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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.

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
Noble
Blurs
Kindness
Blur
Evil
Breeds
Government
Wickedness
Human
Decency
Humans
Suspicion
Matter
Objectives
Life
Ill
Cheapens

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In a trader-dominated society, the scribe is usually kept out of the management of affairs, but it given a more or less free hand in the cultural field. By frustrating the scribe's craving for commanding action, the trader draws upon himself the scribe's wrath and scorn.
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Ours is a golden age of minorities. At no time in the past have dissident minorities felt so much at home and had so much room to throw their weight around. They speak and act as if they were the people, and what they abominate most is the dissent of the majority.
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There would be no society if living together depended upon understanding each other.
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To change everything, simply change your attitude.
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There are many who find a good alibi far more attractive than an achievement. For an achievement does not settle anything permanently. We still have to prove our worth anew each day we have to prove that we are as good today as we were yesterday. But when we have a valid alibi for not achieving anything we are fixed, so to speak, for life.
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Intolerance is the ''Do Not Touch'' sign on something that cannot bear touching. We do not mind having our hair ruffled, but we will not tolerate any familiarity with the toupee which covers our baldness.
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We feel free when we escape - even if it be but from the frying pan to the fire.
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Whenever you trace the origin of a skill or practices which played a crucial role in the ascent of man, we usually reach the realm of play.
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Universities are an example of organizations dominated wholly by intellectuals yet, outside pure science, they have not been an optimal milieu for the unfolding of creative talents. In neither art, music, literature, technology and social theory, nor planning have the Universities figured as originators or as seedbeds of new talents and energies.
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It is not at all simple to understand the simple.
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The Greeks invented logic but were not fooled by it.
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The less satisfaction we derive from being ourselves, the greater is our desire to be like others.
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What merit there is in my thinking is derived from two peculiarities: (1) My inability to be familiar with anything. I simply can't take things for granted. (2) My endless patience. I assume that the only way to find an answer is to hang on long enough and keep groping.
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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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The taint inherent in absolute power is not its inhumanity but its antihumanity.
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In an adequate social order, the untalented should be able to acquire a sense of usefulness and of growth without interfering with the development of talent around them
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Judgment consists not in seeing through deceptions and evil intentions, but in being able to awaken the decency dormant in every person.
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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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It was the craving to be a one and only people which impelled the ancient Hebrews to invent a one and only God whose one and only people they were to be.
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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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