Material Things Quotes - Page 3

• The essence of spirituality does not consist in a specialised or narrow interest in some imagined part of life, but in a certain enlightened attitude to all the various situations which obtain in life. It covers and includes the whole of life. All the material things of this world can be made subservient to the divine game, and when they are thus subordained they become auxiliary to the self-affirmation of the spirit.

  Meher Baba

  Attitude, Self, Essence

  "Discourses, Volume I". Book by Meher Baba, 1967.

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• Everything I wanted before, I want twice as much now. And that doesn't mean material things; it means to explore more, to think more. Being an artist doesn't start because you're 21, and it doesn't end because you're 51. You are who you are until the day you die.

  Jennifer Lopez

  Mean, Artist, Thinking

  "Jennifer Lopez: I Would Never Have In Vitro, I’m ‘Hyper J Lo’ Now", www.huffingtonpost.com. March 18, 2010.

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• We who are rich are often demanding and difficult. We shut ourselves up in our apartments and may even use a watchdog to defend our property. Poor people, of course, have nothing to defend and often share the little they have. When people have all the material things they need, they seem not to need each other. They are self-sufficient. There is no interdependence. There is no love.

  Jean Vanier

  Self, People, Needs

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• The sooner the world solves its economic problems, the sooner its inhabitants can afford leisure and peace and get on with the non-material things that are inherently important: the work of mind and spirit that is gloriously and uniquely human, the work that no machine can ever do.

  Louis O. Kelso

  Wisdom, Mind, Important

  Louis O. Kelso, Patricia Hetter Kelso (1967). “Two-factor Theory: the Economics of Reality; how to Turn Eighty Million Workers Into Capitalists on Borrowed Money, and Other Proposals”, New York : Vintage Books

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• Happiness doesn't necessarily lie in material things. You just have to put yourself in a position to be happy. If you can do what you love for a living, that's a good start.

  Joan Jett

  Lying, Materials, Position

  "Joan Jett Opens Up About Her Biggest Transformation Yet And Looks Back On What Could've Been". Interview with Amy Rose Spiegel, www.buzzfeed.com. September 10, 2013.

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• People who know their worth can live austerely; it's the people nagged by the gnawing knowledge of their own cheapness who have that eternal necessity for submerging themselves in what they feel is superlative in material things, as if fine possessions could make them fine.

  Mabel Seeley

  People, Fine, Possession

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• I was in my late thirties and decided my intention in life had nothing to do with the acquiring of material things, but rather it was now my intention to experience the evolution of my own soul and to grow spiritually. I wanted to come to know the highest truths of life and to express those truths in action, through myself. I wanted to become the grandest version of the greatest idea I ever held about who I am in regards to my relationship with God.

  Neale Donald Walsch

  Ideas, Who I Am, Soul

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• By a lot of peoples standards, I lived a very privileged life. I never wanted for attention, I never wanted for material things. In some ways, I was probably spoiled because I never had to share. And I was doted on.

  Catherine Tate

  Way, Attention, Spoiled

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• We live in a vastly complex society which has been able to provide us with a multitude of material things, and this is good, but people are beginning to suspect we have paid a high spiritual price for our plenty.

  Euell Gibbons

  Spiritual, People, Able

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• Never will I pray for the material things of the world. I am not calling to a servant to bring me food. I am not ordering an innkeeper to provide me with room. Never will I seek delivery of gold, love, good health, petty victories, fame, success, or happiness. Only for guidance will I pray, that I may be shown the way to acquire these things, and my prayer will always be answered.

  Og Mandino

  Prayer, Victory, Gold

  Og Mandino (1998). “The Greatest Gift in the World”, Frederick Fell Publishers

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• Man is still by instinct a predatory animal given to devilish aggression. The discoveries of science have immensely increased productivity of material things. They have increased the standards of living and comfort. They have eliminated infinite drudgery. They have increased leisure. But that gives more time for devilment. The work of science has eliminated much disease and suffering. It has increased the length of life. That, together with increase in productivity, has resulted in vastly increased populations. Also it increased the number of people engaged in devilment.

  Herbert Hoover

  Life, Science, Animal

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• I came to the conclusion is that we have a very shallow view of human nature in the policy world. We're really good at talking about material things, really bad at talking about emotions, really good at stuff we can count, really bad at the deeper stuff that actually drives behavior.

  David Brooks

  Views, Talking, World

  "David Brooks: From Spouses to Sofas, Emotions Tell Us What to Value". Interview with Jeffrey Brown, www.pbs.org. March 8, 2011.

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• All material Things seem to have been composed of the hard and solid Particles ... variously associated with the first Creation by the Counsel of an intelligent Agent. For it became him who created them to set them in order: and if he did so, it is unphilosophical to seek for any other Origin of the World, or to pretend that it might arise out of a Chaos by the mere Laws of Nature.

  Isaac Newton

  Nature, Science, Intelligent

  Isaac Newton (2004). “Isaac Newton: Philosophical Writings”, p.138, Cambridge University Press

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• Paul observed, We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out (1 Timothy 6:7). He was referring to material things, wealth. However, we will take our knowledge and experience and training from this life with us into the next life.

  David Berg

  Training, World, Next

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• The possessions God allows us to have are intended for our use, not our enjoyment. Trying to squeeze something out of them that was never in them in the first place is a futile endeavor. A cow's udders, gently pressed, will yield sweet milk, nourishing and refreshing. Applying more and more pressure will not produce greater quantities of milk. We lose the good of material things by expecting too much from them. Those who try hardest to please themselves with earthly goods find the least satisfaction in them.

  William Gurnall

  Sweet, Yield, Trying

  William Gurnall (2015). “Daily Readings from The Christian in Complete Armour: Daily Readings in Spiritual Warfare”, p.240, Moody Publishers

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• Material goods consist of useful material things, and of all rights to hold, or use, or derive benefits from material things, or to receive them at a future time.

  Alfred Marshall

  Rights, Benefits, Use

  Alfred Marshall (2010). “Principles of Economics”, p.54, Cosimo, Inc.

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• Nin knew how much humans loved money, riches, and material things-though he never really could understand why. The more technologically advanced the human species got, the more isolated they seemed to become, at the same time. It was alarming, how humans could spend entire lifetimes engaged in all kinds of activities, without getting any closer to knowing who they really were, inside.

  Jess C Scott

  Money, Knowing, Riches

  Jess C. Scott (2011). “The Other Side of Life (Book #1, Cyberpunk Elven Trilogy)”, p.9, Jess C Scott

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• Renounce all those material things that you gained by exploiting other human beings.

  Tracy Chapman

  Renounce, Misinterpretation, Materials

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• I am thinking, therefore I exist. (...) I was a substance whose whole essence or nature is solely to think, and which does not require any place, or depend on any material thing, in order to exist. Accordingly this 'I' - that is, the soul by which I am what I am - is entirely distinct from the body, and indeed is easier to know than the body, and would not fail to be whatever it is, even if the body did not exist.

  Rene Descartes

  Thinking, Order, Essence

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• Eternal truths are ultimately invisible, and you won't find them in material things or natural phenomena, or even in human emotions.

  Yoko Ogawa

  Emotion, Invisible, Natural

  Yoko Ogawa (2009). “The Housekeeper and the Professor: A Novel”, p.116, Picador

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• My voice is the only material thing in which I can still reveal myself. Go ahead and cut off the hand or the testicles of a voice. Try to find the head of a voice, the orifice through which it passes, or even the breasts to which you can attach the clips of your electrodes. Nothing. Resonant tooth.

  Abdellatif Laabi

  Cutting, Hands, Voice

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• We have been measuring too much in terms of the dollar. What we should do is think in terms of useful materials-things that will be of value to us in our daily life.

  Charles Kettering

  Thinking, Dollars, Too Much

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• What I find most injurious to mankind in modern advertising is the constant appeal to material standards and values, the elevating of material things into an end in themselves, a virtue.

  Ann Bridge

  Advertising, Virtue, Modern

  Ann Bridge (2013). “Singing Waters”, p.178, A&C Black

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• Happiness doesn't come from money and material things, but from the self-expression they can offer you.

  Randy Gage

  Self, Expression, Materials

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• The power of material things, to bestow happiness, to bring joy into the life is tremendously exaggerated. But The right mental attitude for example gratitude that things are not worse, the trained mind the right habits of thought - lifeskills, will bring to us the best there is in the universe.

  Orison Swett Marden

  Gratitude, Attitude, Joy

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