Quote of the Day
Laugh, and the world laughs with you,
weep, and you weep alone.
For the sad old earth must borrow it’s mirth,
but has trouble enough of its own.
Sing and the hills will answer, sigh
it is lost on the air
For the echoes bound to a joyful sound
but shrink from voicing care.Rejoice and men will seek you,
grieve and they turn and go
They want full measure of all your
pleasure but do not need your woe.
Be glad and your friends are many,
be sad and you’ll lose them all
There are none to decline your nectared wine
but alone you must drink life’s gall.Feast and your halls are crowded,
fast and the world goes by
Succeed and give and it helps you live
but no man can help you die.
There is room in the halls of pleasure
for a long and lordly train
But one by one we must all file on
through the narrow aisles of painElla Wheeler Wilcox
Solitude
February 25, 1883
Over 40 years ago I wrote a program to give me a random quote every time my computer booted up. I still use that program. Instead of on boot, it runs when I start up a new instance of a command prompt. The quote above appeared a few minutes ago. I don’t remember putting the quote in the collection. But like a lot of others in the collection, it resonates with me. Perhaps, in these troubled times, it will resonate with you as well and give you some direction to better days ahead.
I asked Grok for the original publish date and received a little more than what I asked for:
It was first published on February 25, 1883, in The New York Sun newspaper. (Some sources note slight variations like February 21, but February 25 is the most consistently cited date across reliable references.)
The poem later appeared in her collection Poems of Passion, released in May 1883, which became a major bestseller.
The inspiration came from an incident on a train where Wilcox observed contrasting emotions—a joyful group and a grieving widow—leading to the insight that joy is shared, but sorrow is often solitary. She reportedly earned just $5 for the initial newspaper publication.