Quotes By Eric Hoffer

Social improvement is attained more readily by a concern with the quality of results than with the purity of motives.

Nationalist pride, like other variants of pride, can be a substitute for self-respect.

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.

It still holds true that man is most uniquely human when he turns obstacles into opportunities.

When cowardice is made respectable, its followers are without number both from among the weak and the strong; it easily becomes a fashion.

Take away hatred from some people, and you have men without faith.

We are more prone to generalize the bad than the good. We assume that the bad is more potent and contagious.

It is the awareness of unfulfilled desires which gives a nation the feeling that it has a mission and a destiny.

The game of history is usually played by the best and the worst over the heads of the majority in the middle.

Children are the keys of paradise.

We are told that talent creates its own opportunities. But it sometimes seems that intense desire creates not only its own opportunities, but its own talents.

A dissenting minority feels free only when it can impose its will on the majority: what it abominates most is the dissent of the majority.

The weakness of a soul is proportionate to the number of truths that must be kept from it.

In times of change learners inherit the earth; while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.

Man is the only creature that strives to surpass himself, and yearns for the impossible.

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.

To spell out the obvious is often to call it in question.

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.

Every new adjustment is a crisis in self-esteem.

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.

Charlatanism of some degree is indispensable to effective leadership.

Every intense desire is perhaps a desire to be different from what we are.

We can be absolutely certain only about things we do not understand.

The real Antichrist is he who turns the wine of an original idea into the water of mediocrity.

Propaganda does not deceive people; it merely helps them to deceive themselves.

Where everything is possible miracles become commonplaces, but the familiar ceases to be self-evident.

Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that moves mountains.

Kindness can become its own motive. We are made kind by being kind.

Youth itself is a talent, a perishable talent.

In a time of drastic change it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned usually find themselves equipped to live in a world that no longer exists.