A human differs from animals in that one is never completely and finally happy. Except for rare moments of harmony with the world’s ether and the mildness of the air, one is sure that things could be better. Humans always experience anxiety about the present; they always want to improve it. Why this is so—no one knows. However, we have sufficient confirmation of this a priori fact.
An animal, hiding from rain, seeks shelter. A human, if circumstances allow, builds a canopy. Or a hut. Or a house. Or an estate. A human never stops seeking new reasons for anxiety and new ways to eliminate them. Such is human nature, and nothing can be done about it. When our people envy rich people who, in their view, “are going crazy from excess,” it would not hurt them to remember that billions of people who live much poorer might envy them. There is no limit to wealth, and this wealth is subjective. A millionaire who gives away his millions to charity and science is, in principle, no different from one who squanders them on pleasures. Both seek new wealth. It simply looks different for different people at different moments of their lives.
There is no “philosophy” or “abstractness” in these arguments. Pure practice. Our civilization exists only because, for some unknown reason, we cannot, like ants or bees, calmly enjoy surrounding reality and simply adapt to changes.
Wealth is what gets produced in attempts to satisfy anxiety. I may be told that in these attempts many unpleasant things were also done—things we can hardly consider wealth. My answer is this: they could have been done without society.