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Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many.

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
Rudeness
Corrupts
Weakness
Power
Many
Work

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There is no loneliness greater than the loneliness of a failure. The failure is a stranger in his own house.
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When we believe ourselves in possession of the only truth, we are likely to be indifferent to common everyday truths.
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The intellectuals and the young, booted and spurred, feel themselves born to ride us.
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The sick in soul insist that it is humanity that is sick, and they are the surgeons to operate on it. They want to turn the world into a sickroom. And once they get humanity strapped to the operating table, they operate on it with an ax.
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In every passionate pursuit, the pursuit counts more than the object pursued.
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The chemistry of dissatisfaction is as the chemistry of some marvelously potent tar. In it are the building stones of explosives, stimulants, poisons, opiates, perfumes and stenches.
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There is a tendency to judge a race, a nation or any distinct group by its leastworthy members.
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Take away hatred from some people, and you have men without faith.
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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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Glory is largely a theatrical concept. There is no striving for glory without a vivid awareness of an audience... The desire to escape or camouflage their unsatisfactory selves develops in the frustrated a facility for pretending -- for making a show -- and also a readiness to identify themselves wholly with an imposing spectacle.
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The taint inherent in absolute power is not its inhumanity but its antihumanity.
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To the creative individual all experience is seminal-all events are equidistant from new ideasand insights.
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Craving, not having, is the mother of a reckless giving of oneself.
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To have a grievance is to have a purpose in life. It not infrequently happens that those who hunger for hope give their allegiance to him who offers them a grievance.
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Ideas have significance for him only as a prelude to action.
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The real persuaders are our appetites, our fears and above all our vanity. The skillful propagandist stirs and coaches these internal persuaders.
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Commitment becomes hysterical when those who have nothing to give advocate generosity, and those who have nothing to give up preach renunciation.
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To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are.
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Resistance, whether to one's appetites or to the ways of the world, is a chief factor in the shaping of character.
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