All conservatives are such from personal defects. They have been effeminated by position or nature, born halt and blind, through luxury of their parents, and can only, like invalids, act on the defensive.
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–82) American Philosopher
Luxury is an enticing pleasure, a bastard mirth, which hath honey in her mouth, gall in her heart, and a sting in her tail.
—Francis Quarles (1592–1644) English Religious Poet
What think you, if he were conveyed to bed, Wrapped in sweet clothes, rings put upon his fingers, A most delicious banquet by his bed, And brave attendants near him when he wakes, Would not the beggar then forget himself?
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright
Luxury is a word of uncertain signification, and may be taken in a good as in a bad sense
—David Hume (1711–76) Scottish Philosopher, Historian
Luxury ruins republics; poverty, monarchies.
—Montesquieu (1689–1755) French Political Philosopher, Jurist
For many people, before age 60, it’s business before pleasure. After 60, pleasure before business.
—Marty Nemko (b.1950) American Career Coach
I know it is more agreeable to walk upon carpets than to lie upon dungeon floors, I know it is pleasant to have all the comforts and luxuries of civilization; but he who cares only for these things is worth no more than a butterfly, contented and thoughtless, upon a morning flower; and who ever thought of rearing a tombstone to a last summer’s butterfly?
—Henry Ward Beecher (1813–87) American Clergyman, Writer
Fell luxury! more perilous to youth than storms or quicksands, poverty or chains.
—Hannah More
War has become a luxury that only small nations can afford.
—Hannah Arendt (1906–75) German-American Philosopher, Political Theorist
The greatest luxury of riches is, that they enable you to escape so much good advice.
—Arthur Helps (1813–75) English Dramatist, Essayist
Learn the luxury of doing good.
—Oliver Goldsmith (1730–74) Irish Novelist, Playwright, Poet
All luxury corrupts either the morals or the taste.
—Joseph Joubert (1754–1824) French Writer, Moralist
O luxury! Thou curst of heaven’s decree.
—Oliver Goldsmith (1730–74) Irish Novelist, Playwright, Poet
You cannot spend money in luxury without doing good to the poor. Nay, you do more good to them by spending it in luxury—you make them exert industry, whereas by giving it, you keep them idle.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
It was a shrewd saying, whoever said it, “That the man who first brought ruin on the Roman people was he who pampered them by largesses and amusements.”
—Plutarch (c.46–c.120 CE) Greek Biographer, Philosopher
Anger is an expensive luxury in which only men of a certain income can indulge.
—George William Curtis (1824–92) American Essayist, Public Speaker, Editor, Author
I always thought I should be treated like a star.
—Madonna (b.1958) American Pop Singer, Actress
On the soft bed of luxury, most kingdoms have expired.
—Edward Young (1683–1765) English Poet
Pessimism is a luxury that a Jew can never allow himself.
—Golda Meir (1898–1978) Israeli Head of State
We act as though comfort and luxury were the chief requirements of life, when all that we need to make us really happy is something to be enthusiastic about.
—Charles Kingsley (1819–75) English Clergyman, Academic, Historian, Novelist
Sofas ’twas half a sin to sit upon,
So costly were they; carpets, every stitch
Of workmanship so rare, they make you wish
You could glide o’er them like a golden fish.
—Lord Byron (George Gordon Byron) (1788–1824) English Romantic Poet
Sedition is bred in the lap of luxury and its chosen emissaries are the beggared spendthrift and the impoverished libertine.
—George Bancroft (1800–91) American Historian, Politician
Now we suffer the evils of a long peace; luxury more cruel than war broods over us and avenges a conquered world.
—Juvenal (c.60–c.136 CE) Roman Poet
Every luxury must be paid for, and everything is a luxury, starting with being in the world.
—Cesare Pavese (1908–50) Italian Novelist, Poet, Critic, Translator
Unless we are accustomed to them from early youth, splendid chambers and elegant furniture had best be left to people who neither have nor can have any thoughts.
—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German Poet
Living in the lap of luxury isn’t bad, except that you never know when luxury is going to stand up.
—Orson Welles (1915–85) American Film Director, Actor
Blesses his stars, and thinks it luxury.
—Joseph Addison (1672–1719) English Essayist, Poet, Playwright, Politician
The saddest thing I can imagine is to get used to luxury.
—Charlie Chaplin (1889–1977) British Actor
Then there is that glorious Epicurean paradox, uttered by my friend, the Historian in one of his flashing moments: Give us the luxuries of life, and we will dispense with its necessaries
—Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (1809–94) American Physician, Essayist
Uncompromising thought is the luxury of the closeted recluse.
—Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American Head of State
Avarice and luxury, those pests which have ever been the ruin of every great state.
—Livy (Titus Livius) (59 BCE–17 CE) Roman Historian
By luxury we condemn ourselves to greater torments than have yet been invented by anger or revenge, or inflicted by the greatest tyrants upon the orst of men.
—William Temple (1881–1944) British Clergyman, Theologian
Truly, one gets easier accustomed to a silken bed than to a sack of leaves.
—Berthold Auerbach (1812–82) German Novelist
The more various our artificial necessities, the wider is our circle of pleasure; for all pleasure consists in obviating necessities as they rise; luxury, therefore, as it increases our wants, increases our capacity for happiness
—Oliver Goldsmith (1730–74) Irish Novelist, Playwright, Poet
Luxury must be comfortable, otherwise it is not luxury.
—Coco Chanel (1883–1971) French Fashion Designer
The odious and disgusting aristocracy of wealth is built upon the ruins of all that is good in chivalry or republicanism; and luxury is the forerunner of a barbarism scarcely capable of cure.
—Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822) English Poet, Dramatist, Essayist, Novelist
Luxury is the wolf at the door and its fangs are the vanities and conceits germinated by success. When an artist learns this, he knows where the danger is.
—Tennessee Williams (1911–83) American Playwright
Contentment is natural wealth, luxury is artificial poverty.
—Socrates (469BCE–399BCE) Ancient Greek Philosopher
A point of view can be a dangerous luxury when substituted for insight and understanding.
—Marshall Mcluhan (1911–80) Canadian Writer, Thinker, Educator
Sell not your liberty to gratify your luxury
—Indian Proverb
Blest hour! It was a luxury—to be!
—Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834) English Poet, Literary Critic, Philosopher
Most of the luxuries, and many of the so-called comforts of life, are not only indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind. Cultivate poverty like a garden herb, like sage. Do not trouble yourself much to get new things, whether clothes or friends. Turn the old; return to them. Things do not change; we change. The very simplicity and nakedness of man’s life in the primitive ages imply this advantage, at least, that they left him still but a sojourner in nature. To be awake is to be alive. Time is but the stream I go a-fishing in. Every man is a builder of a temple, called his body, to the god he worships, after a style purely his own, nor can he get off by hammering marble instead. We are all sculptors and painters, and our material is our own flesh and blood and bones. Any nobleness begins at once to refine a man’s features, any meanness or sensuality to imbrute them. Rather than love, than money, than fame, give me truth.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
The great majority of men, especially in France, both desire and possess a fashionable woman, much in the way one might own a fine horse—as a luxury befitting a young man.
—Stendhal (Marie-Henri Beyle) (1783–1842) French Writer
A sentimentalist is simply one who desires to have the LUXURY of an emotion without paying for it.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
The goal of every culture is to decay through over-civilization; the factors of decadence,—luxury, skepticism, weariness and superstition,—are constant. The civilization of one epoch becomes the manure of the next.
—Cyril Connolly (1903–74) British Literary Critic, Writer
Were the labor and capital, now spent on pernicious luxuries, to be employed in the intellectual, moral, and religious culture of the whole people, how immense would be the gain, in every respect, though for a short time material products were diminished. A better age will look back with wonder and scorn on the misdirected industry of the present times.
—William Ellery Channing (1780–1842) American Unitarian Theologian, Poet
We live in an age when unnecessary things are our only necessities.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
Luxury, so far as it reaches the people, will do good to the race of people; it will strengthen and multiply them. Sir, no nation was ever hurt by luxury; for, as I said before; it can reach but a very few.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
Most of the luxuries and many of the so-called comforts of life are not only not indispensable, but positive hindrances to the elevation of mankind.
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–62) American Philosopher
We read on the foreheads of those who are surrounded by a foolish luxury, that fortune sells what she is thought to give.
—Jean de La Fontaine (1621–95) French Poet, Short Story Writer