Quote

A desire presupposes the possibility of action to achieve it action presupposes a goal which is worth achieving.

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
Witty
Possibility
Worth
Achieve
Goal
Desire
Inspirational
Presupposes
Action
Achieving

More quotes by Ayn Rand

Image
Faith and force ... are corollaries: every period of history dominated by mysticism, was a period of statism, of dictatorship, of tyranny.
Ayn Rand
Image
The creed of sacrifice is a morality for the immoral.
Ayn Rand
Image
Sacrifice is the surrender of that which you value in favor of which you dont
Ayn Rand
Image
Your emotional capacity is an empty motor, and your values are the fuel with which your mind fills it. If you choose a mix of contradictions, it will clog your motor, corrode your transmission and wreck you on your first attempt to move with a machine which you, the driver, have corrupted.
Ayn Rand
Image
Racism is a doctrine of, by and for brutes.
Ayn Rand
Image
I have no faith at all. I only hold convictions.
Ayn Rand
Image
But what man does out of despair, is not necessarily a key to his character. I have always thought that the real key is in that which he seeks for his enjoyment.
Ayn Rand
Image
Do you know the hallmark of the second-rater? It's resentment of another man's achievement.
Ayn Rand
Image
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
Image
Guilt is a rope that wears thin.
Ayn Rand
Image
Rationalization is a process of not perceiving reality, but of attempting to make reality fit one’s emotions.
Ayn Rand
Image
A 'whim' is a desire experienced by a person who does not know and does not care to discover its cause.
Ayn Rand
Image
Capitalism is a social system based on the recognition of individual rights, including property rights, in which all property is privately owned.
Ayn Rand
Image
Creation comes before distribution - or there will be nothing to distribute. The need of the creator comes before the need of any possible beneficiary. Yet we are taught to admire the second-hander who dispenses gifts he has not produced above the man who made the gifts possible. We praise an act of charity. We shrug at an act of achievement.
Ayn Rand
Image
Collectivism, as an intellectual power and a moral ideal, is dead. But freedom and individualism, and their political expression, capitalism, have not yet been discovered.
Ayn Rand
Image
Man's unique reward, however, is that while animals survive by adjusting themselves to their background, man survives by adjusting his background to himself.
Ayn Rand
Image
...if men are to be ruled, then the enemy is reason.
Ayn Rand
Image
What is morality, she asked. Judgement to distinguish right and wrong, vision to see the truth, and courage to act upon it, dedication to that which is good, integrity to stand by the good at any price.
Ayn Rand
Image
She knew that even pain can be confessed, but to confess happiness is to stand naked, delivered to the witness.
Ayn Rand
Image
The ' pleasure' of being drunk is obviously the pleasure of escaping from the responsibility of Consciousness.
Ayn Rand