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Let us destroy, but don't let us pretend that we are commiting an act of virtue.

Ayn Rand

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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
Pretend
Destroy
Virtue

More quotes by Ayn Rand

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If it were true that men could achieve their good by means of turning some men into sacrificial animals, and ... if I were asked to serve the interests of society apart from, above and against my own I would refuse... I would fight in the full confidence of the justice of my battle and of a living being's right to exist.
Ayn Rand
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I am only concerned with politics so I may see the day when I don't have to be concerned with politics.
Ayn Rand
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The more neurotic and evasive a person is, the shorter the range of his interests.
Ayn Rand
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America's founding Ideal was the principle of individual rights. Nothing more - and nothing less.
Ayn Rand
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Thinking men cannot be ruled ambitious men do not stagnate.
Ayn Rand
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There is no transgression blacker than to do or think alone.
Ayn Rand
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No one's happiness but my own is in my power to achieve or to destroy.
Ayn Rand
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It only stands to reason that where there's sacrifice, there's someone collecting the sacrificial offerings. Where there's service, there is someone being served. The man who speaks to you of sacrifice is speaking of slaves and masters, and intends to be the master.
Ayn Rand
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Value is that which one acts to gain and/or keep. Virtue is the act by which one aims and/or keeps it.
Ayn Rand
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Andrei, did you like the opera? Not particularly. Andrei, do you see what you're missing? I don't think I do, Kira. It's all rather silly. And useless. Can't you enjoy things that are useless, merely because they are beautiful? No. But I enjoyed it. The music? No. The way you listened to it.
Ayn Rand
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Those who say theory and practice are two unrelated realms are fools in one and scoundrels in the other.
Ayn Rand
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God... a being whose only definition is that he is beyond man's power to conceive.
Ayn Rand
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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.
Ayn Rand
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If you know that this life is all that you have, wouldn't you make the most of it?
Ayn Rand
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The action required to sustain human life is primarily intellectual everything man needs has to be discovered by his mind and produced by his effort.
Ayn Rand
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I don’t approve of religion.
Ayn Rand
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This is the age othe common man, they tell us-a title which any man may claim to the extent osuch distinction as he has managed not to achieve.
Ayn Rand
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The mark of an honest man... is that he means what he says and knows what he means.
Ayn Rand
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I am an innovator. This is a term of distinction, a term of honor, rather than something to hide or apologize for. Anyone who has new or valuable ideas to offer stands outside the intellectual status quo. But the status quo is not a stream, let alone a 'mainstream'. It is a stagnant swamp. It is the innovators who carry mankind forward.
Ayn Rand
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By what he chooses to present and by how he presents it, any author expresses his fundamental, metaphysical values.
Ayn Rand