In his compendium of psycho- emotional states, The Anatomy of Melancholy, Robert Burton, academic and clergyman, studies the causes and effects of covetousness. He sometimes conflates avarice with envy (greed with covetousness) because they do overlap. Avarice is wanting more and more of something to the point where you have more than you need but still are greedy for more. It can be the unquenchable desire for chocolate or cake or gold.

Usually it is applied to the obsessive accumulation of material goods or wealth. The possessing becomes the object of the act of acquiring; just having the gold, not using it to buy things, that is the compulsion. Envy is coveting what another has. It is a commandment that ‘Thou shall not covet …’ It is another form of greed. Citing Plutarch, Robert Burton asserts that ‘all the causes of our miseries in this life […] have had their beginning from stubborn anger […] or some unjust or immoderate affection, as covetousness, &c’. On his own account he adds that ‘usury, fraud, Simony [selling church offices], oppression, lying, swearing, bearing false witness’ issue from ‘this fountain of covetousness, that greediness in getting, tenacity in keeping, sordidity in spending’. Apart from simony, all are found in Volpone and are integral to its ethical framework. Orthodox morality is so inverted that Volpone can assert of gold,

He means that money can buy the appearance of having these qualities in the eyes of others for, of course, in reality they are only to be earned by one's deeds, not by simply having a title, power, rank or wealth. But Volpone (and Ben Jonson) lives in such a world that if you have riches you are thought to be virtuous, have a good name, are honourable and honoured by others. If you have a noble title (often bought in James I's time) you are thought to be noble courageous, honest and wise in your behaviour just by virtue of having the title. This was the failing of the hierarchical system.