Ran across this today on the thunderbolts.info site, their TPOD had part of an essay by Eric Hoffer. So I looked him up. Interdasting!

link to an article at archive.org:

https:// archive.org/stream/ERIC_ED398138/ERIC_ED398138_djvu.txt

Couple of quotes from the archive.org article.

"FRANK: Hoffer saw three kinds of people who start, lead, and consolidate mass movements: first, men of words (whom he later called intellectuals) who start a mass movement.

Second are men of action who lead the revolutionary phase of the movement and are usually uncreative, frustrated, self-righteous, petty and rude. Third are practical men of affairs who take over and, if the movement survives, make leading the movement their careers."

"BETTY: Hoffer's second book. The Passionate State Of Mind . 1955, from his 1930s and '40s notebooks, continued to describe the true believer as one who shakes the world. A passionate mind comes from dissatisfaction with one's self. It is usually uncreative and uses its energy only to convulse the world. The weak, Hoffer said, often conquer the strong because their very insecurity drives them to unite and to turn their weakness into strength. In times of great change, the weak become pioneers. Hoffer found hope in people's capacity for compassion, pity, and helpfulness."

I am continuing the reading, just thought I would share. Haven't seen him brought up before.

Tried to fix formatting in text from c/p. errors in text (sp, punct, etc) are in the orig doc.