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Where freedom is real, equality is the passion of the masses. Where equality is real, freedom is the passion of a small minority.

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
Liberty
Small
Passion
Minority
Freedom
Masses
Real
Minorities
Equality
Mass

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Originality is deliberate and forced, and partakes of the nature of a protest.
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The desire to belong is partly a desire to lose oneself.
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We need not only a purpose in life to give meaning to our existence but also something to give meaning to our suffering. We need as much something to suffer for as something to live for.
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We find it hard to apply the knowledge of ourselves to our judgment of others. The fact that we are never of one kind, that we never love without reservations and never hate with all our being cannot prevent us from seeing others as wholly black or white.
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It is also plausible that those movements with the greatest inner contradiction and between profession and practice - that is to say with a strong feeling of guilt - are likely to be the most fervent in imposing their faith on others.
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The misery of a child is interesting to a mother, the misery of a young man is interesting to a young woman, the misery of an old man is interesting to nobody.
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Help your sister's boat across the water, and yours too will reach the other side. Kindness can become its own motive. We are made kind by being kind.
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Facts are counterrevolutionary.
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An easygoing person is probably more accessible to the realization of eternity--the endless flow of life and death--than one who takes his prospects and duties overseriously. It is the overserious who are truly frivolous.
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You accept certain unlovely things about yourself and manage to live with them. The atonement for such an acceptance is that you make allowances for others - that you cleanse yourself of the sin of self-righteousness.
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The technique of a mass movement aims to infect people with a malady and then offer the movement as a cure.
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We used to think that revolutions are the cause of change. Actually it is the other way around: change prepares the ground for revolution.
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The hardest thing to cope with is not selfishness or vanity or deceitfulness, but sheer stupidity.
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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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A successful social technique consists perhaps in finding unobjectionable means for individual self-assertion.
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When grubbing for necessities man is still an animal. He becomes uniquely human when he reaches out for the superfluous and extravagant.
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The act of self-denial seems to confer on us the right to be harsh and merciless toward others.
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My writing is done in railroad yards while waiting for a freight, in the fields while waiting for a truck, and at noon after lunch. Towns are too distracting.
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To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are.
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