The possession of gold has ruined fewer men than the lack of it. What noble enterprises have been checked and what fine souls have been blighted in the gloom of poverty the world will never know. Thomas Bailey Aldrich
Poverty has, in large cities, very different appearances; it is often concealed in splendor, and often in extravagance. Samuel Johnson
We who are liberal and progressive know that the poor are our equals in every sense except that of being equal to us. Lionel Trilling
Poverty is very good in poems, but it is very bad in a house. It is very good in maxims and in sermons, but it is very bad in practical life. Henry Ward Beecher
Love and business and family and religion and art and patriotism are nothing but shadows of words when a man’s starving. O. Henry
A man willing to work, and unable to find work, is perhaps the saddest sight that fortune’s inequality exhibits under this sun. Thomas Carlyle
Poverty with joy is not poverty at all. The poor man is not one who has little, but one who hankers after more. Seneca
Unhappiness doesn't grow on the chest like leprosy. Poverty won't fall off the roof like a loose tile, no; poverty and unhappiness are man’s doing. Bertolt Brecht
An empty stomach will not listen to anything. Proverb
For the poor of this world, two major ways of expiring are available; either by the absolute indifference of your fellow men in peacetime, or by the homicidal passion of these same when war breaks out. Louis Ferdinand Celine
To be a poor man is hard, but to be a poor race in a land of dollars is the very bottom of hardships. W. E. B. Du Bois
The strong demand, contend, prevail; the beggar is a fool. Georgia Douglas Johnson
Moral principle is a looser bond than pecuniary interest. Abraham Lincoln
All the arguments which are brought to represent poverty as no evil show it to be evidently a great evil. You never find people laboring to convince you that you may live very happily upon a plentiful fortune. Samuel Johnson
To be without some of the things you want is an indispensable part of happiness. Bertrand Russell
Those who have not, and live in want, are a menace. Ridden with envy and fooled by demagogues. Euripides
An earthquake achieves what the law promises but does not in practice maintain the equality of all men. Ignazio Silone
For every talent that poverty has stimulated it has blighted a hundred. John W. Gardner
The poor don't know that their function in life is to exercise our generosity. Jean Paul Sartre
You may not know it, but at the far end of despair, there is a white clearing where one is almost happy. Jean Anouilh
Three were the fates. Poverty that chains; gray drudgery that grinds the hope away, and gaping ignorance that starves the soul. Edwin Markham
Hunger is the teacher of the arts and bestows invention. Persius
There is always more misery among the lower classes than there is humanity in the higher. Victor Hugo
It is extraordinary how many emotional storms one may weather in safety if one is ballasted with ever so little gold. William MC Fee
In a change of government, the poor change nothing beyond the change of their master. Phaedrus
God gives almonds to those who have no teeth. Proverb
It is not poverty so much as pretense that harasses a ruined man; the struggle between a proud man and an empty purse; the keeping up of a hollow show that must soon come to an end. Washington Irving
A hungry man is not a free man. Adlai Stevenson
It is easy enough to say that poverty is no crime. No; if it were, men wouldn't be ashamed of it. It’s a blunder, though, and is punished as such. Jerome K. Jerome
We know well only what we are deprived of. Francois Mauriac
Some men make money not for the sake of living; but ache in the blindness of greed and live just for their fortunes sake. Juvenal
Poverty is no disgrace, but no honor either. Proverb
If you would know what the Lord God thinks of money, you have only to look at those to whom he gives it. Maurice Baring
To eat bread without hope is still slowly to starve to death. Pearl S. Buck
Beggars should be abolished entirely. Verily, it is annoying to give to them and it is annoying not to give to them. Nietzsche
Short of genius, a rich man cannot imagine poverty. Charles Peguy
Pearls around the neck; stones upon the heart. Proverb
