden in his own heart. He strives after it throughout his whole
life. It is as if he was in pursuit of the horizon: the further he proceeds, the
further the horizon seems to have moved away. For there are two aims: the one is
real, and the other false. That which is false is momentary, transitory, and
unreliable - wealth, power, fame, and position are all snatched from one hand by
the other. ... Man wants something in life upon which he can rely; and this
shows, whether he believes in a deity or not, that he is constantly seeking for
God. He seeks for Him not knowing that he is seeking for God. Nevertheless,
every soul is pursuing some reality, something to hold on to; trying to grasp
something which will prove dependable, a beauty that cannot change and that one
can always look upon as one's own, a beauty that one feels will last forever.
And where can one find it? Within one's own heart. And it is the art of finding
that beauty, of developing, improving, and spreading that beauty through life,
allowing it to manifest before the inner and outer view, which one calls the art
of the mystic.