Eric Hoffer

All mass movements avail themselves of action as a means of unification. The conflicts a mass movement seeks and incites read more

All mass movements avail themselves of action as a means of unification. The conflicts a mass movement seeks and incites serve not only to down its enemies but also to strip its followers of their distinct individuality and render them more soluble in the collective medium.

Conservatism is sometimes a symptom of sterility. Those who have nothing in them that can grow and develop must cling read more

Conservatism is sometimes a symptom of sterility. Those who have nothing in them that can grow and develop must cling to what they have in beliefs, ideas and possessions. The sterile radical, too, is basically conservative. He is afraid to let go of the ideas and beliefs he picked up in his youth lest his life be seen as empty and wasted.

Faith, enthusiasm, and passionate intensity in general are substitutes for the self-confidence born of experience and the possession of skill. read more

Faith, enthusiasm, and passionate intensity in general are substitutes for the self-confidence born of experience and the possession of skill. Where there is the necessary skill to move mountains there is no need for the faith that moves mountains.

It is part of the formidableness of a genuine mass movement that the self-sacrifice it promotes includes also a sacrifice read more

It is part of the formidableness of a genuine mass movement that the self-sacrifice it promotes includes also a sacrifice of some of the moral sense which cramps and restrains our nature.

Our quarrel with the world is an echo of the endless quarrel proceeding within us.

Our quarrel with the world is an echo of the endless quarrel proceeding within us.