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
art effort creative
In products of the human mind, simplicity marks the end of a process of refining, while complexity marks a primitive stage. Michelangelo 's definition of art as the purgation of superfluities suggests that the creative effort consists largely in the elimination of that which complicates and confuses a pattern
art discovery creative
There is probably nothing more sublime than discontent transmuted into a work of art, a scientific discovery, and so on.
creative soul way
There is perhaps no better way of measuring the natural endowment of a soul than by its ability to transmute dissatisfaction into a creative impulse.
creative degrees proportion
A person's creative ability decreases in direct proportion to the degree to which he takes himself seriously.
self creative flow
The compulsion to take ourselves seriously is in inverse proportion to our creative capacity. When the creative flow dries up, all we have left is our importance.
creative experience events
To the creative individual all experience is seminal-all events are equidistant from new ideasand insights.
growing-up children creative
Both the revolutionary and the creative individual are perpetual juveniles. The revolutionary does not grow up because he cannot grow, while the creative individual cannot grow up because he keeps growing.
creative missing way
The most gifted members of the human species are at their creative best when they cannot have their way, and must compensate for what they miss by realizing and cultivating their capacities and talents.
art creativity creative
Creativity is discontent translated into arts.
wise long creative
The wise learn from the experience of others, and the creative know how to make a crumb of experience go a long way.
corrupts destroy hate injustice power resentment spring weakness wherever wickedness
Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many. The resentment of the weak does not spring from any injustice done to them but from the sense of their inadequacy and impotence. They hate not wickedness but weakness. When it is in their power to do so, the weak destroy weakness wherever they see it.
america cannot hurry leisure needs nor people perpetual preserved result state
The superficiality of the American is the result of his hustling. It needs leisure to think things out; it needs leisure to mature. People in a hurry cannot think, cannot grow, nor can they decay. They are preserved in a state of perpetual puerility.
imitation rudeness strength weak
Rudeness is the weak man's imitation of strength
attitude extreme flight self
Every extreme attitude is a flight from the self