Greed Quotes

He who is greedy is always in want.

Horace

No gain satisfies a greedy mind.

Ambition if it feeds at all does so on the ambition of others.

You can stand tall without standing on someone. You can be a victor without having victims.

Greed lessens what is gathered.

We risk all in being too greedy.

Jean de La Fontaine

Greed is a bottomless pit which exhausts the person in an endless effort to satisfy the need without ever reaching satisfaction.

Greed like the love of comfort is a kind of fear.

Pillars are fallen at thy feet Fanes quiver in the air A prostrate city is thy seat And thou alone art there.

On what strange stuff Ambition feeds!

The greedy man is incontent with a whole world set before him.

Sa'di

For greed all nature is too little.

Marcus Annaeus Seneca

Greed's worst point is its ingratitude.

Marcus Annaeus Seneca

O Indra, destroy all those lustful peoplebehaving like birds....angry onesbehaving like wolves....greedy onesbehaving like vultures....enticed ones behaving like owls..... arrogant ones behaivng like eagles and the jealous ones behaving like dogs.

Veda

Instead of loving people and using money, people often love money and use people.

Wayne Gerard Trotman

Love is responsible for nearly every kind of insanity in the world though greed, vanity, and pure meanness contribute their portion to general misery.

There was somewhere, if you knew where to find it, some place where money could be made like drawing water from a well, some Big Rock Candy Mountain where life was effortless and rich and unrestricted and full of adventure and action, where something could be had for nothing.

Wallace Stegner

Beautiful credit! The foundation of modern society. Who shall say that this is not the golden age of mutual trust, of unlimited reliance upon human promises? That is a peculiar condition of society which enables a whole nation to instantly recognize point and meaning in the familiar newspaper anecdote, which puts into the mouth of a distinguished speculator in lands and mines this remark: 'I wasn't worth a cent two years ago, and now I owe two millions of dollars.

I did NOT have three thousand pairs of shoes, I had one thousand and sixty.

The only way to the top is killing and greed. Okay, I’m kidding. But killing helps.

Douglas Coupland

Whenever we have excess, giving should be our natural response. It should be the automatic decision, the obvious thing to do in light of Scripture and human need.

I liked this rich lifestyle, but I loved the poor lifestyle better. The less money people had, the less greedy they seemed to be. The people who lived around our flocks seemed to always love everyone around them. Even though they aren’t always happy and can’t always afford the bills, they are still glad to be alive.

Shannon A. Thompson

Wouldn't it be nice, for once, to find a world which was at peace with itself. No matter how always those few wanted more than others. Those not satisfied with running their own lives but wishing to have power over the lives of the others. Greedy people. Greedy for wealth, or power or both.

Garry Douglas Kilworth

Brad Green, almost overnight, became the poster boy for the common Wall Street tale - proving once again that greed, most definitely, kills. Giving away about 99% of his fortune was also front page news, but Green barely blinked at having to scrape by with only $200 million. The government seized all five of his homes, his three boats, two jets, a helicopter, 14 cars, and all of his assets except the $200 million he stashed for a rainy day in an offshore bank account.

Phil Wohl

The pain and shame felt are unknown to those with planned vacations. They know not of the tsunami that rescinded the homes, goals, and hopes of its victims—swallowed by the sea of greed.

John-Talmage Mathis

Wars and revolutions and battles, you see, are due simply and solely to the body and its desires. All wars are undertaken for the acquisition of wealth; and the reason why we have to acquire wealth is the body, because we are slaves in its service.

Plato

The greedy bastard, thought Weintî. He knows perfectly well that twenty shekels is the going rate for a female household slave of my age.

Pah…commoners, traders." Ergus made a disparaging gesture.Traders with money, Ergus. Money they put at the disposition of young Tanahkos," Lmachdan said in a dry tone. "Money that turns into soldiers. Soldiers who are used to extort tribute from us. Tribute that is turned into more soldiers. The warlord has a good thing going, I'll say that for him.

We are all born to love people and use things. Unfortunately, we grow to love things and use people...

T. Rafael Cimino

It does seem as if the more one gets the more one wants

Louisa May Alcott

Whatever worldly thing we may covet - zealously striving to obtain and then retain - never seems to bring an end to our desires. Covetousness, envy, jealousy, and greed always escalate into a vicious spiral, as we seek greater and greater gratification but find less and less contentment. . . . Striving to acquire the things of the world not only does not bring lasting happiness and peace, but it drives us to seek more. When "all we've ever wanted" is grounded in the temporal trappings of this world, it is never enough!

Brent Top

Descending the endless stairs for the sixth time, Mr. Lecky thought of all the goods those closed doors hid. Fantastic was the discouragement it caused him. Aware of such variety and great quantity, Mr. Lecky saw the danger of forgetting or never even imagining things which, discovered, he would want. Everlastingly midway between two equal errors, to which could he cleave? To have time for everything, one must make haste. To gain access to everything, one must be patient.Moreover, hasty, or patient as Job, with what great labor would Mr. Lecky carry up on his back all he got! Making, as he was every moment, the climb back longer, giving, as he did with each step down, consent to toil more and more severe, he could anticipate vaguely and abhor another possibility. Curious and insubstantial as his fearing not to find what he could not think of, was his resentment of a perhaps coming time when he might, in revolt against the inanity of exertion, live meanly and miserably, with no object but somehow to make what was already at hand suffice for him. Against this insidious ill chance there exists no defense, since so often what today is detested will appear tomorrow - though surely still detestable - good and wise.

James Gould Cozzens

The wish to acquire is in truth very natural and common, and men always do so when they can, and for this they will be praised not blamed; but when they cannot do so, yet wish to do so by any means, then there is folly and blame.

Sometimes in life, as in literature, people get their just desserts. The greedy man loses everything because he cannot resist seeking more riches.

Elise Blackwell

Fidelity surveyed a group with at least $1 million investment assets excluding real estate and retirement. 42% of them did not FEEL wealthy.

Christopher Hayes

Didn’t we all grow up understanding that bribes and payoffs - - by whatever name or rationale - - were bad. And that people were supposed to be the focal point of society, not money?

Why is it that so many people think all the answers are in their wallet?

I can’t do that,” he said, exhaling sharply and staring out the glass into the street.“Why not?”His face softened. “I need his money.”Spencer looked at me and I couldn’t help but stare back. We were all in the same boat, prisoners to GREED.

If you took everything I’d ever found hot in a girl and piled them into a corner, you’d get Cricket Hunt standing in a corner.

I thought back to all the times I’d slept with a girl and not thought twice about it and my gut ached. If a girl doesn’t safeguard herself, who will? I’d always had the mentality that men will change when women change but I never thought about how safeguarding the girls around me was just as much my responsibility as it was theirs.

I followed suit, a little bit nervous, and very unaware of what I was supposed to do. I had that same sensation you get when you were new to a school and had no idea who anyone was in your lunch period. You’d take your lunch tray and sort of stand around for a moment looking for a good spot to take a seat but the entire time you’re searching, all you can feel is everyone’s eyes on you. That’s a shitty feeling.

I started toward the barn and was grateful that the wind was still. About halfway up the drive, my heart began to beat an irregular rhythm as I caught sight of Cricket coming toward me. My breath caught in my throat. This girl. This tiny little girl had such incredible power over me with her big, blue, round, sad eyes. Her unusual face, her unusually striking face. Her pert nose. The faint laugh lines around her eyes and mouth. And I didn’t know her, didn’t really even know if she and I were anything alike but that didn’t stop me from wishing we shared a future...even if she did belong to someone else.

I ran up the stairs, shedding pieces of my suit as I went, determined for a shower, resolute in washing away what I’d just done, who I really was but I was certain there was nothing that could cleanse me, to launder my poisoned blood. This was who I was. Hopeless personified.

In fifteen hundred years someone will figure out a way to squeeze black juice out of the yellow sand, and that will get everyone very excited. Some people who were rich already will get a lot richer, and some people who were poor will be told that they're richer but will be pretty sure they're not.

August said you row?” she asked. Her voice spilled over me like warm syrup. I closed my eyes and enjoyed the drugging sensation then realized she’d asked me a question.“Yeah,” I answered belatedly. Good. A short answer but it’s better than mouth diarrhea. “I row...a-uh-boat...with-uh-my teammates.” Superb! Just-uh-superb.

The world is old and full of lessons. We will not lack for examples. We only have to look around carefully, earnestly, so we can learn and realize that success, to be genuine, must not be propelled by greed.

Psyche Roxas-Mendoza

Now there was great rejoicing at the rumor of Alderic's quest, for all folk knew that he was a cautious man, and they deemed that he would succeed and enrich the world, and they rubbed their hands in the cities at the thought of largesse; and there was joy among all men in Alderic's country, except perchance among the lenders of money, who feared they would soon be paid. And there was rejoicing also because men hoped that when the Gibbelins were robbed of their hoard, they would shatter their high-built bridge and break the golden chains that bound them to the world, and drift back, they and their tower, to the moon, from which they had come and to which they rightly belonged. There was little love for the Gibbelins, though all men envied their hoard.("The Hoard Of The Gibbelins")

A motto of many politicians, public servants and money bags: Ask not 'What can I do for you?' but 'What can I do you for?

CREEPOther people have written about war. About how one plane sweeps over and the whole place is ablaze in minutes. About how a young man may kill another young many with perfect legality. I prefer to write about less sudden things. About how we inch further away without even noticing. And then it's too late. Or is it? No it's not too late to say sorry, we were wrong, let's try again to get along. No, it's not too late to quit lying, halt the greed, stop polluting air earth and seas. I prefer to write about less noisy things. About change happening so gradually that one day you just accept the world as different. And you don't question because you're old, and you don't feel like making waves, and anyway, they'd say you were insane.......

Nothing is sufficient for the person who finds sufficiency too little

Epicurus

All right people, listen up! If you've got a family back home waiting for you or if you just want to save your own skin, turn around and walk away. Also, women! I have no intention of fighting any women!

Selfish needs, wants, and desires needed to be obliterated. Greed, overindulgence, and gluttony had to be expunged from human behavior. The solution was in self-control, in minimalism, in sparse living conditions; one simple and a brand-new dictionary filled with words everyone would understand.

Of all the countries in the world, we Americans have been the greatest destroyers of land of any race of people barbaric or civilized," Bennett said in a speech at the start of the dust storms. What was happening, he said, was "sinister", a symptom of "our stupendous ignorance.

Money makes people stupid. They don't have to work as hard as people who don't have money. That's why the smart people who do have money mostly use it for one thing… They use it to make sure the people without it don't get any more.

Greed harms you: generosity helps you. This is why is has been said: 'Greed is the mother of incapacity'.

The avarice, the hunger for materialistic possessions and the dependency upon alcohol had gradually become stronger and stronger. And now, it was the sum total of what she was.

Human greed feeds a creed.

Men kill for many reasons, they steal but for one-greed.

Sharon Kay Penman

The Only Good Greed Is Greed For Enlightening Experiences

I disagree. You want to bring back someone that you've lost. You might want money. Maybe you want women. Or, you might want to protect the world. These are all common things people want. Things that their hearts desire. Greed may not be good, but it's not so bad, either. You humans think greed is just for money and power! But everyone wants something they don't have.

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