Jay-Z Quotes

Maybe we all have a dark place inside of us, a place where dark thoughts and darker dreams live, but it doesn't have to become who we are.

The man whose only pleasure in life is making money, weighs less on the moral scale than an angleworm.

The world is so competitive, aggressive, consumive, selfish and during the time we spend here we must be all but that.

The curse of covetousness is that it destroys manhood by substituting money for character.

It's almost as if we each have a vampire inside us. Controlling that beast, that dark side, is what fascinates me.

Greed has been with human beings forever. We have a number of things in our species that you would call 'the dark side,' and greed is one of them. If you don't put certain structures in place or restrictions on those parts of our being that come from that dark place, then it gets out of control.

Our necessities never equal our wants.

None of us is guaranteed against failure or corruption of any kind; witness what's going on in the world in this moment, the follies of human nature and the failures of human nature.

Pride, avarice, and envy are in every home.

Pride, envy, avarice—these sparks Have set on fire the hearts of all men.

The depraved nature of man is well known. He has a natural bias toward his own interest, which will prevail ... unless checked.

All for ourselves, and nothing for other people, seems, in every age of the world, to have been the vile maxim of the masters of mankind.

I believe that people generally want to be what we call good. They want to cooperate with people. They don't want to steal; they don't want to cheat. But everybody has a price. Everybody has an incentive.

It's impossible to exorcise the darkness out of you. We can pretend it's not there until something bursts.

We have darkness as human beings.

Instead of hating the people you think are war-makers, hate the appetites and disorder in your own soul, which are the causes of war. If you love peace, then hate injustice, hate tyranny, hate greed - but hate these things in yourself, not in another.

I played Lucifer once, which is sort of a difficult character to research. I thought to myself, "We all have the potential to be selfish, to be cruel - at least to think evil thoughts, even if we don't ever act out on them. Even if we don't ever think we behave badly, we probably do more than we realize."

there is enough treachery , hatred violence absurdity in the average human being to supply any given army on any given day

In the race of men is much greed and envy; but of truth, little.

Maybe a new religion will rise now. Maybe without it, man will crumble in cynicism and selfishness because he really needs his gods.

I explained to him, however, that my nature was such that my physical needs often got in the way of my feelings.

People are just greedy animals, after all.

We all carry within us places of exile, our crimes, our ravages. Our task is not to unleash them on the world; it is to transform them in ourselves and others.

Urges ... every man has urges. But the true measure of man is to admit them, to learn to control them. The Shield used to refer to themselves as the most dominant force in our universe. But that ain't the way I remember it. They fell victim to the faults of men. Their lust and greed and valor for glory, it led them right down in the pit, where they belong. Tonight, they'll burn for it. For I am no man. I am reborn. Our bond can never be broken, and our urges can never be satisfied.