What is really desired, under the name of riches, is, essentially, power over men; in its simplest sense, the power of obtaining for our own advantage the labor of servant, tradesman, and artist; in wider sense, authority of directing large masses of the nation to various ends (good, trivial, or hurtful, according to the mind of the rich person).

John Ruskin (1819–1900) English art critic, painter, writer, social thinker

Unto This Last, ch. 2 (1860)