Erich Fromm quotes

The danger of the past was that men became slaves. The danger of the future is that men may become robots.

Man's main task in life is to give birth to himself, to become what he potentially is. The most important product of his effort is his own personality.

We all dream; we do not understand our dreams, yet we act as if nothing strange goes on in our sleep minds, strange at least by comparison with the logical, purposeful doings of our minds when we are awake.

The successful revolutionary is a statesman, the unsuccessful one a criminal.

The mother-child relationship is paradoxical and, in a sense, tragic. It requires the most intense love on the mother's side, yet this very love must help the child grow away from the mother, and to become fully independent.

Why should society feel responsible only for the education of children, and not for the education of all adults of every age?

Just as modern mass production requires the standardization of commodities, so the social process requires standardization of man, and this standardization is called equality.

In love the paradox occurs that two beings become one and yet remain two.

Why should society feel responsible only for the education of children, and not for the education of all adults of every age?

Only the person who has faith in himself is able to be faithful to others.

The danger of the past was that men became slaves. The danger of the future is that men may become robots.

There is no meaning to life except the meaning man gives his life by the unfolding of his powers.

Mother's love is peace. It need not be acquired, it need not be deserved.

Man always dies before he is fully born.

Creativity requires the courage to let go of certainties.

The capacity to be puzzled is the premise of all creation, be it in art or in science.

Both dreams and myths are important communications from ourselves to ourselves. If we do not understand the language in which they are written, we miss a great deal of what we know and tell ourselves in those hours when we are not busy manipulating the outside world.

To hope means to be ready at every moment for that which is not yet born, and yet not become desperate if there is no birth in our lifetime.

Who will tell whether one happy moment of love or the joy of breathing or walking on a bright morning and smelling the fresh air, is not worth all the suffering and effort which life implies.

There can be no real freedom without the freedom to fail.

Love is the only sane and satisfactory answer to the problem of human existence.

Why should society feel responsible only for the education of children, and not for the education of all adults of every age?

The ordinary man with extraordinary power is the chief danger for mankind - not the fiend or the sadist.

Mother's love is peace. It need not be acquired, it need not be deserved.

The capacity to be puzzled is the premise of all creation, be it in art or in science.

Just as modern mass production requires the standardization of commodities, so the social process requires standardization of man, and this standardization is called equality.

The danger of the past was that men became slaves. The danger of the future is that men may become robots.