Eric Hoffer Quotes Page 3


 
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Best 148 Quotes by Eric Hoffer – Page 3 of 5

“Our greatest pretenses are built up not to hide the evil and the ugly in us, but our emptiness. The hardest thing to hide is something that is not there.”

“Our greatest weariness comes from work not done.”

“Our passionate preoccupation with the sky, the stars, and a God somewhere in outer space is a homing impulse. We are drawn back to where we came from.”

“Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life.”

“People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them.”

“Perhaps our originality manifests itself most strikingly in what we do with that which we did not originate. To discover something wholly new can be a matter of chance, of idle tinkering, or even of the chronic dissatisfaction of the untalented.”

“Propaganda does not deceive people; it merely helps them to deceive themselves.”

“Retribution often means that we eventually do to ourselves what we have done unto others.”

“Rudeness is the weak man's imitation of strength.”

“Self-esteem and self-contempt have specific odors; they can be smelled.”

“Social improvement is attained more readily by a concern with the quality of results than with the purity of motives.”

“Sometimes we feel the loss of a prejudice as a loss of vigor.”

“That which corrodes the souls of the persecuted is the monstrous inner agreement with the prevailing prejudice against them.”

“The basic test of freedom is perhaps less in what we are free to do than in what we are free not to do.”

“The chemistry of dissatisfaction is as the chemistry of some marvelously potent tar. In it are the building stones of explosives, stimulants, poisons, opiates, perfumes and stenches.”

“The compulsion to take ourselves seriously is in inverse proportion to our creative capacity. When the creative flow dries up, all we have left is our importance.”

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“When a group of people make something sacred, the members of the cult lose the ability to think clearly about it. Morality binds and blinds.”


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“The end comes when we no longer talk with ourselves. It is the end of genuine thinking and the beginning of the final loneliness.”

“The game of history is usually played by the best and the worst over the heads of the majority in the middle.”

“The greatest weariness comes from work not done.”

“The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings.”

“The main effect of a real revolution is perhaps that it sweeps away those who do not know how to wish, and brings to the front men with insatiable appetites for action, power and all that the world has to offer.”

“The nature of a society is largely determined by the direction in which talent and ambition flow by the tilt of the social landscape.”

“The necessary has never been man's top priority. The passionate pursuit of the nonessential and the extravagant is one of the chief traits of human uniqueness. Unlike other forms of life, man's greatest exertions are made in the pursuit not of necessities but of superfluities.”

“The pleasure we derive from doing favors is partly in the feeling it gives us that we are not altogether worthless. It is a pleasant surprise to ourselves.”

“The pre-human creature from which man evolved was unlike any other living thing in its malicious viciousness toward its own kind. Humanization was not a leap forward but a groping toward survival.”

“The real antichrist is he who turns the wine of an original idea into the water of mediocrity.”

“The real persuaders are our appetites, our fears and above all our vanity. The skillful propagandist stirs and coaches these internal persuaders.”

“The remarkable thing is that we really love our neighbor as ourselves: we do unto others as we do unto ourselves. We hate others when we hate ourselves. We are tolerant toward others when we tolerate ourselves. We forgive others when we forgive ourselves. We are prone to sacrifice others when we are ready to sacrifice ourselves.”

“The savior who wants to turn men into angels is as much a hater of human nature as the totalitarian despot who wants to turn them into puppets.”

“The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness.”

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“An animal's eyes have the power to speak a great language.”


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