The secret of happiness is to admire without desiring. And that is not happiness.
—F. H. Bradley (1846–1924) British Philosopher
The darkest hour in the history of any young man is when he sits down to study how to get money without honestly earning it.
—Horace Greeley (1811–72) American Elected Rep, Politician, Reformer, Editor
Happiness seems to require a modicum of external prosperity.
—Aristotle (384BCE–322BCE) Ancient Greek Philosopher, Scholar
October. This is one of the peculiarly dangerous months to speculate in stocks. The others are July, January, September, April, November, May, March, June, December, August, and February.
—Mark Twain (1835–1910) American Humorist
Money doesn’t mind if we say it’s evil, it goes from strength to strength. It’s a fiction, an addiction, and a tacit conspiracy.
—Martin Amis (b.1949) American Novelist, Short Story Writer
Beware of little expenses; a small leak will sink a great ship.
—Benjamin Franklin (1706–90) American Political leader, Inventor, Diplomat, Author
Friends love misery, in fact. Sometimes, especially if we are too lucky or too successful or too pretty, our misery is the only thing that endears us to our friends.
—Erica Jong (b.1942) American Novelist, Poet, Writer
A man with a surplus can control circumstances, but a man without a surplus is controlled by them, and often he has no opportunity to exercise judgment.
—Harvey Samuel Firestone (1868–1938) American Businessperson
Do not value money for any more nor any less than its worth; it is a good servant but a bad master.
—Alexandre Dumas, fils (1824–95) French Author, Playwright
The contempt of money is no more a virtue than to wash one’s hand is one; but one does not willingly shake hands with a man that never washes his.
—Hugh Walpole (1884–1941) English Novelist, Short Story Writer, Dramatist
Money, or even power, can never yield happiness unless it be accompanied by the goodwill of others.
—B. C. Forbes (1880–1954) Scottish-born American Journalist, Publisher
A man is usually more careful of his money than of his principles.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. (1841–1935) American Jurist, Justice, Author
Foul cankering rust the hidden treasure frets,|But gold that’s put to use more gold begets.
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
All money means to me is a pride in accomplishment.
—Ray Kroc (1902–84) American Entrepreneur, Businessperson
It frees you from doing things you dislike. Since I dislike doing nearly everything, money is handy.
—Groucho Marx (1890–1977) American Actor, Comedian, Singer
Money is neither my god nor my devil. It is a form of energy that tends to make us more of who we already are, whether it’s greedy or loving.
—Dan Millman (b.1946) American Children’s Books Writer, Sportsperson
I pity that man who wants a coat so cheap that the man or woman who produces the cloth shall starve in the process.
—Benjamin Harrison (1833–1901) American Political leader, Politician, Lawyer
All currency is neurotic currency.
—Norman O. Brown (1913–2002) American Philosopher
The price we have to pay for money is sometimes liberty.
—Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–94) Scottish Novelist
No man can tell whether he is rich or poor by turning to his ledger. It is the heart that makes a man rich. He is rich according to what he is, not according to what he has.
—Henry Ward Beecher (1813–87) American Protestant Clergyman, Social Reformer, Abolitionist
Money is a terrible master but an excellent servant.
—P. T. Barnum (1810–91) American Businessperson, Entertainer
I really don’t like talking about money. All I can say is that the Good Lord must have wanted me to have it.
—Larry Bird (b.1956) American Sportsperson
The love of money is the root of all evil.
—The Holy Bible Scripture in the Christian Faith
The covetous man never has money; the prodigal will have none shortly.
—Ben Jonson (1572–1637) English Dramatist, Poet, Actor
I am looking for a lot of men who have an infinite capacity to not know what can’t be done. If money is your hope for independence you will never have it. The only real security that a man will have in this world is a reserve of knowledge, experience, and ability.
—Henry Ford (1863–1947) American Businessperson, Engineer
Put not your trust in money, but put your money in trust.
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–94) American Physician
Money cannot buy peace of mind. It cannot heal ruptured relationships, or build meaning into a life that has none.
—Richard DeVos (b.1926) American Businessperson
It requires a great deal of boldness and a great deal of caution to make a great fortune, and when you have got it, it requires ten times as much wit to keep it.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
I don’t care too much for money, money can’t buy me love.
—John Lennon (1940–80) British Singer, Songwriter, Musician, Activist
He who lends money on usury consumes his own as well as the stranger’s.
—The Talmud Sacred Text of the Jewish Faith
A wise man should have money in his head, but not in his heart.
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745) Irish Satirist
In this world there are only two tragedies. One is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it. The last is much the worst; the last is a real tragedy!
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet
Money is multiplied in practical value depending on the number of W’s you control in your life: what you do, when you do it, where you do it, and with whom you do it. I call this the freedom multiplier.
—Tim Ferriss
The great rule is not to talk about money with people who have much more or much less than you.
—Katharine Whitehorn (b.1928) English Journalist, Writer, Columnist
Few rich men own their own property. Their property owns them.
—Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–99) American Atheist Politician, Orator, Social Critic, Essayist
Money is much more exciting than anything it buys.
—Mignon McLaughlin (1913–83) American Journalist, Author
Wealth may be like waters gathered in a house, which, finding no outlet, drown the owner.
—The Talmud Sacred Text of the Jewish Faith
What’s money? A man is a success if he gets up in the morning and gets to bed at night and in between does what he wants to do.
—Bob Dylan (b.1941) American Singer, Songwriter, Musician
If you can actually count your money, then you’re not a rich man.
—J. Paul Getty (1892–1976) American Business Person, Art Collector, Philanthropist
Successful people make money. It’s not that people who make money become successful, but that successful people attract money. They bring success to what they do.
—Wayne Dyer (b.1940) American Motivational Writer, Author, Motivational Speaker
Money never made a fool of anybody; it only shows them up.
—Elbert Hubbard (1856–1915) American Writer, Publisher, Artist, Philosopher
He is rich who enjoys what he possesseth.
—The Talmud Sacred Text of the Jewish Faith
Money is like manure; it’s not worth a thing unless it’s spread around encouraging young things to grow.
—Thornton Wilder (1897–1975) American Novelist, Playwright
When it is a question of money, everybody is of the same religion.
—Voltaire (1694–1778) French Philosopher
Let us keep a firm grip upon our money, for without it the whole assembly of virtues are but as blades of grass.
—Bhartruhari
The Law of Triviality… briefly stated, it means that the time spent on any item of the agenda will be in inverse proportion to the sum involved.
—C. Northcote Parkinson (1909–93) British Historian, Scholar, Novelist, Satirist
My old father used to have a saying: If you make a bad bargain, hug it all the tighter.
—Abraham Lincoln (1809–65) American Head of State
Draw your salary before spending it.
—Charles Farrar Browne (Artemus Ward) (1834–67) American Humorist, Writer
What a man does with his wealth depends upon his idea of happiness. Those who draw prizes in life are apt to spend tastelessly, if not viciously; not knowing that it requires as much talent to spend as to make.
—Edwin Percy Whipple (1819–86) American Essayist, Literary Critic
The fortune of this world is like a wheel with two buckets, the full becomes empty and the empty full.
—The Talmud Sacred Text of the Jewish Faith
Oh, I wish I were a miser; being a miser must be so occupying.
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946) American Writer
The goal should not be to make money or acquire things, but to achieve the consciousness through which the substance will flow forth when and as you need it.
—Eric Butterworth
I don’t want to make money. I just want to be wonderful.
—Marilyn Monroe (1926–62) American Actor, Model, Singer
A treasure is to be valued for its own sake and not for what it will buy.
—Graham Greene (1904–91) British Novelist, Playwright, Short Story Writer
Money is life to us wretched mortals.
—Hesiod (b.1493) Greek Poet, Economist
If anything is evident about people who manage money, it is that the task attracts a very low level of talent, one that is protected in its highly imperfect profession by the mystery that is thought to enfold the subject of economics in general and of money in particular.
—John Kenneth Galbraith (1908–2006) Canadian-born American Economist
Money makes even bastards legitimate.
—The Talmud Sacred Text of the Jewish Faith
Let us all be happy, and live within our means, even if we have to borrow the money to do it with.
—Charles Farrar Browne (Artemus Ward) (1834–67) American Humorist, Writer
Capital is to the progress of society what gas is to a car.
—James Truslow Adams (1878–1949) American Historian, Writer
Money won’t buy happiness, but it will pay the salaries of a huge research staff to study the problem.
—Burton Hillis (William E. Vaughan) (1915–77) American Columnist, Author
The higher men climb,|the longer their working day.|There are no office hours for leaders.
—James Gibbons (1834–1921) American Catholic Religious Leader, Clergyman
“Your money, or your life”. We know what to do when a burglar makes this demand of us, but not when God does.
—Mignon McLaughlin (1913–83) American Journalist, Author
Make all you can, save all you can, give all you can.
—John Wesley (1703–91) British Methodist Religious Leader, Preacher, Theologian
When you let money speak for you, it drowns out anything else you meant to say.
—Mignon McLaughlin (1913–83) American Journalist, Author
It was said of old Sarah, Duchess of Marlborough, that she never puts dots over her I s, to save ink.
—Hugh Walpole (1884–1941) English Novelist, Short Story Writer, Dramatist
The only thing that can console one for being poor is extravagance. The only thing that can console one for being rich is economy.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet
A woman’s mink coat represents the sacrifice of a lot of little animals, including her husband.
—Mignon McLaughlin (1913–83) American Journalist, Author
In its famous paradox, the equation of money and excrement, psychoanalysis becomes the first science to state what common sense and the poets have long known — that the essence of money is in its absolute worthlessness.
—Norman O. Brown (1913–2002) American Philosopher
There are people who have money and people who are rich.
—Coco Chanel (1883–1971) French Fashion Designer
Money makes a good servant, but a bad master.
—Francis Bacon (1561–1626) English Philosopher
There is only one class in the community that thinks more about money than the rich, and that is the poor.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet
Money alone is only a mean; it presupposes a man to use it. The rich man can go where he pleases, but perhaps please himself nowhere. He can buy a library or visit the whole world, but perhaps has neither patience to read nor intelligence to see…. The purse may be full and the heart empty. He may have gained the world and lost himself; and with all his wealth around him … he may live as blank a life as any tattered ditcher.
—Robert Louis Stevenson (1850–94) Scottish Novelist
Giving people self-confidence is by far the most important thing that I can do. Because then they will act.
—Jack Welch (b.1935) American Businessperson
I wish I’d said it first, and I don’t even know who did: The only problems that money can solve are money problems.
—Mignon McLaughlin (1913–83) American Journalist, Author
Money is like muck, not good except it be spread.
—Francis Bacon (1561–1626) English Philosopher
Money is the sinews of love, as of war.
—George Farquhar (1677–1707) Irish Dramatist
Like all wage slaves, he had two crosses to bear: the people he worked for and the people he worked with
—Stephen Vizinczey (b.1933) Hungarian-born Canadian Novelist, Literary Critic, Author
It happens a little unluckily that the persons who have the most infinite contempt of money are the same that have the strongest appetite for the pleasures it procures.
—William Shenstone (1714–63) English Poet, Gardener
Man hands on misery to man. It deepens like a coastal shelf. Get out as early as you can, and don’t have any kids yourself.
—Philip Larkin (1922–85) English Poet, Librarian, Novelist
A budget tells us what we can’t afford, but it doesn’t keep us from buying it.
—William Feather (1889–1981) American Publisher, Author
If a person gets his attitude toward money straight, it will help straighten out almost every other area in his life.
—Billy Graham (1918–91) American Baptist Religious Leader
Many of the things you can count, don’t count. Many of the things you can’t count, really count.
—Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born Physicist
Money is power, freedom, a cushion, the root of all evil, the sum of blessings.
—Carl Sandburg (1878–1967) American Children’s Books Writer, Poet, Biographer, Novelist, Socialist
They deem me mad because I will not sell my days for gold; and I deem them mad because they think my days have a price.
—Khalil Gibran (1883–1931) Lebanese-born American Philosopher, Poet, Painter, Theologian, Sculptor
I’ve always thought anyone can make money. Making a life worth living, that’s the real test.
—Robert Fulghum (b.1937) American Unitarian Universalist Author, Essayist, Clergyman
Money was made not to command our will, but all our lawful pleasures to fulfill; shame and woe to us, if we our wealth obey — the horse doth with the horseman run away.
—Abraham Cowley (1618–67) English Poet
Business is the art of extracting money from another man’s pocket without resorting to violence.
—Anonymous
Nothing so cements and holds together all the parts of a society as faith or credit, which can never be kept up unless men are under some force or necessity of honestly paying what they owe to one another.
—Cicero (106BCE–43BCE) Roman Philosopher, Orator, Politician, Lawyer
But money, wife, is the true Fuller’s Earth for reputations, there is not a spot or a stain but what it can take out.
—John Gay (1685–1732) English Poet, Dramatist
The greed of gain has no time or limit to its capaciousness. It’s one object is to produce and consume. It has pity neither for beautiful nature nor for living human beings. It is ruthlessly ready without a moment’s hesitation to crush beauty and life out of them, molding them into money.
—Rabindranath Tagore (1861–1941) Indian Hindu Polymath
All work and no play makes jack. With enough jack, Jack needn’t be a dull boy.
—Malcolm Forbes (1919–90) American Publisher
There are few sorrows, however poignant, in which a good income is of no avail.
—Logan Pearsall Smith (1865–1946) American Essayist, Critic
Money is plentiful for those who understand the simple laws which govern its acquisition.
—George Samuel Clason (1874–1957) American Businessperson, Author
Simply by not owning three medium-sized castles in Tuscany I have saved enough money in the last forty years on insurance premiums alone to buy a medium-sized castle in Tuscany.
—Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1886–1969) German-born American Architect, Academic
Men are seldom more innocently employed than when they are honestly making money.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
Rule No.1: Never lose money. Rule No.2: Never forget rule No.1.
—Warren Buffett (b.1930) American Investor
Money is human happiness in the abstract; and so the man who is no longer capable of enjoying such happiness in the concrete, sets his whole heart on money.
—Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) German Philosopher
Money is like manure. You have to spread it around or it smells.
—J. Paul Getty (1892–1976) American Business Person, Art Collector, Philanthropist
Sir, money, money, the most charming of all things: money, which will say more in one moment than the most elegant lover can in years. Perhaps you will say a man is not young; I answer he is rich. He is not genteel, handsome, witty, brave, good-humored, but he is rich, rich, rich, rich, rich—that one word contradicts everything you can say against him.
—Henry Fielding (1707–54) English Novelist, Dramatist
Money is always there but the pockets change.
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946) American Writer
Money isn’t the most important thing in life, but it’s reasonably close to oxygen on the “gotta have it” scale.
—Zig Ziglar (1926–2012) American Author
It is not how much one makes but to what purpose one spends.
—John Ruskin (1819–1900) English Art Critic, Social Thinker
After a certain point, money is meaningless. It ceases to be the goal. The game is what counts.
—Aristotle Onassis (1906–75) Greek Businessperson
It is true that money cannot buy happiness but it does make it possible for you to enjoy the best that the world has to offer.
—George Samuel Clason (1874–1957) American Businessperson, Author
A rich man is nothing but a poor man with money.
—W. C. Fields (1880–1946) American Actor, Comedian, Writer
Money makes up in a measure all other wants in men.
—William Wycherley (1640–1715) English Dramatist
Comparatively few people know what a million dollars actually is. To the majority it is a gaseous concept, swelling or decreasing as the occasion suggests. In the minds of politicians, perhaps more than anywhere, the notion of a million dollars has this accordion-like ability to expand or contract; if they are disposing of it, the million is a pleasing sum, reflecting warmly upon themselves; if somebody else wants it, it becomes a figure of inordinate size, not to be compassed by the rational mind.
—Robertson Davies (1913–95) Canada Journalist, Playwright, Academic, Critic, Novelist
The money complex is the demonic, and the demonic is God’s ape; the money complex is therefore the heir to and substitute for the religious complex, an attempt to find God in things.
—Norman O. Brown (1913–2002) American Philosopher
There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose. … .
—John Maynard Keynes (1883–1946)
Too much money is as demoralizing as too little, and there’s no such thing as exactly enough.
—Mignon McLaughlin (1913–83) American Journalist, Author
But for money and the need of it, there would not be half the friendship in the world. It is powerful for good if divinely used. Give it plenty of air and it is sweet as the hawthorn; shut it up and it cankers and breeds worms.
—George MacDonald (1824–1905) Scottish Christian Author, Poet, Minister
Put all your eggs in one basket and then watch that basket.
—Mark Twain (1835–1910) American Humorist
I would rather be a beggar and spend my money like a king, than be a king and spend money like a beggar.
—Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–99) American Atheist Politician, Orator, Social Critic, Essayist
The money men make lives after them.
—Samuel Butler
When I was young I used to think that money was the most important thing in life; now that I am old, I know it is.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet
I’m not into the money thing. You can only sleep in one bed at a time. You can only eat one meal at a time, or be in one car at a time. So I don’t have to have millions of dollars to be happy. All I need are clothes on my back, a decent meal, and a little loving when I feel like it. That’s the bottom line.
—Ray Charles (1930–2004) American Singer, Songwriter, Musician
When a fellow says it hain’t the money but the principle o’ the thing, it’s th’ money.
—Charles Farrar Browne (Artemus Ward) (1834–67) American Humorist, Writer
The highest use of capital is not to make more money, but to make money do more for the betterment of life.
—Henry Ford (1863–1947) American Businessperson, Engineer