65 Happy Marriage Quotes That Will Inspire Every Couple

Every couple that’s been married for a significant amount of time is always asked the same question: What’s the secret to a happy marriage? There’s the traditional advice like “never go to bed angry,” and the classic reminder that marriage requires compromise. But in order to live happily ever after, your marriage must be a happy one, filled with the kind of deep passion and radical acceptance that cultivates a blissful bond between two people. Of course, no marriage is happy all the time, but by focusing on your partner’s strengths and expressing your love and appreciation every day, you’ll be celebrating many years of wedded bliss in no time.

To celebrate the joys of marriage, we’ve put together a list of the best happy marriage quotes of all time. Whether you’re engaged, newly married, or going on multiple decades married to the same person, you’ll appreciate these 65 happy marriage quotes from literature, film, comedians, and celebrities.

1. “A happy marriage is a long conversation which always seems too short.” —André Maurois
2. “Happy is the man who finds a true friend, and far happier is he who finds that true friend in his wife.” —Franz Schubert
3. “Sensual pleasures have the fleeting brilliance of a comet; a happy marriage has the tranquility of a lovely sunset.” —Ann Landers
4. “To get the full value of joy you must have someone to divide it with.” —Mark Twain
5. “I love being married. It’s so great to find that one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life.” —Rita Rudner
6. “The secret of a happy marriage is finding the right person. You know they're right if you love to be with them all the time.” —Julia Child
7. “Marriage is like watching the color of leaves in the fall; ever changing and more stunningly beautiful with each passing day.” —Fawn Weaver
8. “The highest happiness on earth is marriage.” —William Lyon Phelps
9. “Marriage is a risk; I think it’s a great and glorious risk, as long as you embark on the adventure in the same spirit.” —Cate Blanchett
10. “A good marriage is one where each partner secretly suspects they got the better deal.” —Unknown
11. “To be fully seen by somebody, then, and be loved anyhow—this is a human offering that can border on miraculous.” —Elizabeth Gilbert
12. "Marriage is like a graph—it has its ups and downs and as long as things bounce back up again, you’ve got a good marriage. If it heads straight down, then you’ve got some problems!" —Julie Andrews
13. “We have a couple of rules in our relationship. The first rule is that I make her feel like she’s getting everything. The second rule is that I actually do let her have her way in everything. And, so far, it’s working.” —Justin Timberlake
14. “I got gaps; you got gaps; we fill each other’s gaps...Love is absolute loyalty. People fade, looks fade, but loyalty never fades. You can depend so much on certain people; you can set your watch by them. And that’s love, even if it doesn’t seem very exciting." —Sylvester Stallone
15. "A simple 'I love you' means more than money." —Frank Sinatra
16. "When you end up happily married, even the failed relationships have worked beautifully to get you there." —Julia Roberts
17. "There's no bad consequence to loving fully, with all your heart. You always gain by giving love. It's like that beautiful Shakespeare quote from Romeo and Juliet: 'My bounty is as boundless as the sea. My love is deep. The more I give to thee, the more I have. For both are infinite.'" —Reese Witherspoon
18. “A happy marriage is the union of two good forgivers.” —Ruth Bell Graham
19. “I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where, I love you directly without problems or pride: I love you like this because I don’t know any other way to love, except in this form in which I am not nor are you, so close that your hand upon my chest is mine, so close that your eyes close with my dreams.” —Pablo Neruda
20. “Some people ask the secret of our long marriage. We take time to go to a restaurant two times a week. A little candlelight, dinner, soft music, and dancing. She goes Tuesdays, I go Fridays." —Henny Youngman
21. “Love recognizes no barriers. It jumps hurdles, leaps fences, penetrates walls to arrive at its destination full of hope.” —Maya Angelou
22. "Love is a friendship set to music." —Joseph Campbell
23. “A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person.” —Mignon McLaughlin
24. “If I had a flower for every time thought of you… I could walk through my garden forever.” —Alfred, Lord Tennyson
25. “Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage.” —Lao Tzu
26. “Every heart sings a song, incomplete, until another heart whispers back. Those who wish to sing always find a song. At the touch of a lover, everyone becomes a poet.” —Plato
27. “Look, you want to know what marriage is really like? Fine. You wake up, she's there. You come back from work, she's there. You fall asleep, she's there. You eat dinner, she's there. You know? I mean, I know that sounds like a bad thing, but it's not." —Ray Romano as Ray Barone on Everybody Loves Raymond
28. “There is no more lovely, friendly, and charming relationship, communion or company than a good marriage.” —Martin Luther
29. “A great marriage is not when the ‘perfect couple’ comes together. It is when an imperfect couple learns to enjoy their differences.” —Dave Meurer
30. "When a marriage works, nothing on Earth can take its place." —Helen Gahagan Douglas
31. "This is what marriage really means: helping one another to reach the full status of being persons, responsible beings who do not run away from life." —Paul Tournier
32. "Almost no one is foolish enough to imagine that he automatically deserves great success in any field of activity, yet almost everyone believes that he automatically deserves success in marriage." —Sydney J. Harris
33. "Love is but the discovery of ourselves in others, and the delight in the recognition." —Alexander Smith
34. “When you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.” —Meg Ryan as Sally Albright in When Harry Met Sally
35. “Love at first sight is easy to understand; it’s when two people have been looking at each other for a lifetime that it becomes a miracle.” —Sam Levenson
36. “To find someone who will love you for no reason, and to shower that person with reasons, that is the ultimate happiness.” —Robert Brault
37. “After a while, you just want to be with the one that makes you laugh.” —Chris Noth as Mr. Big, Sex and the City
38. “Being someone’s first love may be great, but to be their last is beyond perfect.” —Anonymous
39. “The greatest marriages are built on teamwork. A mutual respect, a healthy dose of admiration, and a never-ending portion of love and grace.” —Fawn Weaver
40. “Love doesn’t make the world go round; love is what makes the ride worthwhile.” —Elizabeth Barrett Browning
41. “Love is a temporary madness. It erupts like volcanoes and then subsides. And when it subsides, you have to make a decision. You have to work out whether your roots have so entwined together that it is inconceivable that you should ever part. Because this is what love is.” —Louis de Bernières
42. “There are a hundred paths through the world that are easier than loving. But who wants easier?” —Marry Oliver
43. “I love you not only for what you are, but for what I am when I am with you.” —Roy Croft
44. “Love is like a friendship caught on fire.” —Bruce Lee
45. “Marriage is a mosaic you build with your spouse. Millions of tiny moments that create your love story.” —Jennifer Smith
46. "I have someone who I can talk to about anything and someone who I care more about than I’ve cared about anybody.” —George Clooney
47. “Marriage, ultimately, is the practice of becoming passionate friends.” —Harville Hendrix
48. “Marriage is not a noun; it’s a verb. It isn’t something you get. It’s something you do. It’s the way you love your partner every day.” —Barbara De Angelis
49. “Happy marriages begin when we marry the ones we love, and they blossom when we love the ones we married.” —Tim Mullen
50. “Marriage is the highest state of friendship. If happy, it lessens our cares by dividing them, at the same time that it doubles our pleasures by mutual participation.” —Samuel Richardson
51. “The secret of a happy marriage remains a secret.” —Henny Youngman
52. "Happiness [is] only real when shared." Jon Krakauer, Into the Wild
53. "I married for love but the obvious side benefit of having someone around to find my glasses cannot be ignored." —Cameron Esposito
54. "But once you've actually been in love, you can't live with 'will do;' it's worse than living with yourself." —Andrew Sean Greer, Less
55. "People say, 'Jeez, it must be hard to stay married in show business. I think it's hard to stay married anywhere. But if you marry the right person, it might work out. We give each other a natural sense of support for whatever the other wants to pursue. Our marriage doesn't require vast work." —Tom Hanks
56. “We support each other in everything we do. We want the other one to strive. [It] makes you happy when the other one strives. And you know what, we don’t have a very strong social life because we really like to spend time together. So, we do spend a lot of quality time together." —Salma Hayak
57. "We're friends, too. We love each other, but we actually like each other—and that's an important distinction there. Love is passion and all of that stuff, but actually liking somebody and enjoying someone's company is something slightly different, and it lasts longer. So you can have both, and I think that's important. Be married to your best friend." —Sting
58. "He does tell me every single day of my life I'm beautiful, and I do know a lot of women live without that. And it does matter, someone just telling you that." —Mary Steenburgen
59. "Something my dad says...He says you end up marrying the one you don't understand. Then you spend the rest of your life trying." —Frederik Backman, Anxious People
60. "You don’t stop loving a person when they’re hurt. You get stronger so they can lean on you." —Kristin Hannah, The Great Alone
61. “One of the things that really allows us to get through these moments that are obviously very stressful—we’re talking about the future of the free world—it’s important to be able to laugh at yourself and each other. We do a healthy amount of both of that. We don’t take ourselves too seriously in the context of our relationship. You can’t. You just have to flow and know what’s really important.” —Kamala Harris
62. “The secret is that you just take care of each other and admire each other and support each other and you get that back … If Jeffrey and I disagree on something, he always agrees with me!” —Ina Garten
63. “I felt that I had met someone who I would absolutely, you know, trade my life for. I met someone who—her life meant more to me than my life.” —George Clooney
64. “A good marriage is a contest of generosity.” —Diane Sawyer
65. "When I feel the support that I have from him, I feel invincible. There's someone behind you on your good days and someone in front of you on your bad days." —Emily Blunt