Quotes About Wealth

Since money meant nothing to them, they had to stress the sentimental value of gifts.

To defuse tensions and spread economic benefits more widely, he argued that the rich should donate large sums to worthy causes during their lifetimes

all looking up at the windows of J. P. Morgan & Co.

From the outset, Rockefeller had to wrestle with the demons of pride and greed.

elite pedigree on both sides of his family, Jefferson was anything but common. His father, Peter, was a tobacco planter, a judge of the court of chancery, and a member of the Virginia House of Burgesses, while his mother, Jane Randolph, came from a prominent family. By the time Peter Jefferson died, he bequeathed to his children more than 60 slaves, 25 horses, 70 head of cattle, 200 hogs, and 7,500 acres; two-thirds of this bountiful legacy went to his eldest son, Thomas.

Rockefeller's philanthropy was relatively discreet.

When rebuffed by a bank officer for a loan, he shot back in anger, "Some day I'll be the richest man in the world.

He went through the week cautioning himself with proverbs taught by Eliza, such as "Pride goeth before a fall," and this spiritual self-scrutiny intensified with his growing wealth.

I don't see any harm myself in making a little money, provided that it can be done honestly and reasonably.

Had Rockefeller not feared his own capacity for excess, he wouldn't have engaged in such strenuous introspection.

To Rockefeller, the least imaginative use of money was to give it to people outright instead of delving into the causes of human misery.

For this reason, he never used his wealth to alleviate poverty directly and scorned any charity that smacked of social welfare.

More than one person who was refused later accused Rockefeller of having ruined him.

Harriman was a very different type from Pierpont.

Their strategy was to make clients feel accepted into a private club, as if a Morgan account were a membership card to the aristocracy.

when John Rockefeller dies," Archbold said, "the world is going to be surprised to learn what a very great man he has been in every way.

Profiting from the Rockefeller tie, the Equitable Trust became within a decade America's eighth-largest bank.

But if John nursed vengeful feelings toward Bill, it must have been secretly gratifying to him that his father left at the very dawn of his triumph and forfeited any claim to his wealth.

He believed in Standard Oil and gladly purchased all available stock from other directors.

Pierpont's anti-Semitism was well known.

His dislike of Jews may have been sharpened by dealings with the Rothschilds.

Beyond the size of his stake, Rockefeller also possessed an unlikely charisma

Gates himself invested in several of the companies he managed for Rockefeller, and in 1902 he cashed in a tidy $500,000 profit.

Mr. Rockefeller may have made himself the richest man in the world, but he has paid.