A successful social technique consists perhaps in finding unobjectionable means for individual self-assertion. — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
To the creative individual all experience is seminal-all events are equidistant from new ideasand insights. — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
Only the individual who has come to terms with his self can have a dispassionate attitude toward the world. — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
True loyalty between individuals is possible only in a loose and relatively free society. — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
Faith is primarily a process of identification; the process by which the individual ceases to be himself and becomes part of something… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The individual who has to justify his existence by his own efforts is in eternal bondage to himself. — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
When people are free to do as they please, they usually imitate each other. Originality is deliberate and forced, and partakes of… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
Collective unity is not the result of the brotherly love of the faithful for each other. The loyalty of the true believer… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The impression somehow prevails that the true believer, particularly the religious individual, is a humble person. The truth is that the surrendering… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The chief burden of the frustrated is the consciousness of a blemished, ineffectual self, and their chief desire is to slough off… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The capacity for getting along with our neighbor depends to a large extent on the capacity for getting along with ourselves. The… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The revulsion from an unwanted self, and the impulse to forget it, mask it, slough it off and lose it, produce both… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The individual's most vital need is to prove his worth, and this usually means an insatiable hunger for action. For it is… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
There is no telling to what extremes of cruelty and ruthlessness a man will go when he is freed from the fears,… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
However much we talk of the inexorable laws governing the life of individuals and of societies, we remain at the bottom convinced… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
Every device employed to bolster individual freedom must have as its chief purpose the impairment of the absoluteness of power. The indications… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
Poverty when coupled with creativeness is usually free of frustration. This is true of the poor artisan skilled in his trade and… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The autonomous individual, striving to realize himself and prove his worth, has created all that is great in literature, art, music, science… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
There is no telling to what extremes of cruelty and ruthlessness a man will go when he is freed from the fears,… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
Unless a man has the talents to make something of himself, freedom is an irksome burden. We join a mass movement to… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The act of self-denial seems to confer on us the right to be harsh and merciless toward others. The impression somehow prevails… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
When watching men of power in action it must be always kept in mind that, whether they know it or not, their… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
Unless a man has talents to make something of himself, freedom is an irksome burden. Of what avail is freedom to choose… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
When our individual interests and prospects do not seem worth living for, we are in desperate need for something apart from us… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The education explosion is producing a vast number of people who want to live significant, important lives but lack the ability to… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
When we lose our individual independence in the corporateness of a mass movement, we find a new freedom — freedom to hate,… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The ideal of self-advancement which the civilizing west offers to backward populations brings with it the plague of individual frustration. All the… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
There is a totalitarian regime inside every one of us. We are ruled by a ruthless politburo which sets our norms and… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
It is the individual only who is timeless. Societies, cultures, and civilizations -- past and present -- are often incomprehensible to outsiders,… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
Both the revolutionary and the creative individual are perpetual juveniles. The revolutionary does not grow up because he cannot grow, while the… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
Both Faith and Terror are instruments for the elimination of individual self-respect. Terror crushes the autonomy of self-respect, where Faith obtains its… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
Imitation is often a shortcut to a solution. We copy when we lack the inclination, the ability or the time to work… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
A rising mass movement attracts and holds a following not by its doctrine and promises but by the refuge it offers from… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share Image
The truth seems to be that propaganda on its own cannot force its way into unwilling minds; neither can it inculcate something wholly new;… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
When grubbing for necessities man is still an animal. He becomes uniquely human when he reaches out for the superfluous and extravagant. — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
Our originality shows itself most strikingly not in what we wholly originate but in what we do with that which we borrow from others. — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
The creative mind is the playful mind. Philosophy is the play and dance of ideas. — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
It is also plausible that those movements with the greatest inner contradiction and between profession and practice - that is to say with a… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
“In the alchemy of man's soul almost all noble attributes--courage, honor, love, hope, faith, duty, loyalty, etc.--can be transmuted into ruthlessness. Compassion alone stands… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
The act of self-denial seems to confer on us the right to be harsh and merciless toward others. The impression somehow prevails that the… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
A nation without dregs and malcontents, is orderly, decent, peaceful and pleasant, but perhaps without the seed of things to come — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
Compassion alone stands apart from the continuous traffic between good and evil proceeding within us. — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
There are many who find a good alibi far more attractive than an achievement. For an achievement does not settle anything permanently. We still… — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
Man is the only creature that strives to surpass himself, and yearns for the impossible. — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
This food-and-shelter theory concerning man's efforts is without insight. The desire for praise is more imperative than the desire for food and shelter — Eric Hoffer Copy Share
