According to Albert Einstein, "A hundred times every day I remind myself that my inner and outer life are based on the labors of other men, living and dead, and that I must exert myself in order to give in the same measure as I have received and am still receiving.” He said that the “trite objects of human efforts – possessions, outward success, luxury – have always seemed to me contemptible."

Albert Einstein, The World As I See It (1931).