Dollars! All their cares, hopes, joys, affections,
virtues, and associations seemed to be melted down
into dollars. Whatever the chance contributions that
fell into the slow cauldron of their talk, they made
the gruel thick and slab with dollars. Men were
weighed by their dollars, measures were gauged by
their dollars; life was auctioned, appraised, put
up, and knocked down for its dollars. The next
respectable thing to dollars was any venture having
their attainment for its end. The more of that
worthless ballast, honor and fair-dealing, which any
man cast overboard from the ship of his Good Nature
and Good Intent, the more ample stowage-room he had
for dollars. Make commerce one huge lie and mighty
theft. Deface the banner of the nation for an idle
rag; pollute it star by star; and cut out stripe by
stripe as from the arm of a degraded soldier. Do
anything for dollars! What is a flag to them!
-- Charles Dickens
1812-1870, British
Novelist
In any
country where talent and virtue produce no
advancement, money will be the national god. Its
inhabitants will either have to possess money or
make others believe that they do. Wealth will be the
highest virtue, poverty the greatest vice. Those who
have money will display it in every imaginable way.
If their ostentation does not exceed their fortune,
all will be well. But if their ostentation does
exceed their fortune they will ruin themselves. In
such a country, the greatest fortunes will vanish in
the twinkling of an eye. Those who don't have money
will ruin themselves with vain efforts to conceal
their poverty. That is one kind of affluence: the
outward sign of wealth for a small number, the mask
of poverty for the majority, and a source of
corruption for all.
-- Denis Diderot
1713-1784, French
Philosopher
A
billion here, a billion there, and soon you're
talking about real money.
-- Everett M. Dirksen
1896-1969, American
Representative, Senator
When
you don't have any money, the problem is food, When
you have money, it's sex. When you have both, its.
It's health, If everything is simple, then you're
frightened of death.
-- J. P. Donleavy
1926-, American
Writer
