It takes a vice to check a vice, and virtue is the by-product of a stalemate between opposite vices.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that opposing forces can highlight each other's nature, resulting in a balance that fosters virtue.
In this quote, Eric Hoffer reflects on the idea that vices can serve as a necessary counterbalance to one another, implying that no singular virtue can exist without the presence of its opposing vice. This stalemate between conflicting moralities or behaviors creates an environment in which virtue can emerge, underscoring the complexity of human nature and the moral landscape we navigate.
In practice
This quote could be used in a debate about morality in a philosophy class.
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.
Perhaps someone will have seen mine, the one Iβm waiting for, just as I saw him, in a ditch when his hands were making their last appeal and his eyes no longer could see. Someone who will never know what that man was to me; someone whose name Iβll never know.
Our future may look fearfully intimidating, yet we can look up to the Engineer of the Universe, confident that nothing escapes His attention or slips out of the control of those strong hands.
Arms, like laws, discourage and keep the invader and plunderer in awe and preserve order.
In the midst of death life persists, in the midst of untruth, truth persists, in the midst of darkness light persists.
And you know what it is? San Francisco a golden handcuff with the key thrown away.
What is still more to our shame as civilized Christians, we debauch their morals already too prone to vice, and we introduce among them wants and perhaps disease which they never before knew and which serve only to disturb that happy tranquility which they and their forefathers enjoyed. If anyone denies the truth of this assertion, let him tell me what the natives of the whole extent of America have gained by the commerce they have had with Europeans.
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