Elizabeth Goudge (1900–1984) English fiction writer
The Scent of Water (1963), Chapter 13.2
“It is startling to realize how much unbelief is necessary to make belief possible.”
Section 56
The True Believer (1951), Part Three: United Action and Self-Sacrifice
Source: The True Believer: Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements
Context: It is startling to realize how much unbelief is necessary to make belief possible. What we know as blind faith is sustained by innumerable unbeliefs.
Context: The readiness for self-sacrifice is contingent on an imperviousness to the realities of life.... For self-sacrifice is an unreasonable act.... All active mass movements strive, therefore, to interpose a fact-proof screen between the faithful and the realities of the world.... by claiming that the ultimate and absolute truth is already embodied in their doctrine and that there is no truth nor certitude outside it.... To rely on the evidence of senses and of reason is heresy and treason. It is startling to realize how much unbelief is necessary to make belief possible. What we know as blind faith is sustained by innumerable unbeliefs.
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Do you have more details about the quote "It is startling to realize how much unbelief is necessary to make belief possible." by Eric Hoffer?
Eric Hoffer240
American philosopher 1898–1983Related quotes
“Belief consists in accepting the affirmations of the soul; unbelief, in denying them.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet
“It is a world of startling possibilities.”
Charles Fletcher Dole (1845–1927) Unitarian minister, speaker, and writer
The Hope of Immortality (Ingersoll Lecture, 1906).
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Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742–1799) German scientist, satirist
Bei den meisten Menschen gründet sich der unglaube in einer Sache auf blinden Glauben in einer anderen.
http://books.google.com/books?id=oK1LAAAAcAAJ&q=%22Bei+den+meisten+Menschen+gr%C3%BCndet+sich+der+unglaube+in+einer+Sache+auf+blinden+Glauben+in+einer+anderen%22&pg=PA104#v=onepage
L 81
Variant translation: With most people disbelief in a thing is founded on a blind belief in some other thing.
Aphorisms (1765-1799), Notebook L (1793-1796)
Camille Paglia (1947) American writer
Source: Vamps and Tramps (1994), "No Law in the Arena: A Pagan Theory of Sexuality", p. 80
Ezra Taft Benson (1899–1994) President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints
Variant: Nothing will surprise us more than when we get to heaven and see the Father and realize how well we know Him and how familiar His face is to us.
“It is possible and imperative that we discover
A brave and startling truth.”
Maya Angelou book A Brave and Startling Truth
A Brave and Startling Truth (1995)
“The possibility to realize a dream is what makes life interesting”
Yamilet Peña (1992) female gymnast from the Dominican Republic
Quoted in "Yamilet Peña La posibilidad de realizar un sueño es lo que hace la vida interesante" in: Diario Libre, by Manauri Jorge. 2012-08-10 ( online http://www.diariolibre.com/olimpiadas2012/2012/08/10/i347393_yamilet-pena-posibilidad-realizar-sueno-que-hace-vida-interesante.html). <br class="br">ARS Universal Press Conference, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic, 2012-08-19
Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman
Source: 1840s, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave (1845), Ch. 10