„The noblest people are those despising wealth, learning, pleasure and life; esteeming above them poverty, ignorance, hardship and death.“

„Where people are really attached, poverty itself is wealth.“

—  Jane Austen, book Northanger Abbey

Source: Northanger Abbey

„That people who pay greater respect to a wealthy villain than to an honest, upright man in poverty, almost deserve to be enslaved; they plainly show that wealth, however it may be acquired, is, in their esteem, to be preferred to virtue.“

—  John Hancock American Patriot and statesman during the American Revolution (1737–1793) 1737 - 1793

Boston Massacre Oration (1774)
Context: Surely you never will tamely suffer this country to be a den of thieves. Remember, my friends, from whom you sprang. Let not a meanness of spirit, unknown to those whom you boast of as your fathers, excite a thought to the dishonor of your mothers I conjure you, by all that is dear, by all that is honorable, by all that is sacred, not only that ye pray, but that ye act; that, if necessary, ye fight, and even die, for the prosperity of our Jerusalem. Break in sunder, with noble disdain, the bonds with which the Philistines have bound you. Suffer not yourselves to be betrayed, by the soft arts of luxury and effeminacy, into the pit digged for your destruction. Despise the glare of wealth. That people who pay greater respect to a wealthy villain than to an honest, upright man in poverty, almost deserve to be enslaved; they plainly show that wealth, however it may be acquired, is, in their esteem, to be preferred to virtue.

„…richness of heart of the poor people [and to despise] the poverty of heart of the rich.“

—  Baba Amte Indian freedom fighter, social worker 1914 - 2008

„The noblest pleasure is the joy of understanding.“

—  Leonardo Da Vinci Italian Renaissance polymath 1452 - 1519

„The study of science, dissociated from that of philosophy and literature, narrows the mind and weakens the power to love and follow the noblest ideals: for the truths which science ignores and must ignore are precisely those which have the deepest bearing on life and conduct.“

—  John Lancaster Spalding Catholic bishop 1840 - 1916

Source: Aphorisms and Reflections (1901), p. 241

„There is no greater wealth than wisdom, no greater poverty than ignorance; no greater heritage than culture and no greater support than consultation.“

—  Ali, book Nahj al-Balagha

Nahj al-Balagha

„The main thing:… not to let myself be defined by history, not to take it as an excuse—despise it in those who hide their personal insignificance behind it—and yet know it, in order to understand people and above all to see through them“

—  Peter Handke Austrian writer, playwright and film director 1942

my hatred of history as a refuge for be-nothings
Source: Das Gewicht der Welt [The Weight of the World], p. 11

„As no one can adventure nearer the throne of God by virtue of his rank, his wealth, or his talent, so no one is kept farther from that throne by his low condition, or by his poverty of wealth, of learning, or of intellect. The prince and the sage are not more welcome to heaven than the poor and ignorant.“

—  Albert Barnes American theologian 1798 - 1870

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 455.

„In order to eat, you have to be hungry. In order to learn, you have to be ignorant. Ignorance is a condition of learning. Pain is a condition of health. Passion is a condition of thought. Death is a condition of life.“

—  Robert Anton Wilson American author and polymath 1932 - 2007

Source: Leviathan

„The rich people are those who create wealth, and you have to treat them well so they continue to give wealth.“

—  Augusto Pinochet Former dictator of the republic of Chile 1915 - 2006

Speech (26 May 1988), quoted in "Las frases para el bronce de Pinochet."
1980s

„One of the glaring failures of capitalism is the continuing widespread existence of poverty - often extreme poverty. Even in the advanced economies, many millions of people endure terrible economic and social deprivation, despite the incredible wealth all around them.“

—  Jim Stanford Canadian economist 1961

Part 3, Chapter 14, Dividing the Pie, p. 168
Economics For Everyone (2008)

„Of course, for a lot of people, death was a welcome change. Grinding poverty takes the edge off most things, including life.“

—  Tom Baker English actor 1934

„The safest wealth is the poverty of needs.“

—  Franz Werfel Austrian-Bohemian author 1890 - 1945

Der sicherste Reichtum ist die Armut an Bedürfnissen.
Zwischen oben und unten (1946), p. 315

„The Fascist accepts life and loves it, knowing nothing of and despising suicide; he rather conceives of life as duty and struggle and conquest, life which should be high and full, lived for oneself, but above all for others — those who are at hand and those who are far distant, contemporaries, and those who will come after.“

—  Benito Mussolini, book The Doctrine of Fascism

"The Doctrine of Fascism" (1932)
1930s

„Poetry is a purging of the world's poverty and change and evil and death. It is a present perfecting, a satisfaction in the irremediable poverty of life.“

—  Wallace Stevens American poet 1879 - 1955

Opus Posthumous (1955), Adagia

„What I know is that those who risked their lives to earn the pleasure of God are real men. They managed to rid the Islamic nation of disgrace. We hold them in the highest esteem.“

—  Osama bin Laden founder of al-Qaeda 1957 - 2011

In response to the interviewer stating: 'Do you know the men who have been arrested for these attacks?'
1990s, Time magazine interview (1998)

„But the prize for courage will surely be awarded most justly to those who best know the difference between hardship and pleasure and yet are never tempted to shrink from danger.“

—  Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War

Book II, 2.40-[3]
History of the Peloponnesian War, Book II

„… a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention…“

—  Herbert A. Simon American political scientist, economist, sociologist, and psychologist 1916 - 2001

Simon, H. A. (1971) "Designing Organizations for an Information-Rich World" in: Martin Greenberger, Computers, Communication, and the Public Interest, Baltimore. MD: The Johns Hopkins Press. pp. 40–41.
1960s-1970s
Context: In an information-rich world, the wealth of information means a dearth of something else: a scarcity of whatever it is that information consumes. What information consumes is rather obvious: it consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it.

„The choice of life is not between fame and fortune, nor wealth and poverty, but between good and evil.“

—  Boyd K. Packer American Mormon leader 1924 - 2015