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Ayn Rand Quotes - Page 41

All Quotes Acceptance Achievement Acting Addiction Age Ambition Architecture Art Atheism Atheist Authority Being Happy Bill Of Rights Business Challenges Change Character Charity Children Choices Church Competition Compromise Conflict Consciousness Corruption Country Courage Creation Crime Culture Death Dedication Desire Dignity Duty Earth Economics Economy Effort Ego Egoism Emptiness Energy Eternity Ethics Evil Failing Fate Fear Feelings Fighting Free Market Freedom Frustration Funny Future Genius Giving Giving Up Gold Greatness Greed Guilt Hallmark Happiness Hate Hatred Heart History Home Honesty Honor House Humanity Hurt Identity Independence Individualism Individuality Insanity Inspiration Inspirational Inspiring Integrity Joy Judgement Judgment Justice Justification Kindness Knowledge Leadership Leaving Liberty Life Literature Live Life Logic Loneliness Love Lust Lying Mankind Mediocrity Money Morality Morning Motivation Motivational Obedience Objectivism Pain Passion Past Peace Perception Persuasion Philosophy Politics Power Pride Progress Property Property Rights Purpose Racism Reading Reality Recognition Recovery Religion Responsibility Running Sacrifice School Self Confidence Self Esteem Self Respect Selfishness Shame Sin Sleep Socialism Society Soul Struggle Stupidity Style Success Suffering Surrender Survival Talent Time Today Tolerance Trust Truth Tyranny Understanding Values Virtue Vision Waiting War Weakness Wealth Winning Wisdom Work Worship Writing

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

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.

Support, Political, Minorities

Ayn Rand (1988). “The Ayn Rand Lexicon: Objectivism from A to Z”, p.190, Penguin

My dear fellow, who will let you?" "That's not the point. The point is, who will stop me?

Life, Fountainhead, Howard Roark

Ayn Rand (1999). “Ayn Rand Reader”, p.20, Penguin

She felt a board indifference toward the immediate world around her toward other children and adults alike. She took it as a regrettable accident to be borne patiently for a while, that she happened to be imprisoned among people who were dull. She had caught a glimpse of another world and she knew it existed somewhere, the world that had created trains, bridges, telegraph wires and signal lights winking in the night. She had to wait she thought, and grow up to that world. - Dagny Taggart

Children, Growing Up, Night

She watched the prairies the rivers, the towns slipping past at an untouchable distance below - and she noted that the sense of detachment one feels when looking at the earth from a plane was the same sense she felt when looking at people: only her distance from people seemed longer. - Dagny Taggart

Distance, Past, Rivers

Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.1972, Penguin

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.

Cities, Pieces, Arms

Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.232, Penguin

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.

Men, Attention, Dignity

Ayn Rand (1999). “Ayn Rand Reader”, p.98, Penguin

You still love me - even if there's one expression of it that you will always feel and want, but will not give me no longer. I'm still what I was, and you'll always see it, and you'll always grant me the same response, even if there's a greater one that you grant another man. No matter what you feel for him, it will not change what you feel for me, and it won't treason to either, because it comes from the same root, it's the same payment in answer to the same values.

Men, Expression, Roots

He walked, groping for a sentence that hung in his mind as an empty shape. He could neither fill it or dismiss it.

Mind, Shapes, Empty

Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.3, Hamilton Books

I write - and read - for the sake of the story... My basic test for any story is: 'Would I want to meet these characters and observe these events in real life? Is this story an experience worth living through for its own sake? Is the pleasure of contemplating these characters an end itself?

Real, Writing, Character

Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.10, Penguin

He liked to observe emotions; they were like red lanterns strung along the dark unknown of another's personality, marking vulnerable points.

Dark, Personality, Red

Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.15, Hamilton Books

Dagny, we can never lose the things we live for. We may have to change their form at times, if we've made an error, but the purpose remains the same and the forms are ours to make.

Errors, Purpose, May

Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.472, Hamilton Books

Man's mind is his basic tool of survival. Life is given to him, survival is not. His body is given to him, its sustenance is not. His mind is given to him, its content is not. To remain alive, he must act, and before he can act he must know the nature and purpose of his action. He cannot obtain his food without a knowledge of food and of the way to obtain it. He cannot dig a ditch-or build a cyclotron-without a knowledge of his aim and of the means to achieve it. To remain alive, he must think

Mean, Men, Thinking

Ayn Rand (1963). “For the New Intellectual: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (50th Anniversary Edition)”, p.96, Penguin

Because I never have any definite destination. This ship is not for going to places, but for getting away from them. When I stop at a port, it's only for the sheer pleasure of leaving it. I always think: here's one more place that can't hold me.

Thinking, Leaving, Ships

Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.421, Penguin

There's something I want you to know,' said Cherryl, her voice taut and harsh, 'so that there won't be any pretending about it. I'm not going to put on the sweet relative act. I know what you've done to Jim and how you've made him miserable all his life. I'm going to protect him against you. I'll put you in your place. I'm Mrs. Taggart. I'm the woman in this family now.' 'That's quite all right,' said Dagny. 'I'm the man.

Sweet, Men, Voice

Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.303, Hamilton Books

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.

Running, Kindness, Eye

Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.781, Penguin

The age of the skyscraper is gone. This is the age of the housing project. Which is always a prelude to the age of the cave.

Age, Gone, Caves

Ayn Rand (2005). “The Fountainhead”, p.735, Penguin

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?

Life, Philosophy, Work

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

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.

Pain, Moving, Sadness

Ayn Rand (2005). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.17, Penguin

Through the dry phases of calculations in her mind, she noticed that she did have time to feel something: it was the hard, exhilarating pleasure of action.

Mind, Phases, Dry

Ayn Rand (1957). “ATLAS SHRUGGED”

Theirs is the banner in my hand. And I wish I had the power to tell them that the despair of their hearts was not to be final, and their night was not without hope. For the battle they lost can never be lost. For that which they died to save can never perish. 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. And man will go on. Man, not men. ~Equality 7-2521 (as Prometheus), pgs 103-104

Sleep, Heart, Men

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

Do you mean to tell me that you're thinking seriously of building that way, when and if you are an architect?" Yes." My dear fellow, who will let you?" That's not the point. The point is, who will stop me?

Mean, Thinking, Way

Ayn Rand (1999). “Ayn Rand Reader”, p.20, Penguin

He stepped to the window and pointed to the skyscrapers of the city. He said that we had to extinguish the lights of the world, and when we would see the lights of New York go out, we would know that our job was done.

Jobs, New York, Light

Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.886, Hamilton Books

This is pity,” he thought, and then he lifted his head in wonder. He thought that there must be something terribly wrong with a world in which this monstrous feeling is called a virtue.

Feelings, World, Wonder

Ayn Rand (2011). “Ayn Rand Novel Collection”, p.751, Penguin

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

Running, Real, Vision

Ayn Rand (2005). “The Early Ayn Rand: Revised Edition: A Selection From Her Unpublished Fiction”, p.281, Penguin

Have you ever felt the longing for someone you could admire? For something, not to look down at, but up to?

Inspirational, Looks, Admiration

Ayn Rand (2016). “Atlas Shrugged”, p.274, Hamilton Books

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