Ayn Rand Quotes - Page 23

• I take no pride in hopeless longing; I wouldn't hold a stillborn aspiration. I'd want to have it, to make it, to live it.

  Ayn Rand

  Pride, Want, Hopeless

  Ayn Rand (2005). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.357, Penguin

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• The most depraved type of human being ... (is) the man without a purpose.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Purpose, Type

  Ayn Rand (2005). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.107, Penguin

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• Look, Gail." Roark got up, reached out, tore a thick branch off a tree, held it in both hands, one fist closed at each end; then, his wrists and knuckles tensed against the resistance, he bent the branch slowly into an arc. "Now I can make what I want of it: a bow, a spear, a cane, a railing. That's the meaning of life." "Your strength?" "Your work." He tossed the branch aside. "The material the earth offers you and what you make of it . . .

  Ayn Rand

  Hands, Tree, Looks

  Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.711, Penguin

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• To interpose the threat of physical destruction between a man and his perception of reality, is to negate and paralyze his means of survival to force him to act against his own judgment, is like forcing him to act against his own sight

  Ayn Rand

  Mean, Reality, Men

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.781, Hamilton Books

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• Show me your achievement, and the knowledge will give me courage for mine.

  Ayn Rand

  Giving, Achievement, Fountainhead

  Ayn Rand (1999). “Ayn Rand Reader”, p.399, Penguin

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• One can study what exists and how consciousness functions; but one cannot analyze (or “prove”) existence as such, or consciousness as such. These are irreducible primaries. (An attempt to “prove” them is self-contradict ory: it is an attempt to “prove” existence by means of nonexistence, and consciousness by means of unconsciousness .)

  Ayn Rand

  Mean, Self, Study

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• I am a man who does not exist for others.

  Ayn Rand

  Men, Doe, Fountainhead

  Ayn Rand (1999). “Ayn Rand Reader”, p.78, Penguin

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• 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.'

  Ayn Rand

  Successful, Men, Law

  Ayn Rand, Nathaniel Branden, Alan Greenspan, Robert Hessen (1986). “Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal”, p.46, Penguin

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• 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.

  Ayn Rand

  Inspirational, Success, Acceptance

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

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• 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.

  Ayn Rand

  Philosophy, Goal, Joy

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.711, Hamilton Books

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• 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.

  Ayn Rand

  Life Changing, Passion, Mean

  Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.571, Penguin

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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

  Money, People, Trying

  "Atlas Shrugged".

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• We are on strike, we, the men of the mind. We are on strike against self-immolation. We are on strike against the creed of unearned rewards and unrewarded duties. We are on strike against the dogma that the pursuit of one's happiness is evil. We are on strike against the doctrine that life is guilt.

  Ayn Rand

  Work, Men, Self

  Ayn Rand (2005). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.954, Penguin

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• I am interested in politics so that one day I will not have to be interested in politics.

  Ayn Rand

  One Day, Liberty, Politics

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• It does not matter that only a few in each generation will grasp and achieve the full reality of man's proper stature-and the rest will betray it. It is those few that move the world and give life its meaning-and it is those few that I have always sought to address. The rest are no concern of mine; it is not me or "The Fountainhead" that they will betray: it is their own souls.

  Ayn Rand

  Life, Courage, Betrayal

  Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.13, Penguin

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• The creed of sacrifice is a morality for the immoral.

  Ayn Rand

  Sacrifice, Morality, Creeds

  Ayn Rand (1999). “Ayn Rand Reader”, p.93, Penguin

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• I can accept anything, except what seems to be the easiest for most people: the half-way, the almost, the just-about, the in-between.

  Ayn Rand

  People, Half, Way

  Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.483, Penguin

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• The more propaganda . . . conservatives spread for capitalist economics while at the same time preaching collectivism morally and philosophically , the more nails they’ll drive into capitalism’s coffin.

  Ayn Rand

  Nails, Coffins, Economics

  Ayn Rand (1997). “Letters of Ayn Rand”, p.281, Penguin

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• There is a fundamental conviction which some people never acquire, some hold only in their youth, and a few hold to the end of their days-the conviction that ideas matter . . . . That ideas matter means that knowledge matters, that truth matters, that one's mind matters . . .

  Ayn Rand

  Mean, Ideas, People

  Ayn Rand (1999). “The Return of the Primitive: The Anti-Industrial Revolution”, p.104, Penguin

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• 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.

  Ayn Rand

  Brother, Men, Fire

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• I love you, Dominique. As selfishly as the fact that I exist. As selfishly as my lungs breathe air. I breathe for my own necessity, for the fuel of my body, for my survival. I've given you, not my sacrifice or my pity, but my ego and my naked need. This is the only way I can want you to love me.

  Ayn Rand

  Love You, Sacrifice, Air

  Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.358, Penguin

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• You know, I think that only if one feels immensely important can one feel truly light.

  Ayn Rand

  Thinking, Light, Important

  Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.1110, Penguin

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• I can't compete and when I do, the rules of engagement change in the middle of the game. I'll let the powers that be vanquish themselves and return in three to five years to sift through the remains.

  Ayn Rand

  Years, Games, Political

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• The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren

  Ayn Rand

  Government, Criminals, Cracks

  Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.334, Hamilton Books

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• When intellectual leaders fail to foster the best in the mixed, unformed, vacillating character of people at large, the thugs are sure to bring out the worst. When the ablest men turn into cowards, the average men turn into brutes.

  Ayn Rand

  Character, Thug, Men

  Ayn Rand (1990). “The Voice of Reason: Essays in Objectivist Thought”, p.46, Penguin

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