top of page
"Have you ever looked for the root of production? Take a look at an electric generator and dare tell yourself that it was created by the muscular effort of unthinking brutes. Try to grow a seed of wheat without the knowledge left to you by men who had to discover it for the first time. Try to obtain your food by means of nothing but physical motions-and you'll learn that man's mind is the root of all the goods produced and of all the wealth that has ever existed on earth."
Standard
Customized
Exlpore more Intelligence quotes

"There can be no two opinions as to what a highbrow is. He is the man or woman of thoroughbred intelligence who rides his mind at a gallop across country in pursuit of an idea."

"It is not clear that intelligence has any long-term survival value."

"The Clinton White House today said they would start to give national security and intelligence briefings to George Bush. I don't know how well this is working out. Today after the first one Bush said, 'I've got one question: What color is the red phone?'"

"Solving a problem is intelligence. Preventing a problem is wisdom."

"No one believes he is an idiot until the consequences of his actions prove it. Then hindsight rubs it in."

"Intelligence is a way of thinking, not a choice of words."

"Though the stupid have great capacity to direct the world because they are plentiful, the clever has a much greater capacity to prevent the stupid from halting the progression of humanity because - though they are rare - they are tactical and intelligent!"

"Developing your emotional intelligence will allow you to explore new depths of understanding in yourself and others."

"To have contrary [negative, wrong] intellect has become an odd rule in this current era, hasn't it? The one who proceeds with caution will win."

"Most unintelligent or foolish people do not regard themselves as that, they regard themselves as not-that-intelligent or not-that-wise."
Explore more quotes by Ayn Rand

"Every form of happiness if one, every desire is driven by the same motor-by our love for a single value, for the highest potentiality of our own existence-and every achievement is an expression of it."

"Logic rests on the axiom that existence exists. Logic is the art of non-contradictory identification."

"Productive work is the central purpose of a rational man's life the central value that integrates and determines the hierarchy of all his other values. Reason is the source the precondition of his productive work - pride is the result."

"And now I see the face of god, and I raise this god over the earth, this god whom men have sought since men came into being, this god who will grant them joy and peace and pride. This god, this one word: 'I."

"The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws."

"Ask yourself whether the dream of heaven and greatness should be waiting for us in our graves - or whether it should be ours here and now and on this earth."

"Dagny," he said, looking at the city as it moved past their taxi window, "think of the first man who thought of making a steel girder. He knew what he saw, what he thought and what he wanted. He did not say, 'It seems to me,' and he did not take orders from those who say, 'In my opinion."

"I am neither foe nor friend to my brothers, but such as each of them shall deserve of me. And to earn my love, my brothers must do more than to have been born. I do not grant my love without reason, nor to any chance passer-by who may wish to claim it. I honor men with my love. But honor is a thing to be earned.I shall choose friends among men, but neither slaves nor masters. And I shall choose only such as please me, and them I shall love and respect, but neither command not obey."

"We knew not where we were going. We only knew that we must run, run to the end of the world, run to the end of our days."
bottom of page