The great make its feel, first of all, the indifference of circumstances. They call into activity the higher perceptions, and subdue the low habits of comfort and luxury; but the higher perceptions find their objects everywhere; only the low habits need palaces and banquets.
If theater is ritual, then dance is too... It's as if the threads connecting us to the rest of the world were washed clean of preconceptions and fears. When you dance, you can enjoy the luxury of being you.
Having a kid made me realize, "I have to take care of this kid, but I can't have the luxury of dropping everything in the world and spending every waking moment with him. I've got to work."
If I could sell 500 million records every time, it would be great. But I've also had the luxury experience of having it when I was a teenager, in a very kind of model version of it.
Part of the true luxury of "earned laziness" are the braggin rights that come along with being purposefully and publicly lazy. It is a badge of distinction, an emblem of success, without having to say too much about it. It labels us, affords us kudos, and raises our profile in the "pecking order" of our fellow troglodytes. It says to others, "See, I've done so well that I can afford to do nothing at all whenever I so choose!
Alone, condemned, deserted, as those who are about to die are alone, there was a luxury in it, an isolation full of sublimity; a freedom which the attached can never know
We grew up in a very material-lacking socialist society, but today China is a capitalist society. It's very materialistic. It's full of desire and luxury goods.
I find nothing healthful or exalting in the smooth conventions of society. I do not like the close air of saloons. I begin to suspect myself to be a prisoner, though treated with all this courtesy and luxury. I pay a destructive tax in my conformity.
All conservatives are such from personal defects. They have been effiminated by position of nature, born halt and blind, through luxury of their parents, and can only, like invalids, act on the defensive.
When the toll upon carriages of luxury, upon coaches, post-chaises, etc. is made somewhat higher in proportion to their weight, than upon carriages of necessary use, such as carts, wagons, etc. the indolence and vanity of the rich is made to contribute in a very easy manner to the relief of the poor, by rendering cheaper the transportation of heavy goods to all the different parts of the country.