Quotes about poverty and the poor

"Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime."

Aristotle on poverty and the poor
11 fans of this quote   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"Poverty is an anomaly to rich people. It is very difficult to make out why people who want dinner do not ring the bell."

Bagehot, Walter on poverty and the poor   

"Anyone who has struggled with poverty knows how extremely expensive it is to be poor."

Baldwin, James on poverty and the poor
3 fans of this quote   

"The poverty of our century is unlike that of any other. It is not, as poverty was before, the result of natural scarcity, but of a set of priorities imposed upon the rest of the world by the rich. Consequently, the modern poor are not pitied but written off as trash. The twentieth-century consumer economy has produced the first culture for which a beggar is a reminder of nothing."

Berger, John on poverty and the poor
6 fans of this quote   

"A poor man with nothing in his belly needs hope, illusion, more than bread."

Bernanos, Georges on poverty and the poor   

"The poor will always be with you. [John 12: 8]"

Bible on poverty and the poor   

"The destruction of the poor is their poverty."

Bible on poverty and the poor
3 fans of this quote   

"He that has pity on the poor lends to the Lord."

Bible on poverty and the poor   

"Whoever shuts his ears at the cry of the poor, they also shall cry themselves, but not be heard."

Bible on poverty and the poor   

"Who ever mocks the poor insults his maker; and he that is glad at calamities shall not go unpunished."

Bible on poverty and the poor
3 fans of this quote   

"Poverty is the step-mother of genius."

Billings, Josh on poverty and the poor
3 fans of this quote   

"Remember the poor, it costs nothing."

Billings, Josh on poverty and the poor   

"I am a poor man, but I have this consolation: I am poor by accident, not by design."

Billings, Josh on poverty and the poor   

"To be a poor man is hard, but to be a poor race in a land of dollars is the very bottom of hardships."

Bois, W. E. B. Du on poverty and the poor   

"The surest way to remain poor is to be an honest man."

Bonaparte, Napoleon on poverty and the poor
4 fans of this quote   

"Poverty makes you sad as well as wise."

Brecht, Bertolt on poverty and the poor   

"When I gave food to the poor, they called me a saint. When I asked why the poor were hungry, they called me a communist."

Camara, Dom H. on poverty and the poor
6 fans of this quote   

"The Poor Man whom everyone speaks of, the Poor Man whom everyone pities, one of the repulsive Poor from whom charitable souls keep their distance, he has still said nothing. Or, rather, he has spoken through the voice of Victor Hugo, Zola, Richepin. At least, they said so. And these shameful impostures fed their authors. Cruel irony, the Poor Man tormented with hunger feeds those who plead his case."

Camus, Albert on poverty and the poor   

"There's a point of poverty at which the spirit isn't with the body all the time. It finds the body really too unbearable. So it's almost as if you were talking to the soul itself. And a soul's not properly responsible."

Celine, Louis-Ferdinand on poverty and the poor   

"The honest poor can sometimes forget poverty. The honest rich can never forget it."

Chesterton, Gilbert K. on poverty and the poor   

"The hermit doesn't sleep at night, in love with the blue of the vacant moon. The cool of the breeze that rustles the trees rustles him too."

Ching-An on poverty and the poor   

"To suppose such a thing possible as a society, in which men, who are able and willing to work, cannot support their families, and ought, with a great part of the women, to be compelled to lead a life of celibacy, for fear of having children to be starved; to suppose such a thing possible is monstrous."

Cobbett, William on poverty and the poor   

"In a country well governed poverty is something to be ashamed of. In a country badly governed wealth is something to be ashamed of."

Confucius on poverty and the poor
10 fans of this quote   

"The poverty from which I have suffered could be diagnosed as Soho poverty. It comes from having the airs and graces of a genius and no talent."

Crisp, Quentin on poverty and the poor   

"To be shelterless and alone in the open country, hearing the wind moan and watching for day through the whole long weary night; to listen to the falling rain, and crouch for warmth beneath the lee of some old barn or rick, or in the hollow of a tree; are dismal things -- but not so dismal as the wandering up and down where shelter is, and beds and sleepers are by thousands; a houseless rejected creature."

Dickens, Charles on poverty and the poor   

"One of the strangest things about life is that the poor, who need the money the most, are the ones that never have it."

Dunne, Finley Peter on poverty and the poor   

"I have found out in later years that my family was very poor, but the glory of America is that we didn't know it. [On his childhood]"

Eisenhower, Dwight D. on poverty and the poor   

"It is seldom that the miserable of the world can help regarding their misery as a wrong inflicted by those who are less miserable."

Eliot, George on poverty and the poor   

"Poverty consist in feeling poor."

Emerson, Ralph Waldo on poverty and the poor   

"The greatest man in history was the poorest."

Emerson, Ralph Waldo on poverty and the poor   

"There's no scandal like rags, nor any crime so shameful as poverty."

Farquhar, George on poverty and the poor   

"I used to think I was poor. Then they told me I wasn't poor, I was needy. Then they told me it was self-defeating to think of myself as needy. I was deprived. (Oh not deprived but rather underprivileged.) Then they told me that underprivileged was overused. I was disadvantaged. I still don't have a dime. But I have a great vocabulary."

Feiffer, Jules on poverty and the poor   

"It is a sin to be poor."

Fillmore, Charles on poverty and the poor   

This quotation can be viewed in the context of a book

"We are not concerned with the very poor. They are unthinkable, and only to be approached by the statistician or the poet."

Forster, Edward M. on poverty and the poor   

"The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor, to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets and to steal bread."

France, Anatole on poverty and the poor   

"I thank fate for having made me born poor. Poverty taught me the true value of the gifts useful to life."

France, Anatole on poverty and the poor
3 fans of this quote   

"Grant me the treasure of sublime poverty: permit the distinctive sign of our order to be that it does not possess anything of its own beneath the sun, for the glory of your name, and that it have no other patrimony than begging."

Francis of Assisi, St. on poverty and the poor   

"Having been poor is no shame, but being ashamed of it, is."

Franklin, Benjamin on poverty and the poor
12 fans of this quote   

"Poor men's reasons are not heard."

Fuller, Thomas on poverty and the poor   

"Poverty is the worst form of violence."

Gandhi, Mahatma on poverty and the poor
21 fans of this quote