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Human history begins with man's act of disobedience which is at the same time the beginning of his freedom and the development of his reason.

Erich Fromm

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Erich Fromm
Age: 79 †
Born: 1900
Born: March 23
Died: 1980
Died: March 18
Philosopher
Psychoanalyst
Psychologist
Sociologist
University Teacher
Writer
Frankfurt/Main
History
Reason
Human
Disobedience
Humans
Begins
Men
Beginning
Time
Development
Liberty
Freedom

More quotes by Erich Fromm

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The root of the word education is e-ducere, literally, to lead forth, or to bring out something which is potentially present.
Erich Fromm
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Psychoanalysis is essentially a theory of unconscious strivings, of resistance, of falsification of reality according to one's subjective needs and expectations.
Erich Fromm
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The mother's and father's attitudes toward the child correspond to the child's own needs.... Mother has the function of making himsecure in life, father has the function of teaching him, guiding him to cope with those problems with which the particular society the child has been born into confronts him.
Erich Fromm
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I believe that the unity of man as opposed to other living things derives from the fact that man is the conscious life of himself. Man is conscious of himself, of his future, which is death, of his smallness, of his impotence he is aware of others as others man is in nature, subject to its laws even if he transcends it with his thought.
Erich Fromm
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I think if you ask people what their concept of heaven is, they would say, if they are honest, that it is a big department store, with new things every week - all the money to buy them, and maybe a little more than the neighbours.
Erich Fromm
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To take the difficulties, setbacks and sorrows of life as a challenge to overcome makes us stronger, rather than unjust punishment which should not happen to us, requires faith and courage.
Erich Fromm
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This Marxian sentence, repeated to the point of boredom, is misinterpreted. In reality [Karl] Marx was a religious man.
Erich Fromm
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I believe indeed that to rescue the humanist tradition of the last decades is of the utmost importance, and that Victor Serge is one of the outstanding personalities representing the socialist aspect of humanism.
Erich Fromm
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We have faith in the potentialities of others, of ourselves, and of mankind because, and only to the degree to which, we have experienced the growth of our own potentialities, the reality of growth in ourselves, the strength of our own power of reason and love.
Erich Fromm
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The average American is not concerned with his society. He talks about it, but you know if one speaks of being concerned, I mean something about which one loses one's sleep, sometimes.
Erich Fromm
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People think that to love is simple, but that to find the right object to love - or to be loved by - is difficult.
Erich Fromm
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The whole life of the individual is nothing but the process of giving birth to himself indeed, we should be fully born when we die.
Erich Fromm
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Actually, if you take the average American, and studies have shown that, he is really concerned only with private affairs that is to say, with his health, his money and family affairs.
Erich Fromm
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To die is poignantly bitter, but the idea of having to die without having lived is unbearable.
Erich Fromm
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Finally one arrives at this: the state of sleep has an ambiguous function in sleep, the lack of contact with the culture brings out the worst and also the best in us.
Erich Fromm
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Giving is the highest expression of potency.
Erich Fromm
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If you do not smile, you are judged lacking in a 'pleasing personality' - and you need to have a pleasing personality if you want to sell your services, whether as a waitress, a salesman, or a physician.
Erich Fromm
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It takes a moment to tell someone you love them, but it takes a lifetime to prove it.
Erich Fromm
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The human passions transform man from a mere thing into a hero, into a being that in spite of tremendous handicaps tries to make sense of life.
Erich Fromm
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The person who gives up his individual self and becomes an automaton, identical with millions of other automatons around him, need not feel alone and anxious any more. But the price he pays, however, is high it is the loss of his self.
Erich Fromm