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Inflation Is Not Caused By The Actions Of Private Citizens, But By The Government: By An Artificial Expansion Of The Money Supply Required To Support Deficit Spending. No Private Embezzlers Or Bank Robbers In History Have Ever Plundered People's Savings On A Scale Comparable To The Plunder Perpetrated By The Fiscal Policies Of Statist Governments.

-Ayn Rand

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Inflation Is Not Caused

Ayn Rand

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Inflation Is Not Caused By The Actions Of Private Citizens, But By The Government: By An Artificial Expansion Of The Money Supply Required To Support Deficit Spending. No Private Embezzlers Or Bank Robbers In History Have Ever Plundered People's Savings On A Scale Comparable To The Plunder Perpetrated By The Fiscal Policies Of Statist Governments.

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If You Ask Me To Name The Proudest Distinction Of Americans, I Would Choose . . . The Fact That They Were The People Who Created The Phrase "to Make Money." No Other Language Or Nation Had Ever Used These Words Before. . . . Americans Were The First To Understand That Wealth Has To Be Created.

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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.

If One Doesn't Respect Oneself One Can Have Neither Love Nor Respect For Others.

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The Desire Not To Be Anything Is The Desire Not To Be.

If You Agree With Some Tenets Of Objectivism, But Disagree With Others, Do Not Call Yourself An Objectivist; Give Proper Authorship Credit For The Parts You Agree With

My Morality, The Morality Of Reason, Is Contained In A Single Axiom: Existence Exists - And In A Single Choice: To Live.

An Honest Man Is One Who Knows That He Can't Consume More Than He Has Produced.

Roark Smiled, "gail, If This Boat Were Sinking, I'd Give My Life To Save You. Not Because It's Any Kind Of Duty. Only Because I Like You, For Reasons And Standards Of My Own. I Could Die For You. But I Couldn't And Wouldn't Live For You.

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

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It Is Not Death That We Wish To Avoid, But Life That We Wish To Live.

People Create Their Own Questions Because They Are Afraid To Look Straight. All You Have To Do Is Look Straight And See The Road, And When You See It, Don't Sit Looking At It - Walk.

Namely, If I Am Challenging The Base Of All These Institutions, I'm Challenging The Moral Code Of Altruism. The Precept That Man's Moral Duty Is To Live For Others. That Man Must Sacrifice Himself To Others. Which Is The Present Day Morality.

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.

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

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.

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.

Evil Requires The Sanction Of The Victim.

The ' Pleasure' Of Being Drunk Is Obviously The Pleasure Of Escaping From The Responsibility Of Consciousness.

It's Not That I Don't Suffer, It's That I Know The Unimportance Of Suffering. I Know That Pain Is To Be Fought And Thrown Aside, Not To Be Accepted As Part Of One's Soul And As A Permanent Scar Across One's View Of Existence.

Doctors Are Not Servants Of Their Patients, They Are Traders Like Everyone Else In A Free Society And They Should Bear That Title Proudly Considering The Crucial Importance Of The Services They Offer.

I Write - And Read - For The Sake Of The Story... My Basic Test For Any Story Is: 'would I Want To Meet These Characters And Observe These Events In Real Life? Is This Story An Experience Worth Living Through For Its Own Sake? Is The Pleasure Of Contemplating These Characters An End Itself?

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.

So You Think That Money Is The Root Of All Evil. Have You Ever Asked What Is The Root Of All Money?

I Got The Idea [for Anthem's Theme] In My School Days, In Soviet Russia, When I Heard All The Vicious Attacks On Individualism, And Asked Myself What The World Would Be Like If Men Lost The Word 'i.'

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.

It Was The Joy Of Admiration And Of One's Own Ability, Growing Together.

I Worship Individuals For Their Highest Possibilities As Individuals And I Loathe Humanity For Its Failure To Live Up To These Possibilities.

The Charming Aspect Of Christmas Is The Fact That It Expresses Good Will In A Cheerful, Happy, Benevolent, Non-sacrificial Way. One Says: “merry Christmas”-not “weep And Repent.” And The Good Will Is Expressed In A Material, Earthly Form-by Giving Presents To One's Friends, Or By Sending Them Cards In Token Of Remembrance . . . .

A “collective” Mind Does Not Exist. It Is Merely The Sum Of Endless Numbers Of Individual Minds. If We Have An Endless Number Of Individual Minds Who Are Weak, Meek, Submissive And Impotent – Who Renounce Their Creative Supremacy For The Sake Of The “whole” And Accept Humbly That The “whole’s” Verdict – We Don’t Get A Collective Super-brain. We Get Only The Weak, Meek, Submissive And Impotent Collective Mind.

It Is A Matter Of Record That In The German Election Of 1933, The Communist Party Was Ordered By Its Leaders To Vote For The Nazis - With The Explanation That They Could Later Fight The Nazis For Power, But First They Had To Help Destroy Their Common Enemy : Capitalism And Its Parliamentary Form Of Government.

The Conservatives See Man As A Body Freely Roaming The Earth, Building Sand Piles Or Factories - With An Electronic Computer Inside His Skull, Controlled From Washington. The Liberals See Man As A Soul Freewheeling To The Farthest Reaches Of The Universe - But Wearing Chains From Nose To Toes When He Crosses The Street To Buy A Loaf Of Bread.

Just As There Is No Such Thing As A Collective Or Racial Mind, So There Is No Such Thing As A Collective Or Racial Achievement. There Are Only Individual Minds And Individual Achievements-an D A Culture Is Not The Anonymous Product Of Undifferentiate D Masses, But The Sum Of The Intellectual Achievements Of Individual Men.

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.

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

Don't Think Of Them Now. Never Think Of Pain Or Danger Or Enemies A Moment Longer Than Is Necessary To Fight Them. You're Here. It's Our Time And Our Life, Not Theirs. Don't Struggle Not To Be Happy. You Are." - John Gault

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

And Questions Give Us No Rest. We Know Not Why Our Curse Makes Us Seek We Know Not What, Ever And Ever. But We Cannot Resist It. It Whispers To Us That There Are Great Things On This Earth Of Ours, And That We Can Know Them If We Try, And That We Must Know Them. We Ask, Why Must We Know, But It Has No Answer To Give Us. We Must Know That We May Know.

The Man Who Does Not Value Himself, Cannot Value Anything Or Anyone.

A Gun Is Not An Argument.

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.

To The Extent To Which A Man Is Rational, Life Is The Premise Directing His Actions. To The Extent To Which He Is Irrational, The Premise Directing His Actions Is Death.

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.

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

You Love People, Not For What You Do For Them Or What They Do For You. You Love Them For Their Values; Their Virtues.

The Moral Absolute Should Be: If And When, In Any Dispute, One Side Initiates The Use Of Physical Force, That Side Is Wrong - And No Consideration Or Discussion Of The Issues Is Necessary Or Appropriate.

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. The Political Goal Presupposes The Two Others. The Human Characteristic Required By Statism Is Docility, Which Is The Product Of Hopelessness And Intellectual Stagnation. Thinking Men Cannot Be Ruled; Ambitious Men Do Not Stagnate.

We Have Come To See How Great Is The Unexplored.

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.

We Are Born Into This World Unarmed - Our Mind Is Our Only Weapon.

Ah, There's Nothing Like Tea In The Afternoon. When The British Empire Collapses, Historians Will Find That It Had Made But Two Invaluable Contributions To Civilization - This Tea Ritual And The Detective Novel.

Thanksgiving Is A Typically American Holiday. In Spite Of Its Religious Form (giving Thanks To God For A Good Harvest), Its Essential, Secular Meaning Is A Celebration Of Successful Production. It Is A Producers’ Holiday. The Lavish Meal Is A Symbol Of The Fact That Abundant Consumption Is The Result And Reward Of Production. Abundance Is (or Was And Ought To Be) America’s Pride-just As It Is The Pride Of American Parents That Their Children Need Never Know Starvation.

It Was Beautiful And Rare, And You Have Every Right To Despise Me." She Stood Pressed To The Wall, Not Moving. "when You Came In, I Thought 'send Her Away.' But I Knew That If You Went Away, I'd Run After You. I Thought 'i Won't Say A Word.' But I Knew That You'd Know It Before You Left. I Love You. I Know You'd Think Kindlier Of Me If I Said That I Hate You.

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.

Thousands Of Years Ago The First Man Discovered How To Make Fire. He Was Probably Burnt At The Stake He'd Taught His Brothers To Light, But He Left Them A Gift They Had Not Conceived And He Lifted Darkness From The Face Of The Earth.

To Fear To Face An Issue Is To Believe That The Worst Is True.

Self-esteem Is Reliance On Ones Power To Think.

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

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

Because I Never Have Any Definite Destination. This Ship Is Not For Going To Places, But For Getting Away From Them. When I Stop At A Port, It's Only For The Sheer Pleasure Of Leaving It. I Always Think: Here's One More Place That Can't Hold Me.

I Think It's Funny. There Was A Time When Men Were Afraid That Somebody Would Reveal Some Secret Of Theirs That Was Unknown To Their Fellows. Nowadays, They're Afraid That Somebody Will Name What Everybody Knows. Have You Practical People Ever Thought That That's All It Would Take To Blast Your Whole, Big, Complex Structure, With All Your Laws And Guns - Just Somebody Naming The Exact Nature Of What You're Doing?

Do Not Let Your Fire Go Out, Spark By Irreplaceable Spark In The Hopeless Swamps Of The Not-quite, The Not-yet, And The Not-at-all. Do Not Let The Hero In Your Soul Perish In Lonely Frustration For The Life You Deserved And Have Never Been Able To Reach. The World You Desire Can Be Won. It Exists.. It Is Real.. It Is Possible.. It's Yours.

The Only Proper, Moral Purpose Of A Government Is To Protect Man's Rights, Which Means: To Protect Him From Physical Violence - To Protect His Right To His Own Life, To His Own Liberty, To His Own Property And To The Pursuit Of His Own Happiness. Without Property Rights, No Other Rights Are Possible.

Men Have Died In Torture Chambers, On The Stake, In Concentration Camps, In Front Of Firing Squads, Rather Than Renounce Their Convictions. The Appeaser Renounces His Under The Pressure Of A Frown On A Vacant Face.

All Work Is An Act Of Philosophy.

But Aristotle's Philosophy Was The Intellect's Declaration Of Independence.

The Truth Is Not For All Men, But Only For Those Who Seek It.

One Method Of Destroying A Concept Is By Diluting Its Meaning. Observe That By Ascribing Rights To The Unborn, I.e., The Nonliving, The Anti-abortionists Obliterate The Rights Of The Living.

If There Is Any One Proof Of A Man's Incompetence, It Is The Stagnant Mentality Of A Worker Who, Doing Some Small Routine Job In A Vast Undertaking, Does Not Care To Look Beyond The Lever Of A Machine, Does Not Choose To Know How The Machine Got There Or What Makes His Job Possible, And Proclaims That The Management Of The Undertaking Is Parasitical And Unnecessary.

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

People Think That A Liar Gains A Victory Over His Victim. What I’ve Learned Is That A Lie Is An Act Of Self-abdication, Because One Surrenders One’s Reality To The Person To Whom One Lies, Making That Person One’s Master, Condemning Oneself From Then On To Faking The Sort Of Reality That Person’s View Requires To Be Faked…the Man Who Lies To The World, Is The World’s Slave From Then On…there Are No White Lies, There Is Only The Blackest Of Destruction, And A White Lie Is The Blackest Of All.

Life Is A Value To Be Bought And Thinking Is The Only Coin Noble Enough To Buy It.

One Must Never Allow Oneself To Acquire An Exaggerated Sense Of One's Own Importance. There's No Necessity To Burden Oneself With Absolutes

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.

Did I Feel A Physical Desire For Him? I Did. Was I Moved By A Passion Of My Body? I Was. Have I Experienced The Most Violent Form Of Sensual Pleasure? I Have.

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