Eric Hoffer

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Quote	Categories	Rating	Rate
"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."	Evil, Excellence, Good
"Man is the only creature that strives to surpass himself, and yearns for the impossible."	Men, Time
"If a society is to preserve stability and a degree of continuity, it must learn how to keep its adolescents from imposing their tastes, values, and fantasies on everyday life."	Ability, Learning, Life
"To spell out the obvious is often to call it in question."	Miscellaneous
"A preoccupation with the future not only prevents us from seeing the present as it is, but often prompts us to rearrange the past."	History
"Faith in a holy cause is to a considerable extent a substitute for the lost faith in ourselves."	Ability, Faith, Religion
"The misery of a child is interesting to a mother, the misery of a young man is interesting to a young woman, the misery of an old man is interesting to nobody."	Age, Men, Women
"Whenever you trace the origin of a skill or practices which played a crucial role in the ascent of man, we usually reach the realm of play."	Ability, Men
"It is by its promise of a sense of power that evil often attracts the weak."	Evil, Good, Power
"Action is at bottom a swinging and flailing of the arms to regain one's balance and keep afloat."	Miscellaneous
"Perhaps a modern society can remain stable only by eliminating adolescence, by giving its young, from the age of ten, the skills, responsibilities, and rewards of grownups, and opportunites for action in all spheres of life. Adolescence should be a time of useful action, while book learning and scholarship should be a preoccupation of adults."	Ability, Age, Books
"You can never get enough of what you don't need to make you happy."	Happiness, Joy
"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."	Ability, Age, Ambition
"The basic test of freedom is perhaps less in what we are free to do than in what we are free not to do."	Freedom, Liberty
"There would be no society if living together depended upon understanding each other."	Life
"The leader has to be practical and a realist, yet must talk the language of the visionary and the idealist."	Age, Leadership
"Woe to him inside a nonconformist clique who does not conform with nonconformity."	Conformity
"You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you."	Fear
"When people are free to do as they please, they usually imitate each other."	Freedom, Liberty
"In a time of drastic change, it is the learners who inherit the future. The learned find themselves equipped to live in a world which no longer exists."	Change, Learning, Life
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Browse Eric Hoffer quotes by category:

Ability	Age	Ambition
America	Books	Change
Conformity	Desires	Evil
Excellence	Faith	Fear
Freedom	Generosity	Good
Happiness	History	Intentions
Joy	Knowledge	Leadership
Learning	Liberty	Lies
Life	Love	Men
Military	Miscellaneous	Opportunity
Power	Reading	Religion
Responsibility	Sin	Talent
Time	Wants	War
Wisdom	Women