Extended excerpt [Letter to Leonard Read, founder of the Foundation for Economic Education. Rand was returning a copy of a document entitled “Free Men Say!” that Read had given her, along with her editing & feedback notes on the material.]:

“The second test is: does the quotation present a complete thought, by itself, out of context – and is that thought of value? If not – the quotation is useless. You have a great many quotes that are obviously parts of a general discussion, but of no particular strength by themselves. A good quotation must be a complete entity. It must be like a headline – sharp, clear, whole.” (p. 170) 

Source link: Editor’s copy – Letters of Ayn Rand (June 1995) International Standard Book Number (ISBN) 0-525-93946-6

Extended excerpt [Fiction, character ‘John Galt’ delivering a radio address – italics original to Rand’s text]:

“Accept the fact that the achievement of your happiness is the only moral purpose of your life, and that happiness – not pain or mindless self-indulgence – is the proof of your moral integrity, since it is the proof and the result of your loyalty to the achievement of your values. Happiness was the responsibility you dreaded, it required the kind of rational discipline you did not value yourself enough to assume – and the anxious staleness of your days is the monument to your evasion of the knowledge that there is no moral substitute for happiness, that there is no more despicable coward than the man who deserted the battle for his joy, fearing to assert his right to existence, lacking the courage and the loyalty to life of a bird or a flower reaching for the sun. Discard the protective rags of that vice which you call a virtue: humility – learn to value yourself, which means: to fight for your happiness – and when you learn that pride is the sum of all virtues, you will learn to live like a man.” (p. 179)

Source: Library – For the New Intellectual (1961) Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) 1433824

Extended excerpt [Essay. Rand was responding to Pope Paul VI’s Populorum Progressio (On the Development of the Peoples) encyclical, which was released on 26 March 1967. Rand was not a fan – she begins by describing the Pope’s message as “the manifesto of an impassioned hatred for capitalism.” (p. 297)]:

“This look is not confined to children. Comic-strip artists are in the habit of representing it by means of a light-bulb flashing on, above the head of a character who has suddenly grasped an idea. In simple, primitive terms, this is an appropriate symbol: an idea is a light turned on in a man’s soul.” (p. 304)

Source note: Rand’s “Requiem for Man” was originally published in three parts in the July, August & September 1967 issues of The Objectivist pamphlet.

Please see our “Source Link” tab for links to Pope Paul VI’s encyclical and Rand’s text.

Source link [Featured source]: Library – Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal (Nov. 1967) online via Online Library & Internet Archive [free subscription service]: https://archive.org/stream/capitalismunknow00rand#page/304/mode/2up

Source link [Pope Paul VI – Encyclical]: Populorum Progressio (26 March 1967) online via The Vatican: http://w2.vatican.va/content/paul-vi/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-vi_enc_26031967_populorum.html

Misquote notes: A few sources have paraphrased Rand and substituted “Man is” or “People are” without indicating that the the sentence was altered from Rand’s original:

Original text: “He is free to evade reality, he is free to unfocus his mind and stumble blindly down any road he pleases, but not free to avoid the abyss he refuses to see.”

Misquotes/paraphrasing:

“Man is free to evade reality, he is free to unfocus his mind and stumble blindly down any road he pleases, but not free to avoid the abyss he refuses to see.”

“People are free to evade reality, he is free to unfocus his mind and stumble blindly down any road he pleases, but not free to avoid the abyss he refuses to see.”

Extended excerpt [Paper originally delivered by Rand to a University of Wisconsin symposium.]:

“A being who does not know automatically what is true or false, cannot know automatically what is right or wrong what is good for him or evil. Yet he needs that knowledge in order to live. He is not exempt from the laws of reality, he is a specific organism of a specific nature that requires specific actions to sustain his life. He cannot achieve his survival by arbitrary means nor by random motions nor by blind urges nor by chance nor by whim. That which survival requires is set by his nature and is not open to his choice. What is open to his choice is only whether he will discover it or not, whether he will chose the right goals and values or not. He is free to make the wrong choice, but not free to succeed with it. He is free to evade reality, he is free to unfocus his mind and stumble blindly down any road he pleases, but not free to avoid the abyss he refuses to see.” (pp. 18-19)

Source: Library – The Virtue of Selfishness (1964) Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) No. 1050717945

Extended excerpt [Letter to U.S. Congressman Bruce Alger, in response to public remarks he made regarding religion, atheism, and her writing. Rand tells Alger that “the most bewildering statement in your study is on page 14, namely: ‘ATHEISM, AGNOSTICISM, THEREFORE, IS ILLEGAL,’ and goes on to clarify her positions in more detail. Italics are original to the text.]:

“In accordance with the principles of America and of capitalism, I recognize your right to hold any beliefs you choose – and, on the same grounds, you have to recognize my right to hold any convictions I choose. I am an intransigent atheist though not a militant one. This means that I am not fighting against religion – I am fighting for reason. When faith and reason clash, it is up to the religious people to decide how they choose to reconcile the conflict. As far as I am concerned, I have no terms of communication and no means to deal with people, except through reason.” (p. 606)

Source note: The Letters of Ayn Rand editors note: “Congressman Alger answered that he meant that atheism and agnosticism were ‘contrary to the spirit of the law, if not the letter.’” (p. 606)

Source: Editor’s copy – Letters of Ayn Rand (June 1995) International Standard Book Number (ISBN) 0-525-93946-6

Misattribution notes: Some sources have incorrectly attributed this Rand quote to a 1959 interview with journalist Dan Rather. While Rather and “The Mike Wallace Interview” host Mike Wallace were colleagues, the Rand interview was with Wallace only.

Extended excerpt [Televised interview. Excerpted remarks begin at 10:11 in the cited video source. Transcript by Repeat Right – punctuation and minor text changes from cited transcript source.]:

Ayn Rand: […] “It is precisely these trends which are bringing the world to disaster, because we are now moving towards complete collectivism, or socialism. A system under which everybody is enslaved to everybody – and we are moving that way only because of our altruist morality.

Mike Wallace: Ah, yes, but you say everybody is enslaved to everybody, yet this came about democratically, Ayn. Free people, in a free country, voted for this kind of government, wanted this kind of legislation. Do you object to the democratic process?

Rand: I object to the idea that people have the right to vote on everything. The traditional American system was a system based on the idea that [the] majority will prevailed only in public or political affairs. And that it was limited by inalienable individual rights – therefore I do not believe that the majority can vote a man’s life, or property, or freedom away from him. And therefore I do not believe that if a majority votes on any issue, that this makes the issue right, it doesn’t.”

Source link [Featured source – video]: “The Outspoken Ayn Rand Interviewed by Mike Wallace” (25 February 1959) video online via Open Culture: http://www.openculture.com/2013/06/the_outspoken_ayn_rand_interviewed_by_mike_wallace.html

Source link [Featured source – transcript]: Mike Wallace Interviews Ayn Rand (1959): A Transcript (1959) online via Internet Archive: https://archive.org/stream/MikeWallaceInterviewsAynRand/Mike%20Wallace%20interviews%20Ayn%20Ran_djvu.txt

Extended excerpt [Fictional dialogue – Character ‘Gail’]:

“I would give the greatest sunset in the world for one sight of New York’s skyline. Particularly when one can’t see the details. Just the shapes. The shapes and the thought that made them. The sky over New York and the will of man made visible. What other religion do we need? And then people tell me about pilgrimages to some dank pest-hole in a jungle where they go to do homage to a crumbling temple, to a leering stone monster with a pot belly, created by some leprous savage.  Is it beauty and genius they want to see? Do they seek a sense of the sublime? Let them come to New York, stand on the shore of the Hudson, look and kneel. When I see the city from my window – no, I don’t feel how small I am – but I feel that if a war came to threaten this, I would like to throw myself into space, over the city, and protect these buildings with my body.” (p. 478)

Source: Editor’s copy – The Fountainhead (1943 Blakiston Co.) Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) No. 878563057

Extended excerpt [Fictional dialogue. Chapter XIV – Character ‘Ellsworth Toohey’ to ‘Peter Keating’]: “Don’t set out to raze all shrines – you’ll frighten men. Enshrine mediocrity – and the shrines are razed. Then there’s another way. Kill by laughter. Laughter is an instrument of human joy. Learn to use it as a weapon of destruction. Turn it into a sneer. It’s simple. Tell them to laugh at everything. Tell them that a sense of humor is an unlimited virtue. Don’t let anything remain sacred in a man’s soul – and his soul won’t be sacred to him. Kill reverence and you’re killed the hero in man. One doesn’t reverence with a giggle.” (p. 691)

Source: Editor’s copy – The Fountainhead (1943) Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) No. 878563057

Extended excerpt [Fictional dialogue]:

“But money is only a tool. It will take you wherever you wish, but it will not replace you as the driver. It will give you the means for the satisfaction of your desires, but it will not provide you with desires. Money is the scourge of the men who attempt to reverse the law of causality – the men who seek to replace the mind by seizing the products of the mind.” (p. 411)

Source: Editor’s Copy – Atlas Shrugged (1957|Random House 11th printing) Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) No. 740513270

Extended excerpt [Fictional novella – Part Eleven]:

“I know not if this earth on which I stand is the core of the universe or if it is but a speck of dust lost in eternity. I know not and I care not. For I know what happiness is possible to me on earth. And my happiness needs no higher aim to vindicate it. My happiness is not the means to any end. It is the end. It is its own goal. It is its own purpose.

   Neither am I the means to any end others may wish to accomplish. I am not a tool for their use. I am not a servant of their needs. I am not a bandage for their wounds. I am not a sacrifice on their alters.” (pp. 109-110)

Source: Library – Anthem (1946|1990 Penguin/Signet) International Standard Book Number (ISBN) 0451159934

Extended excerpt [Column in Rand’s newsletter]: “”If those vibrations fail, if such debaters are challenged, one finds that they have no arguments, no evidence, no proof, no reasons, no ground to stand on – that their noisy aggressiveness serves to hide a vacuum – that the Argument from Intimidation is a confession of intellectual impotence.” (p. 25, column 1)

Source: Editor’s copy – The Objectivist Newsletter: Volumes 1-4, 1962-1965 (1990) International Standard Book Number (ISBN) 1-56114-149-6

Extended excerpt [Rand journal entry. Quote appears under subheading “Note in regard to Christian morality”]:

“The Christian morality includes the most vicious evil as the most essential part of the happiness it advocates: self-sacrifice. This leads to all the vicious paradoxes of “be happy because you’re not happy,” “find happiness in suffering, etc.” (pp. 599-600)

Source notes: Rand’s estate heir and close Objectivist associate Leonard Peikoff provided the foreword to the Journals of Ayn Rand, and her journal entries were edited by Objectivist scholar David Harriman.

Rand was a staunch atheist, and she expressed harsh criticism for faith, religion, and religious believers throughout her journals. From another entry date April 9, 1934 (italics original to cited source):

“Religion is also the first enemy of the ability to think. That ability is not used by men to one tenth of its possibility, yet before they learn to think they are discouraged by being ordered to take things on faith. Faith is the worst curse of mankind; it is the exact antithesis and enemy of thought. I want to learn why men do not use logical reasoning to govern their lives and [solve] their problems. It is impossible to them or has it been taught to them as impossible.

   I believe this last. And the teacher is the church. Thought and reason are the only weapons of mankind, the only possible bond of understanding among men. Anyone who demands that anything be taken on faith – or relies on any super-mental, super-logical instinct – denies all reason.” (Journals, p. 68)

Source: Library – The Journals of Ayn Rand (1997) International Standard Book Number (ISBN) 0-525-94370-6

Extended excerpt [Rand journal entry. From collection Part I: ‘Early Projects – First Philosophic Journal.’ Brackets and parentheses as they appear in cited source.]: “The fault of liberal democracies: giving full rights to quantity (majorities), they forget the rights of quality, which are much higher rights. Prove that differences of quality not only do exist inexorably, but also should exist. The next step – democracy of superiors only. This is not possible without a set of values from which this honor is to be derived. The new set of values: [my] supreme egoism.” (p. 74)

Source note: Rand’s estate heir and close Objectivist associate Leonard Peikoff provided the foreword to the Journals of Ayn Rand, and her journal entries were edited by Objectivist scholar David Harriman.

Source: Library – The Journals of Ayn Rand (1997) International Standard Book Number (ISBN) 0-525-94370-6

Extended excerpt [Fictional dialogue – ‘Gail’ to ‘Dominique.’ Ellipsis as it appears in cited text.]:

“Control of the world, my dear, belongs to men like me. The Tooheys of this earth wouldn’t know how to dream about it.”

“I’ll try to explain. It’s very difficult. The hardest thing to explain is the glaringly evident which everybody has decided not to see. But if you’ll listen…” (p. 537)

Source: Editor’s copy – The Fountainhead (1943) Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) No. 878563057

Extended excerpt [Fielding an audience question during a public forum Q&A]:

Question – Have you heard of Libertarian presidential candidate Robert MacBride? What do you think of him?

Ayn Rand – “My answer should be “I don’t think of him.” There’s nothing to hear. The trouble in the world today is philosophical: only the right philosophy can save us. But this party plagiarizes some of my ideas, mixes them with the exact opposite – with religionists, anarchists and every intellectual misfit and scum they can find – and call themselves libertarians and run for office. I dislike Reagan and Carter, I’m not too enthusiastic about the other candidates. But the worst of them are giants compared to anybody who would attempt something as un-philosophical, low, and pragmatic as the Libertarian Party. It is the last insult to ideas and philosophical consistency.”

Source: Editor’s copy – Ayn Rand Answers: The Best of Her Q & A (2005) International Standard Book Number (ISBN) 0451216652

Extended excerpt [Essay]:

“In the absence of intellectual opposition, the rebels’ notions will gradually come to be absorbed into the culture. The uncontested absurdities of today are the accepted slogans of tomorrow. They come to be accepted by degrees, by precedent, by implication, by erosion, by default, by dint of constant pressure on one side and constant retreat on the other – until the day when they are suddenly declared to be the country’s official ideology.”

Source note: Rand’s essay was written in response to the1964-1965 student protests at the University of California at Berkeley.

Source: Editor’s copy – The Objectivist Newsletter: Volumes 1-4, 1962-1965

Re-quote notes: Following the success of her novel Atlas Shrugged, Rand toned down her rhetoric and made changes to the cited passage for a revised edition & reprint of We the Living in 1959. The passages from both editions can be viewed below:

1936 original – “Deny the best its right to the top – and you have no best left. What are your masses but mud to be ground underfoot, fuel to be burned for those who deserve it? What is the people but millions of puny, shriveled, helpless souls that have no thoughts of their own, no dreams of their own, no will of their own, who eat and sleep and chew helplessly the words others put into their mildewed brains?”

1959 edited version – “Deny the best its right to the top – and you have no best left. What are your masses but millions of dull, shriveled, stagnant souls that have no thoughts of their own, no dreams of their own, no will of their own, who eat and sleep and chew helplessly the words others put into their brains?” (p. 80)

[Re-quote source: Ayn Rand, We the Living (7 April 1936) New York: Signet, 1959 edited edition, 1983 paperback printing, p. 80]

Extended excerpt [Fiction – character ‘Kira Argounova’ to ‘Andrei Taganov.’ Italic & text original to 1936 first edition of book]:

“Deny the best its right to the top – and you have no best left. What are your masses but mud to be ground underfoot, fuel to be burned for those who deserve it? What is the people but millions of puny, shriveled, helpless souls that have no thoughts of their own, no dreams of their own, no will of their own, who eat and sleep and chew helplessly the words others put into their mildewed brains?”

Source [Featured source]: Library – We the Living (1936) Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) No. 6059669

Source [Re-quote note]: Library – We the Living (1936 | 1959 edit/1983 Signet paperback) International Standard Book Number 0-451-15860-1

Misattribution notes:

A number of sources have incorrectly attributed the “…democracy will cease to exist…” quote to the author Ayn Rand. This is likely due to the fact that the anonymous Dreams Come Due author used the pseudonym ‘John Galt’ – the name of a fictional character in Rand’s book Atlas Shrugged. The cited words here, however, also do not appear in Atlas Shrugged nor in Rand’s other published work or correspondence.

Unfortunately, a larger number of sources have also incorrectly attributed the quote to U.S. President Thomas Jefferson. This misattribution appears to extend back to right around the same time the quote first appeared in print and digital sources in the mid-1980s.

Jefferson estate archivist & researcher Anna Berkes notes that the quotation has not been found in any of the writings of the former president. The closest ideological match she found was in an editor’s note from Jefferson that accompanied his prospectus on a translation of French Senator Destutt de Tracy’s Treatise on Political Economy. Notably, however, Jefferson is neither suggesting that “democracy will cease to exist,” nor opposing any governmental involvement in the distribution of wealth.

We have included the quote (in blue) below within a longer excerpt of Jefferson’s original text for context:

“The reader, in deciding which basis of taxation is most eligible for the local circumstances of his country, will, of course, avail himself of the weighty observations of our author.

To this a single observation shall yet be added. Whether property alone, and the whole of what each citizen possesses, shall be subject to contribution, or only its surplus after satisfying his first wants, or whether the faculties of body and mind shall contribute also from their annual earnings, is a question to be decided. But, when decided, and the principle settled, it is to be equally and fairly applied to all. To take from one, because it is thought that his own industry and that of his fathers has acquired too much, in order to spare to others, who, or whose fathers have not exercised equal industry and skill, is to violate arbitrarily the first principle of association, — “the guarantee to every one of a free exercise of his industry, & the fruits acquired by it. If the overgrown wealth of an individual be deemed dangerous to the State, the best corrective is the law of equal inheritance to all in equal degree; and the better, as this enforces a law of nature, while extra-taxation violates it.”

[Source: Thomas Jefferson, Letter & book prospectus to Joseph Milligan (6 April 1816) in The Writings of Thomas Jefferson, Vols. 13-14, ed. Albert Ellery Bergh, Washington, D.C.: The Thomas Jefferson Memorial Association, 1907, p. 466; online via Google Books, books.google.com]

In her research, Ms. Berkes also located a likely original source of the quote: the 1986 book Dreams Come Due: Government and Economics as if Freedom Mattered by an author using the pseudonym “John Galt”.

Your Repeat Right editors have also conducted a more recent search of a number of different newspaper, government, book, and correspondence databases and agree that Dreams Come True – a book noted by the Kirkus Review as a “mean-spirited thesaurus” with a notable number of “out-of-context quotations”- may have been the origin of the quote.

One thing is for certain – we also could not locate any evidence that the quote was in public circulation prior to the 1980s.

Extended excerpt: Please see “Misquote” tab for additional information.

Source [Possible origin of quote & misattribution to Thomas Jefferson]: Library – Dreams Come Due: Government and Economics As If Freedom Mattered  (July 1986) International Standard Book Number (ISBN) 0-671-61159-3

Source link [Anna Berkes, Jefferson researcher]: “The democracy will cease to exist…(Quotation)” (6 March 2008) Spurious Quotations, The Jefferson Monticello: https://www.monticello.org/site/jefferson/democracy-will-cease-exist-quotation#footnoteref1_1enpepr

Source link [Related Jefferson quote – though still not a match]: Thomas Jefferson, Letter & prospectus to Joseph Milligan (6 April 1816) Writings of Thomas Jefferson; online via Google Books: https://books.google.com/books?id=marTAAAAMAAJ&pg=PA466&lpg=PA466&dq=To+take+from+one,+because+it+is+thought+that+his+own+industry+and+that+of+his+fathers+has+acquired+too+much

Source link [Kirkus Review of Dreams Come Due]: Book review: “Dreams Come Due: Government and Economics as if Freedom Mattered” (1986) Kirkus Review: https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/john-galt/dreams-come-due-government-and-economics-as-if-/

Misquote & misattribution notes:

While the bold & confident question ‘Who will stop me?’ certainly isn’t original to Rand’s Fountainhead, at least that cited segment of the quote does come directly from her book.

“The question isn’t ‘who is going to let me’; it’s ‘who is going to stop me?” is NOT found in The Fountainhead, and we have also been unable to find phrase in any of Rand’s other works. It appears to be a paraphrasing or misquote of the Fountainhead line, and it proliferated online after it was included in editorials and at least one graduation speech in the mid-2000s.

The Rand misquote/misattribution also hit the news in 2013, after the clothing store “Forever 21” elected to use the words on a tank-top that was being marketed to young consumers.  Although the retailer ultimately pulled the tank-top after it discovered that the quote was misattributed to Rand, the story – and the misquote – had already made the media rounds. Please see our “Source Link” tab for additional story links and details.

Extended excerpt [Fictional dialogue – ‘Howard Roark,’ in an exchange with the Dean his school}:

“An hour ago the Dean had wished that this interview would proceed as calmly as possible. Now he wished that Roark would display some emotion; it seem unnatural for him to be so quietly natural in the circumstances.

“Do you mean to tell me that you’re thinking seriously of building that way, when and if you are an architect?”

“Yes.”

“My dear fellow, who will let you?”

“That’s not the point. The point is, who will stop me?” (p. 17)

Source: Editor’s copy – The Fountainhead (1943) Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) No. 878563057

Source link [Rand misquote/misattribution – Forever 21 tank top story]: “Forever 21 Is Now Selling a Shirt with an Ayn Rand Quote On It. But do the chain’s customers ever know what objectivism means?” (10 October 2013) TIME newsfeed; via TIME archive [subscription service]: http://newsfeed.time.com/2013/10/10/forever-21-cashes-in-on-ayn-rands-objectivist-philisophy/