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Not Selfishness, But Precisely The Absence Of A Self. Look At Them. The Man Who Cheats And Lies, But Preserves A Respectable Front. He Knows Himself To Be Dishonest, But Others Think He’s Honest And He Derives His Self-respect From That, Second-hand. The Man Who Takes Credit For An Achievement Which Is Not His Own. He Knows Himself To Be Mediocre, But He’s Great In The Eyes Of Others.

-Ayn Rand

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Not Selfishness, But Precisely

Ayn Rand

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Not Selfishness, But Precisely The Absence Of A Self. Look At Them. The Man Who Cheats And Lies, But Preserves A Respectable Front. He Knows Himself To Be Dishonest, But Others Think He’s Honest And He Derives His Self-respect From That, Second-hand. The Man Who Takes Credit For An Achievement Which Is Not His Own. He Knows Himself To Be Mediocre, But He’s Great In The Eyes Of Others.

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Everything Has Strings Leading To Everything Else. We're All So Tied Together. We're All In A Net, The Net Is Waiting, And We're Pushed Into It By One Single Desire. You Want A Thing And It's Precious To You. Do You Know Who Is Standing Ready To Tear It Out Of Your Hands? You Can't Know, It May Be So Involved And So Far Away, But Someone Is Ready, And You're Afraid Of Them All. And You Cringe And You Crawl And You Beg And You Accept Them--just So They'll Let You Keep It. And Look At Whom You Come To Accept.

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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.

To Preserve One's Mind Intact Through A Modern College Education Is A Test Of Courage And Endurance, But The Battle Is Worth It And The Stakes Are The Highest Possible To Man: The Survival Of Reason.

Living In A Society, Instead Of On A Desert Island, Does Not Relieve A Man Of The Responsibility Of Supporting His Own Life.

Now You See, Dr. Stadler, You're Speaking As If This Book Were Addressing To A Thinking Audience. If It Were, One Would Have To Be Concerned With Such Matters As Accuracy, Validity, Logic And The Prestige Of Science. But It Isn't. It's Addressed To The Public.

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.

I Like To Receive Money For My Work. But I Can Pass That Up This Time. I Like To Have People Know My Work Is Done By Me. But I Can Pass That Up. I Like To Have Tenants Made Happy By My Work. But That Doesn't Matter Too Much. The Only Thing That Matters, My Goal, My Reward, My Beginning, My End Is The Work Itself. My Work Done My Way. Peter, There's Nothing In The World That You Can Offer Me, Except This. Offer Me This And You Can Have Anything I've Got To Give. My Work Done My Way. A Private, Personal, Selfish, Egotistical Motivation. That's The Only Way I Function. That's All I Am.

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To Be Free, A Man Must Be Free Of His Brothers. That Is Freedom. That And Nothing Else.

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

Many Words Have Been Granted Me, And Some Are Wise, And Some Are False, But Only Three Are Holy: "i Will It!

Why Is It Immoral For You To Desire, But Moral For Others To Do So? Why Is It Immoral To Produce A Value And Keep It, But Moral To Give It Away? And If It Is Not Moral For You To Keep A Value, Why Is It Moral For Others To Accept It? If You Are Selfless And Virtuous When You Give It, Are They Not Selfish And Vicious When They Take It?

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.

Morality Pertains Only To The Sphere Of Man's Free Will - Only To Those Actions Which Are Open To His Choice.

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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.

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?

I'm Not Brave Enough To Be A Coward; I See The Consequences Too Clearly.

The Basic Need Of The Creator Is Independence. The Reasoning Mind Cannot Work Under Any Form Of Compulsion. It Cannot Be Curbed, Sacrificed Or Subordinated To Any Consideration Whatsoever. It Demands Total Independence In Function And In Motive.

And That Night We Knew That To Hold The Body Of Women In Our Arms In Neither Ugly Nor Shameful, But The One Ecstasy Granted To The Race Of Men.

You Are Never Called Upon To Prove A Negative. That's A Law Of Logic.

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

To Rest One's Case On Faith Means To Concede That Reason Is On The Side Of One's Enemies- That One Has No Rational Arguments To Offer.

But What Man Does Out Of Despair, Is Not Necessarily A Key To His Character. I Have Always Thought That The Real Key Is In That Which He Seeks For His Enjoyment.

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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.

[what For] Was The First Question He Asked About Any Activity Proposed To Him - And Nothing Would Make Him Act, If He Found No Valid Answer. He Flew Through The Days Of His Summer Month Like A Rocket, But If One Stopped Him In Mid-flight, He Could Always Name The Purpose Of His Every Random Moment. Two Things Were Impossible To Him: To Stand Still Or To Move Aimlessly.

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Worry Is A Waste Of Emotional Reserve".

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Laissez Faire Capitalism

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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.

She Watched The Prairies The Rivers, The Towns Slipping Past At An Untouchable Distance Below - And She Noted That The Sense Of Detachment One Feels When Looking At The Earth From A Plane Was The Same Sense She Felt When Looking At People: Only Her Distance From People Seemed Longer. - Dagny Taggart

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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.

If A Life Could Have A Theme Song - And I Believe Every Worthwhile One Has - Mine Is A Religion, An Obsession, A Mania Or All Of These Expressed In One Word - Individualism. I Was Born With That Obsession, And I've Never Seen And Do Not Know Now A Cause More Worthy, More Misunderstood, More Seemingly Hopeless And Tragically Needed.

I Am Opposed To All Forms Of Control; I Am For An Absolute Laissez Faire, Free, Unregulated Economy. I Am For The Separation Of The State And Economics, Just As We Had Separation Of State And Church, Which Led To Peaceful Coexistence Among Different Religions...so The Same Applies To Economics. If You Separate The Government From Economics, If You Do Not Regulate Production And Trade, You Will Have Peaceful Cooperation, And Harmony And Justice Among Men.

Since Reason Is Man’s Basic Means Of Survival, That Which Is Proper To The Life Of A Rational Being Is The Good; That Which Negates, Opposes Or Destroys It Is The Evil.

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.

What Is A Demanding Pleasure That Demands The Use Of Ones Mind! Not In The Sense Of Problem Solving, But In The Sense Of Exercising Discrimination, Judgment, Awareness.

Government 'help' To Business Is Just As Disastrous As Government Persecution... The Only Way A Government Can Be Of Service To National Prosperity Is By Keeping Its Hands Off.

Under The Antitrust Laws, A Man Becomes A Criminal From The Moment He Goes Into Business, No Matter What He Does. If He Complies With One Of These Laws, He Faces Criminal Prosecution Under Several Others. For Instance, If He Charges Prices Which Some Bureaucrats Judge As Too High, He Can Be Prosecuted For Monopoly Or For A Successful 'intent To Monopolize'; If He Charges Prices Lower Than Those Of His Competitors, He Can Be Prosecuted For 'unfair Competition' Or 'restraint Of Trade'; And If He Charges The Same Prices As His Competitors, He Can Be Prosecuted For 'collusion' Or 'conspiracy.'

In Any Compromise Between Food And Poison, It Is Only Death That Can Win. In Any Compromise Between Good And Evil, It Is Only Evil That Can Profit.

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

Those Touchy Mediocrities Who Sit Trembling Lest Someone's Work Prove Greater Than Their Own - They Have No Inkling Of The Loneliness That Comes When You Reach The Top. The Loneliness For An Equal - For A Mind To Respect And An Achievement To Admire.

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

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.

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.

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.

One Of The Most Destructive Anti-concepts In The History Of Moral Philosophy Is The Term 'duty.

The Quickest Way To Kill The Human Spirit Is To Ask Someone To Do Mediocre Work.

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.

Ordinary Human Concern For Human Distress Does Not Manifest Itself Ordinarily In The Form Of A Gun Aimed At The Wallets And Earnings Of One's Neighbors.

I Am An Innovator. This Is A Term Of Distinction, A Term Of Honor, Rather Than Something To Hide Or Apologize For. Anyone Who Has New Or Valuable Ideas To Offer Stands Outside The Intellectual Status Quo. But The Status Quo Is Not A Stream, Let Alone A 'mainstream'. It Is A Stagnant Swamp. It Is The Innovators Who Carry Mankind Forward.

Love Is Not Self-sacrifice, But The Most Profound Assertion Of Your Own Needs And Values. It Is For Your Own Happiness That You Need The Person You Love, And That Is The Greatest Compliment, The Greatest Tribute You Can Pay To That Person.

What I Want You To Understand, Is The Full Evil Of Those Who Claim To Have Become Convinced That This Earth, By Its Nature, Is A Realm Of Malevolence Where The Good Has No Chance To Win. Let Them Check Their Premises. Let Them Check Their Standards Of Value. Let Them Check - Before They Grant Themselves The Unspeakable License Of Evil-as-necessity - Whether They Know What Is The Good And What Are The Conditions It Requires.

That Time And Those People Are Upon You!

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?

If Parasitism, Favoritism, Corruption, And Greed For The Unearned Did Not Exist, A Mixed Economy Would Bring Them Into Existence.

We Have Only Two Sources Of Information About The Character Of The People Around Us: We Judge Them By What They Do And By What They Say (particularly The First).

The First Right On Earth Is The Right Of The Ego. Man's First Duty Is To Himself. His Moral Law Is Never To Place His Prime Goal Within The Persons Of Others. His Moral Obligation Is To Do What He Wishes, Provided His Wish Does Not Depend Primarily Upon Other Men.

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.

Honor Is Self-esteem Made Visible In Action.

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.

A Government Is The Most Dangerous Threat To Man

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.

The Great Creators - The Thinkers, The Artists, The Scientists, The Inventors - Stood Alone Against The Men Of Their Time. Every Great New Thought Was Opposed. Every Great New Invention Was Denounced. The First Motor Was Considered Foolish. The Airplane Was Considered Impossible... But The Men Of Unborrowed Vision Went Ahead. They Fought, They Suffered And They Paid. But They Won.

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.

It Is Fairly Easy To Grasp Abstract Moral Principles; It Can Be Very Difficult To Apply Them To A Given Situation, Particularly When It Involves The Moral Character Of Another Person.

I Refuse To Accept As Guilt The Fact Of My Own Existence.

The Only Proper Purpose Of A Government Is To Protect Man's Rights, Which Means: To Protect Him From Physical Violence.

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

A Majority Vote Is Not An Epistemological Validation Of An Idea. Voting Is Merely A Proper Political Device--within A Strictly, Constitutionall Y Delimited Sphere Of Action--for Choosing The Practical Means Of Implementing A Society’s Basic Principles. But Those Principles Are Not Determined By Vote.

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.

To Discuss Evil In A Manner Implying Neutrality, Is To Sanction It.

Men Have Been Taught That Their First Concern Is To Relieve The Suffering Of Others. ... To Make That The Highest Test Of Virtue Is To Make Suffering The Most Important Part Of Life. Then Man Must Wish To See Others Suffer In Order That He May Be Virtuous. Such Is The Nature Of Altruism.

Suffering Of Others

All Work Is An Act Of Philosophy.

We Are All Brothers Under The Skin - And I, For One, Would Be Willing To Skin Humanity To Prove It.

Ideas Cannot Be Fought Except By Means Of Better Ideas. The Battle Consists, Not Of Opposing, But Of Exposing; Not Of Denouncing, But Of Disproving; Not Of Evading, But Of Boldly Proclaiming A Full, Consistent, And Radical Alternative.

Altruism Declares That Any Action Taken For The Benefit Of Others Is Good, And Any Action Taken For One's Own Benefit Is Evil. Thus The Beneficiary Of An Action Is The Only Criterion Of Moral Value - And So Long As That Beneficiary Is Anybody Other Than Oneself, Anything Goes.

Ask Yourself Why Totalitarian Dictatorships Find It Necessary To Pour Money And Effort Into Propaganda For Their Own Helpless, Chained, Gagged Slaves, Who Have No Means Of Protest Or Defense. The Answer Is That Even The Humblest Peasant Or The Lowest Savage Would Rise In Blind Rebellion, Were He To Realize That He Is Being Immolated, Not To Some Incomprehensible Noble Purpose, But To Plain, Naked Human Evil.

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.

You Who Prattle That Morality Is Social And That Man Would Need No Morality On A Desert Island - It Is On A Desert Island That He Would Need It Most. Let Him Try To Claim, When There Are No Victims To Pay For It, That A Rock Is A House, That Sand Is Clothing, That Food Will Drop Into His Mouth Without Cause Or Effort, That He Will Collect A Harvest Tomorrow By Devouring His Stock Seed Today - And Reality Will Wipe Him Out, As He Deserves; Reality Will Show Him That Life Is A Value To Be Bought And That Thinking Is The Only Coin Noble Enough To Buy It.

Civilization Is The Progress Toward A Society Of Privacy. The Savage's Whole Existence Is Public, Ruled By The Laws Of His Tribe. Civilization Is The Process Of Setting Man Free From Men.

Progress Of Society

Man Cannot Demand That Others Give Up Their Lives To Make Him Happy.

What Greater Wealth Is There Than To Own Your Life And To Spend It On Growing? Every Living Thing Must Grow. It Can't Stand Still. It Must Grow Or Perish.

He Never Felt Lonliness Except When He Was Happy.

It Is My Eyes Which See, And The Sight Of My Eyes Grants Beauty To The Earth. It Is My Ears Which Hear, And The Hearing Of My Ears Gives Its Song To The World. It Is My Mind Which Thinks, And The Judgement Of My Mind Is The Only Searchlight That Can Find The Truth. It Is My Will Which Chooses, And The Choice Of My Will Is The Only Edict I Must Respect.

Do Not Let The Hero In Your Soul Perish.

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.

It Meant Nothing To Him Any Longer, Only A Faint Tinge Of Sadness--and Somewhere Within Him, A Drop Of Pain Moving Briefly And Vanishing, Like A Raindrop On The Glass Of A Window, Its Course In The Shape Of A Question Mark.

When A Man Attempts To Deal With Me By Force, I Answer Him, By Force.

Every Major Horror Of History Was Committed In The Name Of An Altruistic Motive. Has Any Act Of Selfishness Ever Equalled The Carnage Perpetrated By Disciples Of Altruism.

Do It First And Feel About It Afterwards.' - Dagny Taggart

The Creed Of Sacrifice Is A Morality For The Immoral.

"you Were Not Born To Be A Second-hander." Howard Roark To Gail Wynand In "the Fountainhead"

Man Has A Single Basic Choice: To Think Or Not, And That Is The Gauge Of His Virtue. Moral Perfection Is An Unbreached Rationality-not The Degree Of Your Intelligence, But The Full And Relentless Use Of Your Mind, Not The Extent Of Your Knowledge, But The Acceptance Of Reason As An Absolute.

Freedom, In A Political Context, Means Freedom From Government Coercion. It Does Not Mean Freedom From The Landlord, From The Employer, Or Freedom From The Laws Of Nature Which Do Not Provide Men With Automatic Prosperity. It Means Freedom From The Coercive Power Of The State ' And Nothing Else

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

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?

Faith And Force ... Are Corollaries: Every Period Of History Dominated By Mysticism, Was A Period Of Statism, Of Dictatorship, Of Tyranny.

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.

A Culture Is Not The Anonymous Product Of Undifferentiate D Masses, But The Sum Of The Intellectual Achievements Of Individual Men.

We The Living Is Not A Novel 'about Soviet Russia.' It Is A Novel About Man Against The State. Its Basic Theme Is The Sanctity Of Human Life - Using The Word 'sanctity' Not In A Mystical Sense, But In The Sense Of 'supreme Value.'

She Fell Asleep, Lying There, Her Hand Clasping His. Her Last Awareness, Before She Surrendered The Responsibility Of Consciousness, Was The Sense Of An Enormous Void, The Void Of A City And Of A Continent, Where She Would Never Be Able To Find The Man Whom She Had No Right To Seek.

A Man Doesn't Borrow Pieces Of His Body. A Building Doesn't Borrow Hunks Of Its Soul. Its Maker Gives It The Soul And Every Wall, Window And Stairway To Express It.

The Moral Cannibalism Of All Hedonist And Altruist Doctrines Lies In The Premise That The Happiness Of One Man Necessitates The Injury Of Another.

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

Litigants Obey The Verdict Of A Tribunal Solely On The Premise That There Is An Objective Rule Of Conduct, Which They Both Accept.

America's Founding Ideal Was The Principle Of Individual Rights. Nothing More - And Nothing Less.

Learn To Value Yourself, Which Means: Fight For Your Happiness.

Do Not Let The Hero In Your Soul Perish In Lonely Frustration For The Life You Deserved And Have Never Been Able To Reach.

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

If One's Actions Are Honest, One Does Not Need The Predated Confidence Of Others.

Remember That Rights Are Moral Principles Which Define And Protect A Man's Freedom Of Action, But Impose No Obligations On Other Men.

Why Do They Always Teach Us That It's Easy And Evil To Do What We Want And That We Need Discipline To Restrain Ourselves? It's The Hardest Thing In The World--to Do What We Want. And It Takes The Greatest Kind Of Courage. I Mean, What We Really Want.

Self-sacrifice? But It Is Precisely The Self That Cannot And Must Not Be Sacrificed.

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.

Don't Help Me Or Serve Me, But Let Me See It Once, Because I Need It. Don't Work For My Happiness, My Brothers — Show Me Yours — Show Me That It Is Possible — Show Me Your Achievement — And The Knowledge Will Give Me Courage For Mine.

If Men Want To Oppose War, It Is Statism That They Must Oppose. So Long As They Hold The Tribal Notion That The Individual Is Sacrificial Fodder For The Collective, That Some Men Have The Right To Rule Others By Force, And That Some (any) Alleged “good” Can Justify It-there Can Be No Peace Within A Nation And No Peace Among Nations.

About Mike The Construction Worker, Friend Of Roark: "he Worshipped Expertness Of Any Kind. He Loved His Work Passionately And Had No Tolerance For Anything Save For Other Single-track Devotions. He Was A Master In His Own Filed And Felt No Sympathy Except For Mastery. His View Of The World Was Simple: There Were The Able And There Were The Incompetent; He Was Not Concerned With The Latter."

Construction Workers

Government Holds A Legal Monopoly On The Use Of Physical Force.

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?

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.

Faith Is The Wors Curse Of Mankind, As The Exact Antithesis And Enemy Of Thought.

Those Who Grant Sympathy To Guilt, Grant None To Innocence.

You Can Ignore Reality, But You Can't Ignore The Consequences Of Ignoring Reality.

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

But A Few Understand That Building Is A Great Symbol We Live In Our Minds, And Existence Is The Attempt To Bring That Life Into Physical Reality, To State It In Gesture And Form. For The Man Who Understands This, A House He Owns Is A Statement Of His Life.

Parties Are Intended To Be Celebrations, And Celebrations Should Be Only For Those Who Have Something To Celebrate.

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.

Evil Requires The Sanction Of The Victim.

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.

You Are Damned, And We Wish To Share Your Damnation.

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.

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!

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.

What Is Greatness? I Will Answer: It Is The Capacity To Live By The Three Fundamental Values Of John Galt: Reason, Purpose, Self-esteem.

Art Is The Indispensable Medium For The Communication Of A Moral Ideal.

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.

No Speech Is Ever Considered, But Only The Speaker. It's So Much Easier To Pass Judgement On A Man Than On An Idea.

Ideas Are The Greatest And Most Crucially Practical Power On Earth.

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

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.

Capitalism Has Created The Highest Standard Of Living Ever Known On Earth. The Evidence Is Incontrovertible. The Contrast Between West And East Berlin Is The Latest Demonstration, Like A Laboratory Experiment For All To See. Yet Those Who Are Loudest In Proclaiming Their Desire To Eliminate Poverty Are Loudest In Denouncing Capitalism. Man's Well-being Is Not Their Goal.

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

Your Emotional Capacity Is An Empty Motor, And Your Values Are The Fuel With Which Your Mind Fills It. If You Choose A Mix Of Contradictions, It Will Clog Your Motor, Corrode Your Transmission And Wreck You On Your First Attempt To Move With A Machine Which You, The Driver, Have Corrupted.

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.

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

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

Face A Challenge And Find Joy In The Capacity To Meet It.

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.

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

Hank, This Is Great." "yes." He Said It Simply, Openly. There Was No Flattered Pleasure In His Voice, And No Modesty. This, She Knew, Was A Tribute To Her, The Rarest One Person Could Pay Another: The Tribute Of Feeling Free To Acknowledge One's Own Greatness, Knowing That It Is Understood.

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.

Love Is The Expression Of One's Values, The Greatest Reward You Can Earn For The Moral Qualities You Have Achieved In Your Character And Person, The Emotional Price Paid By One Man For The Joy He Receives From The Virtues Of Another.

The Right To Life Means That A Man Has The Right To Support His Life By His Own Work (on Any Economic Level, As High As His Ability Will Carry Him); It Does Not Mean That Others Must Provide Him With The Necessities Of Life.

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.

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

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

Her Face Lay Still On The Air Under His Face.

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.

One Must Differentiate Between One's Thoughts And One's Emotions With Full Clarity And Precision...no Discussion, Cooperation, Agreement, Or Understanding Is Possible Among Men Who Substitute Emotion For Proof.

To Know One's Own Desires, Their Meaning And Their Costs Requires The Highest Human Virtue: Rationality.

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.

It's Not About Who's Going To Let Me; It's About Who's Going To Stop Me.

Let Me Give You A Tip On A Clue To Men's Characters: The Man Who Damns Money Has Obtained It Dishonorably; The Man Who Respects It Has Earned It.

When The Common Good Of A Society Is Regarded As Something Apart From And Superior To The Individual Good Of Its Members, It Means That The Good Of Some Men Takes Precedence Over The Good Of Others, With Those Others Consigned To The Status Of Sacrificial Animals.

Since There Is No Such Entity As 'the Public,' Since The Public Is Merely A Number Of Individuals, The Idea That 'the Public Interest' Supersedes Private Interests And Rights Can Have But One Meaning: That The Interests And Rights Of Some Individuals Take Precedence Over The Interests And Rights Of Others.

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

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

Because The Beauty Of The Human Body Is That It 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.

The Smallest Minority On Earth Is The Individual. Those Who Deny Individual Rights Cannot Claim To Be Defenders Of Minorities.

All Depressions Are Caused By Government Interference And The Cure Is Always Offered To Take More Of The Poison That Caused The Disaster. Depressions Are Not The Result Of A Free Economy.

Civilization Is The Progress Toward A Society Of Privacy.

Progress Of Society

Whatever Road I Take, The Guiding Star Is Within Me; The Guiding Star And The Loadstone Which Point The Way. They Point In But One Direction. They Point To Me.

Degrees Of Ability Vary, But The Basic Principle Remains The Same: The Degree Of A Man's Independence, Initiative And Personal Love For His Work Determines His Talent As A Worker And His Worth As A Man. 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. There Is No Standard Of Personal Dignity Except Independence.

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.

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.

You Have Been Called Selfish For The Courage Of Acting On Your Own Judgement And Bearing Sole Responsibility For Your Own Life. You Have Been Called Arrogant For Your Independent Mind. You Have Been Called Cruel For Your Unyielding Integrity. You Have Been Calle Anti Social For The Vision That Made You Venture Upon Undiscovered Roads.

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

Do Not Help Your Jailers To Pretend That Their Jail Is Your Natural State Of Existence.

Poverty Is Not A Mortgage On The Labor Of Others-misfortu Ne Is Not A Mortgage On Achievement-fai Lure Is Not A Mortgage On Success-sufferi Ng Is Not A Claim Check, And Its Relief Is Not The Goal Of Existence-man Is Not A Sacrificial Animal On Anyone’s Altar Nor For Anyone’s Cause-life Is Not One Huge Hospital.

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Katharine Fullerton Gerould

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