Prosperity is a way of living and thinking, and not just money or things. Poverty is a way of living and thinking, and not just a lack of money or things.

Eric Butterworth (1916–2003) was a prominent Unity minister and New Thought writer whose work emphasized the creative power of consciousness, affirmative prayer, and the idea that “prosperity” begins as an inner state before it appears as outer circumstance. This quotation reflects a recurring theme in his sermons and books: that material conditions are downstream from habitual thought, expectation, and self-concept. In the postwar American context in which Butterworth preached and published—an era preoccupied with both rising consumer affluence and persistent inequality—he often distinguished spiritual prosperity (a mindset of wholeness, gratitude, and possibility) from mere accumulation, and framed poverty as a constricting mental pattern rather than only an economic statistic.

The quote argues that prosperity and poverty are fundamentally orientations of consciousness: ways of interpreting experience, making choices, and relating to resources. “Prosperity” here means an inner stance of sufficiency—confidence, openness, and constructive expectation—rather than simply having money or possessions. Conversely, “poverty” is portrayed as a mindset of scarcity, fear, and limitation that can persist even amid material comfort. Butterworth’s point is not that money is irrelevant, but that external wealth without inner freedom is fragile, while an inner sense of abundance tends to generate wiser action, resilience, and more effective engagement with opportunities. It encapsulates a New Thought ethic: change the pattern of thought to change the pattern of life.