Quote

When a man declares: There are no blacks and whites [in morality] he is making a psychological confession, and what he means is: I am unwilling to be wholly good - and please don't regard me as wholly evil!

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
Regard
Declares
Please
Whites
Evil
Blacks
Making
Unwilling
Means
Confession
Mean
Wholly
Good
Psychological
Men
Morality

More quotes by Ayn Rand

Image
We didn't really have to take everything so seriously, did we?
Ayn Rand
Image
The quickest way to kill the human spirit is to ask someone to do mediocre work.
Ayn Rand
Image
If a life can have a 'theme-song' - and I believe every worthwhile one has - mine is [best] expressed in one word: Individualism.
Ayn Rand
Image
Collectivism requires self-sacrifice, the subordination of one's interests to those of others.
Ayn Rand
Image
Namely, if I am challenging the base of all these institutions, I'm challenging the moral code of altruism. The precept that man's moral duty is to live for others. That man must sacrifice himself to others. Which is the present day morality.
Ayn Rand
Image
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
Image
Serenity comes from the ability to say “Yes” to existence. Courage comes from the ability to say “No” to the wrong choices made by others.
Ayn Rand
Image
It is the basic, metaphysical fact of man's nature -- the connection between his survival and his use of reason -- that capitalism recognizes and protects.
Ayn Rand
Image
If a man wants love he should correct his weaknesses, or his flaws, and he may deserve it. But he cannot expect the unearned, either in love or in money either in matter or in spirit.
Ayn Rand
Image
Within the extent of your knowledge, you are right.
Ayn Rand
Image
Individualism regards man-every man-as an independent, sovereign entity who possesses an inalienable right to his own life, a right derived from his nature as a rational being.
Ayn Rand
Image
...if men are to be ruled, then the enemy is reason.
Ayn Rand
Image
Each man must live as an end in himself and follow his own rational self-interest.
Ayn Rand
Image
Just as man can't exist without his body, so no rights can exist without the right to translate one's rights into reality, to think, to work and keep the results, which means: the right of property.
Ayn Rand
Image
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.
Ayn Rand
Image
Psychologically, the choice to think or not is the choice to focus or not. Existentially, the choice to focus or not is the choice to be conscious or not. Metaphysically, the choice to be conscious or not is the choice of life or death.
Ayn Rand
Image
you are never called upon to prove a negative. that's a law of logic.
Ayn Rand
Image
Your soul has a single basic function-the act of valuing.
Ayn Rand
Image
Indiscriminate tolerance and indiscriminate condemnation are not two opposites: they are two variants of the same evasion.
Ayn Rand
Image
Aquinas brought an Aristotelian view of reason back into European culture, and lighted the way toward the Renaissance.
Ayn Rand