Eric Hoffer

The short-lived self, teetering on the edge of extinction, is the only thing that can ever really matter.

The short-lived self, teetering on the edge of extinction, is the only thing that can ever really matter.

Man is a luxury loving animal. Take away play, fancies, and luxuries, and you will turn man into a dull, read more

Man is a luxury loving animal. Take away play, fancies, and luxuries, and you will turn man into a dull, sluggish creature, barely energetic enough to obtain a bare subsistence. A society becomes stagnant when its people are too rational or too serious to be tempted by baubles.

When people are fee to do as they please, they usually imitate each other. Originality is deliberate and forced, and read more

When people are fee to do as they please, they usually imitate each other. Originality is deliberate and forced, and partakes of the nature of a protest.

That hatred springs more from self-contempt than from a legitimate grievance is seen in the intimate connection between hatred and read more

That hatred springs more from self-contempt than from a legitimate grievance is seen in the intimate connection between hatred and a guilty conscience.

There is in us a tendency to locate the shaping forces of our existence outside ourselves. Success and failure are read more

There is in us a tendency to locate the shaping forces of our existence outside ourselves. Success and failure are unavoidably related in our minds with the state of things around us. Hence it is that people with a sense of fulfillment think it is a good world and would like to preserve it as it is, while the frustrated favor radical change. The tendency to look for all causes outside ourselves persists even when it is clear that our state of being is the product of personal qualities such as ability, character, appearance, health and so on.