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Reality confronts man with a great many musts, but all of them are conditional the formula of realistic necessity is You must, if and the if stands for man's choice

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
Must
Formulas
Great
Realistic
Men
Necessity
Stands
Choice
Choices
Confronts
Reality
Conditional
Many
Formula

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They talked about nothing in particular, sentences that had meaning only in the sound of the voices, in warm gaiety, in the ease of complete relaxation.
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I cannot stand Tolstoy, and reading him was the most boring literary duty I ever had to perform, his philosophy and his sense of life are not merely mistaken, but evil, and yet, from a purely literary viewpoint, on his own terms, I have to evaluate him as a good writer.
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The view that man was ever to be drawn by some vision of the unattainable shining ahead, doomed ever to aspire, but not to achieve, my life and my values could not bring me to that.
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Guilt is a rope that wears thin.
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A rational process is a moral process.
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Let me be the child in the story and declare that the Emperor is naked — or that America is culturally bankrupt.
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You don't have to see through the eyes of others, hold onto yours, stand on your own judgment, you know that what is, is–say it aloud, like the holiest of prayers, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
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Let me give you a tip on a clue to men's characters: the man who damns money has obtained it dishonorably the man who respects it has earned it.
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My greatest personal mistake is ever to allow a word or moment that “doesn’t count,” i.e., that I do not refer to my own basic principles. Every word, every action, every moment counts. (This is the pattern on which everybody makes mistakes [or] becomes irrational — not relating their one action or one conviction to another.
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I could die for you. But I couldn't, and wouldn't, live for you.
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America's founding Ideal was the principle of individual rights. Nothing more - and nothing less.
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A man who seeks escape from the responsibility of supporting his life by his own thought and effort, and wishes to survive by conquering, ruling and exploiting others, is NOT an Individualist.
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She did not know the nature of her loneliness. The only words that named it were: This is not the world I expected.
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Fransisco, you're some kind of very high nobility, aren't you? He answered, Not yet. The reason my family has lasted for such a long time is that none of us has ever been permitted to think he is born a d'Anconia. We are expected to become one.
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If men want to oppose war, it is statism that they must oppose.
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The worst evil that you can do, psychologically, is to laugh at yourself. That means spitting in your own face.
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The ' pleasure' of being drunk is obviously the pleasure of escaping from the responsibility of Consciousness.
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I refuse to apologize for my ability -- I refuse to apologize for my success -- I refuse to apologize for my money. If this is evil, make the most of it.
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In a capitalist society, all human relationships are voluntary.
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You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality.
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