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If You Want To Know The One Reason That's Taking Me Back, I'll Tell You: I Cannot Bring Myself To Abandon To Destruction All The Greatness Of The World, All That Which Was Mine And Yours, Which Was Made By Us And Is Still Ours By Right - Because I Cannot Believe That Men Refuse To See, That They Can Remain Blind And Deaf To Us Forever, When The Truth Is Ours And Their Lives Depend On Accepting It.

-Ayn Rand

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Ayn Rand

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If You Want To Know The One Reason That's Taking Me Back, I'll Tell You: I Cannot Bring Myself To Abandon To Destruction All The Greatness Of The World, All That Which Was Mine And Yours, Which Was Made By Us And Is Still Ours By Right - Because I Cannot Believe That Men Refuse To See, That They Can Remain Blind And Deaf To Us Forever, When The Truth Is Ours And Their Lives Depend On Accepting It.

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Look, Gail." Roark Got Up, Reached Out, Tore A Thick Branch Off A Tree, Held It In Both Hands, One Fist Closed At Each End; Then, His Wrists And Knuckles Tensed Against The Resistance, He Bent The Branch Slowly Into An Arc. "now I Can Make What I Want Of It: A Bow, A Spear, A Cane, A Railing. That's The Meaning Of Life." "your Strength?" "your Work." He Tossed The Branch Aside. "the Material The Earth Offers You And What You Make Of It . . .

Why Had We Let It Go? Why Had We Both Been Condemned...to An Exile Among Dreary Strangers Who Had Made Us Give Up All Desire For Rest, For Friendship, For The Sound Of Human Voices? Could I Now Reclaim A Single Hour Spent Talking To My Brother, Philip, And Give It To Ken Daggart? Who Made It Our Duty To Accept, As The Only Reward For Our Work, The Gray Torture Of Pretending Love For Those Who Roused Nothing But Contempt?

Collectivism Is The Ancient Principle Of Savagery. ... Collectivism Is Not The 'new Order Of Tomorrow.' It Is The Order Of A Very Dark Yesterday.

I Never Found Beauty In Longing For The Impossible And Never Found The Possible To Be Beyond My Reach.

It's Easy To Run To Others. It's So Hard To Stand On One's Own Record. You Can Fake Virtue For An Audience. You Can't Fake It In Your Own Eyes. Your Ego Is Your Strictest Judge. They Run From It. They Spend Their Lives Running. It's Easier To Donate A Few Thousand To Charity And Think Oneself Noble Than To Base Self-respect On Personal Standards Of Personal Achievement. It's Simple To Seek Substitutes For Competence--such Easy Substitutes: Love, Charm, Kindness, Charity. But There Is No Substitute For Competence.

The Nation Which Once Held The Creed That Greatness Is Achieved By Production, Is Now Told That It Is Achieved By Squalor.

The Romanticists Predominantly, Were Enemies Of Capitalism, Which They Regarded As A Prosaic, Materialistic, “petty Bourgeois” System — Never Realizing That It Was The Only System That Could Make Freedom, Individuality And The Pursuit Of Values Possible In Practice.

Laissez Faire Capitalism

Money Is So Noble A Medium That It Does Not Compete With Guns And It Does Not Make Terms With Brutality. It Will Not Permit A Country To Survive As Half-property, Half-loot.

When You See That Trading Is Done, Not By Consent, But By Compulsion...th At In Order To Produce, You Need To Obtain Permission From Men Who Produce Nothing-you May Know That Your Society Is Doomed.

Even If Smog Were A Risk To Human Life, We Must Remember That Life In Nature, Without Technology, Is Wholesale Death.

The Man At The Top Of The Intellectual Pyramid Contributes The Most To All Those Below Him, But Gets Nothing Except His Material Payment, Receiving No Intellectual Bonus From Others To Add To The Value Of His Time. The Man At The Bottom Who, Left To Himself, Would Starve In His Hopeless Ineptitude, Contributes Nothing To Those Above Him, But Receives The Bonus Of All Of Their Brains. Such Is The Nature Of The 'competition' Between The Strong And The Weak Of The Intellect. Such Is The Pattern Of 'exploitation' For Which You Have Damned The Strong.

Toohey: "mr. Roark, We're Alone Here. Why Don't You Tell Me What You Think Of Me? In Any Words You Wish. No One Will Hear Us." Roark: "but I Don't Think Of You.

You Still Love Me - Even If There's One Expression Of It That You Will Always Feel And Want, But Will Not Give Me No Longer. I'm Still What I Was, And You'll Always See It, And You'll Always Grant Me The Same Response, Even If There's A Greater One That You Grant Another Man. No Matter What You Feel For Him, It Will Not Change What You Feel For Me, And It Won't Treason To Either, Because It Comes From The Same Root, It's The Same Payment In Answer To The Same Values.

She Sat Leaning Back In Her Chair, Looking Ahead, Knowing That He Was As Aware Of Her As She Was Of Him. She Found Pleasure In The Special Self-consciousness It Gave Her. When She Crossed Her Legs, When She Leaned On Her Arm Against The Window Sill, When She Brushed Her Hair Off Her Forehead - Every Movement Of Her Body Was Underscored By A Feeling The Unadmitted Words For Which Were: Is He Seeing It?

Every Form Has Its Own Meaning. Every Man Creates His Meaning And Form And Goal. Why Is It So Important - What Others Have Done? Why Does It Become Sacred By The Mere Fact Of Not Being Your Own? Why Is Anyone And Everyone Right - So Long As It's Not Yourself? Why Does The Number Of Those Others Take The Place Of Truth? Why Is Truth Made A Mere Matter Of Arithmetic - And Only Of Addition At That? Why Is Everything Twisted Out Of All Sense To Fit Everything Else? There Must Be Some Reason. I Don't Know. I've Never Known It. I'd Like To Understand.

Ideas, In A Free Society, Are Not A Crime- And Neither Can They Serve As The Justification Of A Crime.

A Society That Robs An Individual Of The Product Of His Effort, Or Enslaves Him, Or Attempts To Limit The Freedom Of His Mind, Or Compels Him To Act Against His Own Rational Judgment-a Society That Sets Up A Conflict Between Its Edicts And The Requirements Of Man’s Nature—is Not, Strictly Speaking, A Society, But A Mob Held Together By Institutionalized Gang-rule.

The Evasion Of Responsibility Is The Major Cause Of Most Peoples Frustrations And Defeats.

In Order To Fight Any Issue, It Is Necessary To Fight For Something, Not Merely Against Something.

Rights Are Not A Matter Of Numbers - And There Can Be No Such Thing, In Law Or In Morality, As Actions Forbidden To An Individual, But Permitted To A Mob.

A Rational Mind Does Not Work Under Compulsion; It Does Not Subordinate Its Grasp Of Reality To Anyone's Orders, Directives, Or Controls; It Does Not Sacrifice Its Knowledge, Its View Of The Truth, To Anyone's Opinions, Threats, Wishes, Plans.

The More You Learn, The More You Know That You Know Nothing.

There Are No Evil Thoughts Except One; The Refusal To Think.

That Which Is Not Worth Contemplating In Life, Is Not Worth Recreating In Art.

An Irresponsible Person Is A Person Who Makes Vague Promises, Then Breaks His Word, Blames It On Circumstances And Expects Other People To Forgive It.

The Only Thing That Matters My Goal My Reward My Beginning My End Is The Work Itself. My Work Done My Way. A Private Personal Selfish Egotistical Motivation. That’s The Only Way I Function. That’s All I Am.

To Abstain From Condemning A Torturer, Is To Become An Accessory To The Torture And Murder Of His Victims.

Run For Your Life From Any Man Who Tells You That Money Is Evil. That Sentence Is The Leper's Bell Of An Approaching Looter.

You'll Get Everything Society Can Give A Man. You'll Keep All The Money. You'll Take Any Fame Or Honor Anyone Might Want To Grant. You'll Accept Such Gratitude As The Tenants Might Feel. And I - I'll Take What Nobody Can Give A Man, Except Himself. I Will Have Built Cortlandt. - Howard Roark

Collectivism, As An Intellectual Power And A Moral Ideal, Is Dead. But Freedom And Individualism, And Their Political Expression, Capitalism, Have Not Yet Been Discovered.

I Am Opposed To All Forms Of Control. I Am For An Absolute, Laissez-faire, Free, Unregulated Economy.

Style Is Not An End In Itself, It Is Only A Means To An End - The Means Of Telling A Story.

There Can Be No Compromise On Basic Principles. There Can Be No Compromise On Moral Issues. There Can Be No Compromise On Matters Of Knowledge, Of Truth, Of Rational Conviction.

Francisco Could Do Anything He Undertook, He Could Do It Better Than Anyone Else, And He Did It Without Effort. There Was No Boasting In His Manner And Consciousness, No Thought Of Comparison. His Attitude Was Not: 'i Can Do It Better Than You,' But Simply: 'i Can Do It.' What He Meant By Doing Was Doing Superlatively.

To Achieve, You Need Thought. You Have To Know What You Are Doing And That's Real Power.

The Action Required To Sustain Human Life Is Primarily Intellectual; Everything Man Needs Has To Be Discovered By His Mind And Produced By His Effort.

Your Soul Has A Single Basic Function-the Act Of Valuing.

An Artist Recreates Those Aspects Of Reality Which Represent His Fundamental View Of Man's Nature.

The Doctrine That 'human Rights' Are Superior To 'property Rights' Simply Means That Some Human Beings Have The Right To Make Property Out Of Others.

Every Dictator Is A Mystic, And Every Mystic Is A Potential Dictator. A Mystic Craves Obedience From Men, Not Their Agreement. He Wants Them To Surrender Their Consciousness To His Assertions, His Edicts, His Wishes, His Whims - As His Consciousness Is Surrendered To Theirs. He Wants To Deal With Men By Means Of Faith And Force - He Finds No Satisfaction In Their Consent If He Must Earn It By Means Of Facts And Reason.

Politically, The Goal Of Today’s Dominant Trend Is Statism. Philosophically, The Goal Is The Obliteration Of Reason; Psychologically, It Is The Erosion Of Ambition.

Men Have Been Taught That It Is A Virtue To Stand Together. But The Creator Is The Man Who Stands Alone.

He Liked To Observe Emotions; They Were Like Red Lanterns Strung Along The Dark Unknown Of Another's Personality, Marking Vulnerable Points.

They Proclaim That Every Man Is Entitled To Exist Without Labor And, The Laws Of Reality To The Contrary Notwithstanding, Is Entitled To Receive His 'minimum Sustenance' His Food, His Clothes, His Shelter With No Effort On His Part, As His Due And His Birthright. To Receive It From Whom.

Can You Sacrifice A Few? When Those Few Are The Best? Deny The Best Its Right To The Top--and You Have No Best Left. What Are Your Masses But Millions Of Dull, Shriveled, Stagnant Souls That Have No Thoughts Of Their Own, No Dreams Of Their Own, No Will Of Their Own, Who Eat And Sleep And Chew Helplessly The Words Others Put Into Their Brains? And For Those You Would Sacrifice The Few Who Know Life, Who Are Life? I Loathe [andrei] Your Ideals Because I Know No Worse Injustice Than The Giving Of The Undeserved. Because Men Are Not Equal In Ability And One Can't Trust Them As If They Were.

We Are On Strike Against The Doctrine That Life Is Guilt.

Civilization Is The Progress Toward A Society Of Privacy.

Progress Of Society

A Building Has Integrity Just Like A Man. And Just As Seldom.

I Don't Like People Who Speak Or Think In Terms Of Gaining Anybody's Confidence. If One's Actions Are Honest, One Does Not Need The Predated Confidence Of Others, Only Their Rational Perception. The Person Who Craves A Moral Blank Check Of That Kind, Has Dishonest Intentions, Whether He Admits It To Himself Or Not.

She Did Not Know The Nature Of Her Loneliness. The Only Words That Named It Were: This Is Not The World I Expected.

Faith Is The Commitment Of One's Consciousness To Beliefs For Which One Has No Sensory Evidence Or Rational Proof. A Mystic Is A Man Who Treats His Feelings As Tools Of Cognition. Faith Is The Equation Of Feeling With Knowledge.

The Goal Of The 'liberals' - As It Emerges From The Record Of The Past Decades - Was To Smuggle This Country Into Welfare Statism By Means Of Single, Concrete, Specific Measures, Enlarging The Power Of The Government A Step At A Time, Never Permitting These Steps To Be Summed Up Into Principles, Never Permitting Their Direction To Be Identified Or The Basic Issue To Be Named. Thus, Statism Was To Come, Not By Vote Or By Violence, But By Slow Rot - By A Long Process Of Evasion And Epistemological Corruption, Leading To A Fait Accompli.

What Is Kinder--to Believe The Best Of People And Burden Them With A Nobility Beyond Their Endurance--or To See Them As They Are, And Accept It Because It Makes Them Comfortable?

Potentially, A Government Is The Most Dangerous Threat To Man's Rights: It Holds A Legal Monopoly On The Use Of Physical Force Against Legally Disarmed Victims.

Every Movement That Seeks To Enslave A Country, Every Dictatorship Or Potential Dictatorship, Needs Some Minority Group As A Scapegoat Which It Can Blame For The Nation's Troubles And Use As A Justification Of Its Own Demands For Dictatorial Powers. In Soviet Russia, The Scapegoat Was The Bourgeoisie; In Nazi Germany, It Was The Jewish People; In America, It Is The Businessmen.

I Cannot Be Called Upon To Know A Negative Or To Prove A Negative. If There Is A God And You Prove It, That's Fine. But You Don't Tell Me You Can't Know That There Isn't. I Would Say Yes I Know There Isn't Because I Have Been Given No Evidence.

If There Is A God

A Story Is An End In Itself. It Is Not Written To Teach, Sell, Explain Or Destroy Anything. It Is Not Written Even To Entertain. It Is Written As A Man Is Born - An Organic Whole, Dictated Only By Its Own Laws And Its Own Necessity - An End In Itself, Not A Means To An End.

In Order To Be In Control Of Your Life, You Have To Have A Purpose-a Productive Purpose.

Control Of Your Life

Altruism Does Not Mean Mere Kindness Or Generosity, But The Sacrifice Of The Best Among Men To The Worst, The Sacrifice Of Virtues To Flaws, Of Ability To Incompetence, Of Progress To Stagnation-and The Subordinating Of All Life And Of All Values To The Claims Of Anyone's Suffering.

When A Man Declares: "there Are No Blacks And Whites [in Morality]" He Is Making A Psychological Confession, And What He Means Is: "i Am Unwilling To Be Wholly Good - And Please Don't Regard Me As Wholly Evil!"

Joy Is The Goal Of Existence, And Joy Is Not To Be Stumbled Upon, But To Be Achieved, And The Act Of Treason Is To Let Its Vision Drown In The Swamp Of The Moment's Torture.

You Know, I Think That Only If One Feels Immensely Important Can One Feel Truly Light.

The Alleged Short-cut To Knowledge, Which Is Faith, Is Only A Short-circuit Destroying The Mind

A Businessman Cannot Force You To Buy His Product; If He Makes A Mistake, He Suffers The Consequences; If He Fails, He Takes The Loss. If Bureaucrat Makes A Mistake, You Suffer The Consequences; If He Fails, He Passes The Loss On To You.

Some Day, The World Will Discover That, Without Thought, There Can Be No Love.

In Architecture, Mediocrity Is More Glaringly Obvious Than In Other Lines - Because There's A Huge, Physical Object Such As A Building To Demonstrate It.

Needless To Say, Under Either System [socialism Or Fascism], The Inequalities Of Income And Standard Of Living Are Greater Than Anything Possible Under A Free Economy -- And A Man's Position Is Determined, Not By His Productive Ability And Achievement, But By Political Pull And Force. Under Both Systems, Sacrifice Is Invoked As A Magic, Omnipotent Solution In Any Crisis -- And "the Public Good" Is The Altar On Which Victims Are Immolated.

I Love You So Much That Nothing Can Matter To Me - Not Even You...only My Love- Not Your Answer. Not Even Your Indifference

Achieving Life Is Not The Equivalent Of Avoiding Death.

Man's Character Is The Product Of His Premises.

All "public Interest' Legislation (and Any Distribution Of Money Taken By Force From Some Men For The Unearned Benefit Of Others) Comes Down Ultimately To The Grant Of An Undefined Undefinable, Non-objective, Arbitrary Power To Some Government Officials. The Worst Aspect Of It Is Not That Such A Power Can Be Used Dishonestly, But That It Cannot Be Used Honestly. The Wisest Man In The World, With The Purest Integrity, Cannot Find A Criterion For The Just, Equitable, Rational Application Of An Unjust, Inequitable, Irrational Principle.

That Which Exists Possesses Identity; He Could Keep It Out Of Existence By Refusing To Identify It.

People Don't Want To Think. And The Deeper They Get Into Trouble, The Less They Want To Think. But By Some Sort Of Instinct, They Feel That They Ought To And It Makes Them Feel Guilty. So They'll Bless And Follow Anyone Who Gives Them A Justification For Not Thinking. Anyone Who Makes A Virtue - A Highly Intellectual Virtue - Out Of What They Know To Be Their Sin, Their Weakness And Their Guilt.

It Is Easier To Donate A Few Thousand To Charity And Think Oneself Noble Than To Base Self-respect On Personal Standards Of Personal Achievement.

The Right To Agree With Others Is Not A Problem In Any Society; It Is The Right To Disagree That Is Crucial. It Is The Institution Of Private Property That Protects And Implements The Right To Disagree - And Thus Keeps The Road Open To Man's Most Valuable Attribute: The Creative Mind.

There Is Nothing Wrong In Helping Other People, If And When They Are Worthy Of The Help And You Can Afford To Help Them.

Capitalism Has Been Called Nationalistic - Yet It Is The Only System That Banished Ethnicity, And Made It Possible, In The United States, For Men Of Various, Formerly Antagonistic Nationalities To Live Together In Peace.

The Causes Of Illusions Are Not Pretty To Discover. They're Either Vicious Or Tragic.

The Sky Is Like A Black Sieve Pierced By Silver Drops That Tremble, Ready To Burst Through.

There Are No White Lies, There Is Only The Blackest Of Destruction, And A White Lie Is The Blackest Of All.

[s]tatism Is A System Of Institutionalized Violence And Perpetual Civil War. It Leaves Men No Choice But To Fight To Seize Political Power -- To Rob Or Be Robbed, To Kill Or Be Killed. ... Statism Survives By Looting; A Free Country Survives By Production.

The Right To Vote Is A Consequence, Not A Primary Cause, Of A Free Social System - And Its Value Depends On The Constitutional Structure Implementing And Strictly Delimiting The Voters' Power; Unlimited Majority Rule Is An Instance Of The Principle Of Tyranny.

I Want To Know That I've Accomplished Something. I Want To Feel That It Had Some Meaning. At The Last Summing Up, I Want To Be Sure It Wasn't All-for Nothing.

In A Fully Free Society, Taxation-or, To Be Exact, Payment For Governmental Services-would Be Voluntary.

We, Equality 7-2521, Were Not Happy In Those Year In The Home Of The Students. It Was Not That The Learning Was Too Hard For Us. It Was That The Learning Was Too Easy. This Is A Great Sin, To Be Born With A Head Which Is Too Quick. It Is Not Good To Be Different From Our Brothers, But It Is Evil To Be Superior To Them. The Teachers Told Us So, And They Frowned When They Looked At Us.

Love Is An Expression And Assertion Of Self-esteem, A Response To One's Own Values In The Person Of Another. One Gains A Profoundly Personal, Selfish Joy From The Mere Existence Of The Person One Loves. It Is One's Own Personal, Selfish Happiness That One Seeks, Earns, And Derives From Love.

The Man-worshipers, In My Sense Of The Term, Are Those Who See Man's Highest Potential And Strive To Actualize It. The Man-haters Are Those Who Regard Man As A Helpless, Depraved, Contemptible Creature-and Struggle Never To Let Him Discover Otherwise.

Individual Rights Are The Means Of Subordinating Society To Moral Law.

Do Not Keep Silent When Your Own Ideas And Values Are Being Attacked. If A Dictatorship Ever Comes To This Country, It Will Be By The Fault Of Those Who Keep Silent. We Are Still Free Enough To Speak. Do We Have Time? No One Can Tell.

Man Is The Only Living Species That Has The Power To Act As His Own Destroyer - And That Is The Way He Has Acted Through Most Of His History.

If Workers Struggle For Higher Wages, This Is Hailed As "social Gains", If Businessmen Struggle For Higher Profits, This Is Damned As "selfish Greed".

Ask Anything Of Men. Ask Them To Achieve Wealth, Fame, Love, Brutality, Murder, Self-sacrifice. But Don’t Ask Them To Achieve Self-respect. They Will Hate Your Soul.

Never Think Of Pain Or Danger Or Enemies A Moment Longer Than Is Necessary To Fight Them.

Today We Have Discovered The Word That Could Not Be Said. "i

There Are No Contradictions. If You Find One, Check Your Premises.

Self-esteem Is Reliance On One's Power To Think. It Cannot Be Replaced By One's Power To Deceive. The Self-confidence Of A Scientist And The Self-confidence Of A Con Man Are Not Interchangeable States, And Do Not Come From The Same Psychological Universe. The Success Of A Man Who Deals With Reality Augments His Self-confidence. The Success Of A Con Man Augments His Panic.

It's True That There's No Such Thing As Free Will. We Can't Help What We Are Or What We Do. It's Not Our Fault. Nobody's To Blame For Anything. It's All In Your Background ... And Your Glands. If You're Good, That's No Achievement Of Yours - You Were Lucky In Your Glands. If You're Rotten, Nobody Should Punish You - You Were Unlucky, That's All.

America's Skyscrapers Were Not Built By Public Funds Nor For A Public Purpose: They Were Built By The Energy, Initiative And Wealth Of Private Individuals For Personal Profit. And, Instead Of Impoverishing The People, These Skyscrapers, As They Rose Higher And Higher, Kept Raising The People's Standard Of Living - Including The Inhabitants Of The Slums.

Freedom (n.): To Ask Nothing. To Expect Nothing. To Depend On Nothing.

Independent Women

Thinking Men Cannot Be Ruled; Ambitious Men Do Not Stagnate.

Freedom Of Association Includes The Freedom Not To Associate.

Racism Is A Doctrine Of, By And For Brutes.

Believing In Fate Produces Fate. Believing In Freedom Will Create Infinite Possibilities.

The Best, Most Natural Dialogue Is Usually Written As If The Writer Is Listening To Dictation. You Might Get Stuck On Any Particular Point And Have To Question Yourself; But Normally, Dialogue Writes Itself.

In A Free Society, One Does Not Have To Deal With Those Who Are Irrational. One Is Free To Avoid Them.

Money Is A Tool Of Exchange, Which Can't Exist Unless There Are Goods Produced And Men Able To Produce Them. Money Is The Material Shape Of The Principle That Men Who Wish To Deal With One Another Must Deal By Trade And Give Value For Value.

The Right To Life Is The Source Of All Rights -- And The Right To Property Is Their Only Implementation. Without Property Rights, No Other Rights Are Possible. Since Man Has To Sustain His Life By His Own Effort, The Man Who Has No Right To The Product Of His Effort Has No Means To Sustain His Life. The Man Who Produces While Others Dispose Of His Product, Is A Slave.

Under Fascism, Citizens Retain The Responsibilities Of Owning Property, Without Freedom To Act And Without Any Of The Advantages Of Ownership. Under Socialism, Government Officials Acquire All The Advantages Of Ownership, Without Any Of The Responsibilities, Since They Do Not Hold Title To The Property, But Merely The Right To Use It -- At Least Until The Next Purge. In Either Case, The Government Officials Hold The Economic, Political And Legal Power Of Life Or Death Over The Citizens.

There Is A Level Of Cowardice Lower Than That Of The Conformist: The Fashionable Non-conformist.

When I Die, I Hope To Go To Heaven, Whatever The Hell That Is.

Money Will Not Purchase Happiness For The Man Who Has No Concept Of What He Wants.

This Was The Great Clarity Of Being Beyond Emotion, After The Reward Of Having Felt Everything One Could Feel.

No Happy Person Can Be Quite So Impervious To Pain (gail Wynand To Dominique Francon)

To Say ‘i Love You’ One Must First Know How To Say The ‘i.’ The Meaning Of The ‘i’ Is An Independent, Self-sufficient Entity That Does Not Exist For The Sake Of Any Other Person. A Person Who Exists Only For The Sake Of His Loved One Is Not An Independent Entity, But A Spiritual Parasite. The Love Of A Parasite Is Worth Nothing.

...if Men Are To Be Ruled, Then The Enemy Is Reason.

The Source Of The Government's Authority Is “the Consent Of The Governed.” This Means That The Government Is Not The Ruler, But The Servant Or Agent Of The Citizens; It Means That The Government As Such Has No Rights Except The Rights Delegated To It By The Citizens For A Specific Purpose.

Value Is That Which One Acts To Gain And/or Keep. Virtue Is The Act By Which One Aims And/or Keeps It.

You Have No Choice About Your Capacity To Feel That Something Is Good For You Or Evil, But What You Will Consider Good Or Evil, What Will Give You Joy Or Pain, What You Will Love Or Hate, Desire Or Fear, Depends On Your Standard Of Value.

The Three Of Them Set Out Every Morning On Adventures Of Their Own Kind. Once, An Elderly Professor Of Literature, Mrs. Taggart's Friend, Saw Them On Top Of A Pile In A Junk Yard, Dismantling The Carcass Of An Automobile. He Stopped, Shook His Head And Said To Francisco, 'a Young Man Of Your Position Ought To Spend His Time In Libraries, Absorbing The Culture Of The World.' 'what Do You Think I'm Doing?' Asked Francisco.

God... A Being Whose Only Definition Is That He Is Beyond Man's Power To Conceive.

Don't Ever Get Angry At A Man For Stating The Truth.

The Art Of Writing Is The Art Of Doing What You Think You're Doing. This Is Not As Simple As It Sounds. It Implies A Very Difficult Undertaking: The Necessity To Think. And It Implies The Requirement To Think Out Three Separate, Very Hard Problems: What Is It You Want To Say? How Are You Going To Say It? Have You Really Said It?

Man Has Been Called A Rational Being, But Rationality Is A Matter Of Choice... Man Has To Be A Man-by Choice; He Has To Hold His Life As A Value-by Choice; He Has To Learn To Sustain It-by Choice; He Has To Discover The Values It Requires And Practice His Virtues By Choice. A Code Of Values Accepted By Choice Is A Code Of Morality.

The Purpose Of The Law Is Not To Prevent A Future Offense, But To Punish The One Actually Committed.

Love, Friendship, Respect, Admiration Are The Emotional Response Of One Man To The Virtues Of Another, The Spiritual Payment Given In Exchange For The Personal, Selfish Pleasure Which One Man Derives From The Virtues Of Another Man’s Character.

Is It Advisable To Spread Out All The Conveniences Of Culture Before People To Whom A Few Steps Up A Stair To A Library Is A Sufficient Deterrent From Reading?

Live And Act Within The Limit Of Your Knowledge And Keep Expanding It To The Limit Of Your Life. Redeem Your Mind From The Hockshops Of Authority. Accept The Fact That You Are Not Omniscient, But Playing A Zombie Will Not Give You Omniscience-that Your Mind Is Fallible, But Becoming Mindless Will Not Make You Infallible-that An Error Made On Your Own Is Safer Than Ten Truths Accepted On Faith, Because The First Leaves You The Means To Correct It, But The Second Destroys Your Capacity To Distinguish Truth From Error.

I Would Step In The Way Of A Bullet If It Were Aimed At My Husband. It Is Not Self-sacrifice To Die Protecting That Which You Value: If The Value Is Great Enough, You Do Not Care To Exist Without It.

I Am Not The Means To Any End Others May Wish To Accomplish. I Am Not A Tool For Their Use. I Am Not A Servant Of Their Needs. I Am Not A Bandage For Their Wounds, I Am Not A Sacrifice On Their Altars.

We Can Evade Reality, But We Cannot Evade The Consequences Of Evading Reality

One's Own Independent Judgment Is The Means By Which One Must Choose One's Actions, But It Is Not A Moral Criterion Nor A Moral Validation; Only Reference To A Demonstrable Principle Can Validate One's Choices.

She Had Learned, In The Slums Of Her Childhood, That Honest People Were Never Touchy About The Matter Of Being Trusted.

To Love Money Is To Know And Love The Fact That Money Is The Creation Of The Best Power Within You, And Your Passkey To Trade Your Effort For The Effort Of The Best Among Men.

Fight For The Value Of Your Person. Fight For The Virtue Of Your Pride. Fight For The Essence Of That Which Is Man: For His Sovereign Rational Mind. Fight With The Radiant Certainty And The Absolute Rectitude Of Knowing That Yours Is The Morality Of Life And That Yours Is The Battle For Any Achievement, Any Value, Any Grandeur, Any Goodness, Any Joy That Has Ever Existed On This Earth

Every Coercive Monopoly Was Created By Government Intervention Into The Economy: By Special Privileges, Such As Franchises Or Subsidies, Which Closed The Entry Of Competitors Into A Given Field, By Legislative Action.

But Neither Life Nor Happiness Can Be Achieved By The Pursuit Of Irrational Whims. Just As Man Is Free To Attempt To Survive In Any Random Manner, But Will Perish Unless He Lives As His Nature Requires, So He Is Free To Seek His Happiness In Any Mindless Fraud, But The Torture Of Frustration Is All He Will Find, Unless He Seeks The Happiness Proper To Man. The Purpose Of Morality Is To Teach You, Not To Suffer And Die, But To Enjoy Yourself And Live.

Potentially, A Government Is The Most Dangerous Threat To Man's Rights; It Holds A Legal Monopoly On The Use Of Physical Force Against Legally Disarmed Victims. When Unlimited And Unrestricted By Individual Rights, A Government Is Man's Deadliest Enemy. It Is Not As Protection Against Private Actions, But Against Governmental Actions That The Bill Of Rights Was Written.

When I Disagree With A Rational Man, I Let Reality Be Our Final Arbiter; If I Am Right, He Will Learn; If I Am Wrong, I Will; One Of Us Will Win, But Both Will Profit.

Rationality Is The Recognition Of The Fact That Nothing Can Alter The Truth And Nothing Can Take Precedence Over That Act Of Perceiving It.

Through All The Darkness, Through All The Shame Of Which Men Are Capable, The Spirit Of Man Will Remain Alive On This Earth. It May Sleep, But It Will Awaken. It May Wear Chains, But It Will Break Through.

What Objectivity And The Study Of Philosophy Requires Is Not An 'open Mind,' But An Active Mind - A Mind Able And Eagerly Willing To Examine Ideas, But To Examine Them Criticially.

It Does Not Matter That Only A Few In Each Generation Will Grasp And Achieve The Full Reality Of Man's Proper Stature-and The Rest Will Betray It. It Is Those Few That Move The World And Give Life Its Meaning-and It Is Those Few That I Have Always Sought To Address. The Rest Are No Concern Of Mine; It Is Not Me Or "the Fountainhead" That They Will Betray: It Is Their Own Souls.

Happiness Is Not Something You Have In Your Hands; It's Something You Carry In Your Heart. Happiness Is One Thing That Multiplies By Division. Happiness Is That Peculiar Sensation You Acquire When You Are Too Busy To Be Miserable. Happiness Is That State Of Consciousness Which Proceeds From The Achievement Of One's Values.

Individual Rights Are Not Subject To A Public Vote; A Majority Has No Right To Vote Away The Rights Of A Minority; The Political Function Of Rights Is Precisely To Protect Minorities From Oppression By Majorities (and The Smallest Minority On Earth Is The Individual).

Don't Bother To Examine A Folly-ask Yourself Only What It Accomplishes.

Humor Is Not An Unconditional Virtue; Its Moral Character Depends On Its Object. To Laugh At The Contemptible, Is A Virtue; To Laugh At The Good, Is A Hideous Vice. Too Often, Humor Is Used As The Camouflage Of Moral Cowardice.

As We Gain Knowledge, We Do Not Become More Certain, We Become Certain Of More.

I Am Neither Foe Nor Friend To My Brothers, But Such As Each Of Them Shall Deserve Of Me. And To Earn My Love, My Brothers Must Do More Than To Have Been Born. I Do Not Grant My Love Without Reason, Nor To Any Chance Passer-by Who May Wish To Claim It. I Honor Men With My Love. But Honor Is A Thing To Be Earned.

No Advocate Of Reason Can Claim The Right To Force His Ideas On Others. No Advocate Of The Free Mind Can Claim The Right To Force The Minds Of Others. No Rational Society, No Co-operation, No Agreement, No Understanding, No Discussion Are Possible Among Men Who Propose To Substitute Guns For Rational Persuasion.

If You Surrender Everything To The Government And Give It Total Power To Plan The Whole Economy, This Will Not Guarantee Your Economic Security, But It Will Guarantee The Descent Of The Entire Nation To A Level Of Miserable Poverty--as The Practical Results Of Every Totalitarian Economy, Communist Or Fascist, Have Demonstrated.

She Looked At The Crowd And She Felt Simultaneously Astonishment That They Should Stare At Her When This Event Was So Personally Her Own That No Communication About It Was Possible And A Sense Of Fitness That They Should Be Here That They Should Want To See It. Because The Sight Of An Achievement Was The Greatest Gift A Human Being Could Offer To Others.

Hence The Sterile, Uninspiring Futility Of A Great Many Theoretical Discussions Of Ethics, And The Resentment Which Many People Feel Towards Such Discussions: Moral Principles Remain In Their Minds As Floating Abstractions, Offering Them A Goal They Cannot Grasp And Demanding That They Reshape Their Souls In Its Image, Thus Leaving Them With A Burden Of Undefinable Moral Guilt.

He Had A Big Head And A Face So Ugly It Became Almost Fascinating.

Man Needs Knowledge In Order To Survive, And Only Reason Can Achieve It; Men Who Reject The Responsibility Of Thought And Reason, Can Exist Only As Parasites On The Thinking Of Others.

My Views On Charity Are Very Simple. I Do Not Consider It A Major Virtue And, Above All, I Do Not Consider It A Moral Duty. There Is Nothing Wrong In Helping Other People, If And When They Are Worthy Of The Help And You Can Afford To Help Them. I Regard Charity As A Marginal Issue. What I Am Fighting Is The Idea That Charity Is A Moral Duty And A Primary Virtue.

I Am An Intransigent Atheist, Though Not A Militant One. This Means That I Am Not Fighting Against Religion - I Am Fighting For Reason.

When You Force A Man To Act Against His Own Choice And Judgment, It's His Thinking That You Want Him To Suspend.

Men Have Been Taught That It Is A Virtue To Agree With Others. But The Creator Is The Man Who Disagrees. Men Have Been Taught That It Is A Virtue To Swim With The Current. But The Creator Is The Man Who Goes Against The Current. Men Have Been Taught That It Is A Virtue To Stand Together. But The Creator Is The Man Who Stands Alone.

A Conformist Is A Man Who Declares, "it's True Because Others Believe It" - But An Individualist Is Not A Man Who Declares, "it's True Because I Believe It." An Individual Declares, "i Believe It Because I See In Reason That It Is True.

Sacrifice Is The Surrender Of That Which You Value In Favor Of Which You Dont

I Am Only Concerned With Politics So I May See The Day When I Don't Have To Be Concerned With Politics.

If Any Civilization Is To Survive, It Is The Morality Of Altruism That Men Have To Reject.

Capitalism Is Based On Individual Rights - Not On The Sacrifice Of The Individual To The 'public Good' Of The Collective.

If You Saw Atlas, The Giant Who Holds The World On His Shoulders, If You Saw That He Stood, Blood Running Down His Chest, His Knees Buckling, His Arms Trembling But Still Trying To Hold The World Aloft With The Last Of His Strength, And The Greater His Effort The Heavier The World Bore Down Upon His Shoulders - What Would You Tell Him?" I…don't Know. What…could He Do? What Would You Tell Him?" To Shrug.

If A Drought Strikes Them, Animals Perish--man Builds Irrigation Canals; If A Flood Strikes Them, Animals Perish--man Builds Dams; If A Carnivorous Pack Attacks Them, Animals Perish--man Writes The Constitution Of The United States.

Productive Work Is The Central Purpose Of A Rational Man's Life, The Central Value That Integrates And Determines The Hierarchy Of All His Other Values. Reason Is The Source, The Precondition Of His Productive Work, Pride Is The Result.

I Stand Here On The Summit Of The Mountain. I Lift My Head And I Spread My Arms. This, My Body And Spirit, This Is The End Of The Quest. I Wished To Know The Meaning Of All Things. I Am The Meaning. I Wished To Find A Warrant For Being. I Need No Warrant For Being, And No Word Of Sanction Upon My Being. I Am The Warrant And The Sanction. Neither Am I The Means To Any End Others May Wish To Accomplish. I Am Not A Tool For Their Use. I Am Not A Servant Of Their Needs. I Am Not A Sacrifice On Their Alters.

Kira, The Highest Thing In Man Is Not His God. It's That In Him Which Knows The Reverence Due A God. And You, Kira, Are My Highest Reverence.

Integrity Is The Ability To Stand By An Idea.

If You Want To Feel Good, Be Rational.

The Greatest Threat To Mankind And Civilization Is The Spread Of The Totalitarian Philosophy. Its Best Ally Is Not The Devotion Of Its Followers But The Confusion Of Its Enemies. To Fight It, We Must Understand It.

The Spread Of Evil Is The Symptom Of A Vacuum. Whenever Evil Wins, It Is Only By Default: By The Moral Failure Of Those Who Evade The Fact That There Can Be No Compromise On Basic Principles.

Have You Ever Felt A Potential Love For Someone? Like, You Don't Actually Love Them And You Know You Don't, But You Know You Could. You Realise That You Could Easily Fall In Love With Them. It's Almost Like The Bud Of A Flower, Ready To Blossom But It's Just Not Quite There Yet. And You Like Them A Lot, You Really Do. You Think About Them Often, But You Don't Love Them. You Could, Though. You Know You Could.

Falling In Love

Dictatorship Nations Are Outlaws. Any Free Nation Had The Right To Invade Nazi Germany And, Today, Has The Right To Invade Soviet Russia, Cuba, Or Any Other Slave Pen. Whether A Free Nation Chooses To Do So Or Not Is A Matter Of Its Own Self-interest, Not Of Respect For The Nonexistent 'rights' Of Gang Rulers. It Is Not A Free Nation's Duty To Liberate Other Nations At The Price Of Self-sacrifice, But A Free Nation Has The Right To Do It, When And If It So Chooses.

When Personal Judgment Is Inoperative (or Forbidden), Men's First Concern Is Not How To Choose, But How To Justify Their Choice

The Political Function Of 'the Right Of Free Speech' Is To Protect Dissenters And Unpopular Minorities From Forcible Suppression - Not To Guarantee Them The Support, Advantages, And Rewards Of A Popularity They Have Not Gained.

The Man Who Speaks To You Of Sacrifice, Speaks Of Slaves And Masters. And Intends To Be The Master.

Since Religion Is A Primitive Form Of Philosophy — An Attempt To Offer A Comprehensive View Of Reality — Many Of Its Myths Are Distorted, Dramatized Allegories Based On Some Element Of Truth, Some Actual, If Profoundly Elusive, Aspect Of Man's Existence.

Happiness Is That State Of Consciousness Which Proceeds From The Achievement Of One's Values.

She Thought: At This Moment, The Glass Stem Between His Fingers Feels Just Like The One Between Mine. We Have This Much In Common.

My Dear Fellow, Who Will Let You?" "that's Not The Point. The Point Is, Who Will Stop Me?

There Is A Fundamental Conviction Which Some People Never Acquire, Some Hold Only In Their Youth, And A Few Hold To The End Of Their Days-the Conviction That Ideas Matter . . . . That Ideas Matter Means That Knowledge Matters, That Truth Matters, That One's Mind Matters . . .

Everyone Has The Right To Make His Own Decisions, But None Has The Right To Force His Decision On Others.

People Are Not Embracing Collectivism Because They Have Accepted Bad Economics. They Are Accepting Bad Economics Because They Have Embraced Collectivism.

Theirs Is The Banner In My Hand. And I Wish I Had The Power To Tell Them That The Despair Of Their Hearts Was Not To Be Final, And Their Night Was Not Without Hope. For The Battle They Lost Can Never Be Lost. For That Which They Died To Save Can Never Perish. Through All The Darkness, Through All The Shame Of Which Men Are Capable, The Spirit Of Man Will Remain Alive On This Earth. It May Sleep, But It Will Awaken. It May Wear Chains, But It Will Break Through. And Man Will Go On. Man, Not Men. ~equality 7-2521 (as Prometheus), Pgs 103-104

Collectivism Answers: The Power Of Society Is Unlimited. Society May Make Any Laws It Wishes, And Force Them Upon Anyone In Any Manner It Wishes.

Degrees Do Not Matter... One Does Not Bargain About Inches Of Evil.

Capitalism Is The Only System That Can Make Freedom, Individuality, And The Pursuit Of Values Possible In Practice. When I Say 'capitalism,' I Mean A Pure, Uncontrolled, Unregulated Laissez-faire Capitalism - With A Separation Of Economics, In The Same Way And For The Same Reasons As A Separation Of State And Church.

Self-esteem Is Reliance On One's Power To Think... The Man Of Authentic Self-confidence Is The Man Who Relies On The Judgment Of His Own Mind.

Self Confidence

A Reader Has To Be Concerned Only With The End Result; Unless He Chooses To Analyze It, He Does Not Have To Know By What Means That Result Was Achieved-but It Is My Job To Know.

All Life Is A Purposeful Struggle, And Your Only Choice Is The Choice Of A Goal.

The Ladder Of Success Is Best Climbed By Stepping On The Rungs Of Opportunity.

If Capitalism Had Never Existed, Any Honest Humanitarian Should Have Been Struggling To Invent It. But When You See Men Struggling To Evade Its Existence, To Misrepresent Its Nature, And To Destroy Its Last Remnants - You Maybe Sure That Whatever Their Motives, Love Of Man Is Not One Of Them.

"mediocrity" Doesn't Mean Average Intelligence, It Means An Average Intelligence That Resents And Envies Its Betters.

Men Prosper Or Fail, Survive Or Perish In Proportion To The Degree Of Their Rationality.

An Artist Reveals His Naked Soul In His Work.

Now Look At Me! Take A Good Look! I Was Born And I Knew I Was Alive And I Knew What I Wanted. What Do You Think Is Alive In Me? Why Do You Think I'm Alive? Because I Have A Stomach And Eat And Digest The Food? Because I Breathe And Work And Produce More Food To Digest? Or Because I Know What I Want, And That Something Which Knows How To Want—isn't That Life Itself? And Who—in This Damned Universe—who Can Tell Me Why I Should Live For Anything But For That Which I Want?

Sacrifice Does Not Mean The Rejection Of The Worthless, But Of The Precious

The Degree Of A Country's Freedom Is The Degree Of Its Prosperity.

This God, This One Word: I.

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