Quote

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.

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
Gives
Feeling
Derive
Pleasure
Partly
Literature
Altogether
Feelings
Worthless
Giving
Favors
Pleasant
Surprise

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All leaders strive to turn their followers into children.
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...the majority of people cannot endure the bareness and futility of their lives unless they have some ardent dedication, or some passionate pursuit in which they can lose themselves.
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Often, the thing we pursue most passionately is but a substitute for the one thing we really want and cannot have.
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The majority prove their worth by keeping busy. A busy life is the nearest thing to a purposeful life.
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When cowardice is made respectable, its followers are without number both from among the weak and the strong it easily becomes a fashion.
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The proselytizing fanatic strengthens his own faith by converting others. The creed whose legitimacy is most easily challenged is likely to develop the strongest proselytizing impulse.
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In human affairs every solution serves only to sharpen the problem, to show us more clearly what we are up against. There are no final solutions.
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The link between ideas and action is rarely direct. There is almost always an intermediate step in which the idea is overcome.
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If anybody asks me what I have accomplished, I will say all I have accomplished is that I have written a few good sentences.
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The genuine creator creates something that has a life of its own, something that can exist and function without him. This is true not only of the writer, artist and scientist, but of creators in other fields.With the noncreative it is the other way around: in whatever they do, they arrange things so that they themselves become indispensable.
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Absolute faith corrupts as absolutely as absolute power.
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Where unity and self-sacrifice are indispensable for the normal functioning of society, everyday life is likely to be either religiofied (common tasks turned into holy causes) or militarized.
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It needs fanatical faith to rationalize our cowardice.
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People whose lives are barren and insecure seem to show a greater willingness to obey than people who are self-sufficient and self-confident. To the frustrated, freedom from responsibility is more attractive than freedom from restraint.
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We cannot hate those who we despise.
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Creativity is discontent translated into arts.
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Actual creativeness is a matter of moments. One has to piece together the minute grains to make a lump. And it is so easy to miss the momentary flashes, it is like sluicing in placer mining. He who lets the flakes float by has nothing to show for his trouble.
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...in the shaping of a life, chance and the ability to respond to chance are everything.
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It is when power is wedded to chronic fear that it becomes formidable.
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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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