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Eric Hoffer Quotes - Page 2

All Quotes Acceptance Achievement Age Ambition Anxiety Art Atheism Atheist Attitude Awareness Balance Belief Business Change Character Children Communism Compassion Conformity Conservatism Country Creativity Death Deception Dedication Desire Destiny Devil Diversity Doubt Dying Education Effort Energy Environment Envy Equality Evil Excellence Experience Failure Faith Fashion Fate Fear Feelings Fighting Freedom Frustration Future Generosity Giving Glory Growing Up Growth Happiness Hate Hatred Heart History Home Hope Humanity Humility Hunger Ignorance Impulse Independence Individuality Inspirational Integrity Judging Justice Kindness Knowledge Language Laughter Leadership Learning Liberty Life Literature Loneliness Love Loyalty Lying Manifestation Motivational Nature Opportunity Originality Overcoming Passion Past Philosophy Power Prejudice Pride Propaganda Prophet Protest Purpose Quality Reality Reflection Rejection Religion Resentment Respect Responsibility Righteousness Running Sacrifice Sadness Self Confidence Self Esteem Self Respect Sin Society Soul Spring Success Suffering Talent Teaching Technology Time Tolerance Truth Unity Vision Water Weakness Winning Wisdom Work Writing Youth

The best part of the art of living is to know how to grow old gracefully.

The best part of the art of living is to know how to grow old gracefully.

Art, Retirement, Nursing

Eric Hoffer (1996). “The Passionate State of Mind”

Those in possession of absolute power can not only prophesy and make their prophecies come true, but they can also lie and make their lies come true.

Lying, Power, Government

Eric Hoffer (1996). “The Passionate State of Mind”

There is a tendency to judge a race, a nation or any distinct group by its leastworthy members.

Race, Judging, Tolerance

Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

Mass movements can rise and spread without belief in a God, but never without belief in a devil.

Devil, Movement, Libertarian

Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

There is perhaps no better way of measuring the natural endowment of a soul than by its ability to transmute dissatisfaction into a creative impulse.

Creative, Soul, Way

Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

It is a paradox that in our time of drastic rapid change, when the future is in our midst devouring the present before our eyes, we have never been less certain about what is ahead of us.

Change, Time, Future

Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

Learners inherit the earth; while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.

Inspirational, Life, Motivational

Speech on the Occasion of the Opening of the Governor General's Canadian Leadership Conference by Adrienne Clarkson in Winnipeg, archive.gg.ca. May 07, 2004.

It is remarkable by how much a pinch of malice enhances the penetrating power of an idea or an opinion. Our ears, it seems, are wonderfully attuned to sneers and evil reports about our fellow men.

Men, Ideas, Evil

Eric Hoffer (1955). “The passionate state of mind, and other aphorisms”

It is doubtful whether the oppressed ever fight for freedom. They fight for pride and power-power to oppress others.

Fighting, Pride, Trouble

Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

When watching men of power in action it must be always kept in mind that, whether they know it or not, their main purpose is the elimination or neutralization of the independent individual- the independent voter, consumer, worker, owner, thinker- and that every device they employ aims at turning men into a manipulable animated instrument which is Aristotle's definition of a slave.

Independent, Men, Mind

Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

The true believer, no matter how rowdy and violent his acts, is basically an obedient and submissive person.

Rowdy, Matter, Submissive

ERIC HOFFER (1963). “THE TRUE BELIEVER”

A passionate obsession with the outside world or the private lives of others is an attempt to compensate for a lack of meaning in one's own life

Passionate, World, Obsession

We can be absolutely certain only about things we do not understand.

Thinking, Certain, Agnosticism

The True Believer Part 3, Chapter XII, Section 57 (p. 79)

I have a premonition that will not leave me: as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish, the holocaust will be upon us.

Israel, Holocaust, Should

Nowhere at present is there such a measureless loathing of their country by educated people as in America.

Country, America, People

Eric Hoffer (1977). “In our time”, McNally & Loftin Publishers

To know a person's religion we need not listen to his profession of faith but must find his brand of intolerance.

Atheist, Religion, Atheism

Eric Hoffer (1955). “The passionate state of mind, and other aphorisms”

To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are.

Inspirational, Change, Different

Eric Hoffer (1955). “The passionate state of mind, and other aphorisms”

A man is likely to mind his own business when it is worth minding. When it is not, he takes his mind off his own meaningless affairs by minding other people's business.

War, Men, People

Eric Hoffer (2011). “The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements”, p.14, Harper Collins

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

Respect, Gratitude, Hands

"Thoughts of Eric Hoffer, Including: 'Absolute Faith Corrupts Absolutely'". The New York Times Magazine, p.52, April 25, 1971.

The ratio between supervisory and producing personnel is always highest where the intellectuals are in power. In a Communist country it takes half the population to supervise the other half.

Country, Population, Half

"The Temper of Our Time". Book by Eric Hoffer, 1967.

To learn you need a certain degree of confidence, not too much and not too little. If you have too little confidence, you will think you can't learn. If you have too much, you will think you don't have to learn.

Thinking, Degrees, Needs

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

Happiness, Happy, Laughter

Eric Hoffer (1996). “The Passionate State of Mind”

You can never get enough of what you don't need to make you happy.

Happiness, Being Happy, Simple

"Living Our Values, Closing the Ethical Gap" by Jeffrey Rubin, bigthink.com.

Our present addiction to pollsters and forecasters is a symptom of our chronic uncertainty about the future... We watch our experts read the entrails of statistical tables and graphs the way the ancients watched their soothsayers read the entrails of a chicken.

Addiction, Experts, Watches

Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many.

Work, Power, Weakness

Eric Hoffer (1996). “The Passionate State of Mind”

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