David Rockefeller

I never kept a diary, but I wrote detailed notes of my travels.

I learned more from my mother than from all the art historians and curators who have informed me about technical aspects of art history and art appreciation over the years.

When you have a lot of resources, the most important thing is to have had good parents and to have been brought up by people who gave one the proper values.

The conventional notions of art have changed, and a lot of things done today are considered works of art that would have been rejected in the past.

The Christian ethic played an essential part in my upbringing.

I hope the Guggenheim plan will be revived.

90% of all millionaires become so through owning real estate.

Someday I want to be rich. Some people get so rich they lose all respect for humanity. That’s how rich I want to be.

When I see something I like, I buy it, but I do not look for it madly.

The Japanese banks are not having an easy time as they once had.

very day I get up and look through the Forbes list of the richest people in America. If I’m not there, I go to work.

He is richest who is content with the least.

I am convinced that material things can contribute a lot to making one’s life pleasant, but, basically, if you do not have very good friends and relatives who matter to you, life will be really empty and sad and material things cease to be important.

When you have a lot of resources, the most important thing is to have had good parents and to have been brought up by people who gave one the proper values.

Wealth – any income that is at least one hundred dollars more a year than the income of one’s wife’s sister’s husband.

Abramovich’s got six yachts which are just gigantic and you think, ‘What a waste of money. He could transform so many people’s lives if he put that money to good use.

Guilt for being rich, and guilt thinking that perhaps love and peace isn’t enough and you have to go and get shot or something.

Much corporate giving is charitable in nature rather than philanthropic.

My grandfather, along with Carnegie, was a pioneer in philanthropy, which my father then practiced on a very large scale.

I always knew I was going to be rich. I don’t think I ever doubted it for a minute.

No man’s fortune can be an end worthy of his being.