Daniel > Daniel's Quotes

“Freedom (n.): To ask nothing. To expect nothing. To depend on nothing.”
― Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead

“[Dean] “My dear fellow, who will let you?”

[Roark] “That’s not the point. The point is, who will stop me?”
― Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead

“Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark in the hopeless swamps of the not-quite, the not-yet, and the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish in lonely frustration for the life you deserved and have never been able to reach. The world you desire can be won. It exists.. it is real.. it is possible.. it's yours.”
― Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

“I could die for you. But I couldn't, and wouldn't, live for you.”
― Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead

“To say "I love you" one must know first how to say the "I".”
― Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead

“The hardest thing to explain is the glaringly evident which everybody has decided not to see.”
― Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead

“Man—every man—is an end in himself, not a means to the ends of others; he must live for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself; he must work for his rational self-interest, with the achievement of his own happiness as the highest moral purpose of his life.”
― Ayn Rand

“Evil requires the sanction of the victim. ”
― Ayn Rand

“Love is blind, they say; sex is impervious to reason and mocks the power of all philosophers. But, in fact, a person's sexual choice is the result and sum of their fundamental convictions. Tell me what a person finds sexually attractive and I will tell you their entire philosophy of life. Show me the person they sleep with and I will tell you their valuation of themselves. No matter what corruption they're taught about the virtue of selflessness, sex is the most profoundly selfish of all acts, an act which they cannot perform for any motive but their own enjoyment - just try to think of performing it in a spirit of selfless charity! - an act which is not possible in self-abasement, only in self-exultation, only on the confidence of being desired and being worthy of desire. It is an act that forces them to stand naked in spirit, as well as in body, and accept their real ego as their standard of value. They will always be attracted to the person who reflects their deepest vision of themselves, the person whose surrender permits them to experience - or to fake - a sense of self-esteem .. Love is our response to our highest values - and can be nothing else.”
― Ayn Rand

“Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”
― Dylan Thomas, In Country Sleep, and Other Poems

“Those who are determined to be ‘offended’ will discover a provocation somewhere. We cannot possibly adjust enough to please the fanatics, and it is degrading to make the attempt.”
― Christopher Hitchens

“I want to be thoroughly used up when I die, for the harder I work, the more I live. I rejoice in life for its own sake. Life is no ‘brief candle’ to me. It is sort of a splendid torch which I have a hold of for the moment, and I want to make it burn as brightly as possible before handing it over to future generations.”
― George Bernard Shaw

“We’ve arranged a society on science and technology in which
nobody understands anything about science and technology, and
this combustible mixture of ignorance and power sooner or later is
going to blow up in our faces. I mean, who is running the science and
technology in a democracy if the people don’t know anything about
it? Science is more than a body of knowledge, it’s a way of thinking. If
we are not able to ask skeptical questions to interrogate those who tell
us something is true, to be skeptical of those in authority, then we’re
up for grabs for the next charlatan political or religious leader who
comes ambling along. It’s a thing that Jefferson lay great stress on.
It wasn’t enough, he said, to enshrine some rights in the Constitution
and the Bill of Rights, the people had to be educated and they have to
practice their skepticism and their education. Otherwise, we don’t run
the government, the government runs us.
—Carl Sagan”
― Carl Sagan

“There was a footpath leading across fields to New Southgate, and I used to go there alone to watch the sunset and contemplate suicide. I did not, however, commit suicide, because I wished to know more of mathematics.”
― Betrand Russell

“Toohey: "Mr. Roark, we're alone here. Why don't you tell me what you think of me? In any words you wish. No one will hear us."
Roark: "But I don't think of you.”
― Ayn Rand, The Fountainhead

“O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count myself a king of infinite space – were it not that I have bad dreams.

Hamlet, Act 2, Scene 2.”
― William Shakespeare, Hamlet

“Ah, Sir, a novel is a mirror carried along a high road. At one moment it reflects to your vision the azure skies, at another the mire of the puddles at your feet. And the man who carries this mirror in his pack will be accused by you of being immoral! His mirror shews the mire, and you blame the mirror! Rather blame that high road upon which the puddle lies, still more the inspector of roads who allows the water to gather and the puddle to form.”
― Stendhal, The Red and the Black

“Every miserable fool who has nothing at all of which he can be proud, adopts as a last resource pride in the nation to which he belongs; he is ready and happy to defend all its faults and follies tooth and nail, thus reimbursing himself for his own inferiority.”
― Arthur Schopenhauer, Essays and Aphorisms

“If you hold a gun and I hold a gun, we can talk about the law.
If you hold a knife and I hold a knife, we can talk about rules.
If you come empty handed and I come empty handed, we can talk about reason.
But if you have a gun and I only have a knife, then the truth lies in your hands.
If you have a gun and I have nothing, what you hold isn't just a weapon, it's my life.
The concepts of laws, rules and morality only hold meaning when they are based on equality.
The harsh truth of this world is that when money speaks, truth goes silent. And when power speaks, even money takes three steps back.
Those who create the rules are often the first to break them. Rules are chains for the weak, tools for the strong.
In this world, anything good must be fought for.
The masters of the game are fiercely competing for resources while only the weak sit idly, waiting to be given a share.”
― The Godfather II movie 1974