Oh, I wish I were a miser; being a miser must be so occupying.
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946) American Writer
I see every thing I paint in this world, but everybody does not see alike. To the eyes of a miser a guinea is more beautiful than the sun, and a bag worn with the use of money has more beautiful proportions than a vine filled with grapes.
—William Blake (1757–1827) English Poet, Painter, Printmaker
All men’s miseries derive from not being able to sit quiet in a room alone.
—Blaise Pascal (1623–62) French Mathematician, Physicist, Theologian
If you wish to be miserable, think about yourself; about what you want, what you like, what respect people ought to pay you, what people think of you; and then to you nothing will be pure. You will spoil everything you touch; you will make sin and misery for yourself out of everything God sends you; you will be as wretched as you choose.
—Charles Kingsley (1819–75) English Clergyman, Academic, Historian, Novelist
A soul that is reluctant to share does not as a rule have much of its own. Miserliness is here a symptom of meagerness.
—Eric Hoffer (1902–83) American Philosopher, Author
While the miser is merely a capitalist gone mad, the capitalist is a rational miser.
—Karl Marx (1818–1883) German Philosopher, Economist
There are many things that we would throw away if we were not afraid that others might pick them up.
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright
Twins, even from the birth, are misery and man.
—Homer (751–651 BCE) Ancient Greek Poet
Go miser go, for money sell your soul. Trade wares for wares and trudge from pole to pole, So others may say when you are dead and gone. See what a vast estate he left his son.
—John Dryden (1631–1700) English Poet, Literary Critic, Playwright
Do not discourage your children from hoarding, if they have a taste to it; whoever lays up his penny rather than part with it for a cake, at least is not the slave of gross appetite; and shows besides a preference always to be esteemed, of the future to the present moment.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
It is often better to have a great deal of harm happen to one than a little; a great deal may rouse you to remove what a little will only accustom you to endure.
—George Greville, 2nd Earl of Warwick (1746–1816) British Nobleman, Politician
A misery is not to be measured from the nature of the evil, but from the temper of the sufferer.
—Joseph Addison (1672–1719) English Essayist, Poet, Playwright, Politician
As small letters hurt the sight, so do small matters him that is too much intent upon them: they vex and stir up anger, which begets an evil habit in him in reference to greater affairs.
—Plutarch (c.46–c.120 CE) Greek Biographer, Philosopher
If misery be the effect of virtue, it ought to be reverenced; if of ill-fortune, to be pitied; and if of vice, not to be insulted, because it is, perhaps, itself a punishment adequate to the crime by which it was produced; and the humanity of that man can deserve no panegyric who is capable of reproaching a criminal in the hands of the executioner.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
Notwithstanding the sight of all the miseries which wring us and threaten our destruction, we have still an instinct that we cannot repress, which elevates us above our sorrows.
—Blaise Pascal (1623–62) French Mathematician, Physicist, Theologian
A tree does not know itself to be miserable. It is true that it is misery indeed to know one’s self to be miserable; but then it is greatness also. In this way all man’s miseries go to prove his greatness. They are the miseries of a mighty potentate, of a dethroned monarch.
—Blaise Pascal (1623–62) French Mathematician, Physicist, Theologian
Friends love misery, in fact. Sometimes, especially if we are too lucky or too successful or too pretty, our misery is the only thing that endears us to our friends.
—Erica Jong (b.1942) American Novelist, Feminist
The spendthrift robs his heirs the miser robs himself.
—Jean de La Bruyere (1645–96) French Satiric Moralist, Author
Some men have a necessity to be mean, as if they were exercising a faculty which they had to partially neglect since early childhood.
—Unknown
Man hands on misery to man. It deepens like a coastal shelf. Get out as early as you can, and don’t have any kids yourself.
—Philip Larkin (1922–85) English Poet, Librarian, Novelist
Misery so little appertains to our nature, and happiness so much so, that we lament over that which has pained us, but leave unnoticed that which has rejoiced us.
—Jean Paul (1763–1825) German Novelist, Philosopher
To long for that which comes not. To lie a-bed and sleep not. To serve well and please not. To have a horse that goes not. To have a man obeys not. To lie in jail and hope not. To be sick and recover not. To lose one’s way and know not. To wait at door and enter not, and to have a friend we trust not: are ten such spites as hell hath not.
—John Florio (1553–1625) British Translator, Italian Scholar, Tutor
I am as comfortless as a pilgrim with peas in his shoes—and as cold as Charity, Chastity or any other Virtue.
—Lord Byron (George Gordon Byron) (1788–1824) English Romantic Poet
We should pass on from crime to crime, heedless and remorseless, if misery did not stand in our way, and our own pains admonish us of our folly.
—Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist
‘Tis the only comfort of the miserable to have partners in their woes.
—Miguel de Cervantes (1547–1616) Spanish Novelist
What people expect to happen is always different from what actually happens. From this comes great disappointment; this is the way the world works.
—Buddhist Teaching
No scene of life but teems with mortal woe.
—Walter Scott (1771–1832) Scottish Novelist, Poet, Playwright, Lawyer
To correct a natural indifference I was placed half-way between misery and the sun. Misery kept me from believing that all was well under the sun, and the sun taught me that history wasn’t everything.
—Albert Camus (1913–60) Algerian-born French Philosopher, Dramatist, Novelist
Never was a miser a brave soul.
—George Herbert (1593–1633) Welsh Anglican Poet, Orator, Clergyman
People talk about the courage of condemned men walking to the place of execution: sometimes it needs as much courage to walk with any kind of bearing towards another person’s habitual misery.
—Graham Greene (1904–91) British Novelist, Playwright, Short Story Writer
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