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A nation without dregs and malcontents is orderly, peaceful and pleasant, but perhaps without the seed of things to come.

Eric Hoffer

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Eric Hoffer
Age: 84 †
Born: 1898
Born: July 25
Died: 1983
Died: May 21
Philosopher
Psychologist
Writer
New York City
New York
Love
Peaceful
Nation
Malcontents
Perhaps
Malcontent
Nations
Dregs
Peace
Orderly
Come
Seed
Without
Pleasant
Things
Seeds

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A society that refuses to strive for superfluities is likely to end up lacking in necessities.
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We can never really be prepared for that which is wholly new. We have to adjust ourselves, and every radical adjustment is a crisis in self-esteem: we undergo a test, we have to prove ourselves. It needs subordinate self-confidence to face drastic change without inner trembling.
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Self-esteem and self-contempt have specific odors they can be smelled.
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You cannot gauge the intelligence of an American by talking with him you must work with him. The American polishes and refines his way of doing things-even the most commonplace-the way the French of the 17th century polished their maxims.
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No matter how noble the objectives of a government, if it blurs decency and kindness, cheapens human life, and breeds ill will and suspicion it is an evil government.
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The suspicious mind believes more than it doubts. It believes in a formidable and ineradicable evil lurking in every person.
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Creativity is discontent translated into arts.
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There is need for some kind of make-believe in order to face death unflinchingly. To our real, naked selves there is not a thing on earth or in heaven worth dying for.
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That which corrodes the souls of the persecuted is the monstrous inner agreement with the prevailing prejudice against them.
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The desire to be different from the people we live with is sometimes the result of our rejection- real or imagined- by them.
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Our credulity is greatest concerning the things we know least about. And since we know least about ourselves, we are ready to believe all that is said about us. Hence the mysterious power of both flattery and calumny.
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Action is basically a reaction against loss of balance - a flailing of the arms to to regain one's balance. To dispose a soul to action, we must upset its equilibrium.
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It is doubtful whether the oppressed ever fight for freedom. They fight for pride and power-power to oppress others.
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...in the shaping of a life, chance and the ability to respond to chance are everything.
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We can remember minutely and precisely only the things which never really happened to us.
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I can never forget that one of the most gifted, best educated nations in the world, of its own free will, surrendered its fate into the hands of a maniac.
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Nationalist pride, like other variants of pride, can be a substitute for self-respect.
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Naivete in grownups is often charming but when coupled with vanity it is indistinguishable from stupidity.
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A free society is as much a threat to the intellectual's sense of worth as an automated economy is to the workingman's sense of worth. Any social order that can function with a minimum of leadership will be anathema to the intellectual.
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Radicalism itself ceases to be radical when absorbed mainly in preserving its control over a society or an economy.
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