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It is not advisable to venture unsolicited opinions. You should spare yourself the embarrassing discovery of their exact value to your listener.

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
Embarrassing
Venture
Exact
Unsolicited
Opinions
Advisable
Discovery
Listener
Value
Spare
Opinion
Spares
Values
Listeners

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An idea is a light turned on in a man's soul. Comic-strip artists are in the habit of representing it by means of a light bulb flashing on, above the head of a character who has suddenly grasped an idea. In simple, primitive terms, this is an appropriate symbol.
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There is no such dichotomy as 'human rights' versus 'property rights.' No human rights can exist without property rights.
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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.
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An honest man is one who knows that he can't consume more than he has produced.
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Don't help me or serve me, but let me see it once, because I need it. Don't work for my happiness, my brothers — show me yours — show me that it is possible — show me your achievement — and the knowledge will give me courage for mine.
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whose steps were a restless substitute for flight.
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Gold was an objective value, an equivalent of wealth produced. Paper is a mortgage on wealth that does not exist, backed by a gun aimed at those who are expected to produce it.
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The meaning ascribed in popular usage to the word 'selfishness' is not merely wrong: it represents a devastating intellectual 'package-deal,' which is responsible, more than any other single factor, for the arrested moral development of mankind.
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It stands to reason that if sacrifices are being given, somebody is collecting sacrifices.
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A reader has to be concerned only with the end result unless he chooses to analyze it, he does not have to know by what means that result was achieved-but it is my job to know.
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No man can use his brain to think for another.
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Statism needs war a free country does not. Statism survives by looting a free country survives by producing.
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Men prosper or fail, survive or perish in proportion to the degree of their rationality.
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We are fast approaching the stage of the ultimate inversion: the stage where the government is free to do anything it pleases, while the citizens may act only by permission which is the stage of the darkest periods of human history, the stage of rule by brute force.
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One loses everything when one loses one's sense of humor.
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Allies never trust each other, but that doesn't spoil their effectiveness.
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The more you learn, the more you know that you know nothing.
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When I listen to a symphony I love, I don't get from it what the composer got. His 'Yes' was different from mine. He could have no concern for mine and no exact conception of it. That answer is too personal to each man. But in giving himself what he wanted, he gave me a great experience.
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Self-esteem is reliance on ones power to think.
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The charming aspect of Christmas is the fact that it expresses good will in a cheerful, happy, benevolent, non-sacrificial way. One says: “Merry Christmas”-not “Weep and Repent.” And the good will is expressed in a material, earthly form-by giving presents to one's friends, or by sending them cards in token of remembrance . . . .
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