5 Eric Hoffer Quotes on Reality

Eric Hoffer quotes on reality

22. The urge to escape our real self is also an urge to escape the rational and the obvious. The refusal to see ourselves as we are develops a distaste for facts and cold logic. There is no hope for the frustrated in the actual and the possible. Salvation can come to them only from the miraculous, which seeps through a crack in the iron wall of inexorable reality. They ask to be deceived. What Stresemann said of the Germans is true of the frustrated in general: '[They] pray not only for [their] daily bread, but also for [their] daily illusion.' The rule seems to be that those who find difficulty in deceiving themselves are easily deceived by others. They are easily persuaded and led.

42. To most of us nothing is so invisible as an unpleasant truth. Though it is held before our eyes, pushed under our noses, rammed down our throats - we know it not.

71. We usually see only the things we are looking for - so much so that we sometimes see them where they are not.

103. Nature has no compassion. Nature accepts no excuses and the only punishment it knows is death.

212. Those in possession of absolute power can not only prophesy and make their prophecies come true, but they can also lie and make their lies come true.