Cyprian Quotes

In our rich consumers' civilization we spin cocoons around ourselves and get possessed by our possessions.

Earthly goods are given to be used, not to be collected.... Hoarding is idolatry.

We've got a form of brainwashing going on in our country…. Do you know how they brainwash people? They repeat something over and over. And that's what we do in this country. Owning things is good. More money is good. More property is good. More commercialism is good. MORE IS GOOD. MORE IS GOOD. We repeat it--and have it repeated to us--over and over until nobody bothers to even think otherwise. The average person is so fogged up by all this, he has no perspective on what's really important anymore.

I felt I was owned by possessions.

He does not possess wealth; it possesses him.

As human beings, we're very materialistic and have all this stuff - furs and cars and diamonds and money.

Anything you cannot relinquish when it has outlived its usefulness possesses you, and in this materialistic age a great many of us are possessed by our possessions.

I always tried to live my life as though nothing changed. People would say, 'You can have a Rolls-Royce'. I'd say to that, 'What do I want with a Rolls-Royce when I can have a Volkswagen or a bike?' Some people get carried away with the juice.

I tell you the truth, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.

It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly.

What has a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?

He has not acquired a fortune; the fortune has acquired him.

My native land is a slave of heathenism, men's god is their belly, and they live only for the present. The richer a man, the holier.

Always remember this. Television, fame, money - listen, here is a news flash for America. Fame cannot remove your sin. And all of the money you ever amass cannot raise you from the dead.

How many BMWs do you need? How many Rolex watches you gonna wear in your lifetime, for crying out loud? What is it about that kind of desire? I don't understand it.

He who recognizes no higher logic than that of the shilling may become a very rich man, and yet remain all the while an exceedingly poor creature; for riches are no proof whatever of moral worth, and their glitter often serves only to draw attention to the worthlessness of their possessor, as the glow-worm's light reveals the grub.

If money and material things become the center of our lives, they seize us and make us slaves.

Some people's measure of success is how much they can grab hold of and hold on to.

I think if you ask people what their concept of heaven is, they would say, if they are honest, that it is a big department store, with new things every week - all the money to buy them, and maybe a little more than the neighbours.

Avarice is fear sheathed in gold.

It is not life and wealth and power that enslave men, but the cleaving to life and wealth and power.

The love of money as a possession...will be recognised for what it is, a somewhat disgusting morbidity.

Private property has made us so stupid and one-sided that an object is only ours when we have it

All things that a man owns hold him far more than he holds them.