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Ideas have significance for him only as a prelude to action.

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
Prelude
Significance
Action
Ideas

More quotes by Eric Hoffer

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To be fully alive is to feel that everything is possible.
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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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Nothing so bolsters our self-confidence and reconciles us with ourselves as the continuous ability to create to see things grow and develop under our hand, day in, day out.
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Whenever we proclaim the uniqueness of a religion , a truth , a leader, a nation, a race, a part or a holy cause, we are also proclaiming our own uniqueness.
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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.
Eric Hoffer
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Love-making is radical, while marriage is conservative.
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Quite often the social doctors become part of the disease.
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Language was invented to ask questions.
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The remarkable thing is that we really love our neighbor as ourselves: we do unto others as we do unto ourselves. We hate others when we hate ourselves. We are tolerant toward others when we tolerate ourselves. We forgive others when we forgive ourselves. We are prone to sacrifice others when we are ready to sacrifice ourselves.
Eric Hoffer
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When our individual interests and prospects do not seem worth living for, we are in desperate need for something apart from us to live for. All forms of dedication, devotion, loyalty and self-surrender are in essence a desperate clinging to something which might give worth and meaning to our futile, spoiled lives.
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To most of us nothing is so invisible as an unpleasant truth. Though it is held before our eyes, pushed under our noses, rammed down our throats- we know it not.
Eric Hoffer
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It is the individual only who is timeless. Societies, cultures, and civilizations -- past and present -- are often incomprehensible to outsiders, but the individual's hungers, anxieties, dreams, and preoccupations have remained unchanged through the millenia.
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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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There is in most passions a shrinking away from ourselves. The passionate pursuer has all the earmarks of a fugitive.
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The chief difference between me and others is that I have plenty of time not only because I am without a multitude of responsibilities and without daily tasks, which demand attention: But also because I am basically without ambition. Neither the present nor the future has claims on me.
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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.
Eric Hoffer
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When people are bored it is primarily with themselves.
Eric Hoffer
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Faith in a holy cause is to a considerable extent a substitute for lost faith in ourselves.
Eric Hoffer
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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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Man is the only creature that strives to surpass himself, and yearns for the impossible.
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