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This food-and-shelter theory concerning man's efforts is without insight. The desire for praise is more imperative than the desire for food and shelter

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
Insight
Praise
Theory
Food
Imperative
Effort
Imperatives
Desire
Concerning
Without
Shelter
Men
Efforts

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My writing is done in railroad yards while waiting for a freight, in the fields while waiting for a truck, and at noon after lunch. Towns are too distracting.
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Man is a luxury-loving animal. Take away play, fancies, and luxuries, and you will turn man into a dull, sluggish creature, barely energetic enough to obtain a bare subsistence. A society becomes stagnant when its people are too rational or too serious to be tempted by baubles.
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A heresy can spring only from a system that is in full vigor.
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There are many who have grave scruples about deceiving but think it as nothing to deceive themselves.
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Language was invented to ask questions. Answers may be given by grunts and gestures, but questions must be spoken. Humanness came of age when man asked the first question. Social stagnation results not from a lack of answers but from the absence of the impulse to ask questions.
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It is part of the formidableness of a genuine mass movement that the self-sacrifice it promotes includes also a sacrifice of some of the moral sense, which cramps and restrains our nature.
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We usually see only the things we are looking for- so much so that we sometimes see them where they are not.
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The history of this country was made largely by people who wanted to be left alone. Those who could not thrive when left to themselves never felt at ease in America.
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To some, freedom means the opportunity to do what they want to do to most it means not to do what they do not want to do. It is perhaps true that those who can grow will feel free under any condition.
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Where everything is possible miracles become commonplaces, but the familiar ceases to be self-evident.
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We feel free when we escape - even if it be but from the frying pan to the fire.
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People unfit for freedom - who cannot do much with it - are hungry for power. The desire for freedom is an attribute of a have type of self. It says: leave me alone and I shall grow, learn, and realize my capacities. The desire for power is basically an attribute of a have not type of self.
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The passion for equality is partly a passion for anonymity: to be one thread of the many which make up a tunic one thread not distinguishable from the others. No one can then point us out, measure us against others and expose our inferiority.
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It is always safe to assume that people are more subtle and less sensitive than they seem.
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What the intellectual craves above all else is to be taken seriously, to be treated as a decisive force in shaping history. He is far more at home in a society that weighs his every word and keeps close watch on his attitudes then in a society that cares not what he says or does. He would rather be persecuted than ignored.
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The short-lived self, teetering on the edge of extinction, is the only thing that can ever really matter.
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You accept certain unlovely things about yourself and manage to live with them. The atonement for such an acceptance is that you make allowances for others - that you cleanse yourself of the sin of self-righteousness.
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Practically all writers and artists are aware of their destiny and see themselves as actors in a fateful drama. With me, nothing is momentous: obscure youth, glorious old age, fateful coincidences - nothing really matters. I have written a number of good sentences. I have kept free of delusions. I know I am going to die soon.
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In human affairs every solution serves only to sharpen the problem, to show us more clearly what we are up against. There are no final solutions.
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What merit there is in my thinking is derived from two peculiarities: (1) My inability to be familiar with anything. I simply can't take things for granted. (2) My endless patience. I assume that the only way to find an answer is to hang on long enough and keep groping.
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