Avarice

Here's your word of the day: Avarice: a noun meaning extreme greed for money or gain. A simple search on Wikipedia redirects you to greed. I forgot where I read the word but I think the author was listing a few vices. So on a separate thread I searched for the seven capital vices a.k.a. the seven deadly sins: superbia (hubris/pride), avaritia (avarice/greed), luxuria (extravagance, later lust), invidia (envy), gula (gluttony), ira (wrath/anger), and acedia (sloth/laziness). The Catholic Encyclopedia has the following explanation for the word avarice:

Avarice (from Lat. avarus, "greedy"; "to crave") is the inordinate love for riches. Its special malice, broadly speaking, lies in that it makes the getting and keeping of money, possessions, and the like, a purpose in itself to live for. Avarice does not see that these things are valuable only as instruments for the conduct of a rational and harmonious life, due regard being paid of course to the special social condition in which one is placed. It is called a capital vice because it has as its object that for the gaining or holding of which many other sins are committed. It is more to be dreaded in that it often cloaks itself as a virtue, or insinuates itself under the pretext of making a decent provision for the future. In so far as avarice is an incentive to injustice in acquiring and retaining of wealth, it is frequently a grievous sin. In itself, however, and in so far as avarice implies simply an excessive desire of, or pleasure in, riches, it is commonly not a mortal sin.

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