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There's Nothing Of Any Importance In Life — Except How Well You Do Your Work. Nothing. Only That. Whatever Else You Are, Will Come From That. It's The Only Measure Of Human Value.

-Ayn Rand

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There's Nothing Of Any

Ayn Rand

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There's Nothing Of Any Importance In Life — Except How Well You Do Your Work. Nothing. Only That. Whatever Else You Are, Will Come From That. It's The Only Measure Of Human Value.

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There Is No Hope For The World Unless And Until We Formulate, Accept And State Publicly A True Moral Code Of Individualism, Based On Man's Inalienable Right To Live For Himself. Neither To Hurt Nor To Serve His Brothers, But To Be Independent Of Them In His Function And In His Motive. Neither To Sacrifice Them For Himself Nor To Sacrifice Himself For Them.

When It Is Established That Government By Right Can Take Wealth From Some And Give It To Others. When A Society Establishes Criminals-by-right And Looters-by-law, Men Will Use Force To Seize The Wealth Of Disarmed Victims. Such Looters Believe It Safe To Rob Defenseless Men, Once They Have Passed A Law To Disarm Them. But Their Loot Becomes The Magnet For Other Looters, Who Get It From Them As They Got It. Then The Race Goes, Not To The Ablest At Production, But To Those Most Ruthless At Brutality. When Force Is The Standard, The Murderer Wins Over The Pickpocket.

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.

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.

Every Aspect Of Western Culture Needs A New Code Of Ethics - A Rational Ethics - As A Precondition Of Rebirth.

Western Culture

Place Nothing Above The Verdict Of Your Own Mind.

Romantic Art Is The Fuel And The Spark Plug Of A Man's Soul. It's Task Is To Set A Soul On Fire And Never Let It Go Out.

A Man Of Independent Judgment Is A Man Of Profound Self-esteem.

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

That Time And Those People Are Upon You!

The Moral Is The Chosen, Not The Forced; The Understood, Not The Obeyed. The Moral Is The Rational, And Reason Accepts No Commandments.

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.

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

The Only Purpose Of Education Is To Teach A Student How To Live His Life-by Developing His Mind And Equipping Him To Deal With Reality. The Training He Needs Is Theoretical, I.e., Conceptual. He Has To Be Taught To Think, To Understand, To Integrate, To Prove. He Has To Be Taught The Essentials Of The Knowledge Discovered In The Past-and He Has To Be Equipped To Acquire Further Knowledge By His Own Effort.

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.

That Love Is Reverence, And Worship, And Glory, And The Upward Glance. Not A Bandage For Dirty Sores. But They Don’t Know It. Those Who Speak Of Love Most Promiscuously Are The Ones Who’ve Never Felt It. They Make Some Sort Of Feeble Stew Out Of Sympathy, Compassion, Contempt, And General Indifference, And They Call It Love. Once You’ve Felt What It Means To Love As You And I Know It – The Total Passion For The Total Height – You’re Incapable Of Anything Less.

I Made My Fortune By Being Able To Spot A Certain Kind Of Man.

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.

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.

A Creative Man Is Motivated By The Desire To Achieve, Not By The Desire To Beat Others.

Man Holds These Rights [life, Liberty And Property], Not From The Collective Nor For The Collective, But Against The Collective - As A Barrier Which The Collective Cannot Cross... These Rights Are Man's Protection Against All Other Men.

There Is Only One Institution That Can Arrogate To Itself The Power Legally To Trade By Means Of Rubber Checks: The Government. And It Is The Only Institution That Can Mortgage Your Future Without Your Knowledge Or Consent: Government Securities (and Paper Money) Are Promissory Notes On Future Tax Receipts, I.e., On Your Future Production.

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

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

...if Peace Were The Goal Of Today's Intellectuals, A Failure Of That Magnitude -- And The Evidence Of Unspeakable Suffering On So Large A Scale -- Would Make Them Pause And Check Their Statist Premises. Instead, Blind To Everything But Their Hatred For Capitalism, They Are Now Asserting That 'poverty Breeds Wars' ... But The Question Is: What Breeds Poverty? If You Look A The World Of Today And If You Look Back At History, You Will See The Answer: The Degree Of A Country's Freedom Is The Degree Of Its Prosperity.

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.

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.

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

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.

In All Proper Relationships There Is No Sacrifice Of Anyone To Anyone. An Architect Needs Clients, But He Does Not Subordinate His Work To Their Wishes. They Need Him, But They Do Not Order A House Just To Give Him Commission. Men Exchange Their Work By Free, Mutual Consent To Mutual Advantage When Their Personal Interests Agree And They Both Desire The Exchange.

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

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.

A Morality That Holds Need As A Claim, Holds Emptiness-non-existence-as Its Standard Of Value; It Rewards An Absence, A Defect: Weakness, Inability, Incompetence, Suffering, Disease, Disaster, The Lack, The Fault, The Flaw-the Zero.

Errors Of Knowledge Are Not Breaches Of Morality; No Proper Moral Code Can Demand Infallibility Or Omniscience.

Love Is Our Response To Our Highest Values.

Productiveness Is Your Acceptance Of Morality, Your Recognition Of The Fact That You Choose To Live-that Productive Work Is The Process By Which Man's Consciousness Controls His Existence, A Constant Process Of Acquiring Knowledge And Shaping Matter To Fit One's Purpose, Of Translating An Idea Into Physical Form, Of Remaking The Earth In The Image Of One's Values-that All Work Is Creative Work If Done By A Thinking Mind.

Man's Basic Vice, The Source Of All His Evils, Is The Act Of Unfocusing His Mind, The Suspension Of His Consciousness, Which Is Not Blindness, But The Refusal To See, Not Ignorance, But The Refusal To Know.

From The Smallest Necessity To The Highest Religious Abstraction, From The Wheel To The Skyscraper, Everything We Are And Everything We Have Comes From One Attribute Of Man - The Function Of His Reasoning Mind.

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.

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.'

He Wanted Her. He Knew Where To Find Her. He Waited. It Amused Him To Wait, Because He Knew That The Waiting Was Unbearable To Her. He Knew That His Absence Bound Her To Him In A Manner More Complete And Humiliating Than His Presence Could Enforce. He Was Giving Her Time To Attempt An Escape, In Order To Let Her Know Her Own Helplessness When He Chose To See Her Again.

Contrary To The Ecologists, Nature Does Not Stand Still And Does Not Maintain The Kind Of Equilibrium That Guarantees The Survival Of Any Particular Species - Least Of All The Survival Of Her Greatest And Most Fragile Product: Man.

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.

You Have Been The One Encounter In My Life That Can Never Be Repeated

The Purpose Of Man's Life...is To Become An Abject Zombie Who Serves A Purpose He Does Not Know, For Reasons He Is Not To Question.

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

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

Capitalism Demands The Best Of Every Man - His Rationality - And Rewards Him Accordingly. It Leaves Every Man Free To Choose The Work He Likes, To Specialize In It, To Trade His Product For The Products Of Others, And To Go As Far On The Road Of Achievement As His Ability And Ambition Will Carry Him.

We Didn't Really Have To Take Everything So Seriously, Did We?

The Evil Of The World Is Made Possible By Nothing But The Sanction You Give It.

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

Evil Requires The Sanction Of The Victim.

Happiness Is A State Of Non-contradictory Joy . . . Happiness Is Possible Only To A Rational Man, The Man Who Desires Nothing But Rational Goals, Seeks Nothing But Rational Values, And Finds His Joy In Nothing But Rational Actions.

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

America's Abundance Was Not Created By Public Sacrifices To The Common Good, But By The Productive Genius Of Free Men Who Pursued Their Own Personal Interests And The Making Of Their Own Private Fortunes.

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.

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

Words Are A Lens To Focus One's Mind.

They Had Rejected The Soul-body Dichotomy, With Its Two Corollaries: The Impotence Of Man's Mind And The Damnation Of This Earth; They Had Rejected The Doctrine Of Suffering As Man's Metaphysical Fate, They Proclaimed Man's Right To The Pursuit Of Happiness And Were Determined To Establish On Earth The Conditions Required For Man's Proper Existence, By The "unaided" Power Of Their Intellect.

Pursuit Of Happiness

The Man Of Authentic Self-confidence Is The Man Who Relies On The Judgment Of His Own Mind. Such A Man Is Not Malleable; He May Be Mistaken, He May Be Fooled In A Given Instance, But He Is Inflexible In Regard To The Absolutism Of Reality, I.e., In Seeking And Demanding Truth.

People Want Nothing But Mirrors Around Them. To Reflect Them While They’re Reflecting Too ... Reflections Of Reflections And Echoes Of Echoes. No Beginning And No End. No Center And No Purpose.

In That World, You'll Be Able To Rise In The Morning With The Spirit You Had Known In Your Childhood: That Spirit Of Eagerness, Adventure And Certainty Which Comes From Dealing With A Rational Universe.

It's So Graceless, Being A Martyr. It's Honoring Your Adversaries Too Much.

We Are One...alone...and Only...and We Love You Who Are One...alone...and Only. We Looked Into Each Other's Eyes And We Knew The Breath Of A Miracle Had Touched Us, And Fled, And Left Us Groping Vainly. And We Felt Torn, Torn For Some Word We Could Not Find.

If You Want To Save Capitalism There Is Only One Type Of Argument That You Should Adopt, The Only One That Has Ever Won In Any Moral Issue: The Argument From Self-esteem. Check Your Premises, Convince Yourself Of The Rightness Of Your Cause, Then Fight For Capitalism With Full, Moral Certainty.

Wealth Is The Product Of Man's Capacity To Think.

A Moment Or An Eternity—did It Matter? Life, Undefeated, Existed And Could Exist.

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.

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.

But I Don't Think Of You. - Howard Roark

There Is Nothing To Take A Man’s Freedom Away From Him, Save Other Men.

And He Said Her Name To Fill The Space Of Five Years.

It Is A Free Market That Makes Monopolies Impossible.

The Right Of A Nation To Determine Its Own Form Of Government Does Not Include The Right To Establish A Slave Society (that Is, To Legalize The Enslavement Of Some Men By Others). There Is No Such Thing As "the Right To Enslave." A Nation Can Do It, Just As A Man Can Become A Criminal- But Neither Can Do It By Right.

No One's Happiness But My Own Is In My Power To Achieve Or To Destroy.

Overcoming Addiction

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.

I Regret Nothing. There Have Been Things I Missed, But I Ask No Questions, Because I Have Loved It, Such As It Has Been, Even The Moments Of Emptiness, Even The Unanswered-and That I Loved It, That Is The Unanswered In My Life.

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

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.

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.

My Greatest Personal Mistake Is Ever To Allow A Word Or Moment That “doesn’t Count,” I.e., That I Do Not Refer To My Own Basic Principles. Every Word, Every Action, Every Moment Counts. (this Is The Pattern On Which Everybody Makes Mistakes [or] Becomes Irrational — Not Relating Their One Action Or One Conviction To Another.

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.

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

I Don't Want To See You. I Don't Like You. I Don't Like Your Face. You Look Like An Insufferable Egotist. You're Impertinent. You're Too Sure Of Yourself. Twenty Years Ago I Would Have Punched Your Face With The Greatest Of Pleasure.

When One Acts On Pity Against Justice, It Is The Good Whom One Punishes For The Sake Of The Evil; When One Saves The Guilty From Suffering, It Is The Innocent Whom One Forces To Suffer. There Is No Escape From Justice, Nothing Can Be Unearned And Unpaid For In The Universe, Neither In Matter Nor In Spirit—and If The Guilty Do Not Pay, Then The Innocent Have To Pay It.

In A Capitalist Society, All Human Relationships Are Voluntary.

Human Relations

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

I Loathe Your Ideals Because I Know No Worse Injustice Than The Giving Of The Undeserved.

I Feel That Others Live Up To Me, If They Want Me.

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

The Moral Justification Of Capitalism Does Not Lie In The Altruist Claim That It Represents The Best Way To Achieve 'the Common Good.' It Is True That Capitalism Does -- If That Catch-phrase Has Any Meaning -- But This Is Merely A Secondary Consequence. The Moral Justification For Capitalism Lies In The Fact That It Is The Only System Consonant With Man's Rational Nature, That It Protects Man's Survival Qua Man, And That Its Ruling Principle Is: Justice

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

Control Of Your Life

Achieving Life Is Not The Equivalent Of Avoiding Death.

There Is Only One Source Of Authentic Self-confidence: Reason.

Self Confidence

If A Man Speculates On What 'society' Should Do For The Poor, He Accepts Thereby The Collectivist Premise That Men's Lives Belong To Society And That He, As A Member Of Society, Has The Right To Dispose Of Them...that Psychological Confession Reveals The Enormity Of The Extent To Which Altruism Erodes Men's Capacity To Grasp The Concept Of Rights Or The Value Of An Individual Life.

That Something Happened To You Is Of No Importance To Anyone, Not Even To You. The Important Thing About You Is What You Choose To Make Happen - Your Values And Choices. That Which Happened By Accident - What Family You Were Born Into, In What Country, And Where You Went To School - Is Totally Unimportant.

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

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.

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.

If You Know That This Life Is All That You Have, Wouldn't You Make The Most Of It?

Mysticism Requires The Notion Of The Unknowable, Which Is Revealed To Some And Withheld From Others; This Divides Men Into Those Who Feel Guilt And Those Who Cash In On It.

Whatever May Be Open To Disagreement, There Is One Act Of Evil That May Not, The Act That No Man May Commit Against Others And No Man May Sanction Or Forgive. So Long As Men Desire To Live Together, No Man May Initiate—do You Hear Me? No Man May Start—the Use Of Physical Force Against Others.

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 Think That When In Doubt About The Truth Of An Issue, It's Safer And In Better Taste To Select The Least Numerous Of The Adversaries.

He Never Felt Lonliness Except When He Was Happy.

What Is The Basic, The Essential, The Crucial Principle That Differentiates Freedom From Slavery? It Is The Principle Of Voluntary Action Versus Physical Coercion Or Compulsion.

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

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

Happiness Is Not To Be Achieved At The Command Of Emotional Whims.

Whatever Their Future, At The Dawn Of Their Lives, Men Seek A Noble Vision Of Man's Nature And Of Life's Potential.

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.

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.

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?

It Is Not Advisable To Venture Unsolicited Opinions. You Should Spare Yourself The Embarrassing Discovery Of Their Exact Value To Your Listener.

I Consider Promiscuity Immoral. Not Because Sex Is Evil, But Because Sex Is Too Good And Too Important.

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.

It Is Not Fools That I Seek To Address.

The Truly And Deliberately Evil Men Are A Very Small Minority; It Is The Appeaser Who Unleashes Them On Mankind.

The Meaning Ascribed In Popular Usage To The Word 'selfishness' Is Not Merely Wrong: It Represents A Devastating Intellectual 'package-deal,' Which Is Responsible, More Than Any Other Single Factor, For The Arrested Moral Development Of Mankind.

Moral Development

The Genius Must Have His Freedom And His Independence.

"judge Not, That Ye Be Not Judge"... Is An Abdication Of Moral Responsibility: It Is A Moral Blank Check One Gives To Others In Exchange For A Moral Blank Check One Expects For Oneself. There Is No Escape From The Fact That Men Have To Make Choices; So Long As Men Have To Make Choices, There Is No Escape From Moral Values; So Long As Moral Values Are At Stake, No Moral Neutrality Is Possible. To Abstain From Condemning A Torturer, Is To Become An Accesory To The Torture And Murder Of His Victims. The Moral Principle To Adopt... Is: "judge, And Be Prepared To Be Judged."

A Gun Is Not An Argument.

A Rational Man Knows-or Makes It A Point To Discover-the Source Of His Emotions, The Basic Premises From Which They Come.

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.

Do Not Lose Your Knowledge That Man's Proper Estate Is An Upright Posture, An Intransigent Mind, And A Step That Travels Unlimited Roads.

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

Laissez Faire Capitalism

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

I'm Working To Improve My Methods, And Every Hour I Save Is An Hour Added To My Life.

We [entrepreneurs] Required That You Leave Us Free To Function -- Free To Think And Work As We Choose ... -- Free To Earn Our Own Profits And Make Our Own Fortunes ... Such Was The Price We Asked, Which You Chose To Reject As Too High.

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

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

So Long As Men Desire To Live Together, No Man May Initiate The Use Of Physical Force Against Others. . . . When A Man Attempts To Deal With Me By Force, I Answer Him By Force. It Is Only As Retaliation That Force May Be Used And Only Against The Man Who Starts Its Use. No, I Do Not Share His Evil Or Sink To His Concept Of Morality: I Merely Grant Him His Choice, Destruction, The Only Destruction He Had The Right To Choose: His Own.

There Are Two Principles On Which All Men Of Intellectual Integrity And Good Will Can Agree, As A 'basic Minimum,' As A Precondition Of Any Discussion, Co-operation Or Movement Toward An Intellectual Renaissance. . . . They Are Not Axioms, But Until A Man Has Proved Them To Himself And Has Accepted Them, He Is Not Fit For An Intellectual Discussion. These Two Principles Are: A. That Emotions Are Not Tools Of Cognition; B. That No Man Has The Right To Initiate The Use Of Physical Force Against Others.

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

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

The Difference Between A Welfare State And A Totalitarian State Is A Matter Of Time.

Those Who Say Theory And Practice Are Two Unrelated Realms Are Fools In One And Scoundrels In The Other.

The View That Man Was Ever To Be Drawn By Some Vision Of The Unattainable Shining Ahead, Doomed Ever To Aspire, But Not To Achieve, My Life And My Values Could Not Bring Me To That.

The Cult Of Moral Grayness Is A Revolt Against Moral Values.

If A Society Is To Be Free, Its Government Has To Be Controlled.

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

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

This Miracle Of Me Is Mine To Own And Keep, And Mine To Guard, And Mine To Use, And Mine To Kneel Before.

Existence Is Identity, Consciousness Is Identification.

Anyone Who Fights For The Future, Lives In It Today.

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.

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

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

Civilization Is The Progress Toward A Society Of Privacy.

Progress Of Society

Abortion Is A Moral Right-which Should Be Left To The Sole Discretion Of The Woman Involved; Morally, Nothing Other Than Her Wish In The Matter Is To Be Considered. Who Can Conceivably Have The Right To Dictate To Her What Disposition She Is To Make Of The Functions Of Her Body?

Two World Wars, Three Monstrous Dictatorships-in Soviet Russia, Nazi Germany, Red China-plus Every Lesser Variant Of Devastating Socialist Experimentation In A Global Spread Of Brutality And Despair, Have Not Prompted Modern Intellectuals To Question Or Revise Their Dogma. They Still Think That It Is Daring, Idealistic And Unconventional To Denounce The Rich. They Still Believe That Money Is The Root Of All Evil-except Government Money, Which Is The Solution To All Problems.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Truth Is The Recognition Of Reality; Reason, Man's Only Means Of Knowledge, Is His Only Standard Of Truth.

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.

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.

So You Think That Money Is The Root Of All Evil? [...] Have You Ever Asked What Is The Root Of Money? 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. Money Is Not The Tool Of The Moochers, Who Claim Your Product By Tears, Or Of The Looters, Who Take It From You By Force. Money Is Made Possible Only By The Men Who Produce. Is This What You Consider Evil?

A Government Is The Most Dangerous Threat To Man

Well, I Always Know What I Want. And When You Know What You Want--you Go Toward It. Sometimes You Go Very Fast, And Sometimes Only An Inch A Year. Perhaps You Feel Happier When You Go Fast. I Don't Know. I've Forgotten The Difference Long Ago, Because It Really Doesn't Matter, So Long As You Move.

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

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.

To Deal With Men By Force Is As Impractical As To Deal With Nature By Persuasion.

It's The Person Who Would Sell His Soul For A Nickel, Who Is Loudest In Proclaiming His Hatred Of Money.

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

The Worst Guilt Is To Accept An Undeserved Guilt — And That Is What You Have Been Doing All Your Life.

I Dont Work With Collectives. I Don't Consult, I Don't Co-operate, I Don't Collaborate.

Whenever Destroyers Appear Among Men, They Start By Destroying Money, For Money Is Men's Protection And The Base Of A Moral Existence. Destroyers Seize Gold And Leave To Its Owners A Counterfeit Pile Of Paper. This Kills All Objective Standards And Delivers Men Into The Arbitrary Power Of An Arbitrary Setter Of Values. 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.

She Knew That She Could Not Have Reached This White Serenity Except As The Sum Of All The Colors, Of All The Violence She Had Known.

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 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.

The Men Of The Press, Who Despised Their Own Profession, Did Not Know Why They Were Enjoying It Today. One Of Them, A Young Man With Years Of Notorious Success Behind Him And A Cynical Look Of Twice His Age, Said Suddenly, 'i Know What I'd Like To Be: I Wish I Could Be A Man Who Covers News!'

Have You Ever Felt The Longing For Someone You Could Admire? For Something, Not To Look Down At, But Up To?

I Am Older Than You. Believe Me, There Is No Other Way To Live On Earth. Men Are Not Open To Truth Or Reason. They Cannot Be Reached By A Rational Argument. The Mind Is Powerless Against Them. Yet We Have To Deal With Them. If We Want To Accomplish Anything, We Have To Deceive Them Into Letting Us Accomplish It. Or Force Them. They Understand Nothing Else. We Cannot Expect Their Support For Any Endeavor Of The Intellect, For Any Goal Of The Spirit. They Are Nothing But Vicious Animals. They Are Greedy, Self-indulgent, Predatory Dollar-chasers

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

Your Eyes Are As A Flame, But Our Brothers Have Neither Hope Nor Fire. Your Mouth Is Cut Of Granite, But Our Brothers Are Soft And Humble. Your Head Is High, But Our Brothers Cringe. You Walk, But Our Brothers Crawl. We Wish To Be Damned With You, Rather Than Blessed With All Our Brothers. Do As You Please With Us, But Do Not Send Us Away From You.

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

Do You Know That My Personal Crusade In Life (in The Philosophical Sense) Is Not Merely To Fight Collectivism, Nor To Fight Altruism? These Are Only Consequences, Effects, Not Causes. I Am Out After The Real Cause, The Real Root Of Evil On Earth The Irrational.

Every Man Is Free To Rise As Far As He's Able Or Willing, But The Degree To Which He Thinks Determines The Degree To Which He'll Rise.

Positive Thinking

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

All Work Is An Act Of Philosophy.

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?

The Creator's Concern Is The Conquest Of Nature. The Parasite's Concern Is The Conquest Of Men.

Reason Is Not Automatic. Those Who Deny It Cannot Be Conquered By It. Do Not Count On Them. Leave Them Alone.

John Galt Is Prometheus Who Changed His Mind. After Centuries Of Being Torn By Vultures In Payment For Having Brought To Men The Fire Of The Gods, He Broke His Chains—and He Withdrew His Fire—until The Day When Men Withdraw Their Vultures.

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.

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

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.

I Can Say-not As A Patriotic Bromide, But With Full Knowledge Of The Necessary Metaphysical, Epistemological , Ethical, Political And Esthetic Roots-that The United States Of America Is The Greatest, The Noblest And, In Its Original Founding Principles, The Only Moral Country In The History Of The World.

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

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

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.

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.

Fransisco, You're Some Kind Of Very High Nobility, Aren't You?" He Answered, "not Yet. The Reason My Family Has Lasted For Such A Long Time Is That None Of Us Has Ever Been Permitted To Think He Is Born A D'anconia. We Are Expected To Become One.

There Is No Such Thing As A Lousy Job - Only Lousy Men Who Don't Care To Do It.

He Walked, Groping For A Sentence That Hung In His Mind As An Empty Shape. He Could Neither Fill It Or Dismiss It.

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.

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.

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

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Robert Anderson

Francis Of Assisi

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