Quotes about Possession

"Property in ideas is an insoluble contradiction.  [He who complains of "theft" of his idea] complains that something has been stolen which he still possesses, and he wants back something which, if given to him a thousand times, would add nothing to his possession."

Do you measure your greatness more by your gifts or your possessions?

There is poetry as soon as we realize that we possess nothing.

One after another, then by almost geometric progression, things slipped away from me. [A] great burden fell off my shoulders, and I felt that I could not walk with ease and do my work also in the service of my fellow men with great comfort and still greater joy. The possession of anything then became a troublesome thing and a burden. Exploring the cause of that joy, I found that if I kept anything as my own, I had to defend it against the whole world.... And I said to myself: if [other people] want it and would take it, they do so not from any malicious motive but... because thers was a greater need than mine. And I said to myself: possession seems to me to be a crime, I can only possess certain things when I know that others who also want to possess similar things are able to do so. But we know.... such a thing is an impossibility. Therefore, the only thing that can be possessed by all is non-possession, not to have anything whatsoever. Or... a willing surrender....