Eric Hoffer Quotes

Here, we’ve compiled a list of the best Eric Hoffer Quotes. Let’s look at these pieces of wisdom. We definitely have something to learn from them!

1
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.
Eric Hoffer
2
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.
Eric Hoffer
3
Unpredictability, too, can become monotonous.
Eric Hoffer
4
Our passionate preoccupation with the sky, the stars, and a God somewhere in outer space is a homing impulse. We are drawn back to where we came from.
Eric Hoffer
5
Men weary as much of not doing the things they want to do as of doing the things they do not want to do.
Eric Hoffer
6
Youth itself is a talent, a perishable talent.
Eric Hoffer
7
The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings.
Eric Hoffer
8
Our passionate preoccupation with the sky, the stars, and a God somewhere in outer space is a homing impulse. We are drawn back to where we came from.
Eric Hoffer
9
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.
Eric Hoffer
10
Propaganda does not deceive people; it merely helps them to deceive themselves.
Eric Hoffer
11
Facts are counterrevolutionary.
Eric Hoffer
12
An empty head is not really empty; it is stuffed with rubbish. Hence the difficulty of forcing anything into an empty head.
Eric Hoffer
13
To know a person’s religion we need not listen to his profession of faith but must find his brand of intolerance.
Eric Hoffer
14
The beginning of thought is in disagreement – not only with others but also with ourselves.
Eric Hoffer
15
Youth itself is a talent, a perishable talent.
Eric Hoffer
16
We are more prone to generalize the bad than the good. We assume that the bad is more potent and contagious.
Eric Hoffer
17
A great man’s greatest good luck is to die at the right time.
Eric Hoffer
18
Many of the insights of the saint stem from their experience as sinners.
Eric Hoffer
19
To the old, the new is usually bad news.
Eric Hoffer
20
There is probably an element of malice in our readiness to overestimate people – we are, as it were, laying up for ourselves the pleasure of later cutting them down to size.
Eric Hoffer
21
It would be difficult to exaggerate the degree to which we are influenced by those we influence.
Eric Hoffer
22
Our sense of power is more vivid when we break a man’s spirit than when we win his heart.
Eric Hoffer
23
The world leans on us. When we sag, the whole world seems to droop.
Eric Hoffer
24
It is easier to love humanity as a whole than to love one’s neighbor.
Eric Hoffer
25
Kindness can become its own motive. We are made kind by being kind.
Eric Hoffer
26
There are no chaste minds. Minds copulate wherever they meet.
Eric Hoffer
27
It is futile to judge a kind deed by its motives. Kindness can become its own motive. We are made kind by being kind.
Eric Hoffer
28
You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
Eric Hoffer
29
People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them.
Eric Hoffer
30
The greatest weariness comes from work not done.
Eric Hoffer
31
It is often the failure who is the pioneer in new lands, new undertakings, and new forms of expression.
Eric Hoffer
32
There are no chaste minds. Minds copulate wherever they meet.
Eric Hoffer
33
We are more prone to generalize the bad than the good. We assume that the bad is more potent and contagious.
Eric Hoffer
34
The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness.
Eric Hoffer
35
Craving, not having, is the mother of a reckless giving of oneself.
Eric Hoffer
36
It is the around-the-corner brand of hope that prompts people to action, while the distant hope acts as an opiate.
Eric Hoffer
37
With some people solitariness is an escape not from others but from themselves. For they see in the eyes of others only a reflection of themselves.
Eric Hoffer
38
It is a sign of creeping inner death when we can no longer praise the living.
Eric Hoffer
39
Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life.
Eric Hoffer
40
Far more crucial than what we know or do not know is what we do not want to know.
Eric Hoffer
41
Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that moves mountains.
Eric Hoffer
42
The best part of the art of living is to know how to grow old gracefully.
Eric Hoffer
43
Those in possession of absolute power can not only prophesy and make their prophecies come true, but they can also lie and make their lies come true.
Eric Hoffer
44
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.
Eric Hoffer
45
Charlatanism of some degree is indispensable to effective leadership.
Eric Hoffer
46
It is the malady of our age that the young are so busy teaching us that they have no time left to learn.
Eric Hoffer
47
Rudeness is a weak imitation of strength.
Eric Hoffer
48
Children are the keys of paradise.
Eric Hoffer
49
It is not so much the example of others we imitate as the reflection of ourselves in their eyes and the echo of ourselves in their words.
Eric Hoffer
50
Disappointment is a sort of bankruptcy – the bankruptcy of a soul that expends too much in hope and expectation.
Eric Hoffer
51
It sometimes seems that intense desire creates not only its own opportunities, but its own talents.
Eric Hoffer
52
The suspicious mind believes more than it doubts. It believes in a formidable and ineradicable evil lurking in every person.
Eric Hoffer
53
There would be no society if living together depended upon understanding each other.
Eric Hoffer
54
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.
Eric Hoffer
55
There would be no society if living together depended upon understanding each other.
Eric Hoffer
56
It is not so much the example of others we imitate as the reflection of ourselves in their eyes and the echo of ourselves in their words.
Eric Hoffer
57
The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings.
Eric Hoffer
58
Compassion alone stands apart from the continuous traffic between good and evil proceeding within us.
Eric Hoffer
59
It is the malady of our age that the young are so busy teaching us that they have no time left to learn.
Eric Hoffer
60
Creativity is the ability to introduce order into the randomness of nature.
Eric Hoffer
61
Many of the insights of the saint stem from their experience as sinners.
Eric Hoffer
62
It is remarkable by how much a pinch of malice enhances the penetrating power of an idea or an opinion. Our ears, it seems, are wonderfully attuned to sneers and evil reports about our fellow men.
Eric Hoffer
63
You can never get enough of what you don’t need to make you happy.
Eric Hoffer
64
It is not actual suffering but the taste of better things which excites people to revolt.
Eric Hoffer
65
The only way to predict the future is to have power to shape the future.
Eric Hoffer
66
It is remarkable by how much a pinch of malice enhances the penetrating power of an idea or an opinion. Our ears, it seems, are wonderfully attuned to sneers and evil reports about our fellow men.
Eric Hoffer
67
A nation without dregs and malcontents is orderly, peaceful and pleasant, but perhaps without the seed of things to come.
Eric Hoffer
68
Nationalist pride, like other variants of pride, can be a substitute for self-respect.
Eric Hoffer
69
It almost seems that nobody can hate America as much as native Americans. America needs new immigrants to love and cherish it.
Eric Hoffer
70
Our sense of power is more vivid when we break a man’s spirit than when we win his heart.
Eric Hoffer
71
We lie loudest when we lie to ourselves.
Eric Hoffer
72
Wise living consists perhaps less in acquiring good habits than in acquiring as few habits as possible.
Eric Hoffer
73
To spell out the obvious is often to call it in question.
Eric Hoffer
74
Animals often strike us as passionate machines.
Eric Hoffer
75
It is the awareness of unfulfilled desires which gives a nation the feeling that it has a mission and a destiny.
Eric Hoffer
76
Kindness can become its own motive. We are made kind by being kind.
Eric Hoffer
77
When people are free to do as they please, they usually imitate each other.
Eric Hoffer
78
It is not actual suffering but the taste of better things which excites people to revolt.
Eric Hoffer
79
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.
Eric Hoffer
80
We all have private ails. The troublemakers are they who need public cures for their private ails.
Eric Hoffer
81
We are least open to precise knowledge concerning the things we are most vehement about.
Eric Hoffer
82
The greatest weariness comes from work not done.
Eric Hoffer
83
We can be absolutely certain only about things we do not understand.
Eric Hoffer
84
A grievance is most poignant when almost redressed.
Eric Hoffer
85
The real Antichrist is he who turns the wine of an original idea into the water of mediocrity.
Eric Hoffer
86
We do not really feel grateful toward those who make our dreams come true; they ruin our dreams.
Eric Hoffer
87
Man was nature’s mistake she neglected to finish him and she has never ceased paying for her mistake.
Eric Hoffer
88
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.
Eric Hoffer
89
Take away hatred from some people, and you have men without faith.
Eric Hoffer
90
We have rudiments of reverence for the human body, but we consider as nothing the rape of the human mind.
Eric Hoffer
91
The leader has to be practical and a realist, yet must talk the language of the visionary and the idealist.
Eric Hoffer
92
The fear of becoming a ‘has-been’ keeps some people from becoming anything.
Eric Hoffer
93
It still holds true that man is most uniquely human when he turns obstacles into opportunities.
Eric Hoffer
94
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.
Eric Hoffer
95
Craving, not having, is the mother of a reckless giving of oneself.
Eric Hoffer
96
It almost seems that nobody can hate America as much as native Americans. America needs new immigrants to love and cherish it.
Eric Hoffer
97
We used to think that revolutions are the cause of change. Actually it is the other way around: change prepares the ground for revolution.
Eric Hoffer
98
Every new adjustment is a crisis in self-esteem.
Eric Hoffer
99
An empty head is not really empty; it is stuffed with rubbish. Hence the difficulty of forcing anything into an empty head.
Eric Hoffer
100
Someone who thinks the world is always cheating him is right. He is missing that wonderful feeling of trust in someone or something.
Eric Hoffer
101
Those in possession of absolute power can not only prophesy and make their prophecies come true, but they can also lie and make their lies come true.
Eric Hoffer
102
There is probably an element of malice in our readiness to overestimate people – we are, as it were, laying up for ourselves the pleasure of later cutting them down to size.
Eric Hoffer
103
Creativity is the ability to introduce order into the randomness of nature.
Eric Hoffer
104
Faith in a holy cause is to a considerable extent a substitute for lost faith in ourselves.
Eric Hoffer
105
It is easier to love humanity as a whole than to love one’s neighbor.
Eric Hoffer
106
In times of change learners inherit the earth; while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.
Eric Hoffer
107
To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are.
Eric Hoffer
108
Rudeness is a weak imitation of strength.
Eric Hoffer
109
It is by its promise of a sense of power that evil often attracts the weak.
Eric Hoffer
110
To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are.
Eric Hoffer
111
The search for happiness is one of the chief sources of unhappiness.
Eric Hoffer