"Health and happiness" and "May all your troubles be little ones" are the most common wedding toasts. They have become cliche. Some options:
A Second Marriage: To the triumph of hope over experience.
-Samuel Johnson,1770
A toast to love and laughter and happily ever after.
A toast to the groom-and discretion to his bachelor friends.
Down the hatch, to a striking match!
Drink, my buddies, drink with discerning,
Wedlock's a lane where there is no turning;
Never was owl more blind than lover;
Drink and be merry, lads; and think it over.
-Bachelor party toast
Grow old with me!
The best is yet to be,
The last of life,
For which, the first is made.
-Robert Browning
Here's to my mother-in-law's daughter,
Here's to her father-in-law's son;
And here's to the vows we've just taken,
And the life we've just begun.
Here's to the bride and mother-in-law,
Here's to the groom and father-in law,
Here's to sister and brother-in-law,
Here's to friends and friends-in-law,
May none of them need an attorney-at-law.
Here's to thee and thy folks from me and my folks;
And if thee and they folks love me and my folks
As much as me and my folks love thee and thy folks,
Then there never was folks since folks was folks
Loved me and my folks as much as thee and thy folks.
Here's to the Bride and the Groom!
May you have a happy honeymoon,
May you lead a happy life,
May you have a bunch of money soon,
And live without all strife.
Here's to the bride that is to be,
Here's to the groom she'll wed,
May all their troubles be light as bubbles
Or the feathers that make up their bed!
Here's to the groom with bride so fair,
And here's to the bride with groom so rare!
Here's to the happy man: All the world loves a lover.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson
Here's to the husband-and here's to the wife;
May they remain lovers for life.
I drink to myself and one other,
And may that one other be he
Who drinks to himself and one other,
and may that one other be me.
It is written:
"When children find true love,
parents find true joy."
Here's to your joy and ours,
from this day forward
-Parents' toast
Let us toast the health of the bride;
Let us toast the health of the groom,
Let us toast the person that tied;
Let us toast every guest in the room.
Look down you gods,
And on this couple drop a blessed crown.
-Shakespeare
Love, be true to her; Life, be dear to her;
Health, stay close to her; Joy, draw near to her;
Fortune, find what you can do for her,
Search your treasure-house through and through for her,
Follow her footsteps the wide world over-
And keep her husband always her lover.
-Anna LEWIS, "To the Bride"
Marriage: A community consisting of a master, a mistress, and two slaves-making in all, two.
-Ambrose Bierce
Marriage has teeth, and him bit very hot.
--Jamaican proverb
Marriage is a wonderful institution, but who wants to live in an institution.
-Groucho Marx
May their joys be as bright as the morning, and their sorrows but shadows that fade in the sunlight of love.
May their joys be as deep as the ocean
And their misfortunes as light as the foam.
May we all live to be present at their Golden Wedding.
May you grow old on one pillow.
-Armenian
May you have many children
and may they grow as mature in taste
and healthy in color
and as sought after
as the contents of this glass.
-Irish
May you live forever, may I never die.
May your love be as endless as your wedding rings.
May your wedding days be few and your anniversaries many.
May you have enough happiness to keep you sweet; enough trials to keep you strong; enough sorrow to keep you human; enough hope to keep you happy; enough failure to keep you humble; enough success to keep you eager; enough friends to give you comfort; enough faith and courage in yourself, your business, and your country to banish depression; enough wealth to meet your needs; enough determination to make each day a better day than yesterday.
Needles and pins, needles and pins
When a man marries his trouble begins.
Never above you. Never below you. Always beside you.
-Walter Winchell
The greatest of all arts is the art of living together.
-William Lyon Phelps
There is nothing nobler or more admirable than when two people who see eye to eye keep house as man and wife, confounding their enemies and delighting their friends.
-Homer, Odyssey,ninth century B.C.
These two, now standing hand in hand,
Remind us of our native land,
For when today they linked their fates,
They entered the United States.
To my wife,
My bride and joy.
To the newly weds: May "for better or worse" be far better than worse.
You don't marry one person; you marry three-the person you think they are, the person they are, and the person they are going to become as the result of being married to you.
-Richard Needham, You and All the Rest,
edited by Jean Shagbaum
(M. Sutkiewicz, Toronto) quoted in
Reader's Digest, December 1983
You only get married for the second time once.
-Garrison KEILLOR,
quoted in Forbes, November 2, 1987
Wedlock's like wine-not properly judged of till the second glass.
-Ernest Jarrold