Eric Hoffer Quotes
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Rudeness is a weak imitation of strength.
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People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them.
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One of the marks of a truly vigorous society is the ability to dispense with passion as a midwife of action - the ability to pass directly from thought to action.
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A great man's greatest good luck is to die at the right time.
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There is probably an element of malice in our readiness to overestimate people - we are, as it were, laying up for ourselves the pleasure of later cutting them down to size.
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There are no chaste minds. Minds copulate wherever they meet.
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Our greatest pretenses are built up not to hide the evil and the ugly in us, but our emptiness. The hardest thing to hide is something that is not there.
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We all have private ails. The troublemakers are they who need public cures for their private ails.
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Far more crucial than what we know or do not know is what we do not want to know.
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It is not so much the example of others we imitate as the reflection of ourselves in their eyes and the echo of ourselves in their words.
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Kindness can become its own motive. We are made kind by being kind.
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Every intense desire is perhaps a desire to be different from what we are.
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To spell out the obvious is often to call it in question.
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The game of history is usually played by the best and the worst over the heads of the majority in the middle.
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The savior who wants to turn men into angels is as much a hater of human nature as the totalitarian despot who wants to turn them into puppets.
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A grievance is most poignant when almost redressed.
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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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A nation without dregs and malcontents is orderly, peaceful and pleasant, but perhaps without the seed of things to come.
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What greater reassurance can the weak have than that they are like anyone else?
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Many of the insights of the saint stem from their experience as sinners.
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The leader has to be practical and a realist, yet must talk the language of the visionary and the idealist.
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When people are bored it is primarily with themselves.
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Nationalist pride, like other variants of pride, can be a substitute for self-respect.
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The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings.