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One of the surprising privileges of intellectuals is that they are free to be scandalously asinine without harming their reputations.

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
Society
Asinine
Free
Reputations
Without
Harming
Privileges
Intellectuals
Surprising
Reputation
Privilege
Scandalously

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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 is a tendency to judge a race, a nation or any distinct group by its leastworthy members.
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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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The best part of the art of living is to know how to grow old gracefully.
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Youth itself is a talent, a perishable talent.
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It is easier to love humanity as a whole than to love one's neighbor.
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Our doubts about ourselves cannot be banished except by working at that which is the one and only thing we know we ought to do. Other people's assertions cannot silence the howling dirge within us. It is our talents rusting unused within us that secrete the poison of self-doubt into our bloodstream.
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Absolute power turns its possessors not into a God but an anti-God. For God turned clay into men, while the absolute despot turns men into clay.
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It needs fanatical faith to rationalize our cowardice.
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All leaders strive to turn their followers into children.
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Sensuality reconciles us with the human race. The misanthropy of the old is due in large part to the fading of the magic glow of desire.
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Both the revolutionary and the creative individual are perpetual juveniles. The revolutionary does not grow up because he cannot grow, while the creative individual cannot grow up because he keeps growing.
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How frighteningly few are the persons whose death would spoil our appetite and make the world seem empty.
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You cannot gauge the intelligence of an American by talking with him you must work with him. The American polishes and refines his way of doing things-even the most commonplace-the way the French of the 17th century polished their maxims.
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The devil personifies not the nature that is around us but the nature that is within us- the infinitely ferocious and cunning prehuman creature that is still within us, sealed in the subconscious cellars of the psyche.
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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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We are ready to die for an opinion but not for a fact: indeed, it is by our readiness to die that we try to prove the factualness of our opinion.
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To wrong those we hate is to add fuel to our hatred. Conversely, to treat an enemy with magnanimity is to blunt our hatred for him.
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Nationalist pride, like other variants of pride, can be a substitute for self-respect.
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