"It's simply a national acknowledgement that in any kind of priority, the needs of human beings must come first. Poverty is here and now. Hunger is here and now. Racial tension is here and now. Pollution is here and now. These are the things that scream for a response. And if we don't listen to that scream - and if we don't respond to it - we may well wind up sitting amidst our own rubble, looking for the truck that hit us - or the bomb that pulverized us. Get the license number of whatever it was that destroyed the dream. And I think we will find that the vehicle was registered in our own name."

"No, madam, 'tis not so well that I am poor, though many of the rich are damned."

"I am as poor as Job, my lord, but not so patient."

"It is still her use To let the wretched man outlive his wealth, To view with hollow eye and wrinkled brow An age of poverty."

"Poor and content is rich and rich enough, But riches fineless is as poor as winter To him that ever fears he shall be poor."

"Stepp'd me in poverty to the very lips."

"The world affords no law to make thee rich; Then be not poor, but break it, and take this."

"The greatest of evils and the worst of crimes is poverty."

"How can you make poverty history without understanding the history of poverty? We need to know how the poverty of the five billion of this world came about. Even more acutely, we need to know how the filthy wealth of the 500 multinationals or the 225 richest people was created. We need to know precisely how this great divide, this unbridgeable chasm, is maintained; how it reproduced itself, and how it is increasingly deepened and widened. We need to ask ourselves: What are the political, social, moral, ideological, economic and cultural mechanisms which produce, reinforce and make such a world not only possible, but seemingly acceptable?"

"Poverty is no discrace to a man, but it is confoundedly inconvenient."

"It is better to be poor and walk in integrity than to be stupid and speak lies."

"The rich is the one that rules over those of little means, and the borrower is servant to the man doing the lending."

"Be not among winebibbers; among riotous eaters of flesh: For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty: and drowsiness shall clothe a man with rags."

"Give beer to those who are perishing, wine to those who are in anguish; let them drink and forget their poverty and remember their misery no more."

"Whose plenty made him pore."

"His rawbone cheekes, through penurie and pine, Were shronke into his jawes, as he did never dyne."

"I also believe that in many parts of this country, and certainly in many parts of this globe, that the opposite of poverty is not wealth. I don't believe that. I actually think, in too many places, the opposite of poverty is justice."

"Wealth is far away, poverty is close at hand."

"To be broke is not a disgrace, it is only a catastrophe."

"The rise of capitalism, rather than delivering improvements in human welfare, was associated with plummeting wages, a reduction in human stature, and a marked upturn in the incidence of famine."

"The world over, private financial markets fail when it comes to the very poor, ... Mainstream banks do not seek out poor communities—because that’s not where the money is."

"If a poor person envies a rich person, he is no better than the rich person."

"Poverty can be defined objectively and applied consistently only in terms of the concept of relative deprivation."

"Beggar that I am, I am even poor in thanks."

"Qui timide rogat, Docet negare."

"It is better for any of you to carry a load of firewood on his own back than to beg from someone else."

"A pampered menial drove me from the door."

"A beggar through the world am I, From place to place I wander by. Fill up my pilgrim's scrip for me, For Christ's sweet sake and charity."

"Mieux vaut goujat debout qu'empereur enterré."

"To get thine ends, lay bashfulnesse aside; Who feares to aske, doth teach to be deny'd."

"Set a beggar on horse backe, they saie, and hee will neuer alight."

"I'd just as soon be a beggar as king, And the reason I'll tell you for why; A king cannot swagger, nor drink like a beggar, Nor be half so happy as I. * * * * * Let the back and side go bare."

"I see, Sir, you are liberal in offers: You taught me first to beg; and now, methinks, You teach me how a beggar should be answer'd."

"Well, whiles I am a beggar I will rail And say, there is no sin but to be rich; And being rich, my virtue then shall be To say, there is no vice but beggary."

"Unless the old adage must be verified, That beggars mounted, run their horse to death."

"The Gods have not ordained hunger to be our death: even to the well-fed man comes death in varied shape, The riches of the liberal never waste away, while he who will not give finds none to comfort him, The man with food in store who, when the needy comes in miserable case begging for bread to eat, Hardens his heart against him, when of old finds not one to comfort him. Bounteous is he who gives unto the beggar who comes to him in want of food, and the feeble, Success attends him in the shout of battle. He makes a friend of him in future troubles, No friend is he who to his friend and comrade who comes imploring food, will offer nothing. Let the rich satisfy the poor implorer, and bend his eye upon a longer pathway, Riches come now to one, now to another, and like the wheels of cars are ever rolling, The foolish man wins food with fruitless labour: that food – I speak the truth – shall be his ruin, He feeds no trusty friend, no man to love him. All guilt is he who eats with no partaker."

"Do not oppress the orphans and do not reject the beggars."

"My eye no longer wells up at the shame of those who beg; my hand became too hard for the trembling of filled hands. Where have the tears of my eye and the down of my heart gone? Oh loneliness of all bestowers! Oh muteness of all who shine! Many suns revolve in desolate space. To everything that is dark they speak with their light – to me they are mute. Oh this is the enmity of light toward that which shines; mercilessly it goes its orbit. Unjust in its deepest heart toward that which shines: cold toward suns – thus every sun goes. Like a storm the suns fly their orbit, that is their motion. They follow their inexorable will; that is their coldness. Oh it is you only, you dark ones, you nocturnal ones, who create warmth out of that which shines! Oh it is you only who drink milk and refreshment from the udders of light! Alas, ice surrounds me, my hand burns itself on iciness! Alas, there is thirst in me that yearns for your thirst!"

"Der wahre Bettler ist Doch einzig und allein der wahre König."

"Borgen ist nicht viel besser als betteln."

"He once begged alms of a statue, and, when asked why he did so, replied, "To get practice in being refused.""

"Beggars are a sure indicator that there are no Christians, or else very few and dispirited ones, in any town in which beggars are seen."

"A man may be reputed an able man this year, and yet be a beggar the next; it is a misfortune that happens to many men, and his former reputation will signify nothing."

"A shamefaced man makes a bad beggar."

"Be they wynners or loosers,…beggers should be no choosers."

"It is an affirmative command to give tzedaka to the poor of Israel. ... Anyone who sees a poor man begging alms and turns away his glance from him and does not give him tzedaka transgresses a negative command, as it is said, "You shall not harden your heart nor shut your hand to your needy brother" (Deuteronomy 15:7)."

"Never stand begging for that which you have the power to earn."

"Set a beggar on horseback, and he will ride a gallop."

"Homer himself must beg if he want means, and as by report sometimes he did "go from door to door and sing ballads, with a company of boys about him.""