56 Poorly Constructed Quotes

In the vast expanse of literary and conversational history, not all quotes are created equal. While some words of wisdom have etched themselves into the annals of time, there exists a peculiar charm in those that miss the mark, barely graze it, or simply dive headfirst into the realm of the perplexing. Here, we've curated a collection of the top 56 poorly constructed quotes—lines that bewilder, amuse, and offer a light-hearted reminder that even in their clumsy construction, there can sometimes be an unintended brilliance. So, prepare to chuckle, scratch your head, and appreciate the delightful imperfection of these memorable attempts at making a statement.

1. “Look at that sea, girls--all silver and shadow and vision of things not seen. We couldn't enjoy its loveliness any more if we had millions of dollars and ropes of diamonds.” - Lucy Maud Montgomery

2. “If a free society cannot help the many who are poor, it cannot save the few who are rich.[Inaugural Address, January 20 1961]” - John F. Kennedy

3. “I had noticed that both in the very poor and very rich extremes of society the mad were often allowed to mingle freely.” - Charles Bukowski

4. “The cry of the poor is not always just, but if you don't listen to it, you will never know what justice is.” - Howard Zinn

5. “E po, mirupafshim! Po me mbyt trishtimi, nga merzia. Seç kam nje brenge ne shpirt, Makar Aleksejeviç. As vete s'e di arsyen. E tille dite paska qene. Mirupafshim!” - Fyodor Dostoevsky

6. “Duhet te qendrojne larg njeri-tjetri si fatkeqet ashtu dhe te varferit, keshtu nuk do te rendoheshin nga njeri-tjetri. Ju shkaktova aq shume fatkeqesi, qe s'i kishit patur kurre me pare ne jeten modeste te vetmitarit. Kjo me brengos, ma derrmon shpirtin.” - Fyodor Dostoevsky

7. “Po ç'pune ke ti, mor zoteri, me çizmet e mia te shqyera dhe me berrylat e mi te grisur?” - Fyodor Dostoevsky

8. “It is not theft, properly speaking, to take secretly and use another's property in a case of extreme need: because that which he takes for the support of his life becomes his own property by reason of that need” - Thomas Aquinas

9. “There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.” - Warren Buffett

10. “Am I right in suggesting that ordinary life is a mean between these extremes, that the noble man devotes his material wealth to lofty ends, the advancement of science, or art, or some such true ideal; and that the base man does the opposite by concentrating all his abilities on the amassing of wealth?'Exactly; that is the real distinction between the artist and the bourgeois, or, if you prefer it, between the gentleman and the cad. Money, and the things money can buy, have no value, for there is no question of creation, but only of exchange. Houses, lands, gold, jewels, even existing works of art, may be tossed about from one hand to another; they are so, constantly. But neither you nor I can write a sonnet; and what we have, our appreciation of art, we did not buy. We inherited the germ of it, and we developed it by the sweat of our brows. The possession of money helped us, but only by giving us time and opportunity and the means of travel. Anyhow, the principle is clear; one must sacrifice the lower to the higher, and, as the Greeks did with their oxen, one must fatten and bedeck the lower, so that it may be the worthier offering.” - Aleister Crowley

11. “Even today we don't pay serious attention to the issue of poverty, because the powerful remain relatively untouched by it. Most people distance themselves from the issue by saying that if the poor worked harder, they wouldn't be poor.” - Muhammad Yunus

12. “The fact that the poor are alive is clear proof of their ability.” - Muhammad Yunus

13. “The poor are always prophetic. As true prophets always point out, they reveal God's design. That is why we should take time to listen to them. And that means staying near them, because they speak quietly and infrequently; they are afraid to speak out, they lack confidence in themselves because they have been broken and oppressed. But if we listen to them, they will bring us back to the essential.” - Jean Vanier

14. “One of the Great Rules of Economics According to John GreenIf you are rich, you have to be an idiot not to stay rich. And if you are poor, you have to be really smart to get rich.” - John Green

15. “If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn't help the poor, either we have to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we've got to acknowledge that He commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition and then admit that we just don't want to do it.” - Stephen Colbert

16. “America is the wealthiest nation on Earth, but its people are mainly poor, and poor Americans are urged to hate themselves. To quote the American humorist Kin Hubbard, 'It ain’t no disgrace to be poor, but it might as well be.' It is in fact a crime for an American to be poor, even though America is a nation of poor. Every other nation has folk traditions of men who were poor but extremely wise and virtuous, and therefore more estimable than anyone with power and gold. No such tales are told by the American poor. They mock themselves and glorify their betters. The meanest eating or drinking establishment, owned by a man who is himself poor, is very likely to have a sign on its wall asking this cruel question: 'if you’re so smart, why ain’t you rich?' There will also be an American flag no larger than a child’s hand – glued to a lollipop stick and flying from the cash register.Americans, like human beings everywhere, believe many things that are obviously untrue. Their most destructive untruth is that it is very easy for any American to make money. They will not acknowledge how in fact hard money is to come by, and, therefore, those who have no money blame and blame and blame themselves. This inward blame has been a treasure for the rich and powerful, who have had to do less for their poor, publicly and privately, than any other ruling class since, say Napoleonic times. Many novelties have come from America. The most startling of these, a thing without precedent, is a mass of undignified poor. They do not love one another because they do not love themselves.” - Kurt Vonnegut

17. “Our people are good people; our people are kind people. Pray God some day kind people won't all be poor.” - John Steinbeck

18. “Back in Russia we were dirt-poor. Here in the West we are still poor but have risen above the dirt to tower alongside stalks of grass!” - Vera Nazarian

19. “Tipsy, they tumbled early into bed - to get as much sleep as they could. So they would feel less hunger. The summer catch had been poor; there wasn't much food. They ate with care and looked sideways at the old: the old were gluttons, everybody knew it, and what was the good of feeding them? It wouldn't harm them to starve a little. The hungry dogs howled. The women rinsed the children's bellies with hot water three times a day, so they wouldn't cry so much for food. The old starved silently. ("The North")” - Yevgeny Zamyatin

20. “Why, Tom - us people will go on livin' when all them people is gone. Why, Tom, we're the people that live. They ain't gonna wipe us out. Why, we're the people - we go on.''We take a beatin' all the time.''I know.' Ma chuckled. 'Maybe that makes us tough. Rich fellas come up an' they die, an' their kids ain't no good, an' they die out. But, Tom, we keep a-comin'. Don' you fret none, Tom. A different time's comin'.” - John Steinbeck

21. “I hadn't found out yet that mankind consists of two very different races, the rich and the poor. It took me ... and plenty of other people . . . twenty years and the war to learn to stick to my class and ask the price of things before touching them, let alone setting my heart on them.” - Louis-Ferdinand Celine

22. “Mother Teresa would seek no other pulpit than the hovels of the poor, and no other sermon than her works of love, performed for the unloved, in God's name.” - Joseph Langford

23. “I was so thin I could slice bread with my shoulderblades, only I seldom had bread” - Charles Bukowski

24. “It is the privilege of the richTo waste the time of the poorTo water with tears in secretA tree that grows in secretThat bears fruit in secretThat ripened falls to the ground in secretAnd manures the parent treeOh the wicked tree of hatred and the secretThe sap rising and the tears falling.” - Stevie Smith

25. “You say you care about the poor? Tell me their names.” - Craig & Nayhouy Greenfield

26. “The few own the many because they possess the means of livelihood of all ... The country is governed for the richest, for the corporations, the bankers, the land speculators, and for the exploiters of labor. The majority of mankind are working people. So long as their fair demands - the ownership and control of their livelihoods - are set at naught, we can have neither men's rights nor women's rights. The majority of mankind is ground down by industrial oppression in order that the small remnant may live in ease.” - Helen Keller

27. “Indolent and unworthy the beggar may be—but that is not your concern: It is better, said Joseph Smith, to feed ten impostors than to run the risk of turning away one honest petition.” - Hugh Nibley

28. “So I heard the boom of my father's rifle when he shot my best friend. A bullet only costs about two cents, and anybody can afford that.” - Sherman Alexie

29. “Good works is giving to the poor and the helpless, but divine works is showing them their worth to the One who matters.” - Criss Jami

30. “Thank God (my wife) and I were both born poorso the concept of fidelity was allowed to take root in us.” - Allan Wolf

31. “We are all born and someday we’ll all die. Most likely to some degree alone.What if our aloneness isn’t a tragedy? What if our aloneness is what allows us to speak the truth without being afraid? What if our aloneness is what allows us to adventure – to experience the world as a dynamic presence – as a changeable, interactive thing?If I lived in Bosnia or Rwanda or who knows where else, needless death wouldn’t be a distant symbol to me, it wouldn’t be a metaphor, it would be a reality.And I have no right to this metaphor. But I use it to console myself. To give a fraction of meaning to something enormous and needless.This realization. This realization that I will live my life in this world where I have privileges.I can’t cool boiling waters in Russia. I can’t be Picasso. I can’t be Jesus. I can’t save the planet single-handedly.I can wash dishes.” - Rachel Corrie

32. “The mass of the rich and the poor are differentiated by their incomes and nothing else, and the average millionaire is only the average dishwasher dressed in a new suit.” - George Orwell

33. “I have always found that it is far more convenient to be rich rather than to be poor.” - Amanda Quick

34. “You have to be objective about money to use it fairly. It doesn't make you any better or any more useful than any other person. Even if you use your money to help people...that doesn't make you better than somebody who has no money but is sympathetic and genuinely loving to fellow human beings.” - Keith Haring

35. “How reprehensible it is when those blessed with commodities insist on ignoring the poor. Better to torment them, force them into indentured servitude, inflict compulsion and blows—this at least produces a connection, fury and a pounding heart, and these too constitute a form of relationship. But to cower in elegant homes behind golden garden gates, fearful lest the breath of warm humankind touch you, unable to indulge in extravagances for fear they might be glimpsed by the embittered oppressed, to oppress and yet lack the courage to show yourself as an oppressor, even to fear the ones you are oppressing, feeling ill at ease in your own wealth and begrudging others their ease, to resort to disagreeable weapons that require neither true audacity nor manly courage, to have money, but only money, without splendor: That’s what things look like in our cities at present” - Robert Walser

36. “I felt like a kid standing in the world's greatest video arcade without any quarters, unable to do anything but walk around and watch the other kids play.” - Ernest Cline

37. “The rich can afford to be progressive. Poor people have reason to be afraid of the future.” - Garrison Keillor

38. “My God, rich people have the time to praise You if they want to, but the poor people are so busy, accept their work as praise because, my God, they don’t have time for everything.” - Garrison Keillor

39. “When YOU stop believing one person in the world cannot make a difference; differences in the world will be made.” - Kellie Elmore

40. “Nina sniffed, shifting her shoulders to look at the sky through the branches. "She's a sweet girl, but poor."Ire pricked through me, and the last of his charisma shredded. "Being poor is not an indication of potential or worth. It's a lack of resources.” - Kim Harrison

41. “You've got that eternal idiotic idea that if anarchy came it would come from the poor. Why should it? The poor have been rebels, but they have never been anarchists; they have more interest than anyone else in there being some decent government. The poor man really has a stake in the country. The rich man hasn't; he can go away to New Guinea in a yacht. The poor have sometimes objected to being governed badly; the rich have always objected to being governed at all. Aristocrats were always anarchists” - G.K. Chesterton

42. “Being wealthy isn't just a question of having lots of money. It's a question of what we want. Wealth isn't an absolute, it's relative to desire. Every time we seek something that we can't afford, we can be counted as poor, how much money we may actually have.” - Jean Jacques Rousseau

43. “Here is the problem: Poor Americans consume too little healthcare, especially preventive healthcare. Other Americans—often rich Americans—consume too much healthcare, often unwisely, and sometimes to their detriment. The American healthcare system combines famine with gluttony.” - Otis Webb Brawley

44. “I am very poor - for a know nothing, understand nothing. It is not a calamitous condition until it is realized.” - Rafael Sabatini, Scaramouche

45. “The most impoverished peasant can be delighted by the opening of the first spring flower, and the most wealthy aristocrat can curse the day he was born because of some petty offense to his sensibilities. She is a very wise woman. To achieve serenity we have to view life not as it is measured by the world around us but as we ourselves measure it. We must accept that the scales are not at all equal.” - Emma Wildes

46. “A society which has poor people on its streets is a failed society!” - Mehmet Murat ildan

47. “God thundered again and again through the prophets that worship in the context of mistreatment of the poor and disadvantaged is an outrage.” - Ronald J. Sider

48. “We fought a war on poverty, and poverty won” - Ronald Reagan

49. “Kuwa tajiri si kazi rahisi. Ukipata milioni ya kwanza utataka nyingine kulinda hiyo ya kwanza. Ukipata ya pili utataka mbili zingine kulinda hizo mbili za kwanza, n.k. Si kazi rahisi. Si kama unavyofikiria. Utajiri haujanipa furaha. Umenipa uhuru. Ndugu zangu ni maskini wa kutupwa. Ningependa kuishi kama maskini mwenye pesa nyingi.” - Enock Maregesi

50. “It seems that the fiction writer has a revolting attachment to the poor, for even when he writes about the rich, he is more concerned with what they lack than with what they have.” - Flannery O'Connor

51. “If you have two shirts in your closet, one belongs to you and the other to the man with no shirt.” - St. Ambrose

52. “Once the demands of necessity and propriety have been met, the rest that one owns belongs to the poor.” - Pope Leo XIII

53. “Frequently give up some of your property by giving it with a generous heart to the poor ... It is true that God will repay us not only in the next world but even in this.” - St. Francis de Sales

54. “Our God is known for His compassion for the needy; let us be known for it as well.” - Dillon Burroughs

55. “Many overlook the fact that Jesus was homeless. He did not only teach the poor; He lived among them.” - Dillon Burroughs

56. “I thought of Sammy Glick rocking in his cradle of hate, malnutrition, prejudice, suspicions, amorality, the anarchy of the poor; I thought of him as a mangy puppy in a dog-eat-dog world. I was modulating my hate for Sammy Glick from the personal to the societal. I no longer even hated Rivington Street but the idea of Rivington Street, all Rivington Streets of all nationalities allowed to pile up in cities like gigantic dung heaps smelling up the world, ambitions growing out of filth and crawling away like worms. I saw Sammy Glick on a battlefield where every soldier was his own cause, his own army and his own flag, and I realized that I had singled him out not because he had been born into the world anymore selfish, ruthless and cruel than anybody else, even though he had become all three, but because in the midst of a war that was selfish, ruthless and cruel Sammy was proving himself the fittest and the fiercest and the fastest.” - Budd Schulberg