The less justified a man is in claiming excellence for his own self, the more ready he is to claim all excellence for his nation, his religion, his race or his holy cause... A man is likely to mind his own business when it is worth minding; when it is not, he takes his mind off his own meaningless affairs by minding other people's business.


Eric Hoffer

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The less justified a man is in claiming excellence for his own self, the more ready he is to claim a...
ERIC HOFFER
A man is likely to mind his own business when it is worth minding. When it is not, he takes his min...
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Jesse didn't suggest it. He was minding his own business.
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KUO HIS
Why does a virtuous man take delight in the landscapes? Because the din of the dusty world and the l...
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Charlie was on his way to the grocery store, sitting at a red light, minding his own business.
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Every man is his own ancestor, and every man is his own heir. He devises his own future, and he inhe...
FREDERICK HENRY HEDGE
Every man is his own ancestor, and every man his own heir. He devises his own fortune, and he inheri...
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Treat the other man's faith gently; it is all he has to believe with. His mind was created for his ...
HENRY S HASKINS
Treat the other man's faith gently; it is all he has to believe with. His mind was created for his o...
HENRY S. HASKINS
Thanks, for a country where nobody is allowed to mind his own business. Thanks, for a nation of fink...
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It is a tragedy for this neighborhood that is so quiet and it, you wouldn't it's the last thing you ...
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When a man is getting worse, he understands his own badness less and less.
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No man is ever whipped until he quits in his own mind.
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Love is the magician that pulls man out of his own hat.
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Fear even when morbid is not cowardice. That is the label we reserve for something that a man does...
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Only person who can mind his own business is a person who has reached a state beyond his mind.
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A man is not a man until he leaves his home or has a house of his own.
VIKRANT PARSAI
True wisdom is less presuming than folly. The wise man doubteth often, and changeth his mind; the fo...
AKHENATON AKHENATON
True wisdom is less presuming than folly. The wise man doubteth often, and changeth his mind; the fo...
AKHENATON
If a man consults whether he is to fight, when he has the power in his own hands, it is certain that...
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Man is hypocrite! He says that he loves flowers but he kills them for his own simple interests and f...
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Man's mind is like a store of idolatry and superstition; so much so that if a man believes his o...
JOHN CALVIN
When man turns tyrant it is his own freedom he destroys.
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If a man can't manage his own life, he can't manage a business.
S. TRUETT CATHY
The man of character is the persistent man, the man who is faithful to his own word, his own convict...
MARIA MONTESSORI
Man,His world & His dreams;When a man is placed aright in his world,he is most likely going to dream...
DAVID ATTA (A.K.A DAVIED ATTLARS & MR DAIN)
Poor is the man who does not know his own intrinsic worth and tends to measure everything by relativ...
SIDNEY MADWED
Poor is the man who does not know his own intrinsic worth and tends to measure everything by relativ...
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No man is worth his salt who is not ready at all times to risk his well-being, to risk his body, to ...
THEODORE ROOSEVELT
No man is worth his salt who is not ready at all times to risk his body - to risk his well-being - t...
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Man's mind is like a store of idolatry and superstition; so much so that if a man believes his own m...
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The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor an...
JAMES A. MICHENER
The master in the art of living makes little distinction between his work and his play, his labor an...
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The time for a person to instantly interact with his own soul, inspect his own mind and introspect w...
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The wise man does not lay up his own treasures. The more he gives to others, the more he has for his...
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As every man is hunted by his own daemon, vexed by his own disease, this checks all his activity.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
He is his own best friend, and takes delight in privacy whereas the man of no virtue or ability is h...
ARISTOTLE
The more a man takes the needs of others on his own heart, the more he must take his own heart to Go...
SOURCE UNKNOWN
The reason man does not experience his true cultural self is that until he experiences another self ...
EDWARD T. HALL
No man is allowed to be a judge in his own cause, because his interest would certainly bias his judg...
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The right of nature... is the liberty each man hath to use his own power, as he will himself, for th...
THOMAS HOBBES
The wise man questions the wisdom of others because he questions his own, the foolish man, because i...
LEO STEIN
The wise man questions the wisdom of others because he questions his own, the foolish man, because ...
LEO STEIN
Greatness lies, not in being strong, but in the right using of strength; and strength is not used ri...
HENRY WARD BEECHER
An Individualist is a man who lives for his own sake and by his own mind; he neither sacrifices hims...
AYN RAND
When the white man turns tyrant, it is his own freedom that he destroys.
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When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him...
C.S. LEWIS
When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him...
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At birth man is offered only one choice --the choice of his death. But if this choice is governed by...
JEAN-PIERRE MELVILLE
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It is a man's own mind, not his enemy or foe, that lures him to evil ways.
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Guys like Josh Gordon need to stay in his sport and mind his own business.
KYRIE IRVING
Man is not suffering by external forces as much as his own dysfunctional mind and self inflicted neg...
ADITYA AJMERA
A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor an...
LAWRENCE PEARSALL JACKS
A master in the art of living draws no sharp distinction between his work and his play; his labor an...
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The wise man does not permit himself to set up even in his own mind any comparisons of his friends. ...
CHARLES DUDLEY WARNER
A man who is advised and he takes it, is still a man who acts from his own free will.
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A man is called selfish, not for pursuing his own good, but for neglecting his neighbor's
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When a man takes an oath...,he's holding his ownself in his own hands. Like water. And if he opens h...
ROBERT BOLT
When a citizen gives his suffrage to a man of known immorality he abuses his trust; he sacrifices no...
NOAH WEBSTER
How should a man be capable of grooming his own horse, or of furbishing his own spear and helmet, if...
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Mind your business" had been the motto of her childhood. But now that seemed like a failing in a fri...
ANITA DIAMANT
For what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall...
BIBLE
Faced with crisis, the man of character falls back on himself. He imposes his own stamp of action, t...
CHARLES DE GAULLE
Every man is his own greatest enemy, and as it were his own executioner.
SIR THOMAS BROWNE
When a man is known to have no settled convictions of his own he can't convict other people
MARK TWAIN
In the United States, man does not feel that he has been torn from the center of creation and suspen...
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The man who regards his own life and that of his fellow-creatures as meaningless is not merely unfor...
ALBERT EINSTEIN
The man who regards his own life and that of his fellow creatures as meaningless is not merely unfor...
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A man's own self is his friend. A man's own self is his foe.
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By his father he is English, by his mother he is American - to my mind the blend which makes the per...
MARK TWAIN
What is freedom to that young man, who sits there, with his arms folded over his broad chest, the ti...
HARRIET ELIZABETH BEECHER STOWE
A man must first care for his own household before he can be of use to the state. But no matter how ...
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The mind becomes much more beautiful,
when man could see his own weaknesses.
TOBA BETA
When a man thinks he is reading the character of another, he is often unconsciously betraying his ow...
JOSEPH FARRELL
For it pleased God, after he had made all things by the word of his power, to create man after his o...
GEORGE WHITEFIELD
He was a great person to have on staff. He made a real contribution, not only by his own writing, bu...
GORDON DAVIDSON
The man who masters his thoughts, masters himself; and it is only on that journey that his potential...
RDAMBITION
By his father he is English, by his mother he is Americanto my mind the blend which makes the perfec...
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It is the '94 race which in many ways allowed Ted Kennedy to become his own man rather than the ...
CHUCK TODD
When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.
SAMUEL JOHNSON
Each man lives in his own universe and when he dies the world is over
BANGAMBIKI HABYARIMANA
Man is whoever he thinks he is, within his own boundaries.
DUDLEY DAVIDSON-JARRETT
A man is called selfish not for pursuing his own good, but for neglecting his neighbor's.
RICHARD WHATELY
That young man will either be killed by you or he will spend the rest of his life in prison in a cou...
DAVID BAUGH
Man is a gregarious animal, and much more so in his mind than in his body. He may like to go alone f...
GEORGE SANTAYANA
A man is at his youngest when he thinks he is a man, not yet realizing that his actions must show it...
MARY RENAULT
A true leader is unselfish ,for he strives for the good of his people & not his own.
DAVID ATTA (A.K.A DAVIED ATTLARS & MR DAIN)
The key to every man is his thought. He can only be reformed by showing him a new idea which command...
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
The key to every man is his thought.... He can only be reformed by showing him a new idea which comm...
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
A genius is the man in whom you are least likely to find the power of attending to anything insipid ...
WILLIAM JAMES
Civil liberty is the status of the man who is guaranteed by law and civil institutions the exclusive...
WILLIAM GRAHAM SUMNER
Religion is doing; a man does not merely think his religion or feel it, he lives his religion as muc...
GEORGE GURDJIEFF
Religion is doing; a man does not merely think his religion or feel it, he ''lives'' his religion as...
GURDJIEFF
When man lives under government, he is fallen, his worth is gone, and his nature tarnished.
ADAM WEISHAUPT
Man is most happy, when his own actions are arguments and examples of his virtue.
JOHN WEBSTER
A man is at his best when he is simply not like the rest in all his life's test
ANUJ SOMANY
Each man has his own vocation; his talent is his call. There is one direction in which all space is ...
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
A Man in Business must put up many Affronts, if he loves his own Quiet.
WILLIAM PENN

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The nature of society is largely determined by the direction in which talent and ambition flow-by th...
ERIC HOFFER
It is a sign of a creeping inner death when we no longer can praise the living.
ERIC HOFFER
There are similarities between absolute power and absolute faith: a demand for absolute obedience, a...
ERIC HOFFER
Every new adjustment is a crisis in self-esteem.
ERIC HOFFER
Wise living consists perhaps less in acquiring good habits than in acquiring as few habits as possib...
ERIC HOFFER
Someone who thinks the world is always cheating him is right. He is missing that wonderful feeling o...
ERIC HOFFER
Action is at bottom a swinging and flailing of the arms to regain one's balance and keep afloat.
ERIC HOFFER
People who bite the hand that feeds them usually lick the boot that kicks them.
ERIC HOFFER
Whenever you trace the origin of a skill or practices which played a crucial role in the ascent of m...
ERIC HOFFER
It is not actual suffering but the taste of better things which excites people to revolt.
ERIC HOFFER
In times of change learners inherit the earth; while the learned find themselves beautifully equippe...
ERIC HOFFER
The savior who wants to turn men into angels is as much a hater of human nature as the totalitaria...
ERIC HOFFER
Rudeness is the weak man's imitation of strength
ERIC HOFFER
The great crimes of the twentieth century were committed not by money-grubbing capitalists but by d...
ERIC HOFFER
The real Antichrist is he who turns the wine of an original idea into the water of mediocrity.
ERIC HOFFER
It is a sign of creeping inner death when we can no longer praise the living.
ERIC HOFFER
One of the marks of a truly vigorous society is the ability to dispense with passion as a midwife of...
ERIC HOFFER
There is probably an element of malice in our readiness to overestimate people - we are, as it were,...
ERIC HOFFER
Our great weariness comes from work not done.
ERIC HOFFER
It is remarkable by how much a pinch of malice enhances the penetrating power of an idea or an opi...
ERIC HOFFER
There is apparently no surer way of turning a thing into its opposite than by exaggerating it
ERIC HOFFER
It is the pull of opposite poles that stretches souls. And only stretched souls make music.
ERIC HOFFER
To spell out the obvious is often to call it in question.
ERIC HOFFER
The leader has to be practical and a realist, yet must talk the language of the visionary and the ...
ERIC HOFFER
The game of History is usually played by the best and the worst over the heads of thr majority in th...
ERIC HOFFER
Where there is the necessary technical skill to move mountains, there is no need for the faith that ...
ERIC HOFFER
You dehumanize a man as much by returning him to nature - by making him one with rocks, vegetation, ...
ERIC HOFFER
Nonconformists travel as a rule in bunches. You rarely find a nonconformist who goes it alone. And w...
ERIC HOFFER
Our achievements speak for themselves. What we have to keep track of are our failures, discouragemen...
ERIC HOFFER
The link between ideas and action is rarely direct. There is almost always an intermediate step in w...
ERIC HOFFER
To grow old is to grow common. Old age equalizes - we are aware that what is happening to us has hap...
ERIC HOFFER
It is easier to love humanity as a whole that to love one's neighbor.
ERIC HOFFER
However much we talk of the inexorable laws governing the life of individuals and of societies, we r...
ERIC HOFFER
One might equate growing up with a mistrust of words. A mature person trusts his eyes more than his ...
ERIC HOFFER
Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life.
ERIC HOFFER
We feel free when we escape -- even if it be but from the frying pan to the fire.
ERIC HOFFER