Authors:

A
B
C
D
E
F
G
H
I
J
K
L
M
N
O
P
Q
R
S
T
U
V
W
X
Y
Z

Eric Hoffer Quotes about Society

All Eric Hoffer 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 quotes Soul Spring Success Suffering Talent Teaching Technology Time Tolerance Truth Unity Vision Water Weakness Winning Wisdom Work Writing Youth

The rule seems to be that those who find no difficulty in deceiving themselves are easily deceived by others. They are easily persuaded and led.

The rule seems to be that those who find no difficulty in deceiving themselves are easily deceived by others. They are easily persuaded and led.

Society, Deceiving, Deceived

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

One of the surprising privileges of intellectuals is that they are free to be scandalously asinine without harming their reputations.

Society, Privilege, Reputation

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

We run fastest and farthest when we run from ourselves.

Running, Society

Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

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

Society, Quality, Improvement

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

There is apparently no surer way of turning a thing into its opposite than by exaggerating it

Opposites, Society, Way

Eric Hoffer (1963). “The Ordeal of Change”

All mass movements generate in their adherents a readiness to die and a proclivity for united action; all of them, irrespective of the doctrine they preach and the program they project, breed fanaticism, enthusiasm, fervent hope, hatred and intolerance; all of them are capable of releasing a powerful flow of activity in certain departments of life; all of them demand blind faith and singlehearted allegiance.

Powerful, Hatred, Society

Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

The fanatic is not really a stickler to principle. He embraces a cause not primarily because of its justness or holiness but because of his desperate need for something to hold onto.

Society, Holiness, Causes

Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

The revulsion from an unwanted self, and the impulse to forget it, mask it, slough it off and lose it, produce both a readiness to sacrifice the self and a willingness to dissolve it by losing one's individual distinctness in a compact collective whole.

Sacrifice, Self, Society

Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

Conservatism is sometimes a symptom of sterility. Those who have nothing in them that can grow and develop must cling to what they have in beliefs, ideas and possessions. The sterile radical, too, is basically conservative. He is afraid to let go of the ideas and beliefs he picked up in his youth lest his life be seen as empty and wasted.

Letting Go, Ideas, Society

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

Quite often the social doctors become part of the disease.

Doctors, Society, Disease

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

It is not at all simple to understand the simple.

Simple, Society

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

Proselytizing is more a passionate search for something not yet found than a desire to bestow upon the world something we already have. It is a search for a final and irrefutable demonstration that our absolute truth is indeed the one and only truth. The proselytizing fanatic strengthens his own faith by converting others.

Society, Desire, World

In human affairs, the best stimulus for running ahead is to have something we must run from.

Running, Progress, Society

Eric Hoffer (1963). “The Ordeal of Change”

It is a perplexing and unpleasant truth that when men already have "something worth fighting for,they do not feel like fighting.

Fighting, Men, Society

ERIC HOFFER (1963). “THE TRUE BELIEVER”

Spiritual stagnation ensues when man's environment becomes unpredictable or when his inner life is made wholly predictable.

Spiritual, Men, Society

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

A society that refuses to strive for superfluities is likely to end up lacking in necessities.

Society, Strive, Ends

Eric Hoffer (1969). “Working and Thinking on the Waterfront: A Journal, June 1958-May 1959”

The ideal of self-advancement which the civilizing west offers to backward populations brings with it the plague of individual frustration. All the advantages brought by the West are ineffectual substitutes for the sheltering and soothing anonymity of communal existence.

Frustration, Self, Society

Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

When grubbing for necessities man is still an animal. He becomes uniquely human when he reaches out for the superfluous and extravagant.

Animal, Men, Society

Eric Hoffer (1969). “Working and Thinking on the Waterfront: A Journal, June 1958-May 1959”

The technique of a mass movement aims to infect people with a malady and then offer the movement as a cure.

People, Society, Technique

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

Though they seem at opposite poles, fanatics of all kinds are actually crowded together at one end. It is the fanatic and the moderate who are poles apart and never meet.

Opposites, Together, Society

Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

You May Also Like: