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Individual Rights Are Not Subject To A Public Vote; A Majority Has No Right To Vote Away The Rights Of A Minority.
-Ayn Rand
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Individual Rights Are Not

Ayn Rand
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Individual Rights Are Not Subject To A Public Vote; A Majority Has No Right To Vote Away The Rights Of A Minority.

Understanding the Quote: "individual rights are not subject to a public vote; a majority has..."

This quote by Ayn Rand reflects deeply on the theme of rights. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under Rights, Liberty, Majority, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Ayn Rand interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Ayn Rand

Ayn Rand is celebrated for insightful thoughts on rights and liberty. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

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Topic
Rights
Liberty
Majority
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Racism Is The Lowest, Most Crudely Primitive Form Of Collectivism. It Is The Notion Of Ascribing Moral, Social Or Political Significance To A Man’s Genetic Lineage-the Notion That A Man’s Intellectual And Characterologic Al Traits Are Produced And Transmitted By His Internal Body Chemistry.
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The Worst Guilt Is To Accept An Undeserved Guilt — And That Is What You Have Been Doing All Your Life.
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When I Die, I Hope To Go To Heaven, Whatever The Hell That Is.
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She Had Won The Battle Against Her Memories. But One Form Of Torture Remained, Untouched By The Years, The Torture Of The Word "why?
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Volumes Can Be And Have Been Written About The Issue Of Freedom Versus Dictatorship, But, In Essence, It Comes Down To A Single Question: Do You Consider It Moral To Treat Men As Sacrificial Animals And To Rule Them By Physical Force?
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The More You Learn, The More You Know That You Know Nothing.
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But Why Should You Care What People Will Say? All You Have To Do Is Please Yourself.
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If You Get Caught At Some Crucial Point And Somebody Tells You That Your Doctrine Doesn't Make Sense - You're Ready For Him. You Tell Him There's Something Above Sense. That Here He Must Not Try To Think, He Must Feel. He Must Believe. Suspend Reason And You Can Play It Deuces Wild.
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If Workers Struggle For Higher Wages, This Is Hailed As "social Gains", If Businessmen Struggle For Higher Profits, This Is Damned As "selfish Greed".
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The Man Without A Purpose Is A Man Who Drifts At The Mercy Of Random Feelings Or Unidentified Urges And Is Capable Of Any Evil, Because He Is Totally Out Of Control Of His Own Life. In Order To Be In Control Of Your Life, You Have To Have A Purpose-a Productive Purpose.
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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!"
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But You See," Said Roark Quietly, "i Have, Let’s Say, Sixty Years To Live. Most Of That Time Will Be Spent Working. I’ve Chosen The Work I Want To Do. If I Find No Joy In It, Then I’m Only Condemning Myself To Sixty Years Of Torture. And I Can Find The Joy Only If I Do My Work In The Best Way Possible To Me. But The Best Is A Matter Of Standards—and I Set My Own Standards. I Inherit Nothing. I Stand At The End Of No Tradition. I May, Perhaps, Stand At The Beginning Of One.
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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.
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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.
Dream
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The Moral Cannibalism Of All Hedonist And Altruist Doctrines Lies In The Premise That The Happiness Of One Man Necessitates The Injury Of Another.
Lying
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You Don't Have To See Through The Eyes Of Others, Hold Onto Yours, Stand On Your Own Judgment, You Know That What Is, Is–say It Aloud, Like The Holiest Of Prayers, And Don't Let Anyone Tell You Otherwise.
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Now Take A Human Body. Why Wouldn't You Like To See A Human Body With A Curling Tail With A Crest Of Ostrich Feathers At The End? And With Ears Shaped Like Acanthus Leaves? It Would Be Ornamental, You Know, Instead Of The Stark, Bare Ugliness We Have Now. Well, Why Don't You Like The Idea? Because It Would Be Useless And Pointless. Because The Beauty Of The Human Body Is That Is Hasn't A Single Muscle Which Doesn't Serve Its Purpose; That There's Not A Line Wasted; That Every Detail Of It Fits One Idea, The Idea Of A Man And The Life Of A Man.
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Did It Ever Occur To You, That There Is No Conflict Of Interests Among Men, Neither In Business Nor In Trade Nor In Their Most Personal Desires - If They Omit The Irrational From Their View Of The Possible And Destruction From Their View Of The Practical?
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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.
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Let Us Destroy, But Don't Let Us Pretend That We Are Commiting An Act Of Virtue.
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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.
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Science Was Born As A Result And Consequence Of Philosophy; It Cannot Survive Without A Philosophical Base. If Philosophy Perishes, Science Will Be Next To Go.
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There's Nothing Of Any Importance In Life-except How Well You Do Your Work.
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Are My Characters Copies Of People In Real Life? ... Don't Ever Believe The Stories About Authors Putting People Into Novels. That Idea Is A Kind Of Joke On Both Authors And Readers. All The Readers Believe That Authors Do It. All The Authors Know That It Can't Be Done.
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As A Cultural-intellectual Power And A Moral Ideal, Collectivism Died In World War Ii. If We Are Still Rolling In Its Direction, It Is Only By The Inertia Of A Void And The Momentum Of Disintegration. A Social Movement That Began With The Ponderous, Brain-cracking, Dialectical Constructs Of Hegel And Marx, And Ends Up With A Horde Of Morally Unwashed Children Stamping Their Foot And Shrieking: "i Want It Now Is Through."
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A Mystic Is A Man Who Treats His Feelings As Tools Of Cognition.
Men
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I Made My Fortune By Being Able To Spot A Certain Kind Of Man.
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She Knew That Even Pain Can Be Confessed, But To Confess Happiness Is To Stand Naked, Delivered To The Witness.
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We Are On Strike Against Martyrdom—and Against The Moral Code That Demands It. We Are On Strike Against Those Who Believe That One Man Must Exist For The Sake Of Another. We Are On Strike Against The Morality Of Cannibals, Be It Practiced In Body Or In Spirit. We Will Not Deal With Men On Any Terms But Ours—and Our Terms Are A Moral Code Which Holds That Man Is An End In Himself And Not The Means To Any End Of Others.
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Self Respect Is Something That Can't Be Killed. The Worst Thing Is To Kill A Man's Pretense At It.
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Individualism Regards Man - Every Man - As An Independent, Sovereign Entity Who Possesses An Inalienable Right To His Own Life, A Right Derived From His Nature As A Rational Being. Individualism Holds That A Civilized Society, Or Any Form Of Association, Cooperation Or Peaceful Co-existence Among Men, Can Be Achieved Only On The Basis Of The Recognition Of Individual Rights - And That A Group, As Such, Has No Rights Other Than The Individual Rights Of Its Members.
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Why Have You Been Staring At Me Ever Since We Met? Because I’m Not The Gail Wynand You’d Heard About. You See, I Love You. And Love Is Exception-making. If You Were In Love You’d Want To Be Broken, Trampled, Ordered, Dominated, Because That’s The Impossible, In The Inconceivable For You In Your Relations With People. That Would Be The One Gift, The Great Exception You’d Want To Offer The Man You Loved. But It Wouldn’t Be Easy For You.
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For The First Time Since Her Return, She Felt Pain, A Violent Pain, But It Made Her Feel Alive, Because It Was Worth Feeling.
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While, Politically, A Mixed Economy Preserves The Semblance Of An Organized Society With A Semblance Of Law And Order, Economically It Is The Equivalent Of The Chaos That Had Ruled China For Centuries: A Chaos Of Robber Gangs Looting-and Draining-the Productive Elements Of The Country.
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There’s No Way To Rule Innocent Men. The Only Power Any Government Has Is The Power To Crack Down On Criminals. Well, When There Aren’t Enough Criminals, One Makes Them. One Declares So Many Things To Be A Crime That It Becomes Impossible For Me To Live Without Breaking Laws. Who Wants A Nation Of Law-abiding Citizens? What’s There In That For Anyone? But Just Pass The Kind Of Laws That Can Neither Be Observed Or Enforced Nor Objectively Interpreted - And You Create A Nation Of Law-breakers - And Then You Cash In On Guilt.
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But I Still Wonder How It Was Possible, In Those Graceless Years Of Transition, Long Ago, That Men Did Not See Whither They Were Going, And Went On, In Blindness And Cowardice, To Their Fate. I Wonder, For It Is Hard For Me To Conceive How Men Who Knew The Word "i," Could Give It Up And Not Know What They Lost. But Such Has Been The Story, For I Have Lived In The City Of The Damned, And I Know What Horror Men Permitted To Be Brought Upon Them.
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My Dear Fellow, Who Will Let You?" "that's Not The Point. The Point Is, Who Will Stop Me?
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The Concept Of Free Competition Enforced By Law Is A Grotesque Contradiction In Terms.
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I Want It Real. I Want To Know That There Is Someone, Somewhere, Who Wants It, Too. Or Else What Is The Use Of Seeing It, And Working, And Burning Oneself For An Impossible Vision? A Spirit, Too, Needs Fuel. It Can Run Dry
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Integrity Is The Ability To Stand By An Idea.
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You Know, I Think That Only If One Feels Immensely Important Can One Feel Truly Light.
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Never Think Of Pain Or Danger Or Enemies A Moment Longer Than Is Necessary To Fight Them.
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To Achieve, You Need Thought. You Have To Know What You Are Doing And That's Real Power.
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To Sell Your Soul Is The Easiest Thing In The World. That's What Everybody Does Every Hour Of His Life. If I Asked You To Keep Your Soul - Would You Understand Why That's Much Harder?
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The World Is Perishing From An Orgy Of Self-sacrificing.
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I Love You So Much That Nothing Can Matter To Me - Not Even You...only My Love- Not Your Answer. Not Even Your Indifference
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I Do Not Seek The Good Of Others As A Sanction For My Right To Exist, Nor Do I Recognize The Good Of Others As A Justification For Their Seizure Of My Property Or Their Destruction Of My Life.
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Independence Is The Only Gauge Of Human Virtue And Value. What A Man Is And Makes Of Himself; Not What He Has Or Hasn’t Done For Others. There Is No Substitute For Personal Dignity.
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It's The Person Who Would Sell His Soul For A Nickel, Who Is Loudest In Proclaiming His Hatred Of Money.... Let Me Give You A Tip On Men's Characters: The Man Who Damns Money Has Obtained It Dishonorably; The Man Who Respects It Has Earned It. Run For Your Life From Any Man Who Tells You That Money Is Evil. That Sentence Is The...bell Of An Approaching Looter.
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It Is Not As Late As You Think. It Is Merely Early - In The Age Of The Rebirth Of Individualism.
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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.
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Defiance, Not Obedience, Is The American's Answer To Overbearing Authority.
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The Sky Is Like A Black Sieve Pierced By Silver Drops That Tremble, Ready To Burst Through.
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The Charming Aspect Of Christmas Is The Fact That It Expresses Good Will In A Cheerful, Happy, Benevolent, Non-sacrificial Way.
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Those Who Tell You That Man Is Unable To Perceive A Reality Undistorted By His Senses, Mean That They Are Unwilling To Perceive A Reality Undistorted By Their Feelings. "things As They Are" Are Things As Perceived By Your Mind; Divorce Them From Reason And They Become "things As Perceived By Your Wishes.
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Whether It’s A Symphony Or A Coal Mine, All Work Is An Act Of Creating And Comes From The Same Source: From An Inviolate Capacity To See Through One’s Own Eyes-which Means: The Capacity To Perform A Rational Identification- Which Means: The Capacity To See, To Connect And To Make What Had Not Been Seen, Connected And Made Before.
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There Can Be No Compromise Between Freedom And Government Controls; To Accept 'just A Few Controls' Is To Surrender The Principle Of Inalienable Individual Rights And To Substitute For It The Principle Of The Government’s Unlimited, Arbitrary Power, Thus Delivering Oneself Into Gradual Enslavement. As An Example Of This Process, Observe The Present Domestic Policy Of The United States.
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It's Such A Waste To Be Subtle And Vicious With People Who Don't Even Know That You're Being Subtle And Vicious
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Only The Man Who Does Not Need It, Is Fit To Inherit Wealth, The Man Who Would Make His Fortune No Matter Where He Started.
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There Has Never Been A Philosophy, A Theory Or A Doctrine, That Attacked (or 'limited') Reason, Which Did Not Preach Submission To The Power Of Some Authority.
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Did You Get Your Money By Fraud? By Pandering To Men's Vices Or Men's Stupidity? By Catering To Fools, In The Hope Of Getting More Than Your Ability Deserves? By Lowering Your Standards? By Doing Work You Despise For Purchasers You Scorn? If So, Then Your Money Will Not Give You A Moment's Or A Penny's Worth Of Joy. Then All The Things You Buy Will Become, Not A Tribute To You, But A Reproach; Not An Achievement, But A Reminder Of Shame.
Money
Men
Giving
In Order To Live, Man Must Act; In Order To Act, He Must Make Choices; In Order To Make Choices, He Must Define A Code Of Values; In Order To Define A Code Of Values, He Must Know What He Is And Where He Is – I.e. He Must Know His Own Nature (including His Means Of Knowledge) And The Nature Of The Universe In Which He Acts – I.e. He Needs Metaphysics, Epistemology, Ethics, Which Means: Philosophy. He Cannot Escape From This Need; His Only Alternative Is Whether The Philosophy Guiding Him Is To Be Chosen By His Mind Or By Chance.
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Mean
Men
But There Are People Who'll Try To Hurt You Through The Good They See In You--knowing That It's The Good, Needing It And Punishing You For It. Don't Let It Break You When You Discover That.
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He, Too, Stood Looking At Her For A Moment - And It Seemed To Her That It Was Not A Look Of Greeting After An Absence, But The Look Of Someone Who Had Thought Of Her Every Day Of That Year. She Could Not Be Certain, It Was Only An Instant, So Brief That Just As She Caught It, He Was Turning.
Years
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"mediocrity" Doesn't Mean Average Intelligence, It Means An Average Intelligence That Resents And Envies Its Betters.
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Gold Was An Objective Value, An Equivalent Of Wealth Produced. Paper Is A Mortgage On Wealth That Does Not Exist, Backed By A Gun Aimed At Those Who Are Expected To Produce It.
Gun
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Andrei, Did You Like The Opera?" "not Particularly." "andrei, Do You See What You're Missing?" "i Don't Think I Do, Kira. It's All Rather Silly. And Useless." "can't You Enjoy Things That Are Useless, Merely Because They Are Beautiful?" "no. But I Enjoyed It." "the Music?" "no. The Way You Listened To It.
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Silly
Thinking
Do Not Lose Your Knowledge That Man's Proper Estate Is An Upright Posture, An Intransigent Mind, And A Step That Travels Unlimited Roads.
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Men
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If Any Civilization Is To Survive, It Is The Morality Of Altruism That Men Have To Reject.
Men
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Words Are A Lens To Focus One's Mind.
Writing
Focus
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The Majority Of Those Who Are Loosely Identified By The Term 'liberals' Are Afraid To Let Themselves Discover That What They Advocate Is Statism. They Want To Keep All The Advantages And Effects Of Capitalism, While Destroying The Cause, And They Want To Establish Statism Without Its Necessary Effects. They Do Not Want To Know Or To Admit That They Are The Champions Of Dictatorship And Slavery.
Champion
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Capitalism Has Been Called A System Of Greed—yet It Is The System That Raised The Standard Of Living Of Its Poorest Citizens To Heights No Collectivist System Has Ever Begun To Equal, And No Tribal Gang Can Conceive Of.
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Guilt Is A Rope That Wears Thin.
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Rope
Guilt Feelings
The Mind Is The Attribute Of Man. When Man Is Born, He Comes Into Existence With Only One Weapon With Him--the Reasoning Mind.
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The Purpose Of The Law Is Not To Prevent A Future Offense, But To Punish The One Actually Committed.
Law
Purpose
Committed
One Of The Most Destructive Anti-concepts In The History Of Moral Philosophy Is The Term 'duty.
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Man Cannot Demand That Others Give Up Their Lives To Make Him Happy.
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Men
Giving
The Evasion Of Responsibility Is The Major Cause Of Most Peoples Frustrations And Defeats.
Responsibility
Frustration
Causes
Mr. Ward, What Is It That The Foulest Bastards On Earth Denounce Us For, Among Other Things? Oh Yes, For Our Motto Of 'business As Usual.' Well-business As Usual, Mr. Ward!
Business
Usual
Earth
The Men Who Attempt To Survive, Not By Means Of Reason, But By Means Of Force, Are Attempting To Survive By The Method Of Animals.
Mean
Animal
Men
We Are On Strike Against The Doctrine That Life Is Guilt.
Guilt
Doctrine
Life Is
Reality Confronts Man With A Great Many Musts, But All Of Them Are Conditional The Formula Of Realistic Necessity Is You Must, If And The If Stands For Man's Choice
Men
Reality
Ifs And
The Man Who Speaks To You Of Sacrifice, Speaks Of Slaves And Masters. And Intends To Be The Master.
Sacrifice
Men
Liberty
The Creator's Concern Is The Conquest Of Nature. The Parasite's Concern Is The Conquest Of Men.
Men
Political
Politics
The Three Values Which Men Had Held For Centuries And Which Have Now Collapsed Are: Mysticism, Collectivism, Altruism. Mysticism — As A Cultural Power — Died At The Time Of The Renaissance. Collectivism — As A Political Ideal — Died In World War Ii. As To Altruism — It Has Never Been Alive. It Is The Poison Of Death In The Blood Of Western Civilization, And Men Survived It Only To The Extent To Which They Neither Believed Nor Practiced It.
War
Men
Civilization
Do Not Set Out To Write With Your Eyes On The Box Office. It Can't Be Done.
Writing
Eye
Office
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.
Philosophy
Goal
Joy
I Am A Man Who Does Not Exist For Others.
Men
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We Are Now Moving Towards Complete Collectivism Or Socialism, A System Under Which Everybody Is Enslaved To Everybody.
Moving
Liberty
Socialism
Civilization Is The Progress Toward A Society Of Privacy.
Progress Of Society
Civilization
Political
But The Mind Is An Attribute Of The Individual. There Is No Such Thing As A Collective Brain. There Is No Such Thing As A Collective Thought. An Agreement Reached By A Group Of Men Is Only A Compromise Or An Average Drawn Upon Many Individual Thoughts.
Men
Average
Individuality
When One Turns From Reason To Faith, When One Rejects The Absolutism Of Reality, One Undercuts The Absolutism Of One's Consciousness - And One's Mind Becomes An Organ One Cannot Trust Any Longer. It Becomes What The Mystics Claim It To Be: A Tool Of Distortion.
Reality
Mind
Absolutism
I Like To Think Of Fire Held In A Man's Hand. Fire, A Dangerous Force, Tamed At His Fingertips. I Often Wonder About The Hours When A Man Sits Alone, Watching The Smoke Of A Cigarette, Thinking. I Wonder What Great Things Have Come From Such Hours. When A Man Thinks, There Is A Spot Of Fire Alive In His Mind--and It Is Proper That He Should Have The Burning Point Of A Cigarette As His One Expression.
Men
Thinking
Fire
In Proportion To The Mental Energy He Spent, The Man Who Creates A New Invention Receives But A Small Percentage Of His Value In Terms Of Material Payment, No Matter What Fortune He Makes, No Matter What Millions He Earns. But The Man Who Works As A Janitor In The Factory Producing That Invention, Receives An Enormous Payment In Proportion To The Mental Effort That His Job Requires Of Him. And The Same Is True Of All Men Between, On All Levels Of Ambition And Ability.
Jobs
Ambition
Men
The Men Who Are Not Interested In Philosophy Need It Most Urgently; They Are Most Helplessly In Its Power.
Philosophy
Men
Needs
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.
Sleep
Men
Break Through
If One Doesn't Respect Oneself One Can Have Neither Love Nor Respect For Others.
Inspirational
Respect
Ethics
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.
Men
Ethnicity
Together
But What Is Freedom? Freedom From What? There Is Nothing To Take A Man's Freedom Away From Him, Save Other Men. To Be Free, A Man Must Be Free Of His Brothers. That Is Freedom. That And Nothing Else.
Brother
Men
Anthem
To Say 'i Love You' One Must First Be Able To Say The 'i.'
Love
Inspirational
Life
Man Is A Being With Free Will; Therefore, Each Man Is Potentially Good Or Evil, And It's Up To Him And Only Him (through His Reasoning Mind) To Decide Which He Wants To Be.
Witty
Men
Evil
When Intellectual Leaders Fail To Foster The Best In The Mixed, Unformed, Vacillating Character Of People At Large, The Thugs Are Sure To Bring Out The Worst. When The Ablest Men Turn Into Cowards, The Average Men Turn Into Brutes.
Character
Thug
Men
There Can Be No Compromise On Moral Principles.
Principles
Moral
Compromise
And Man Will Go On. Man, Not Men.
Men
Goes On
Prometheus
I've Always Thought That A Feeling Which Changes Never Existed In The First Place.
Feelings
Firsts
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
Gratitude
Men
Giving
Married People Dont Look Like They Have Bedrooms On Their Minds When They Look At Each Other. In This World, Either You're Virtuous Or You Enjoy Yourself. Not Both...not Both.
People
Mind
Looks
Capitalism And Altruism Are Incompatible; They Are Philosophical Opposites; They Cannot Co-exist In The Same Man Or In The Same Society.
Philosophical
Men
Opposites
Life Is A Value To Be Bought And Thinking Is The Only Coin Noble Enough To Buy It.
Thinking
Noble
Coins
The Argument From Intimidation Is A Confession Of Intellectual Impotence.
Intellectual
Liberty
Argument
Do Not Make The Mistake Of The Ignorant Who Think That An Individualist Is A Man Who Says: “i’ll Do As I Please At Everybody Else’s Expense.” An Individualist Is A Man Who Recognizes The Inalienable Individual Rights Of Man—his Own And Those Of Others.
Respect
Mistake
Men
She Stood At The Window, Her Arms Spread Wide, Holding On To Each Side Of The Frame, It Was As If She Held A Piece Of The City.
Cities
Pieces
Arms
It's Not About Who's Going To Let Me; It's About Who's Going To Stop Me.
Let Me
There Is A Level Of Cowardice Lower Than That Of The Conformist: The Fashionable Non-conformist.
Funny
Crazy
Silly
There Is Only One Source Of Authentic Self-confidence: Reason.
Self Esteem
Self Confidence
Reason
Achievement Of Your Happiness Is The Only Moral Purpose Of Your Life, And That Happiness, Not Pain Or Mindless Self-indulgence, Is The Proof Of Your Moral Integrity, Since It Is The Proof And The Result Of Your Loyalty To The Achievement Of Your Values.
Inspirational
Happiness
Loyalty
There Is No Such Thing As Duty. If You Know That A Thing Is Right, You Want To Do It. If You Don't Want To Do It - It Isn't Right. If It's Right And You Don't Want To Do It - You Don't Know What Right Is And You're Not A Man.
Men
Want
Duty
Reason Is Not Automatic. Those Who Deny It Cannot Be Conquered By It. Do Not Count On Them. Leave Them Alone.
Leave Me Alone
Reason
Deny
Whether You Know The Shape Of A Pebble Or The Structure Of A Solar System, The Anxioms Remain The Same: That It Exists And That You Know It.
Knowledge
Shapes
Pebbles
You Will Follow Me, If We Are What We Are, You And I, If We Live, If The World Exists, If You Know The Meaning Of This Moment And Can't Let It Slip By, As Others Let It Slip, Into The Senselessness Of The Unwilled And Unreached.
Ambition
World
Moments
Capitalism Is Not The System Of The Past; It Is The System Of The Future -- If Mankind Is To Have A Future
Future
Past
Humanity
In A Capitalist Society, All Human Relationships Are Voluntary. Men Are Free To Cooperate Or Not, To Deal With One Another Or Not, As Their Own Individual Judgments, Convictions And Interests Dictate.
Men
Liberty
Economics
I Am Interested In Politics Only In Order To Secure And Protect Freedom.
Order
Protect
Secure
Integrity Is The Recognition Of The Fact That You Cannot Fake Your Consciousness, Just As Honesty Is The Recognition Of The Fact That You Cannot Fake Existence.
Honesty
Integrity
Fake
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.
Life
Running
Fake People
For The Coming Of That Day Shall I Fight, I And My Sons And My Chosen Friends. For The Freedom Of Man. For His Rights. For His Life. For His Honor.
Fighting
Son
Men
I Am Opposed To All Forms Of Control. I Am For An Absolute, Laissez-faire, Free, Unregulated Economy.
Laissez Faire
Economy
Form
It Is The Metaphysically Given That Must Be Accepted: It Cannot Be Changed. It Is The Man-made That Must Never Be Accepted Uncritically: It Must Be Judged, Then Accepted Or Rejected And Changed When Necessary.
Philosophy
Acceptance
Men
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.
Mean
Errors
Firsts
To Arrive At A Contradiction Is To Confess An Error In One's Thinking; To Maintain A Contradiction Is To Abdicate One's Mind And To Evict Oneself From The Realm Of Reality.
Thinking
Reality
Errors
There Is A Fundamental Moral Difference Between A Man Who Sees His Self-interest In Production And A Man Who Sees It In Robbery. The Evil Of A Robber Does Not Lie In The Fact That He Pursues His Own Interests, But In What He Regards As To His Own Interest; Not In The Fact That He Pursues His Values, But In What He Chose To Value; Not In The Fact That He Wants To Live, But In The Fact That He Wants To Live On A Subhuman Level.
Lying
Men
Self
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.
Winning
Evil
Hatred
People, He Thought, Were As Hungry For A Sight Of Joy As He Had Always Been--for A Moment's Relief From That Gray Load Of Suffering Which Seemed So Inexplicable And Unnecessary. He Had Never Been Able To Understand Why Men Should Be Unhappy.
Men
Sight
People
A Chronic Lack Of Pleasure, Of Any Enjoyable, Rewarding Or Stimulating Experiences, Produces A Slow, Gradual, Day-by-day Erosion Of Man's Emotional Vitality, Which He May Ignore Or Repress, But Which Is Recorded By The Relentless Computer Of His Subconscious Mechanism That Registers An Ebbing Flow, Then A Trickle, Then A Few Last Drops Of Fuel--until The Day When His Inner Motor Stops And He Wonders Desperately Why He Has No Desire To Go On, Unable To Find Any Definable Cause Of His Hopeless, Chronic Sense Of Exhaustion.
Men
Emotional
Erosion
Individualism Regards Man-every Man-as An Independent, Sovereign Entity Who Possesses An Inalienable Right To His Own Life, A Right Derived From His Nature As A Rational Being.
Independent
Men
Sovereign
The Mark Of An Honest Man... Is That He Means What He Says And Knows What He Means.
Mean
Men
Honest
Rationalization Is A Cover-up, A Process Of Providing One's Emotions With A False Identity, Of Giving Them Spurious Explanations And Justifications - In Order To Hide One's Motives, Not Just From Others, But Primarily From Oneself. The Price Of Rationalizing Is The Hampering, The Distortion, And, Ultimately, The Destruction Of One's Cognitive Faculty. Rationalization Is A Process Not Of Perceiving Reality, But Of Attempting To Make Reality Fit One's Emotions.
Reality
Order
Giving
The Man Who Does Not Value Himself, Cannot Value Anything Or Anyone.
Self Esteem
Self Worth
Men
A Government Is The Most Dangerous Threat To Man
Men
Monopoly
Bill Of Rights
There Are Two Sides To Every Issue: One Side Is Right And The Other Is Wrong, But The Middle Is Always Evil.
Inspirational
Courage
Two Sides
Have You Noticed That The Imbecile Always Smiles? Man's First Frown Is The First Touch Of God On His Forehead. The Touch Of Thought.
Men
Imbeciles
Firsts
Freedom Comes From Seeing The Ignorance Of Your Critics And Discovering The Emptiness Of Their Virtue.
Ignorance
Emptiness
Virtue
Sacrifice Is The Surrender Of That Which You Value In Favor Of Which You Dont
Sacrifice
Favors
Surrender
Since Nature Does Not Endow All Men With Equal Beauty Or Equal Intelligence, And The Faculty Of Volition Leads Men To Make Different Choices, The Egalitarians Propose To Abolish The "unfairness" Of Nature And Of Volition, And To Establish Universal Equality In Fact - In Defiance Of Facts. It Is Not Equality Before The Law That They Seek, But Inequality: The Establishment Of An Inverted Social Pyramid, With A New Aristocracy On Top - The Aristocracy Of Non-value.
Equality
Men
Law
Those Who Grant Sympathy To Guilt, Grant None To Innocence.
Guilt
Innocence
Grants
Economics Departments Are Dominated By Marxism, Which Is Taken Straight Or On The Rocks, In The Form Of Keynesianism.
Taken
Rocks
Economics
A Gun Is Not An Argument.
Gun
Argument
To Abstain From Condemning A Torturer, Is To Become An Accessory To The Torture And Murder Of His Victims.
Accessories
Murder
Victim
The Creed Of Sacrifice Is A Morality For The Immoral.
Sacrifice
Morality
Creeds
The Entire History Of Science Is A Progression Of Exploded Fallacies.
Progression
Fallacy
History Of Science
Living In A Society, Instead Of On A Desert Island, Does Not Relieve A Man Of The Responsibility Of Supporting His Own Life.
Responsibility
Men
Islands
To Be The Kind Of Writer You Want To Be, You Must First Be The Kind Of Thinker You Want To Be.
Writing
Creative
Firsts
To Achieve, You Need Thought
Wisdom
Philosophy
Needs
Do You Mean To Tell Me That You're Thinking Seriously Of Building That Way, When And If You Are An Architect?" Yes." My Dear Fellow, Who Will Let You?" That's Not The Point. The Point Is, Who Will Stop Me?
Mean
Thinking
Way
The Fight We Are In Here, Make No Mistake About It, Is A Fight Of Individualism Versus Collectivism.
Mistake
Fighting
Individualism
A Good Novel Is An Indivisible Sum; Every Scene, Sequence And Passage Of A Good Novel Has To Involve, Contribute To And Advance All Three Of Its Major Attributes: Theme, Plot, Characterization.
Plot
Three
Scene
Aristotle May Be Regarded As The Cultural Barometer Of Western History. Whenever His Influence Dominated The Scene, It Paved The Way For One Of History's Brilliant Eras; Whenever It Fell, So Did Mankind.
May
Way
Eras
There Were Things In My Past Which I Have Not Liked. But All The Things Of Which I Was Proud Will Remain.
Past
Proud
My Past
I Started My Life With A Single Absolute: That The World Was Mine To Shape In The Image Of My Highest Values And Never To Be Given Up To A Lesser Standard, No Matter How Long Or Hard The Struggle.
Philosophy
Struggle
Long
The Men Who Are Not Interested In Philosophy Need It Most Urgently: They Are Most Helplessly In Its Power. The Men Who Are Not Interested In Philosophy Absorb Its Principles From The Cultural Atmosphere Around Them-from Schools, Colleges, Books, Magazines, Newspapers, Movies, Television, Etc. Who Sets The Tone Of A Culture? A Small Handful Of Men: The Philosophers. Others Follow Their Lead, Either By Conviction Or By Default.
Philosophy
Book
School
Do Not Let Your Fire Go Out ... Do Not Let The Hero In Your Soul Perish ... Check Your Road And The Nature Of Your Battle. The World You Desired Can Be Won. It Exists, It Is Real, It Is Possible, It Is Yours.
Real
Hero
Recovery
The Nation Which Once Held The Creed That Greatness Is Achieved By Production, Is Now Told That It Is Achieved By Squalor.
Greatness
Novelists
Philosopher
Then No Rightful Cause Was Left, And The Pain Of Anger Was Turning Into The Shameful Pain Of Submission. He Had No Right To Condemn Anyone - He Thought - To Denounce Anything, To Fight And Die Joyously, Claiming The Sanctity Of Virtue. The Broken Promises, The Unconfessed Desires, The Betrayal, The Deceit, The Lies, The Fraud - He Was Guilty Of Them All. What Form Of Corruption Could He Scorn? Degrees Do Not Matter, He Thought; One Does Not Bargain About Inches Of Evil.
Betrayal
Pain
Lying
One Loses Everything When One Loses One's Sense Of Humor.
Sense Of Humor
Fountainhead
Fountain Head
Observe, In Politics, That The Term Extremism Has Become A Synonym Of "evil," Regardless Of The Content Of The Issue (the Evil Is Not What You Are Extreme About, But That You Are "extreme" - I.e., Consistent).
Issues
Evil
Consistent
It Is Not Advisable To Venture Unsolicited Opinions. You Should Spare Yourself The Embarrassing Discovery Of Their Exact Value To Your Listener.
Discovery
Venture
Opinion
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.
Life
Believe
Greatness
She Thought How Strange It Would Be If She Ever Said 'hello' To Him. One Did Not Greet Oneself Each Morning.
Morning
Would Be
Strange
Ask Yourself Whether The Dream Of Heaven And Greatness Should Be Waiting For Us In Our Graves - Or Whether It Should Be Ours Here And Now And On This Earth.
Dream
Happy Life
Greatness
Any Group Or "collective", Large Or Small, Is Only A Number Of Individuals. A Group Can Have No Rights Other Than The Rights Of Its Individual Members.
Rights
Numbers
Groups
Racism Is A Doctrine Of, By And For Brutes.
Racism
Doctrine
Brutes
The Plot Of A Movie Is Its Motor. It Is Not An Accident That People Call Pictures 'vehicles' For Stars. A Vehicle Has To Move. A Plotless Story Is Like An Expensive Car With A Wonderful Body Design, Luxurious Seats, Upholstery, Headlights (production, Direction, Cast) - And No Motor Under Its Hood. That Is Why It Gets Nowhere.
Movie
Stars
Moving
The Pressure Disappeared With The First Word He Put On Paper. He Thought--while His Hand Moved Rapidly--what A Power There Was In Words; Later, For Those Who Heard Them, But First For The One Who Found Them; A Healing Power, A Solution, Like The Breaking Of A Barrier. He Thought, Perhaps The Basic Secret The Scientists Have Not Discovered, The First Fount Of Life, Is That Which Happens When A Thought Takes Shape In Words.
Healing
Hands
Secret
A Man Who Seeks Escape From The Responsibility Of Supporting His Life By His Own Thought And Effort, And Wishes To Survive By Conquering, Ruling And Exploiting Others, Is Not An Individualist.
Responsibility
Men
Effort
Live A Life As A Monument To Your Soul.
Life
Motivation
Soul
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. So Long As Men Live Together On Earth And Need Means To Deal With One Another--their Only Substitute, If They Abandon Money, Is The Muzzle Of A Gun.
Running
Mean
Gun
No Speech Is Ever Considered, But Only The Speaker. It's So Much Easier To Pass Judgement On A Man Than On An Idea.
Men
Ideas
Speech
There Are No Evil Thoughts Except One; The Refusal To Think.
Dream
Thinking
Evil
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.
Government
Special
Liberty
A Free Mind And A Free Market Are Corollaries.
Intellectual
Mind
Free Market
An Artist Reveals His Naked Soul In His Work.
Artist
Soul
Naked
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.
Mediocrity
Lines
Architecture
You Seek Escape From Pain. We Seek The Achievement Of Happiness. You Exist For The Sake Of Avoiding Punishment. We Exist For The Sake Of Earning Rewards. Threats Will Not Make Us Function; Fear Is Not Our Incentive. It Is Not Death That We Wish To Avoid, But Life That We Wish To Live
Life
Happiness
Death
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.
Responsibility
Government
Political
Whenever Destroyers Appear Among Men, They Start By Destroying Money, For Money Is Men's Protection, And The Base Of A Moral Existence.
Men
Moral
Protection
Do Not Help Your Jailers To Pretend That Their Jail Is Your Natural State Of Existence.
Jail
Helping
Natural
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.
I Love You
Spiritual
Independent
There Is No Such Dichotomy As 'human Rights' Versus 'property Rights.' No Human Rights Can Exist Without Property Rights.
Rights
Dichotomy
Humans
I Refuse To Apologize For My Ability -- I Refuse To Apologize For My Success -- I Refuse To Apologize For My Money. If This Is Evil, Make The Most Of It.
Money
Evil
Apologizing
A Leash Is A Rope With A Noose At Both Ends.
Rope
Ends
Leashes
Selfishness Does Not Mean Only To Do Things For One's Self. One May Do Things, Affecting Others, For His Own Pleasure And Benefit. This Is Not Immoral, But The Highest Of Morality.
Mean
Self
Doe
The Moral Is The Chosen, Not The Forced; The Understood, Not The Obeyed. The Moral Is The Rational, And Reason Accepts No Commandments.
Moral
Reason
Accepting
My Philosophy, In Essence, Is The Concept Of Man As A Heroic Being, With His Own Happiness As The Moral Purpose Of His Life, With Productive Achievement As His Noblest Activity, And Reason As His Only Absolute.
Life
Philosophy
Men
You Have Chosen To Risk Your Lives For The Defense Of This Country. I Will Not Insult You By Saying That You Are Dedicated To Selfless Service--it Is Not A Virtue In My Morality. In My Morality, The Defense Of One's Country Means That A Man Is Personally Unwilling To Live As The Conquered Slave Of Any Enemy, Foreign Or Domestic. This Is An Enormous Virtue.
Country
Mean
Men
If The Rest Of Them Can Survive Only By Destroying Us, Then Why Should We Wish Them To Survive? . . . Nothing Can Make It Moral To Destroy The Best. One Can't Be Punished For Being Good. One Can't Be Penalized For Ability.
Wish
Moral
Destroying
The American Businessmen, As A Class, Have Demonstrated The Greatest Productive Genius And The Most Spectacular Achievements Ever Recorded In The Economic History Of Mankind. What Reward Did They Receive From Our Culture And Its Intellectuals? The Position Of A Hated, Persecuted Minority. The Position Of A Scapegoat For The Evils Of The Bureaucrats.
Business
Class
Evil
To Love Is To Value. Only A Rationally Selfish Man, A Man Of Self Esteem, Is Capable Of Love - Because He Is The Only Man Capable Of Holding Firm, Consistent, Uncompromising, Unbetrayed Value. The Man Who Does Not Value Himself, Cannot Value Anything Or Anyone
Selfish
Self Esteem
Love Is
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.
Trust
Struggle
Men
Love Should Be Treated Like A Business Deal, But Every Business Deal Has Its Own Terms And Its Own Currency. And In Love, The Currency Is Virtue. You Love People Not For What You Do For Them Or What They Do For You. You Love Them For The Values, The Virtues, Which They Have Achieved In Their Own Character.
Business
Character
People
[t]he Only Real Moral Crime That One Man Can Commit Against Another Is The Attempt To Create, By His Words Or Actions, An Impression Of The Contradictory, The Impossible, The Irrational, And Thus Shake The Concept Of Rationality In His Victim.
Real
Men
Thinking
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