Ayn Rand Quotes About Independence

• Independence is the recognition of the fact that yours is the responsibility of judgment and nothing can help you escape it-that no substitute can do your thinking, as no pinch-hitter can live your life-that the vilest form of self-abasement and self-destruction is the subordination of your mind to the mind of another, the acceptance of an authority over your brain, the acceptance of his assertions as facts, his say-so as truth, his edicts as middle-man between your consciousness and your existence.

  Ayn Rand

  Responsibility, Acceptance, Men

  Ayn Rand (1988). “The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z”, p.225, Penguin

• Freedom (n.): To ask nothing. To expect nothing. To depend on nothing.

  Ayn Rand

  Inspirational, Freedom, Independent Women

• The basic need of the creator is independence. The reasoning mind cannot work under any form of compulsion. It cannot be curbed, sacrificed or subordinated to any consideration whatsoever. It demands total independence in function and in motive.

  Ayn Rand

  Independence, Mind, Needs

  Ayn Rand (1963). “For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (50th Anniversary Edition)”, p.63, Penguin

• Degrees of ability vary, but the basic principle remains the same: the degree of a man's independence, initiative and personal love for his work determines his talent as a worker and his worth as a man. Independence is the only gauge of human virtue and value. What a man is and makes of himself; not what he has or hasn't done for others. There is no substitute for personal dignity. There is no standard of personal dignity except independence.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Independence, Principles

  Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.877, Penguin

• Independence is the recognition of the fact that yours is the responsibility of judgement and nothing can help you escape it - that no substitute can do your thinking, as no pinch-hitter can live your life.

  Ayn Rand

  Responsibility, Thinking, Live Your Life

  Ayn Rand (1957). “Atlas Shrugged”

• 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.

  Ayn Rand

  Honesty, Integrity, Self Esteem

• The first right on earth is the right of the ego. Man's first duty is to himself. His moral law is never to place his prime goal within the persons of others. His moral obligation is to do what he wishes, provided his wish does not depend primarily upon other men.

  Ayn Rand

  Independent, Men, Rights

  Ayn Rand (1999). “Ayn Rand Reader”, p.76, Penguin

• Independence is the only gauge of human virtue and value. What a man is and makes of himself; not what he has or hasn’t done for others. There is no substitute for personal dignity.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Independence, Gauges

  Ayn Rand (1999). “Ayn Rand Reader”, p.75, Penguin

• But Aristotle's philosophy was the intellect's Declaration of Independence.

  Ayn Rand

  Philosophy, Intellectual, Independence

  Ayn Rand (1963). “For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (50th Anniversary Edition)”, p.18, Penguin

• The genius must have his freedom and his independence.

  Ayn Rand

  Independence, Genius

  Ayn Rand, Leonard Peikoff (1999). “The Journals of Ayn Rand”, p.461, Penguin

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