The-Conquest-of-Happiness-by-Bertrand-Russell

as a good example, have in them no element of this
contact with Earth. Such pleasures, in the instant
when they cease, leave a man feeling dusty and
dissatisfied, hungry for he knows not what. Such
pleasures bring nothing that can be called joy.
Those, on the other hand, that bring us into contact
with the life of the Earth have something in them
profoundly satisfying; when they cease, the
happiness that they brought remains, although their
intensity while they existed may have been less
than that of more exciting dissipations.
The destination that I have in mind runs through the
whole gamut from the simplest to the most
civilised occupations. The two-year-old boy
whom I spoke of a moment ago displayed the most
primitive possible form of union with the life of
Earth. But in a higher form the same thing is to be
found in poetry. What makes Shakespeare’s lyrics
supreme is that they are filled with this same joy
that made the two-year-old embrace the grass.
Consider ‘Hark, hark, the lark’, or ‘Come unto
these yellow sands’; you will find in these poems