Quotes by Eric Hoffer

About Eric Hoffer:

Eric Hoffer was an American moral and social philosopher. He was the author of ten books and was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in February 1983. His first book, The True Believer (1951), was widely recognized as a classic, receiving critical acclaim from both scholars and laymen, although Hoffer believed that The Ordeal of Change was his finest work.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

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

We are least open to precise knowledge concerning the things we are most vehement about.

Eric Hoffer

Charlatanism of some degree is indispensable to effective leadership.

Eric Hoffer

Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life.

Eric Hoffer

It is easier to love humanity as a whole than to love one's neighbor.

Eric Hoffer

It almost seems that nobody can hate America as much as native Americans. America needs new immigrants to love and cherish it.

Eric Hoffer

Call not that man wretched, who whatever ills he suffers, has a child to love.

Eric Hoffer

People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them.

Eric Hoffer

The real Antichrist is he who turns the wine of an original idea into the water of mediocrity.

Eric Hoffer

Kindness can become its own motive. We are made kind by being kind.

Eric Hoffer

The suspicious mind believes more than it doubts. It believes in a formidable and ineradicable evil lurking in every person.

Eric Hoffer

The leader has to be practical and a realist, yet must talk the language of the visionary and the idealist.

Eric Hoffer

Nationalist pride, like other variants of pride, can be a substitute for self-respect.

Eric Hoffer

Propaganda does not deceive people; it merely helps them to deceive themselves.

Eric Hoffer

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

You can never get enough of what you don't need to make you happy.

Eric Hoffer

A nation without dregs and malcontents is orderly, peaceful and pleasant, but perhaps without the seed of things to come.

Eric Hoffer

We lie loudest when we lie to ourselves.

Eric Hoffer

It is the child in man that is the source of his uniqueness and creativeness, and the playground is the optimal milieu for the unfolding of his capacities and talents.

Eric Hoffer

An empty head is not really empty; it is stuffed with rubbish. Hence the difficulty of forcing anything into an empty head.

Eric Hoffer

Every new adjustment is a crisis in self-esteem.

Eric Hoffer

Author Bio

  • NameEric Hoffer
  • DescriptionAmerican psychologist
  • BornJuly 25, 1902
  • DiedMay 21, 1983
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionWriter; Philosopher; Psychologist
  • AwardsPresidential Medal Of Freedom