# Quotes about materialism - Quotes: 13 - Authors: 12 - Broader topic: [Quotes about money](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/money.md) - Narrower topics: [Possessions](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/possessions.md) - Topic page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism - JSON version (same data): https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.json ## Quotes > This material change has made you all materialists, and yet it has rendered your grasp on reality uncertain. It has made you rely on the material gratification of the senses. It has made you worship Mammon and in this new material world everything comes too easily. Heat comes too easily and cold. Money comes too easily. Don’t forget that it will go as easily too. Romance comes too easily, and success. We have all grown soft from this ease. Position changes too easily. Values shift elusively. When everything is totalled up we have evolved a fine variety of flushing toilets but not a very good world. [John P Marquand](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-p-marquand.md) · [The Late George Apley](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-p-marquand/the-late-george-apley.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-p-marquand/the-late-george-apley/this-material-change.md) Topics: [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > Whatever a being may own is of no importance, of no concern at all. It is gone and useless. All we have is our breath. I shall fight for it with teeth and nails. [B. Traven](https://www.leafyquotes.com/b-traven.md) · [The Death Ship](https://www.leafyquotes.com/b-traven/the-death-ship.md) · p. 222 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/b-traven/the-death-ship/whatever-a-being.md) Topics: [life](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/life.md), [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > "We have been but little molested, for we have not the things which most men value." [John Wyndham](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-wyndham.md) · [Sleepers of Mars](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-wyndham/sleepers-of-mars.md) · p. 145 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/john-wyndham/sleepers-of-mars/we-have-been.md) Topics: [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > Inner listening makes clearer to us what we really want, as distinct from what we have been talked into, and it might not have a price tag. We may also discover that "ownership" is in some sense an illusion, that holding on to things can keep us from freely enjoying them. Greater awareness may give us new appreciation for simple things. [Marilyn Ferguson](https://www.leafyquotes.com/marilyn-ferguson.md) · [The Aquarian Conspiracy](https://www.leafyquotes.com/marilyn-ferguson/the-aquarian-conspiracy.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/marilyn-ferguson/the-aquarian-conspiracy/inner-listening-makes.md) Topics: [simplicity](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/simplicity.md), [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > Bad, I thought, looking around me, that I’d accumulated so much. A man should never own more stuff than he can carry in his hands at a dead run. It was bad, but it had happened. [Fredric Brown](https://www.leafyquotes.com/fredric-brown.md) · [The Lights in the Sky are Stars](https://www.leafyquotes.com/fredric-brown/the-lights-in-the-sky-are-stars.md) · p. 230 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/fredric-brown/the-lights-in-the-sky-are-stars/bad-i-thought.md) Topics: [simplicity](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/simplicity.md), [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > I knew that I had made my last journey in the Empty Quarter and that a phase in my life was ended. Here in the desert I had found all that I asked; I knew that I should never find it again.  But it was not only this personal sorrow that distressed me. I realized that the Bedu with whom I had lived and travelled, and in whose company I had found contentment, were doomed.  Some people maintain that they will be better off when they have exchanged the hardship and poverty of the desert for the security of a materialistic world.  This I do not believe.  I shall always remember how often I was humbled by those illiterate herdsmen who possessed, in so much greater measure than I, generosity and courage, endurance, patience, and light-hearted gallantry.  Among no other people have I felt the same sense of personal inferiority. [Wilfred Thesiger](https://www.leafyquotes.com/wilfred-thesiger.md) · [Arabian Sands](https://www.leafyquotes.com/wilfred-thesiger/arabian-sands.md) · p. 310 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/wilfred-thesiger/arabian-sands/i-knew-that.md) Topics: [humility](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/humility.md), [nostalgia](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/nostalgia.md), [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > Anna accumulated things as a way of insulating herself against her own thoughts. [M. John Harrison](https://www.leafyquotes.com/m-john-harrison.md) · [Light](https://www.leafyquotes.com/m-john-harrison/light.md) · p. 150 — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/m-john-harrison/light/anna-accumulated-things.md) Topics: [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > Something is profoundly wrong with the way we live today. For thirty years we have made a virtue out of the pursuit of material self-interest: indeed, this very pursuit now constitutes whatever remains of our sense of collective purpose. We know what things cost but have no idea what they are worth. We no longer ask of a judicial ruling or a legislative act: is it good? Is it fair? Is it just? Is it right? Will it help bring about a better society or a better world? Those used to be the political questions, even if they invited no easy answers. We must learn once again to pose them. [Tony Judt](https://www.leafyquotes.com/tony-judt.md) · [Ill Fares The Land](https://www.leafyquotes.com/tony-judt/ill-fares-the-land.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/tony-judt/ill-fares-the-land/something-is-profoundly.md) Topics: [consumerism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/consumerism.md), [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > The great materialistic progress which we have venerated for so long is on the verge of bankruptcy. We can no longer believe that we are born into this world to accumulate wealth and abandon ourselves to mortal pleasures. We see the dangers and realize that we have been exploited for centuries. We were told the twentieth century was the most progressive that the world has ever known, but unfortunately the progression was in the direction of self-destruction. [Manly P. Hall](https://www.leafyquotes.com/manly-p-hall.md) · [The Secret Teachings of All Ages](https://www.leafyquotes.com/manly-p-hall/the-secret-teachings-of-all-ages.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/manly-p-hall/the-secret-teachings-of-all-ages/the-great-materialistic.md) Topics: [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > For average working folks, America was becoming a puzzle. Who was buying all these two-hundred-dollar copper saucepans, anyway? And how was everyone paying for these BMWs? Were people shrewd or just stupefyingly irresponsible? [Daniel Suárez](https://www.leafyquotes.com/daniel-suarez.md) · [Daemon](https://www.leafyquotes.com/daniel-suarez/daemon.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/daniel-suarez/daemon/for-average-working.md) Topics: [consumerism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/consumerism.md), [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > Is humanity ready for a transformation of consciousness, an inner flowering so radical and profound that compared to it the flowering of plants, no matter how beautiful, is only a pale reflection? Can human beings lose the density of their conditioned mind structures and become like crystals or precious stones, so to speak, transparent to the light of consciousness? Can they defy the gravitational pull of materialism and materiality and rise above identification with form that keeps the ego in place and condemns them to imprisonment within their own personality? [Eckhart Tolle](https://www.leafyquotes.com/eckhart-tolle.md) · [A New Earth](https://www.leafyquotes.com/eckhart-tolle/a-new-earth.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/eckhart-tolle/a-new-earth/is-humanity-ready.md) Topics: [consciousness](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/consciousness.md), [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > "Things. Cosas. Things attach themselves like leeches to the human soul, then they bleed out the sweetness and the music and the primordial joy of being unencumbered upon the land." [Tom Robbins](https://www.leafyquotes.com/tom-robbins.md) · [Fierce Invalids Home From Hot Climates](https://www.leafyquotes.com/tom-robbins/fierce-invalids-home-from-hot-climates.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/tom-robbins/fierce-invalids-home-from-hot-climates/things-cosas-things.md) Topics: [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md) > Any half-awake materialist well knows — that which you hold holds you. [Tom Robbins](https://www.leafyquotes.com/tom-robbins.md) · [Still Life with Woodpecker](https://www.leafyquotes.com/tom-robbins/still-life-with-woodpecker.md) — [Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/tom-robbins/still-life-with-woodpecker/any-half-awake-materialist.md) Topics: [materialism](https://www.leafyquotes.com/topics/materialism.md)