
The Ayn Rand Column ‘Introducing Objectivism’
Source: The Anarchist Cookbook (1971), Chapter Three: "Natural, Nonlethal, and Lethal Weapons", p. 93.
The Ayn Rand Column ‘Introducing Objectivism’
The Principles of Success in Literature (1865)
Context: A man must be himself convinced if he is to convince others. The prophet must be his own disciple, or he will make none. Enthusiasm is contagious: belief creates belief. There is no influence issuing from unbelief or from languid acquiescence. This is peculiarly noticeable in Art, because Art depends on sympathy for its influence, and unless the artist has felt the emotions he depicts we remain unmoved: in proportion to the depth of his feeling is our sympathetic response; in proportion to the shallowness or falsehood of his presentation is our coldness or indifference.
Characterizations of Existentialism (1944)
1790s, First Principles of Government (1795)
Context: An avidity to punish is always dangerous to liberty. It leads men to stretch, to misinterpret, and to misapply even the best of laws. He that would make his own liberty secure must guard even his enemy from oppression; for if he violates this duty he establishes a precedent that will reach to himself.
“Every man must do two things alone; he must do his own believing and his own dying..”
“Most powerful is he who has himself in his own power.”
“Civilisation is the distance that man has placed between himself and his own excreta.”
Source: The Dark Light Years