Martial Marcus Valerius Martialis
c. AD 90 · Roman Empire
You will always be poor, Aemilianus, if you are poor now. These days wealth is given to no one but the rich.
Semper pauper eris, si pauper es, Aemiliane.
Dantur opes nullis nunc nisi divitibus.Epigrams 5.81
In the same thread
Wang Fanzhi 王梵志
c. 7th century · Tang China
Other people ride big horses. I alone sit on a donkey. I look back at the man carrying firewood, and feel a little better.
他人騎大馬，我獨跨驢子。
回顧擔柴漢，心下較些子。A poem of Wang Fanzhi, from a Dunhuang manuscript
Ishikawa Takuboku 石川啄木
1910 · Meiji Japan
On a day when every friend seems to have done better than me, I buy flowers, come home, and am tender with my wife.
友がみなわれよりえらく見ゆる日よ
花を買ひ来て
妻としたしむTanka collection A Handful of Sand (Ichiaku no suna)
Yang Wanli 楊萬里
later 12th century · Song China
Wild chrysanthemums and old moss each mint their coins, golden yellow and copper green vying to be the lovelier. Heaven pays them out to the poor poet, but they buy only clear sorrow, never a field.
野菊荒苔各鑄錢，金黄銅綠兩爭妍。
天公支與窮詩客，只買清愁不買田。"Written in Jest"
Seo Gyeongdeok 徐敬德
earlier 16th century · Joseon Korea
In my days of study I meant to set the world in order. In old age I find I am content with Yan Hui's poverty. For wealth and rank there are rivals, and it is hard to lay hands on them. Woods and springs have no keeper, and there a man can rest.
讀書當日志經綸 晩歲還甘顏氏貧
富貴有爭難下手 林泉無禁可安身Hwadam jip, "My Thoughts"
Confucius 孔子
5th century BC · Lu, Spring and Autumn China
"Eating coarse rice and drinking water, with a bent arm for a pillow: there is joy in that too. Wealth and rank gained without right are to me like floating clouds."
子曰：「飯疏食飲水，曲肱而枕之，樂亦在其中矣。不義而富且貴，於我如浮雲。」Analects, book 7 (Shu'er)
1 in 100 Billion · The social network of those who came before us