Quote

Civilization is the progress toward a society of privacy. The savage's whole existence is public, ruled by the laws of his tribe. Civilization is the process of setting man free from men.

Ayn Rand

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Ayn Rand
Age: 77 †
Born: 1905
Born: February 2
Died: 1982
Died: March 6
Essayist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Philosopher
Playwright
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
St. Petersburg
Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum
Men
Public
Privacy
Fountainhead
Existence
Setting
Tribe
Law
Laws
Ruled
Society
Toward
Savage
Free
Civilization
Tribes
Process
Progress
Savages
Inspirational
Liberty
Fierce
Whole
Economic
Settings

More quotes by Ayn Rand

Image
A quest for self-respect is proof of its lack
Ayn Rand
Image
A story is an end in itself. It is not written to teach, sell, explain or destroy anything. It is not written even to entertain. It is written as a man is born - an organic whole, dictated only by its own laws and its own necessity - an end in itself, not a means to an end.
Ayn Rand
Image
Love is the expression of one's values, the greatest reward you can earn for the moral qualities you have achieved in your character and person, the emotional price paid by one man for the joy he receives from the virtues of another.
Ayn Rand
Image
A good quotation must be a complete entity. It must be like a headline - sharp, clear, whole.
Ayn Rand
Image
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
Image
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
Image
In a free society, one does not have to deal with those who are irrational. One is free to avoid them.
Ayn Rand
Image
you are never called upon to prove a negative. that's a law of logic.
Ayn Rand
Image
but their eyes were as cold blue glass buttons.
Ayn Rand
Image
If you tell an ugly woman that she is beautiful, you offer her the great homage of corrupting the concept of beauty.
Ayn Rand
Image
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
Image
If you agree with some tenets of Objectivism, but disagree with others, do not call yourself an Objectivist give proper authorship credit for the parts you agree with
Ayn Rand
Image
This god, this one word: I.
Ayn Rand
Image
There is a level of cowardice lower than that of the conformist: the fashionable non-conformist.
Ayn Rand
Image
To deal with men by force is as impractical as to deal with nature by persuasion.
Ayn Rand
Image
Do not ever say that the desire to 'do good' by force is a good motive. Neither power-lust nor stupidity are good motives.
Ayn Rand
Image
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
Image
If you want to feel good, be rational.
Ayn Rand
Image
Happiness is not to be achieved at the command of emotional whims.
Ayn Rand
Image
Happiness is a state of non-contradictory joy . . . Happiness is possible only to a rational man, the man who desires nothing but rational goals, seeks nothing but rational values, and finds his joy in nothing but rational actions.
Ayn Rand