Ayn Rand Quotes - Page 21

• 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.

  Ayn Rand

  Ideas, Intellectual, Honor

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• Kant is the most evil man in mankind's history.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Evil, Mankind

  Ayn Rand (1988). “The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z”, p.255, Penguin

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• A rational mind does not work under compulsion; it does not subordinate its grasp of reality to anyone's orders, directives, or controls; it does not sacrifice its knowledge, its view of the truth, to anyone's opinions, threats, wishes, plans.

  Ayn Rand

  Truth, Knowledge, Sacrifice

  "Capitalism, the Unknown Ideal".

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• To the extent to which a man is rational, life is the premise directing his actions. To the extent to which he is irrational, the premise directing his actions is death.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Action, Life Is

  Ayn Rand (2005). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.961, Penguin

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• I like to think of fire held in a man's hand. Fire, a dangerous force, tamed at his fingertips. I often wonder about the hours when a man sits alone, watching the smoke of a cigarette, thinking. I wonder what great things have come from such hours. When a man thinks, there is a spot of fire alive in his mind--and it is proper that he should have the burning point of a cigarette as his one expression.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Thinking, Fire

  Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.998, Penguin

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• When a man declares: "There are no blacks and whites [in morality]" he is making a psychological confession, and what he means is: "I am unwilling to be wholly good - and please don't regard me as wholly evil!"

  Ayn Rand

  Mean, Men, Evil

  "The Virtue of Selfishness". Book by Ayn Rand, 1964.

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• Value is that which one acts to gain and/or keep. Virtue is the act by which one aims and/or keeps it.

  Ayn Rand

  Perseverance, Humility, Gains

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• Any work is creative work if done by a thinking mind.

  Ayn Rand

  Business, Thinking, Productive Work

  Ayn Rand (1963). “For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (50th Anniversary Edition)”, p.105, Penguin

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• Roark smiled, "Gail, if this boat were sinking, I'd give my life to save you. Not because it's any kind of duty. Only because I like you, for reasons and standards of my own. I could die for you. But I couldn't and wouldn't live for you.

  Ayn Rand

  I Like You, Giving, Kind

  Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.580, Penguin

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• Genius is an exaggeration of dimension. So is elephantiasis. Both may be only a disease.

  Ayn Rand

  Genius, May, Disease

  Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.290, Penguin

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• The mind is the attribute of man. When man is born, he comes into existence with only one weapon with him--The reasoning mind.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Mind, Weapons

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• A gun is not an argument.

  Ayn Rand

  Gun, Argument

  Ayn Rand, Nathaniel Branden, Alan Greenspan, Robert Hessen (1986). “Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal”, p.16, Penguin

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• She had learned, in the slums of her childhood, that honest people were never touchy about the matter of being trusted.

  Ayn Rand

  Trust, Honesty, People

  "Atlas Shrugged".

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• He, too, stood looking at her for a moment - and it seemed to her that it was not a look of greeting after an absence, but the look of someone who had thought of her every day of that year. She could not be certain, it was only an instant, so brief that just as she caught it, he was turning.

  Ayn Rand

  Years, Looks, Moments

  Ayn Rand (2005). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.106, Penguin

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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.

  Ayn Rand

  Philosophy, Acceptance, Men

  Ayn Rand (1988). “The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z”, p.302, Penguin

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• 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.

  Ayn Rand

  Sleep, Men, Break Through

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Anthem”, p.51, Xist Publishing

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• The social system based on and consonant with the altruist morality-with the code of self-sacrifice- is socialism, in all or any of its variants: fascism, Nazism, communism. All of them treat man as a sacrificial animal to be immolated for the benefit of the group, the tribe, the society, the state.

  Ayn Rand

  Sacrifice, Animal, Men

  Ayn Rand (1988). “The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z”, p.33, Penguin

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• All "public interest' legislation (and any distribution of money taken by force from some men for the unearned benefit of others) comes down ultimately to the grant of an undefined undefinable, non-objective, arbitrary power to some government officials. The worst aspect of it is not that such a power can be used dishonestly, but that it cannot be used honestly. The wisest man in the world, with the purest integrity, cannot find a criterion for the just, equitable, rational application of an unjust, inequitable, irrational principle.

  Ayn Rand

  Integrity, Taken, Men

  Ayn Rand, Nathaniel Branden, Alan Greenspan, Robert Hessen (1986). “Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal”, p.161, Penguin

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• It's not that I don't suffer, it's that I know the unimportance of suffering. I know that pain is to be fought and thrown aside, not to be accepted as part of one's soul and as a permanent scar across one's view of existence.

  Ayn Rand

  Letting Go, Pain, Views

  Ayn Rand (2005). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.907, Penguin

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• And here, over the portals of my fort, I shall cut in the stone the word which is to be my beacon and my banner. The word which will not die should we all perish in battle. The word which can never die on this earth, for it is the heart of it and the meaning and the glory. The sacred word: EGO

  Ayn Rand

  Heart, Cutting, Ego

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Anthem”, p.51, Xist Publishing

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• The man-worshipers, in my sense of the term, are those who see man's highest potential and strive to actualize it. The man-haters are those who regard man as a helpless, depraved, contemptible creature-and struggle never to let him discover otherwise.

  Ayn Rand

  Trust, Struggle, Men

  Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.12, Penguin

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• 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.

  Ayn Rand

  Mean, Government, Paper

  Ayn Rand (1988). “The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z”, p.234, Penguin

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• 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.

  Ayn Rand

  Cutting, Simple, Men

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• The charming aspect of Christmas is the fact that it expresses good will in a cheerful, happy, benevolent, non-sacrificial way. One says: “Merry Christmas”-not “Weep and Repent.” And the good will is expressed in a material, earthly form-by giving presents to one's friends, or by sending them cards in token of remembrance . . . .

  Ayn Rand

  Happiness, Happy, Friends

  Ayn Rand (1988). “The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z”, p.91, Penguin

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• 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.

  Ayn Rand

  Honesty, Integrity, Fake

  Ayn Rand (1963). “For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (50th Anniversary Edition)”, p.103, Penguin

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