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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.

-Ayn Rand

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Your Eyes Are As

Ayn Rand

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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.

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It's Good To Suffer. Dont Complain. Bear, Bow, Accept - And Be Grateful That God Has Made You Suffer. For This Makes You Better Than The People Who Are Laughing And Happy.

This Is The Age Othe Common Man, They Tell Us-a Title Which Any Man May Claim To The Extent Osuch Distinction As He Has Managed Not To Achieve.

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.'

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.

I've Always Thought That A Feeling Which Changes Never Existed In The First Place.

What Whip Lashed Them To Their Knees In Shame And Submission? The Worship Of The Word "we.

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 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.

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 You Want To Feel Good, Be Rational.

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.

An Attempt To Achieve The Good By Force Is Like An Attempt To Provide A Man With A Picture Gallery At The Price Of Cutting Out His Eyes.

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

The Writer Who Develops A Beautiful Style, But Has Nothing To Say, Represents A Kind Of Arrested Esthetic Development; He Is Like A Pianist Who Acquires A Brilliant Technique By Playing Finger-exercises, But Never Gives A Concert.

Look Around You And Look At History. You Will See The Achievements Of Man’s Mind. You Will See Man’s Unlimited Potentiality For Greatness, And The Faculty That Makes It Possible. You Will See That Man Is Not A Helpless Monster By Nature, But He Becomes One When He Discards That Faculty: His Mind. And If You Ask Me, What Is Greatness? I Will Answer, It Is The Capacity To Live By The Three Fundamental Values Of John Galt: Reason, Purpose, Self-esteem.

Do Not Let Your Fire Go Out ... Do Not Let The Hero In Your Soul Perish ... Check Your Road And The Nature Of Your Battle. The World You Desired Can Be Won. It Exists, It Is Real, It Is Possible, It Is Yours.

Morally, The Promise Of An Impossible “right” To Economic Security Is An Infamous Attempt To Abrogate The Concept Of Rights. It Can And Does Mean Only One Thing: A Promise To Enslave The Men Who Produce, For The Benefit Of Those Who Don’t.

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

There Are Two Sides To Every Issue: One Side Is Right And The Other Is Wrong, But The Middle Is Always Evil.

I Want It Real. I Want To Know That There Is Someone, Somewhere, Who Wants It, Too. Or Else What Is The Use Of Seeing It, And Working, And Burning Oneself For An Impossible Vision? A Spirit, Too, Needs Fuel. It Can Run Dry

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

She Thought How Strange It Would Be If She Ever Said 'hello' To Him. One Did Not Greet Oneself Each Morning.

He Wanted Nothing, For The Time Being, Except To Understand .... Without Advice, Assistance Or Plan, He Began Reading An Incongruous Assortment Of Books; He Would Find Some Passage Which He Could Not Understand In One Book, And He Would Get Another On That Subject .... There Was No Order In His Reading; But There Was Order In What Remained Of It In His Mind.

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.

Man's Character Is The Product Of His Premises.

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.

Do Not Make The Mistake...of Thinking That A Worker Is A Slave And That He Holds His Job By His Employer's Permission. He Does Not Hold It By Permission - But By Contract, That Is, By A Voluntary Mutual Agreement. A Worker Can Quit His Job; A Slave Cannot.

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.

Every Period Ruled By Mystics Was An Era Of Stagnation And Want, When Most Men Were On Strike Against Existence.

To Demand 'sense' Is The Hallmark Of Nonsense. Nature Does Not Make Sense. Nothing Makes Sense.

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

If The Truth Shall Kill Them, Let Them Die.

Words Of Wisdom

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.

I Will Not Die, It's The World That Will End." Paraphrase Of Unknown Philosopher

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

Did It Ever Occur To You, That There Is No Conflict Of Interests Among Men, Neither In Business Nor In Trade Nor In Their Most Personal Desires If They Omit The Irrational From Their View Of The Possible And Destruction From Their View Of The Practical? There Is No Conflict, And No Call For Sacrifice, And No Man Is A Threat To The Aims Of Another If Men Understand That Reality Is An Absolute Not To Be Faked, That Lies Do Not Work, That The Unearned Cannot Be Had, That The Undeserved Cannot Be Given, That The Destruction Of A Value Which Is, Will Not Bring Value To That Which Isn't.

The Leaves Streamed Down, Trembling In The Sun. They Were Not Green, Only A Few, Scattered Through The Torrent, Stood Out In Single Drops Of Green So Bright And Pure That It Hurt The Eyes; The Rest Were Not A Color, But A Light, The Substance Of Fire On Metal, Living Sparks Without Edges. And It Looked As If The Forest Were A Spread Of Light Boiling Slowly To Produce This Color, The Green Rising In Small Bubbles, The Condensed Essence Of Spring. The Trees Met, Blending Over The Road And The Spots Of Sun On The Ground Moved With The Shifting Of The Branches, Like A Conscious Caress.

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

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.

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.

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

We Are On Strike Against Martyrdom—and Against The Moral Code That Demands It. We Are On Strike Against Those Who Believe That One Man Must Exist For The Sake Of Another. We Are On Strike Against The Morality Of Cannibals, Be It Practiced In Body Or In Spirit. We Will Not Deal With Men On Any Terms But Ours—and Our Terms Are A Moral Code Which Holds That Man Is An End In Himself And Not The Means To Any End Of Others.

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

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

It Is Morally Obscene To Regard Wealth As An Anonymous, Tribal Product And To Talk About 'redistributing' It.

Honor Is Self-esteem Made Visible In Action.

Every Man Builds His World In His Own Image; He Has The Power To Choose, But No Power To Escape The Necessity Of Choice. If He Abdicates His Power, He Abdicates The Status Of Man, And The Grinding Chaos Of The Irrational Is What He Achieves As His Sphere Of Existence—by His Own Choice.

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 Concept Of Individual Rights Is So Prodigious A Feat Of Political Thinking That Few Men Grasp It Fully - And Two Hundred Years Have Not Been Enough For Other Countries To Understand It. But This Is The Concept To Which We Owe Our Lives - The Concept Which Made It Possible For Us To Bring Into Reality Everything Of Value That Any Of Us Did Or Will Achieve Or Experience.

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

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.

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

Selfishness Does Not Mean Only To Do Things For One's Self. One May Do Things, Affecting Others, For His Own Pleasure And Benefit. This Is Not Immoral, But The Highest Of Morality.

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

Romantic Art Is Always Stylized: The Better The Art, The Cleaner And More Attractive And Intelligent The Stylization.

Don't Rely On Our Knowledge Of What's Best For Your Future. We Do Know, But It Can't Be Best Until You Know It.

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

Man Cannot Survive Except Through His Mind. He Comes On Earth Unarmed. His Brain Is His Only Weapon. Animals Obtain Food By Force. Man Had No Claws, No Fangs, No Horns, No Great Strength Of Muscle. He Must Plant His Food Or Hunt It. To Plant, He Needs A Process Of Thought. To Hunt, He Needs Weapons,and To Make Weapons - A Process Of Thought. From This Simplest Necessity To The Highest Religious Abstraction, From The Wheel To The Skyscraper, Everything We Are And We Have Comes From A Single Attribute Of Man -the Function Of His Reasoning Mind.

That's A Cute Sentence: The Years To Come. Why Are You So Sure They're Coming?

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.

Show Me Your Achievement, And The Knowledge Will Give Me Courage For Mine.

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.

Since Only An Individual Man Can Possess Rights, The Expression "individual Rights"? Is A Redundancy (which One Has To Use For Purposes Of Clarification In Today's Intellectual Chaos). But The Expression "collective Rights"? Is A Contradiction In Terms.

I Do Not Think That Tragedy Is Our Natural Fate And I Do Not Live In Chronic Dread Of Disaster. It Is No Happiness, But Suffering That I Consider Unnatural. It Is Not Success, But Calamity That I Regard As The Abnormal Exception In Human Life.

Congress Shall Make No Law Abridging The Freedom Of Production And Trade.

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.

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.

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 Three Values Which Men Had Held For Centuries And Which Have Now Collapsed Are: Mysticism, Collectivism, Altruism. Mysticism — As A Cultural Power — Died At The Time Of The Renaissance. Collectivism — As A Political Ideal — Died In World War Ii. As To Altruism — It Has Never Been Alive. It Is The Poison Of Death In The Blood Of Western Civilization, And Men Survived It Only To The Extent To Which They Neither Believed Nor Practiced It.

The Most Depraved Type Of Human Being ... (is) The Man Without A Purpose.

There Must Be Only Three Supreme Values Which Govern A Person's Life: Reason, Purpose, And Self-esteem. Reason, As His Only Tool Of Knowledge--purpose, As His Choice Of The Happiness Which That Tool Must Proceed To Achieve--self-esteem, As His Inviolate Certainty That His Mind Is Competent To Think And His Person Is Worthy Of Happiness, Which Means: Is Worthy Of Living. These Three Values Imply And Require All Of Man's Virtues, And All His Virtues Pertain To The Relation Of Existence And Consciousness: Rationality, Independence, Integrity, Honesty, Justice, Productiveness, Pride.

If It Were True That Men Could Achieve Their Good By Means Of Turning Some Men Into Sacrificial Animals, And ... If I Were Asked To Serve The Interests Of Society Apart From, Above And Against My Own I Would Refuse... I Would Fight In The Full Confidence Of The Justice Of My Battle And Of A Living Being's Right To Exist.

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

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

If Men Want To Oppose War, It Is Statism That They Must Oppose.

No Man Can Use His Brain To Think For Another.

Defiance, Not Obedience, Is The American's Answer To Overbearing Authority.

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.

A Viler Evil Than To Murder A Man, Is To Sell Him Suicide As An Act Of Virtue.

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

Competition Is A By-product Of Productive Work, Not Its Goal.

Productive Work

Ferris: Are You Going To Be As Impractical As That? Rearden: The Evaluation Of An Action As Practical, Dr. Ferris, Depends On What It Is That One Wishes To Practice. Ferris: Haven't You Always Placed Your Self-interest Above All Else? Rearden: That Is What I Am Doing Right Now.

Did You Get Your Money By Fraud? By Pandering To Men's Vices Or Men's Stupidity? By Catering To Fools, In The Hope Of Getting More Than Your Ability Deserves? By Lowering Your Standards? By Doing Work You Despise For Purchasers You Scorn? If So, Then Your Money Will Not Give You A Moment's Or A Penny's Worth Of Joy. Then All The Things You Buy Will Become, Not A Tribute To You, But A Reproach; Not An Achievement, But A Reminder Of Shame.

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

Every Form Of Happiness If One, Every Desire Is Driven By The Same Motor--by Our Love For A Single Value, For The Highest Potentiality Of Our Own Existence--and Every Achievement Is An Expression Of It.

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

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

Whenever Anyone Accuses Some Person Of Being 'unfeeling,' He Means That That Person Is Just. He Means That That Person Has No Causeless Emotions And Will Not Grant Him A Feeling Which He Does Not Deserve. He Means That 'to Feel' Is To Go Against Reason, Against Moral Values, Against Reality.

You'll Come Back, Because Yours Is An Error Of Knowledge, Not A Moral Failure, Not An Act Of Surrender To Evil, But Only The Last Act Of Being Victim To Your Own Virtue. We'll Wait For You And When You Come Back, You Will Have Discovered That There Need Never Be Any Conflict Among Your Desires, Nor So Tragic A Clash Of Values As The One You've Borne So Well.

No Man Can Have A Right To Impose An Unchosen Obligation , An Unrewarded Duty Or An Involuntary Servitude On Another Man. There Can Be No Such Thing As " The Right To Enslave .

What Is Man? He's Just A Collection Of Chemicals With Delusions Of Grandeur.

Delusions Of Grandeur

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.

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

Let Me Be The Child In The Story And Declare That The Emperor Is Naked — Or That America Is Culturally Bankrupt.

In The Temple Of His Spirit, Each Man Is Alone.

One Of The Methods Used By Statists To Destroy Capitalism Consists In Establishing Controls That Tie A Given Industry Hand And Foot, Making It Unable To Solve Its Problems, Then Declaring That Freedom Has Failed And Stronger Controls Are Necessary.

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.

The Worst Evil That You Can Do, Psychologically, Is To Laugh At Yourself. That Means Spitting In Your Own Face.

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

The Skyline Of New York Is A Monument Of A Splendour That No Pyramids Or Palaces Will Ever Equal Or Approach.

She Stood At The Window, Her Arms Spread Wide, Holding On To Each Side Of The Frame, It Was As If She Held A Piece Of The City.

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.

Rulers Exist Entirely Through The Persons Of Others. Their Goal Is In Their Subjects, In The Activity Of Enslaving. They Are As Dependent As The Beggar, The Social Worker And The Bandit. The Form Of Dependence Does Not Matter.

It Is The Basic, Metaphysical Fact Of Man's Nature -- The Connection Between His Survival And His Use Of Reason -- That Capitalism Recognizes And Protects.

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

Since Time Immemorial And Pre-industrial, 'greed' Has Been The Accusation Hurled At The Rich By The Concrete-bound Illiterates Who Were Unable To Conceive Of The Source Of Wealth Or Of The Motivation Of Those Who Produce It.

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.

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.

The Men Who Are Not Interested In Philosophy Need It Most Urgently: They Are Most Helplessly In Its Power. The Men Who Are Not Interested In Philosophy Absorb Its Principles From The Cultural Atmosphere Around Them-from Schools, Colleges, Books, Magazines, Newspapers, Movies, Television, Etc. Who Sets The Tone Of A Culture? A Small Handful Of Men: The Philosophers. Others Follow Their Lead, Either By Conviction Or By Default.

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.

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

If A Man Wants Love He Should Correct His Weaknesses, Or His Flaws, And He May Deserve It. But He Cannot Expect The Unearned, Either In Love Or In Money; Either In Matter Or In Spirit.

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.

Serenity Comes From The Ability To Say “yes” To Existence. Courage Comes From The Ability To Say “no” To The Wrong Choices Made By Others.

The Men Who Are Not Interested In Philosophy Need It Most Urgently; They Are Most Helplessly In Its Power.

Any Alleged 'right' Of One Man, Which Necessitates The Violation Of The Rights Of Another, Is Not And Cannot Be A Right.

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

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.

Freedom Comes From Seeing The Ignorance Of Your Critics And Discovering The Emptiness Of Their Virtue.

The End Does Not Justify The Means. No One's Rights Can Be Secured By The Violation Of The Rights Of Others.

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

Without Property Rights, No Other Rights Are Possible.

Property Rights

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

The Virtue Involved In Helping Those One Loves Is Not 'selflessness' Or 'sacrifice,' But Integrity.

Any Refusal To Recognize Reality, For Any Reason Whatever, Has Disastrous Consequences. There Are No Evil Thoughts Except One: The Refusal To Think. Don't Ignore Your Own Desires.... Don't Sacrifice Them. Examine Their Cause. There Is A Limit To How Much You Should Have To Bear.

A Society Without Intellectuals Is Like A Body Without A Head

The Genius Must Have His Freedom And His Independence.

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.

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

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

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.

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

Ethics Is A Code Of Values Which Guide Our Choices And Actions And Determine The Purpose And Course Of Our Lives.

Each Man Must Live As An End In Himself And Follow His Own Rational Self-interest.

The World You Desire Can Be Won, It Exists, It Is Real, It Is Possible, It Is Yours.

Dominique As Gail Looks At Her "... There Is A Stage Of Worship Which Makes The Worshiper Himself An Object Of Reverence."

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

The Creed Of Sacrifice Is A Morality For The Immoral.

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.

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

The Mark Of An Honest Man... Is That He Means What He Says And Knows What He Means.

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.

Paper Is A Check Drawn By Legal Looters Upon An Account Which Is Not Theirs: Upon The Virtue Of The Victims. Watch For The Day When It Bounces, Marked: 'account Overdrawn.'

No Man May Initiate The Use Of Physical Force Against Others. No Man-or Group Or Society Or Government-has The Right To Assume The Role Of A Criminal And Initiate The Use Of Physical Compulsion Against Any Man. Men Have The Right To Use Physical Force Only In Retaliation And Only Against Those Who Initiate Its Use. The Ethical Principle Involved Is Simple And Clear-cut: It Is The Difference Between Murder And Self-defense.

At First, Man Was Enslaved By The Gods. But He Broke Their Chains. Then He Was Enslaved By The Kings. But He Broke Their Chains. He Was Enslaved By His Birth, By His Kin, By His Race. But He Broke Their Chains. He Declared To All His Brothers That A Man Has Rights Which Neither God Nor King Nor Other Men Can Take Away From Him, No Matter What Their Number, For His Is The Right Of Man, And There Is No Right On Earth Above This Right. And He Stood On The Threshold Of Freedom For Which The Blood Of The Centuries Behind Him Had Been Spilled.

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.

If [people] Place Such Things As Friendship And Family Ties Above Their Own Productive Work, Yes, Then They Are Immoral. Friendship, Family Life And Human Relationships Are Not Primary In A Man's Life. A Man Who Places Others First, Above His Own Creative Work, Is An Emotional Parasite.

Productive Work

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

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

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

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.

To Achieve, You Need Thought

Whether It’s A Symphony Or A Coal Mine, All Work Is An Act Of Creating And Comes From The Same Source: From An Inviolate Capacity To See Through One’s Own Eyes-which Means: The Capacity To Perform A Rational Identification- Which Means: The Capacity To See, To Connect And To Make What Had Not Been Seen, Connected And Made Before.

Compromise Now, Because You'll Have To Later, Anyway, Only Then You'll Have Gone Through Things You'll Wish You Hadn't.

There Are Four Characteristics Which Brand A Country Unmistakably As A Dictatorship: One-party Rule, Executions Without Trial Or With A Mock Trial For Political Offenses, The Nationalization Or Expropriation Of Private Property, And Censorship. A Country Guilty Of These Outrages Forfeits Any Moral Prerogatives, Any Claim To National Rights Or Sovereignty, And Becomes An Outlaw.

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

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

Capitalism Is Not The System Of The Past; It Is The System Of The Future -- If Mankind Is To Have A Future

This God, This One Word: I.

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.

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 Lust That Drives Others To Enslave An Empire, Had Become, In Her Limits, A Passion For Power Over Him. She Had Set Out To Break Him, As If, Unable To Equal His Value, She Could Surpass It By Destroying It, As If The Measure Of His Greatness Would Thus Become The Measure Of Hers, As If The Vandal Who Smashed A Statue Were Greater Than The Artist Who Had Made It, As If The Murderer Who Killed A Child Were Greater Than The Mother Who Had Given It Birth.

Any Work Is Creative Work If Done By A Thinking Mind.

Productive Work

What Is Morality, She Asked. Judgement To Distinguish Right And Wrong, Vision To See The Truth, And Courage To Act Upon It, Dedication To That Which Is Good, Integrity To Stand By The Good At Any Price.

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

You Don't Know How Hard I've Tried To Be Left Standing All By Myself.

No Matter How Vast Your Knowledge Or How Modest, It Is Your Own Mind That Has To Acquire It. It Is Only With Your Own Knowledge That You Can Deal. It Is Only Your Own Knowledge That You Can Claim To Possess Or Ask Others To Consider. Your Mind Is Your Only Judge Of Truth - And If Others Dissent From Your Verdict, Reality Is The Court Of Final Appeal. Nothing But A Man's Mind Can Perform That Complex, Delicate, Crucial Process Of Identification Which Is Thinking. Nothing Can Direct The Process But His Own Judgment. Nothing Can Direct His Judgment But His Moral Integrity.

The Word 'we' Is As Lime Poured Over Men, Which Sets And Hardens To Stone, And Crushes All Beneath It, And That Which Is White And That Which Is Black Are Lost Equally In The Grey Of It. It Is The Word By Which The Depraved Steal The Virtue Of The Good, By Which The Weak Steal The Might Of The Strong, By Which The Fools Steal The Wisdom Of The Sages.

Every Form Of Happiness Is Private. Our Greatest Moments Are Personal, Self-motivated, Not To Be Touched".

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.

"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."

Man’s Rights Can Be Violated Only By The Use Of Physical Force. It Is Only By Means Of Physical Force That One Man Can Deprive Another Of His Life, Or Enslave Him, Or Rob Him, Or Prevent Him From Pursuing His Own Goals, Or Compel Him To Act Against His Own Rational Judgment.

Don't Worry. They're All Against Me. But I Have One Advantage: They Don't Know What They Want. I Do.

No Concept Man Forms Is Valid Unless He Integrates It Without Contradiction Into The Sum Of His Knowledge.

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.

All Public Projects Are Mausoleums, Not Always In Shapes, But Always In Cost.

You Don't Love Causes. You Don't Love Everybody Indiscriminately. You Love Only Those Who Deserve It.

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.

When Men Abandon Reason, Physical Force Becomes Their Only Means Of Dealing With One Another And Of Settling Disagreements.

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

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?

Collectivism Holds That The Individual Has No Rights, That His Life And Work Belong To The Group (to "society," To The Tribe, The State, The Nation) And That The Group May Sacrifice Him At Its Own Whim To Its Own Interests. The Only Way To Implement A Doctrine Of That Kind Is By Means Of Brute Force - And Statism Has Always Been The Poltical Corollary Of Collectivism.

Great Men Can't Be Ruled.

Thanksgiving Is A Typically American Holiday...the Lavish Meal Is A Symbol Of The Fact That Abundant Consumption Is The Result And Reward Of Production.

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

The Symbol Of All Relationships Among Such Men, The Moral Symbol Of Respect For Human Beings, Is The Trader. We, Who Live By Values, Not By Loot, Are Traders, Both In Matter And In Spirit. A Trader Is A Man Who Earns What He Gets And Does Not Give Or Take The Undeserved.

When A Man Feels Fear Without Reason, You Call Him To The Attention Of A Psychiatrist; You Are Not So Careful To Protect The Meaning, The Nature And The Dignity Of Love.

It Is A Sin To Write This.

Existence Is Identity, Consciousness Is Identification.

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

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

Money Is Just A Tool. It Will Take You Anywhere You Want, But You Have To Be The Driver

We Are Now Moving Towards Complete Collectivism Or Socialism, A System Under Which Everybody Is Enslaved To Everybody.

When You See That Trading Is Done, Not By Consent, But By Compulsion - When You See That In Order To Produce, You Need To Obtain Permission From Men Who Produce Nothing - When You See That Money Is Flowing To Those Who Deal, Not In Goods, But In Favors - When You See That Men Get Richer By Graft And By Pull Than By Work, And Your Laws Don't Protect You Against Them, But Protect Them Against You - When You See Corruption Being Rewarded And Honesty Becoming A Self-sacrifice - You May Know That Your Society Is Doomed.

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.

If You Don't Know, The Thing To Do Is Not To Get Scared, But To Learn.

But The Mind Is An Attribute Of The Individual. There Is No Such Thing As A Collective Brain. There Is No Such Thing As A Collective Thought. An Agreement Reached By A Group Of Men Is Only A Compromise Or An Average Drawn Upon Many Individual Thoughts.

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.

The Adversary She Found Herself Forced To Fight Was Not Worth Matching Or Beating; It Was Not A Superior Ability Which She Would Have Found Honour In Challenging; It Was Ineptitude - A Grey Spread Of Cotton That Seemed Soft And Shapeless, That Could Offer No Resistance To Anything Or Anybody, Yet Managed To Be A Barrier In Her Way. She Stood, Disarmed, Before The Riddle Of What Made This Possible, She Could Find No Answer.

There Is No Such Dichotomy As 'human Rights' Versus 'property Rights.' No Human Rights Can Exist Without Property Rights.

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Ulysses S. Grant

Robert Griffin III

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