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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.

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
Give
Nothing
Hysterical
Giving
Renunciation
Advocate
Preach
Generosity
Commitment
Becomes

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There can be no mass movement without some deliberate misrepresentation of facts.
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It needs fanatical faith to rationalize our cowardice.
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In human affairs, the best stimulus for running ahead is to have something we must run from.
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There is no doubt that in exchanging a self-centered for a selfless life we gain enormously in self-esteem. The vanity of the selfless, even those who practice utmost humility, is boundless.
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I have a premonition that will not leave me: as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish, the holocaust will be upon us.
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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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To find the cause of our ills in something outside ourselves, something specific that can be spotted and eliminated, is a diagnosis that cannot fail to appeal. To say that the cause of our troubles is not in us but in the Jews , and pass immediately to the extermination of the Jews, is a prescription likely to find a wide acceptance.
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The feeling of being hurried is not usually the result of living a full life and having no time. It is on the contrary born of a vague fear that we are wasting our life. When we do not do the one thing we ought to do, we have no time for anything else--we are the busiest people in the world.
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A doctrine insulates the devout not only against the realities around them but also against their own selves. The fanatical believer is not conscious of his envy, malice, pettiness and dishonesty. There is a wall of words between his consciousness and his real self.
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