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There is no doubt that in exchanging a self-centered for a selfless life we gain enormously in self-esteem. The vanity of the selfless, even those who practice utmost humility, is boundless.

Eric Hoffer

Those who would sacrifice a generation to realize an ideal are the enemies of mankind.
ERIC HOFFER

Enemy Ideal Kind Man Sacrifice
The education explosion is producing a vast number of people who want to live significant, important lives but lack the ability to satisfy this craving for importance by individual achievement. The country is being swamped with nobodies who want to be somebodies.
ERIC HOFFER

Ability Achievement Country Education Important Live People Production Satisfaction
The central task of education is to implant a will and facility for learning; it should produce not learned but learning people. The truly human society is a learning society, where grandparents, parents, and children are students together.
ERIC HOFFER

Age Children Difference Education Human Learning People Togetherness True Willing
To become different from what we are, we must have some awareness of what we are.
ERIC HOFFER

Be Yourself Different Improvement Philosophy Transformation Wisdom
The capacity for getting along with our neighbor depends to a large extent on the capacity for getting along with ourselves. The self-respecting individual will try to be as tolerant of his neighbor’s shortcomings as he is of his own.
ERIC HOFFER

Ability Capacity Ourselves Respect Tolerance
A man is likely to mind his own business when it is worth minding. When it is not, he takes his mind off his own meaningless affairs by minding other people’s business.
ERIC HOFFER

Business Character Man Mindset People Worth
Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life.
ERIC HOFFER

Empty Hate Life Passionate Purpose
Every successful person has had failures but repeated failure is no guarantee of eventual success.
ERIC HOFFER

Chance Failure Person Repeat Success
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

Angel Hate Human Man Nature Savior
Language was invented to ask questions.
ERIC HOFFER

Invention Language Talk
Unlike the pattern which seems to prevail in the rest of life, in the human species the weak not only survive but often triumph over the strong. The self-hatred inherent in the weak unlocks energies far more formidable then those mobilized by an ordinary struggle for existence.
ERIC HOFFER

Energy Existence Hate Human Life Pattern Strong Struggle Survive Weakness Win
Communists are frustrated capitalists.
ERIC HOFFER

Attitude Character Frustration Identity One Liner
Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many.
ERIC HOFFER

Corruption Deep Power Weakness
I have a premonition that will not leave me: as it goes with Israel so will it go with all of us. Should Israel perish, the holocaust will be upon us.
ERIC HOFFER

Destruction Leaving Nation Terrorism
It is not actual suffering but the taste of better things which excites people to revolt.
ERIC HOFFER

Excitement People Revolution Suffering Taste
Never have the young taken themselves so seriously, and the calamity is that they are listened to and deferred to by so many adults.
ERIC HOFFER

Adult Listening Serious Young

There is no doubt that in exchanging a self-centered for a selfless life we gain enormously in self-esteem. The vanity of the selfless, even those who practice utmost humility, is boundless.

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There is no doubt that in exchanging a self-centered for a selfless life we gain enormously in self-esteem. The vanity of the selfless, even those who practice utmost humility, is boundless.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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