The age of the skyscraper is gone. This is the age of the housing project. Which is always a prelude to the age of the cave.

Man has been called a rational being, but rationality is a matter of choice... Man has to be a man-by choice; he has to hold his life as a value-by choice; he has to learn to sustain it-by choice; he has to discover the values it requires and practice his virtues by choice. A code of values accepted by choice is a code of morality.

Emotions are not tools of cognition. They tell you nothing about the nature of reality.

This is pity,” he thought, and then he lifted his head in wonder. He thought that there must be something terribly wrong with a world in which this monstrous feeling is called a virtue.

The plot of a movie is its motor. It is not an accident that people call pictures 'vehicles' for stars. A vehicle has to move. A plotless story is like an expensive car with a wonderful body design, luxurious seats, upholstery, headlights (production, direction, cast) - and no motor under its hood. That is why it gets nowhere.

To know one's own desires, their meaning and their costs requires the highest human virtue: rationality.

What is the basic, the essential, the crucial principle that differentiates freedom from slavery? It is the principle of voluntary action versus physical coercion or compulsion.