747 Quotes by Eric Hoffer

It is thus with most of us; we are what other people say we are. We know ourselves chiefly by hearsay.

When we do not do the one thing we ought to do, we have no time for anything else - we are the busiest people in the world.

The fear of becoming a 'has-been' keeps some people from becoming anything.

...in the shaping of a life, chance and the ability to respond to chance are everything.

There are many who find a good alibi far more attractive than an achievement. For an achievement does not settle anything permanently. We still have to prove our worth anew each day; we have to prove that we are as good today as we were yesterday. But when we have a valid alibi for not achieving anything we are fixed, so to speak, for life.

How frighteningly few are the persons whose death would spoil our appetite and make the world seem empty.

It is futile to judge a kind deed by its motives. Kindness can become its own motive. We are made kind by being kind.

A mass movement attracts and holds a following not because it can satisfy the desire for self-advancement, but because it can satisfy the passion for self-renunciation.

The basic test of freedom is perhaps less in what we are free to do than in what we are free not to do.