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
home past people
Ours is a golden age of minorities. At no time in the past have dissident minorities felt so much at home and had so much room to throw their weight around. They speak and act as if they were "the people," and what they abominate most is the dissent of the majority.
past men giving
To make of human affairs a coherent, precise, predictable whole one must ignore or suppress man as he really is. It is by eliminating man from their equation that the makers of history can predict the future, and the writers of history can give a pattern to the past.
believe past different
There is no reason to believe that the nature of the violent minorities is now greatly different from what it was in the past. What has changed is the will and ability of the majority to react.
encouragement past yesterday
When we are in competition with ourselves, and match our todays against our yesterdays, we derive encouragement from past misfortunes and blemishes. Moreover, the competition with ourselves leaves unimpaired our benevolence toward our fellow men.
adversity past preoccupation
A preoccupation with the future not only prevents us from seeing the present as it is but often prompts us to rearrange the past.
dream past civilization
It is the individual only who is timeless. Societies, cultures, and civilizations -- past and present -- are often incomprehensible to outsiders, but the individual's hungers, anxieties, dreams, and preoccupations have remained unchanged through the millenia.
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
bankruptcy hope sort soul
Disappointment is a sort of bankruptcy -- the bankruptcy of a soul that expends too much in hope and expectation.
beside character figure figured name quality rest worried
I wasn't worried about typecasting - I thought I'd figure that out down the road. I figured that, with the quality of the show, Will was going to be my epitaph. It was more about ""Is this the one character I want beside my name for the rest of eternity?
easier humanity love neighbor
It is easier to love humanity than to love your neighbor
finish man mistake neglected paying
Man was nature's mistake -she neglected to finish him - and she has never ceased paying for her mistake.