Quote

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.

Eric Hoffer

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Eric Hoffer
Age: 84 †
Born: 1898
Born: July 25
Died: 1983
Died: May 21
Philosopher
Psychologist
Writer
New York City
New York
Human
Decency
Humans
Suspicion
Matter
Objectives
Life
Ill
Cheapens
Noble
Blurs
Kindness
Blur
Evil
Breeds
Government
Wickedness

More quotes by Eric Hoffer

Image
An empty head is not really empty it is stuffed with rubbish. Hence the difficulty of forcing anything into an empty head.
Eric Hoffer
Image
It takes a vice to check a vice, and virtue is the by-product of a stalemate between opposite vices.
Eric Hoffer
Image
Nothing so offends the doctrinaire intellectual as our ability to achieve the momentous in a matter-of-fact way, unblessed by words.
Eric Hoffer
Image
Failure in the management of practical affairs seems to be a qualification for success in the management of public affairs.
Eric Hoffer
Image
It is our talents rusting unused within us that secrete the poison of self-doubt into our bloodstream.
Eric Hoffer
Image
How frighteningly few are the persons whose death would spoil our appetite and make the world seem empty.
Eric Hoffer
Image
The suspicious mind believes more than it doubts. It believes in a formidable and ineradicable evil lurking in every person.
Eric Hoffer
Image
A successful social technique consists perhaps in finding unobjectionable means for individual self-assertion.
Eric Hoffer
Image
Without a sense of proportion there can be neither good taste nor genuine intelligence, nor perhaps moral integrity.
Eric Hoffer
Image
One wonders whether a generation that demands instant satisfaction of all its needs and instant solution of the world's problems will produce anything of lasting value. Such a generation, even when equipped with the most modern technology, will be essentially primitive it will stand in awe of nature, and submit to the tutelage of medicine men.
Eric Hoffer
Image
Propaganda ... serves more to justify ourselves than to convince others and the more reason we have to feel guilty, the more fervent our propaganda.
Eric Hoffer
Image
Only the individual who has come to terms with his self can have a dispassionate attitude toward the world.
Eric Hoffer
Image
The effectiveness of a doctrine does not come from its meaning but from its certitude. No doctrine however profound and sublime will be effective unless it is presented as the embodiment of the one and only truth
Eric Hoffer
Image
The link between ideas and action is rarely direct. There is almost always an intermediate step in which the idea is overcome.
Eric Hoffer
Image
It is always safe to assume that people are more subtle and less sensitive than they seem.
Eric Hoffer
Image
Add a few drops of venom to a half truth and you have an absolute truth.
Eric Hoffer
Image
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.
Eric Hoffer
Image
One of the surprising privileges of intellectuals is that they are free to be scandalously asinine without harming their reputations.
Eric Hoffer
Image
Sensuality reconciles us with the human race. The misanthropy of the old is due in large part to the fading of the magic glow of desire.
Eric Hoffer
Image
...in the shaping of a life, chance and the ability to respond to chance are everything.
Eric Hoffer