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Poverty quotes

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“'Tis hard for an empty bag to stand upright.” Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

“If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.” John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address

“the less you have, the more you are required to boast.” John Steinbeck, East of Eden

“Capitalism – which in its purest form is entrepreneurism even among the poorest of the poor – does work; but those who make money from it should put back into society, not just sit on it as if they are hatching eggs.” Richard Branson, Losing My Virginity

“No complaint, however, is more common than that of a scarcity of money.” Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations

“Who, being loved, is poor?” Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance

“Every citizen, it is said, must have equality, and therefore in a democracy the poor have more power than the rich, because there are more of them, and the will of the majority is supreme.” Aristotle, Politics

“In the long run, a hierarchical society was only possible on a basis of poverty and ignorance.” George Orwell, 1984

“Really, if the lower orders don't set us a good example, what on earth is the use of them?” Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest

“Better poverty without care, than riches with.” Aesop, Aesop's Fables

“If you’re in trouble or hurt or need—go to poor people. They’re the only ones that’ll help—the only ones.” John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath

“As long as we look to legislation to cure poverty or to abolish special privilege we are going to see poverty spread and special privilege grow.” Henry Ford, My Life and Work

“If your everyday life seems poor, don’t blame it; blame yourself; admit to yourself that you are not enough of a poet to call forth its riches; because for the creator there is not poverty and no poor, indifferent place.” Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

“The world is very different now, for man holds in his mortal hands the power to abolish all forms of human poverty and all forms of human life.” John F. Kennedy, Inaugural Address

“If he needs a million acres to make him feel rich, seems to me he needs it ’cause he feels awful poor inside hisself, and if he’s poor in hisself, there ain’t no million acres gonna make him feel rich, an’ maybe he’s disappointed that...” John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath

“The happy and the powerful do not go into exile, and there are no surer guarantees of equality among men than poverty and misfortune.” Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America

“The burden of poverty isn’t just that you don’t always have the things you need, it’s the feeling of being embarrassed every day of your life, and you’d do anything to lift that burden.” JAY-Z, Decoded

“One of the reasons inequality gets so deep in this country is that everyone wants to be rich. That’s the American ideal. Poor people don’t like talking about poverty because even though they might live in the projects surrounded by other poor...” JAY-Z, Decoded

“I encountered in the street, a very poor young man who was in love. His hat was old, his coat was worn, his elbows were in holes; water trickled through his shoes, and the stars through his soul.” Victor Hugo, Les Misérables

“We have grown literally afraid to be poor. We despise any one who elects to be poor in order to simplify and save his inner life. If he does not join the general scramble and pant with the money-making street, we deem him spiritless and lacking...” William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience

“My friends, some years ago, the Federal Government declared war on poverty, and poverty won.” Ronald Reagan, State of the Union Address

“What you must do, with money and the poor, is never let them get too close to one another.” Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“A man being sometimes more generous when he has but a little money than when he has plenty, perhaps thro' fear of being thought to have but little.” Benjamin Franklin, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin

“What a weary time those years were—to have the desire and the need to live but not the ability.” Charles Bukowski, Ham on Rye

“poverty is the parent of revolution and crime.” Aristotle, Politics

“It is not theft, properly speaking, to take secretly and use another's property in a case of extreme need: because that which he takes for the support of his life becomes his own property by reason of that need.” Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica

“The affluence of the rich excites the indignation of the poor, who are often both driven by want, and prompted by envy to invade his possessions.” Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations

“he who possesseth little is so much the less possessed: blessed be moderate poverty!” Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra

“Wealth, I said, and poverty; the one is the parent of luxury and indolence, and the other of meanness and viciousness, and both of discontent.” Plato, The Republic

“Do you think, because I am poor, obscure, plain, and little, I am soulless and heartless? You think wrong! —I have as much soul as you,—and full as much heart!” Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“Industry is the ceaseless piracy of the rich against the poor.” Emma Goldman, Anarchism and Other Essays

“There is only one class in the community that thinks more about money than the rich, and that is the poor. The poor can think of nothing else.” Oscar Wilde, The Soul of Man under Socialism

“Our people are good people; our people are kind people. Pray God some day kind people won’t all be poor.” John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath

“The great principle of out-of-door relief is, to give the paupers exactly what they don't want; and then they get tired of coming.” Charles Dickens, Oliver Twist

“Today, however, we have to realize that a true ecological approach always becomes a social approach; it must integrate questions of justice in debates on the environment, so as to hear both the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor.” Pope Francis, Laudato si'

“Wherever they’s a fight so hungry people can eat, I’ll be there.” John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath

“She bears a duke's revenues on her back, and in her heart she scorns our poverty.” William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 2

“It is not difficult to be alone if you are poor and a failure. An artist is always alone—if he is an artist. No, what the artist needs is loneliness.” Henry Miller, Tropic of Cancer

“I said, let my body dwell in poverty, and my hands be as the hands of the toiler: but let my soul be as a temple of remembrance where the treasures of knowledge enter and the inner sanctuary is hope.” George Eliot, Daniel Deronda

“the rebellions of the belly are the worst.” Francis Bacon, The Essays of Francis Bacon

Related topics

love money power need virtue knowledge wealth help life freedom possession contempt hunger heart kindness youth burden democracy desire loneliness

Related authors

Charles Bukowski (2)
John Steinbeck (5)
Oscar Wilde (3)
John F. Kennedy (2)
Benjamin Franklin (2)
Aristotle (2)
JAY-Z (2)
Adam Smith (2)
Plato (1)
William Shakespeare (1)
George Orwell (1)
Victor Hugo (1)
Rainer Maria Rilke (1)
Friedrich Nietzsche (1)
Charles Dickens (1)
Charlotte Brontë (1)
Aesop (1)
Richard Branson (1)
Alexis de Tocqueville (1)
George Eliot (1)

Related sources

The Grapes of Wrath (4)
The Wealth of Nations (2)
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin (2)
Decoded (2)
Inaugural Address (2)
Ham on Rye (2)
Politics (2)
East of Eden (1)
Losing My Virginity (1)
The Importance of Being Earnest (1)
Les Misérables (1)
Thus Spoke Zarathustra (1)
A Woman of No Importance (1)
The Soul of Man under Socialism (1)
Jane Eyre (1)
Democracy in America (1)
The Essays of Francis Bacon (1)
State of the Union Address (1)
Aesop's Fables (1)
The Republic (1)