Francisco could do anything he undertook, he could do it better than anyone else, and he did it without effort. There was no boasting in his manner and consciousness, no thought of comparison. His attitude was not: 'I can do it better than you,' but simply: 'I can do it.' What he meant by doing was doing superlatively.
Ayn RandAnd what, incidentally, do you think integrity is? The ability not to pick a watch out of your neighbor's pocket? No, it's not as easy as that. If that were all, I'd say ninety-five percent of humanity were honest, upright men. Only, as you can see, they aren't. Integrity is the ability to stand by an idea.
Ayn RandThe social system based on and consonant with the altruist morality-with the code of self-sacrifice- is socialism, in all or any of its variants: fascism, Nazism, communism. All of them treat man as a sacrificial animal to be immolated for the benefit of the group, the tribe, the society, the state.
Ayn RandWe'll meet again. We'll meet when years have passed, and years make such a difference, don't they?
Ayn RandWhether itโs a symphony or a coal mine, all work is an act of creating and comes from the same source: from an inviolate capacity to see through oneโs own eyes-which means: the capacity to perform a rational identification- which means: the capacity to see, to connect and to make what had not been seen, connected and made before.
Ayn Rand