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A man is likely to mind his own business when it is worth minding.

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
Men
Snooping
Minding
Meddling
Believer
Likely
Worth
Business
Mind

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Communists are frustrated capitalists.
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It is loneliness that makes the loudest noise. This is true of men as of dogs.
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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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Laughter to begin with was probably glee at the misfortunes of others. The baring of the teeth in laughter hints at its savage ancestry. Animals have no malice, hence also no laughter. They never savor the sudden glory of Schadenfreude. It was its infectious quality that made of laughter a medium of mutuality.
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The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness.
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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 wise learn from the experience of others, and the creative know how to make a crumb of experience go a long way.
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Successful action tends to become an end in itself.
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Excesses are essentially gestures. It is easy to be extremely cruel, magnanimous, humble or self-sacrificing when we see ourselves as actors in a performance.
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A society that refuses to strive for superfluities is likely to end up lacking in necessities.
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To make of human affairs a coherent, precise, predictable whole one must ignore or suppress man as he really is. It is by eliminating man from their equation that the makers of history can predict the future, and the writers of history can give a pattern to the past.
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Perhaps our originality manifests itself most strikingly in what we do with that which we did not originate. To discover something wholly new can be a matter of chance, of idle tinkering, or even of the chronic dissatisfaction of the untalented.
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Ideas have significance for him only as a prelude to action.
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The urge to escape our real self is also an urge to escape the rational and the obvious.
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We are least open to precise knowledge concerning the things we are most vehement about.
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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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A passionate obsession with the outside world or the private lives of others is an attempt to compensate for a lack of meaning in one's own life
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Unlike the pattern which seems to prevail in the rest of life, in the human species the weak not only survive but often triumph over the strong. The self-hatred inherent in the weak unlocks energies far more formidable then those mobilized by an ordinary struggle for existence.
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In every passionate pursuit, the pursuit counts more than the object pursued.
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Naivete in grownups is often charming but when coupled with vanity it is indistinguishable from stupidity.
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