On the Unalterable Truth to 'Happiness' or 'Suffering.'

It seems that we are constantly fighting a battle.

It is, in many regards, an imaginary battle inside of our brains, and perhaps it proves the AdBusters slogan that "World War III will be fought inside our minds."
As a species, we are going through a stage of great transition, in which spiritual certainties have been tossed out of the mainstream and into obscurity, and replaced by both scientifically-driven uncertainty, or scientifically motivated pushes for some sort of objective certainty.
In many circles, it seems to have been established that 'happiness' resides outside of the scientific truths, and resides only in what staunch scientists would consider to be the naive minds of the spiritually certain.
This is epitomized in Voltaire's quote: "Happiness is an illusion; only suffering is real."

Now, the strange thing is, Voltaire himself did not seem like a generally unhappy person. Although it is undeniable that he went through plenty of trials during his lifetime (as all human beings naturally do), he lived a full and exciting life with many critics and many fans, and just as many enemies and allies.
One thing to note in reading quotations of any sort is that truth is spoken in every single one of them, the above quotation included.

However, this is a hypocrisy as there are plenty of other quotations that support happiness as an unalterable truth, and others that tell us it is alright to commit homicide, genocide, or (God forbid) even infanticide. There is more power in any and all words that are given the extra merit of quotation marks followed by a dash and the italicized name of the individual who spoke them, which is undoubtedly added to if the individual has been dead for years, decades, centuries, or millenia and therefore has been cemented as having spoken a truth that appeals to an objective reality.

Wisdom, in all cases, supersedes intellectual ability and one must have both in order to be a true and honest intellectual. One of the many honest truths in life is that there is no single and objective honest truth regarding anything at all. Even your very existence is infinitely questionable. Our current struggle for happiness and our seeming inabilities to obtain said happiness arises most prominently from within ourselves as opposed to external societal pressures (although said pressures are a contributor), and can be found in our lust to pursue it. Voltaire is correct when he says 'happiness' is an illusion in the sense that we seem to lust for it as we lust for so many other feelings and things within our lives, and hence, feel the need to pursue it, expending all of our time, energy, and resources on things that may have satisfied us for a moment, but always leave us disillusioned in the long-run when we consider that it was a nice kick while it lasted, but only while it lasted. Hence, we continue to 'pursue' happiness as if it's something that can and should be caught, as Benjamin Franklin suggested. It is essentially these predetermined expectations remaining eternally unfulfilled that lead to our endless sufferings, whether it is something as complicated as existential suffering, or as simple as unrequited love or a lack of general satisfaction. 'Suffering,' to, is just as much an illusion as the expected happiness outlined above, and is only reached when someone gives up on their long-term goal of 'one day becoming happy,' and instead decides to live exclusively in the present; or, not so much 'live' in the present as 'die' in the present. The human mind, one must realize, is a delusion generator, even in the minds of the giants upon whose shoulders we stand (ironically, probably more often in their minds as opposed to others as they have both a vast conscious and unconscious ability of thought which can find the time and energy to prove and justify just about anything quite convincingly and credibly).  

The truth is that both 'happiness' and 'suffering' are nothing but ideas. Words used to define and categorize intrinsically intangible aspects of our experiences, placing them in a box of thought and selling them as this, that, or the other thing. 'Happiness' and 'suffering' are both blanket terms which can, should, and are used in an attempt to describe or define many different things; from physical pleasure to physical pain, psychological contentedness to psychological discontent, satisfaction to frustration, and so on and so forth, all of which are, in themselves, a micromanaged attempt to define and categorize intangible experiences. It is when one realizes that most of their 'happiness' or 'suffering' arises from a tug of war between conceptual ideas both claiming, at different capacities, to be an objective truth, and which can create deep inner turmoil for those who make an attempt to buy into one or the other, or see one or the other as potentially being the one and only objective truth, that one can take a step back from everything. Once that step back has been taken, the individual will notice that each and every quote, claim, religion, scientific theory, and individual outlook speaks a truth. But not an inalienable, all-enveloping truth. Just a truth in a universe that does not even recognize truth, as truth is nothing but an idea as well, and is simply one of the many words we use in an attempt to define the intangible.

Does that make it any less honest?

Of course not. Have faith in yourself and in others, and have faith in the universe as well. Beyond these 3 aspects of life, have faith in anything you wish to have faith in.

"The only thing that we know is that we know nothing, and that is the highest flight of human wisdom." -Aristotle.

And wisdom seems to be something that the world today lacks quite abundantly.