Quotes from Ayn Rand

The man who damns money has obtained it dishonorably; the man who respects it has earned it.

We can ignore reality, but we cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring reality.

Civilization is the process of setting man free from men.

Worry is a waste of emotional reserve.

For the first time since her return, she felt pain, a violent pain, but it made her feel alive, because it was worth feeling.

The worst guilt is to accept an unearned guilt.

He, too, stood looking at her for a moment--and it seemed to her that it was not a look of greeting after an absence, but the look of someone who had thought of her every day of that year. She could not be certain, it was only an instant, so brief that just as she caught it, he was turning...

A rational man never distorts or corrupts his own standards and judgment in order to appeal to the irrationality, stupidity, or dishonesty of others.

I am neither foe nor friend to my brothers, but such as each of them shall deserve of me. And to earn my love, my brothers must do more than to have been born. I do not grant my love without reason, nor to any chance passer-by who may wish to claim it. I honor men with my love. But honor is a thing to be earned.

If the rest of them can survive only by destroying us, then why should we wish them to survive? . . . Nothing can make it moral to destroy the best. One can't be punished for being good. One can't be penalized for ability.

There are no contradictions. If you find one, check your premises.

John Galt is Prometheus who changed his mind. After centuries of being torn by vultures in payment for having brought to men the fire of the gods, he broke his chains—and he withdrew his fire—until the day when men withdraw their vultures.