“Contradictions do not exist. Whenever you think that you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong.”
Ayn Rand (verified)
Atlas Shrugged (Primary source)
In Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand explores Objectivism, a philosophy of rational self-interest. The story follows a dystopian United States where successful innovators, led by John Galt, go on strike to protest excessive government regulation and taxation.
“Do not make the mistake of the ignorant who think that an individualist is a man who says: I’ll do as I please at everybody else’s expense. An individualist is a man who recognizes the inalienable individual rights of man—his own and those of others.
— Ayn Rand (verified)“I don’t intend to build in order to have clients. I intend to have clients in order to build.”
— Ayn Rand (verified)“A creative man is motivated by the desire to achieve, not by the desire to beat others.”
— Ayn Rand (verified)“Who will let you? That’s not the point. The point is, who will stop me?”
— Ayn Rand (verified)“The only way to have a friend is to be one.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson (verified)“Don’t think to hunt two hares with one dog.”
— Benjamin Franklin (verified)“You will always find those who think they know what is your duty better than you know it.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson (verified)“So convenient a thing is it to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find or make a reason for everything one has a mind to do.”
— Benjamin Franklin (verified)