Eric Hoffer
Eric Hoffer
Eric Hofferwas an American moral and social philosopher. He was the author of ten books and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in February 1983. His first book, The True Believer, was widely recognized as a classic, receiving critical acclaim from both scholars and laymen, although Hoffer believed that The Ordeal of Change was his finest work...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth25 July 1902
CountryUnited States of America
effort individuality literature
The individual who has to justify his existence by his own efforts is in eternal bondage to himself.
teacher time children
It is the malady of our age that the young are so busy teaching us that they have no time left to learn.
people age youth
A compilation of what outstanding people said or wrote at the age of 20 would make a collection of asinine pronouncements.
humble sacrifice self
Excesses are essentially gestures. It is easy to be extremely cruel, magnanimous, humble or self-sacrificing when we see ourselves as actors in a performance.
writing smell sweat
Nothing comes easily. My work smells of sweat.
race magic desire
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.
men animal odds
By all odds, earliest man, so naked to the elements and to deadly enemies, should have existed in a state of constant shock. We find him instead the only lighthearted being in a deadly serious universe.... He alone, with childish carelessness, tinkered and played, and exerted himself more in the pursuit of superfluities than of necessities. Yet the tinkering and playing, and the fascination with the nonessential, were a chief source of the inventiveness which enabled man to prevail over better-equipped and more-purposeful animals.
lonely loneliness eye
With some people solitariness is an escape not from others but from themselves. For they see in the eyes of others only a reflection of themselves.
art retirement nursing
The best part of the art of living is to know how to grow old gracefully.
No one has a right to happiness.
mean individuality enemy
All mass movements avail themselves of action as a means of unification. The conflicts a mass movement seeks and incites serve not only to down its enemies but also to strip its followers of their distinct individuality and render them more soluble in the collective medium.
country men white
America is still the best country for the common man -- white or black ... if he can't make it here he won't make it anywhere else.
legitimacy creeds impulse
The proselytizing fanatic strengthens his own faith by converting others. The creed whose legitimacy is most easily challenged is likely to develop the strongest proselytizing impulse.
giving feelings literature
The pleasure we derive from doing favors is partly in the feeling it gives us that we are not altogether worthless. It is a pleasant surprise to ourselves.