True Believer Quotes - Page 2

• The poor on the borderline of starvation live purposeful lives. To be engaged in a desperate struggle for food and shelter is to be wholly free from a sense of futility

  Eric Hoffer

  Struggle, Shelter, Poverty

  Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

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• The truth seems to be that propaganda on its own cannot force its way into unwilling minds; neither can it inculcate something wholly new; nor can it keep people persuaded once they have ceased to believe. It penetrates into minds already open, and rather than instill opinion it articulates and justifies opinions already present in the minds of its recipients.

  Eric Hoffer

  Believe, People, Mind

  "The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements". Book by Eric Hoffer, 1951.

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• It is the individual only who is timeless. Societies, cultures, and civilizations -- past and present -- are often incomprehensible to outsiders, but the individual's hungers, anxieties, dreams, and preoccupations have remained unchanged through the millenia.

  Eric Hoffer

  Dream, Past, Civilization

  Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

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• Proselytizing is more a passionate search for something not yet found than a desire to bestow upon the world something we already have. It is a search for a final and irrefutable demonstration that our absolute truth is indeed the one and only truth. The proselytizing fanatic strengthens his own faith by converting others.

  Eric Hoffer

  Society, Desire, World

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• There is a powerful craving in most of us to see ourselves as instruments in the hands of others and thus free ourselves from the responsibility for acts which are prompted by our own questionable inclinations and impulses.

  Eric Hoffer

  Powerful, Responsibility, Hands

  Eric Hoffer (1996). “The Passionate State of Mind”

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• 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

  Trust, Beauty, Math

  Eric Hoffer (1955). “The passionate state of mind, and other aphorisms”

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• The greatest weariness comes from work not done.

  Eric Hoffer

  Work, Energy, Done

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• To know a person's religion we need not listen to his profession of faith but must find his brand of intolerance.

  Eric Hoffer

  Atheist, Religion, Atheism

  Eric Hoffer (1955). “The passionate state of mind, and other aphorisms”

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• I am a great believer in luck, and I find the harder I work the more I have of it.

  Stephen Leacock

  Inspirational, Motivational, Positive

  Stephen Leacock, Gerald Lynch (2002). “Leacock on Life”, p.91, University of Toronto Press

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• I think President Obama is the most radical president this nation's ever seen. And in particular, I think he is a true believer in government control of the economy and of our everyday lives. In my judgment, we are facing what I consider to be the epic battle of our generation, quite literally the battle over whether we remain a free market nation.

  Ted Cruz

  Epic, Thinking, Government

  "Ted Cruz: Cuban Ivy League Tea Partier for Senate" by Caroline May, dailycaller.com. June 06, 2011.

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• The urge to escape our real self is also an urge to escape the rational and the obvious.

  Eric Hoffer

  Real, Self, Obvious

  Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

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

  Eric Hoffer

  Inspirational, Funny, Education

  "Reflections on the Human Condition" by Eric Hoffer, (Section 49), 1973.

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• You rarely find a nonconformist who goes it alone.

  Eric Hoffer

  Conformity, Clique, Nonconformist

  "Reflections on the Human Condition" by Eric Hoffer, (Section 50), 1973.

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

  Eric Hoffer

  Respect, Gratitude, Hands

  "Thoughts of Eric Hoffer, Including: 'Absolute Faith Corrupts Absolutely'". The New York Times Magazine, p.52, April 25, 1971.

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• Nonconformists travel as a rule in bunches. You rarely find a nonconformist who goes it alone. And woe to him inside a nonconformist clique who does not conform with nonconformity.

  Eric Hoffer

  Doe, Woe, Conformity

  "Reflections on the Human Condition" by Eric Hoffer, (Section 50), 1973.

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• Faith in a holy cause is to a considerable extent a substitute for lost faith in ourselves.

  Eric Hoffer

  Faith, History, Literature

  ERIC HOFFER (1963). “THE TRUE BELIEVER”

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• A doctrine insulates the devout not only against the realities around them but also against their own selves. The fanatical believer is not conscious of his envy, malice, pettiness and dishonesty. There is a wall of words between his consciousness and his real self.

  Eric Hoffer

  Wall, Real, Self

  Eric Hoffer (1996). “The Passionate State of Mind”

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• It is startling to realize how much unbelief is necessary to make belief possible.

  Eric Hoffer

  Belief, Realizing, Believer

  Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

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• Belief is a virus, and once it gets into you, its first order of business is to preserve itself, and the way it preserves itself is to keep you from having any doubts, and the way it keeps you from doubting is to blind you to the way things really are. Evidence contrary to the belief can be staring you straight in the face, and you won't see it... True believers just don't see things the way they are, because if they did, they wouldn't be true believers anymore.

  Philip Caputo

  Order, Doubt, Viruses

  Philip Caputo (2005). “Acts of Faith”, p.146, Vintage

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• But would we know, whether the pretended prophet had really attained a just sentiment of morals? Let us attend to his narration; and we shall soon find, that he bestows praise on such instances of treachery, inhumanity, cruelty, revenge, bigotry, as are utterly incompatible with civilized society. No steady rule of right seems there to be attended to; and every action is blamed or praised, so far only as it is beneficial or hurtful to the true believers.

  David Hume

  Revenge, Islam, Hurtful

  David Hume (1758). “Essays and Treatises on several subjects, etc. New edition”, p.135

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• This sort of dwindling band of true believers each year gets together and talks about the wonderful progress that's been made. None of the rest of us can ever see that.

  Robert L. Park

  Years, Progress, Together

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• I'm a true believer in karma. You get what you give, whether it's bad or good.

  Sandra Bullock

  Life, Karma, Spiritual

  "Happiness Is a Choice". Book by Barry Neil Kaufman (p. 23), 1991.

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• All mass movements strive, therefore, to interpose a fact-proof screen between the faithful and the realities of the world. They do this by claiming that the ultimate and absolute truth is already embodied in their doctrine and that there is no truth nor certitude outside it. The facts on which the true believer bases his conclusions must not be derived from his experience or observation but from holy writ.

  Eric Hoffer

  Reality, Faithful, Doctrine

  Eric Hoffer (1982). “Between the Devil and the Dragon: The Best Essays and Aphorisms of Eric Hoffer”, HarperCollins Publishers

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• True loyalty between individuals is possible only in a loose and relatively free society.

  Eric Hoffer

  Loyalty, Individual, Believer

  Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

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• I've always been a true believer that if men had babies, nobody would be trying to tell them what they can and can't do with their bodies.

  Scott Ian

  Baby, Men, Trying

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