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.
Interpretation
A mass movement gains support not by promoting individual success but through appealing to the desire for self-sacrifice and collective purpose.
Eric Hoffer's quote emphasizes that the strength of a mass movement lies not in its ability to provide personal benefits to its followers, but rather in its capacity to inspire individuals to transcend their personal ambitions in favor of a greater cause. This reflects a deeper human need to contribute to something larger than oneself, revealing how true devotion to a collective ideal can be a powerful motivator.
In practice
In a speech promoting community service, one might use this quote to emphasize the importance of selflessness.
Language was invented to ask questions. Answers may be given by grunts and gestures, but questions must be spoken. Humanness came of age when man asked the first question. Social stagnation results not from a lack of answers but from the absence of the impulse to ask questions.
Faith in humanity, in posterity, in the destiny of one's religion, nation, race, party or family-what is it but the visualization of that eternal something to which we attach the self that is about to be annihilated?
You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you.
Our frustration is greater when we have much and want more than when we have nothing and want some. We are less dissatisfied when we lack many things than when we seem to lack but one thing.
Our credulity is greatest concerning the things we know least about.
Perhaps a modern society can remain stable only by eliminating adolescence, by giving its young, from the age of ten, the skills, responsibilities, and rewards of grownups, and opportunities for action in all spheres of life. Adolescence should be a time of useful action, while book learning and scholarship should be a preoccupation of adults.
Enlightenment means taking full responsibility for your life.
At times, I feel America is something that I can actually put my arms around, more than a land mass and a Constitution, something far more containable and understandable. I don't exactly know what it is, but at these times I feel completely woven into it.
The irony is, the advertising industry knows everyone hates what they produce. This is why they keep looking for new ways to force people to stay tuned.
The first care of every Christian ought to be to lay aside all reliance on works, and strengthen his faith alone more and more, and by it grow in the knowledge, not of works, but of Christ Jesus, who has suffered and risen again for him.
Our world hangs like a magnificent jewel in the vastness of space. Every one of us is a part of that jewel. A facet of that jewel. And in the perspective of infinity, our differences are infinitesimal.
A merely fallen enemy may rise again, but the reconciled one is truly vanquished.
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