materialism

And therefore the idea of serving mankind, of the brotherhood and oneness of people, is fading more and more in the world, and indeed the idea now even meets with mockery, for how can one drop one's habits, where will this slave go now that he is so accustomed to satisfying the innumerable needs he himself has invented? He is isolated, and what does he care about the whole? They have succeeded in amassing more and more things, but have less and less joy.

Most of the very few people who would choose a good heart over riches would eventually use that to either make a lot of money, or attract men or women who are rich.

Some people will insult your intelligence by suddenly being nice or nicer to you once you make it _ or they think you have.

The second most dangerous thing about money is that it leaves most of the people who have a lot of it with the unshakable belief that they are intelligent and well informed. The most dangerous thing about it is that it leaves most of the people who do not have a lot of money with the very same belief.

Getting through life without a lot of money, possessions, and/or friends is admirable, especially if it is by choice.

The Christmas tree, twinkling with lights, had a mountain of gifts piled up beneath it, like offerings to the great god of excess.

If you__e an Orthodox believer, then what sustains this framework is the obligation that you follow. But if you live in a democratic, liberal world whose motto is: __ake choices and manage your choices according to what is good for you,_ then there is a built-in tension between that which connects and that which divides. Between the material and the intellectual or ethical. Materialism is not a dirty word, but in this tension between the individual and the material on the one hand, and the communal and the ethical on the other, we are at the end of an age in which the material and the individual are triumphing.

An expensive coffin does not decrease the deceased__ chances of going to hell.

The death of a billionaire is worth more to the media than the lives of a billion poor people.

The author jokes that the culture at his first job at Entertainment Weekly chased away the worthwhile aspects of his Brown education, but in so doing he makes a subtle point about the profound impact of the culture with which we surround ourselves and how easily we can be defined and constrained by our jobs.

The objects of the present life fill the human eye with a false magnification because of their immediacy.

When selecting a one-night stand, a heterosexual woman who is materialistic is a trillion times more likely to choose a sexually unattractive poor man who seems rich over a sexually attractive rich man who seems poor.

The world economy would collapse if a significant number of people were to realize and then act on the realization that it is possible to enjoy many if not most of the things that they enjoy without first having to own them.

In reality most human beings are not, to most human beings, more important than money.

Greed is a contagious mental illness without which civilization as we know it would not have been possible.

Matter is but the artificial division of energy.

Ambition_ is __reed_ rebranded.

We had made the error of staying small _ and there is no more unforgivable crime in America.