All 50 Uses of
mystic
in
Atlas Shrugged
- It was all right for a disreputable mediocrity like Simon Pritchett to drool it as some sort of woozy mysticism-nobody listened to him.†
Chpt 2.1mysticism = belief in realities that are outside of scientific understanding and normal experience
- It was always the animal's attributes, not man's, that humanity worshipped: the idol of instinct and the idol of force-the mystics and the kings-the mystics, who longed for an irresponsible consciousness and ruled by means of the claim that their dark emotions were superior to reason, that knowledge came in blind, causeless fits, blindly to be followed, not doubted-and the kings, who ruled by means of claws and muscles, with conquest as their method and looting as their aim, with a club or a gun as sole sanction of their power.†
Chpt 3.1mystics = people said to comprehend reality using supernatural means
- It was always the animal's attributes, not man's, that humanity worshipped: the idol of instinct and the idol of force-the mystics and the kings-the mystics, who longed for an irresponsible consciousness and ruled by means of the claim that their dark emotions were superior to reason, that knowledge came in blind, causeless fits, blindly to be followed, not doubted-and the kings, who ruled by means of claws and muscles, with conquest as their method and looting as their aim, with a club or a gun as sole sanction of their power.†
Chpt 3.1
- Dr. Stadler saw the little shyster's eyes studying him for the fraction of a second: the eyes had a touch of superstitious awe, as at the sight of a phenomenon from a mystical realm forever incomprehensible to Mr. Thompson-and they had the piercing, calculating shrewdness of a ward heeler who feels certain that nothing is immune from his standards, a glance like the visual equivalent of the words: What's your angle?†
Chpt 3.3mystical = relating to realities beyond scientific understanding OR inspiring a sense of wonder or mystery; or beyond human comprehension
- I thought I could afford to ignore them-all those impotent mystics who prattle about their souls and are unable to build a roof over their heads.†
Chpt 3.3mystics = people said to comprehend reality using supernatural means
- I had cut myself in two, as the mystics preached, and I ran my business by one code of rules, but my own life by another.†
Chpt 3.3
- If some man like Hugh Akston had told me, when I started, that by accepting the mystics' theory of sex I was accepting the looters' theory of economics, I would have laughed in his face.†
Chpt 3.3
- This age of misery is God's punishment to man for the sin of relying on his mind!" snarled the triumphant voices of mystics of every sect and sort, on street corners, in rain-soaked tents, in crumbling temples.†
Chpt 3.5
- They, the impotent mystics, struggling to escape the responsibility of reason, had known that he, the rationalist, had undertaken to serve their whims.†
Chpt 3.6
- It was not the face itself that made him draw back in horror, but the professors, the philosophers, the moralists, the mystics who had released that face upon the world.†
Chpt 3.6
- You have heard no concepts of morality but the mystical or the social.†
Chpt 3.7mystical = relating to realities beyond scientific understanding OR inspiring a sense of wonder or mystery; or beyond human comprehension
- Sweep aside those hatred-eaten mystics, who pose as friends of humanity and preach that the highest virtue man can practice is to hold his own life as of no value.†
Chpt 3.7mystics = people said to comprehend reality using supernatural means
- Rationality is the recognition of the fact that existence exists, that nothing can alter the truth and nothing can take precedence over that act of perceiving it, which is thinking-that the mind is one's only judge of values and one's only guide of action-that reason is an absolute that permits no compromise-that a concession to the irrational invalidates one's consciousness and turns it from the task of perceiving to the task of faking reality-that the alleged short-cut to knowledge, which is faith, is only a short-circuit destroying the mind-that the acceptance of a mystical invention is a wish for the annihilation of existence and, properly, annihilates one's consciousness.†
Chpt 3.7mystical = relating to realities beyond scientific understanding OR inspiring a sense of wonder or mystery; or beyond human comprehension
- Once he surrendered reason, he was left at the mercy of ... a body moved by unaccountable instincts and of a soul moved by mystic revelations...
Chpt 3.7 *mystic = relating to realities that are outside of scientific understanding and normal experience
- As products of the split between man's soul and body, there are two kinds of teachers of the Morality of Death: the mystics of spirit and the mystics of muscle, whom you call the spiritualists and the materialists, those who believe in consciousness without existence and those who believe in existence without consciousness.†
Chpt 3.7mystics = people said to comprehend reality using supernatural means
- As products of the split between man's soul and body, there are two kinds of teachers of the Morality of Death: the mystics of spirit and the mystics of muscle, whom you call the spiritualists and the materialists, those who believe in consciousness without existence and those who believe in existence without consciousness.†
Chpt 3.7
- The good, say the mystics of spirit, is God, a being whose only definition is that he is beyond man's power to conceive-a definition that invalidates man's consciousness and nullifies his concepts of existence.†
Chpt 3.7
- The good, say the mystics of muscle, is Society-a thing which they define as an organism that possesses no physical form, a super-being embodied in no one in particular and everyone in general except yourself.†
Chpt 3.7
- Man's mind, say the mystics of spirit, must be subordinated to the will of God, Man's mind, say the mystics of muscle, must be subordinated to the will of Society.†
Chpt 3.7
- Man's mind, say the mystics of spirit, must be subordinated to the will of God, Man's mind, say the mystics of muscle, must be subordinated to the will of Society.†
Chpt 3.7
- Man's standard of value, say the mystics of spirit, is the pleasure of God, whose standards are beyond man's power of comprehension and must be accepted on faith.†
Chpt 3.7
- Man's standard of value, say the mystics of muscle, is the pleasure of Society, whose standards are beyond man's right of judgment and must be obeyed as a primary absolute.†
Chpt 3.7
- His reward, say the mystics of spirit, will be given to him beyond the grave.†
Chpt 3.7
- His reward, say the mystics of muscle, will be given on earth-to his great-grandchildren.†
Chpt 3.7
- The mystics of both schools, who preach the creed of sacrifice, are germs that attack you through a single sore: your fear of relying on your mind.†
Chpt 3.7
- The mystics of spirit declare that they possess an extra sense you lack: this special sixth sense consists of contradicting the whole of the knowledge of your five.†
Chpt 3.7
- The mystics of muscle do not bother to assert any claim to extrasensory perception: they merely declare that your senses are not valid, and that their wisdom consists of perceiving your blindness by some manner of unspecified means.†
Chpt 3.7
- The mystics of spirit call it 'another dimension,' which consists of denying dimensions.†
Chpt 3.7
- The mystics of muscle call it 'the future,' which consists of denying the present.†
Chpt 3.7
- The mystics of spirit curse matter, the mystics of muscle curse profit.†
Chpt 3.7
- The mystics of spirit curse matter, the mystics of muscle curse profit.†
Chpt 3.7
- Your teachers, the mystics of both schools, have reversed causality in their consciousness, then strive to reverse it in existence.†
Chpt 3.7
- Just as your mystics of spirit invented their heaven in the image of our earth, omitting our existence, and promised you rewards created by miracle out of non-matter-so your modern mystics of muscle omit our existence and promise you a heaven where matter shapes itself of its own causeless will into all the rewards desired by your non-mind.†
Chpt 3.7
- Just as your mystics of spirit invented their heaven in the image of our earth, omitting our existence, and promised you rewards created by miracle out of non-matter-so your modern mystics of muscle omit our existence and promise you a heaven where matter shapes itself of its own causeless will into all the rewards desired by your non-mind.†
Chpt 3.7
- For centuries, the mystics of spirit had existed by running a protection racket-by making life on earth unbearable, then charging you for consolation and relief, by forbidding all the virtues that make existence possible, then riding on the shoulders of your guilt, by declaring production and joy to be sins, then collecting blackmail from the sinners.†
Chpt 3.7
- Now we are expected to continue running railroads and to know the minute when a train will arrive after crossing the span of a continent, we are expected to continue running steel mills and to know the molecular structure of every drop of metal in the cables of your bridges and in the body of the airplanes that support you in mid-airwhile the tribes of your grotesque little mystics of muscle fight over the carcass of our world, gibbering in sounds of non-language that there are no principles, no absolutes, no knowledge, no mind.†
Chpt 3.7
- For centuries, the mystics of spirit have proclaimed that faith is superior to reason, but have not dared deny the existence of reason.†
Chpt 3.7
- Their heirs and product, the mystics of muscle, have completed their job and achieved their dream: they proclaim that everything is faith, and call it a revolt against believing.†
Chpt 3.7
- If you doubt that such is their purpose, observe with what passionate consistency the mystics of muscle are striving to make you forget that a concept such as 'mind' has ever existed.†
Chpt 3.7
- All your gangs of mystics, of spirit or muscle, are fighting one another for power to rule you, snarling that love is the solution for all the problems of your spirit and that a whip is the solution for all the problems of your bodyyou who have agreed to have no mind.†
Chpt 3.7
- Make no mistake about the character of mystics.†
Chpt 3.7
- Destruction is the only end that the mystics' creed has ever achieved, as it is the only end that you see them achieving today, and if the ravages wrought by their acts have not made them question their doctrines, if they profess to be moved by love, yet are not deterred by piles of human corpses, it is because the truth about their souls is worse than the obscene excuse you have allowed them, the excuse that the end justifies the means and that the horrors they practice are means to nobler ends.†
Chpt 3.7
- You who are innocent enough to believe that the forces let loose in your world today are moved by greed for material plunder-the mystics' scramble for spoils is only a screen to conceal from their mind the nature of their motive.†
Chpt 3.7
- Take a look around you, you savages who stutter that ideas are created by men's means of production, that a machine is not the product of human thought, but a mystical power that produces human thinking.†
Chpt 3.7mystical = relating to realities beyond scientific understanding OR inspiring a sense of wonder or mystery; or beyond human comprehension
- Every period ruled by mystics was an era of stagnation and want, when most men were on strike against existence, working for less than their barest survival, leaving nothing but scraps for their rulers to loot, refusing to think, to venture, to produce, when the ultimate collector of their profits and the final authority on truth or error was the whim of some gilded degenerate sanctioned as superior to reason by divine right and by grace of a club.†
Chpt 3.7mystics = people said to comprehend reality using supernatural means
- The game of the mystics is up.†
Chpt 3.7
- As you surrendered to the mystics of muscle when they told you that ignorance consists of claiming knowledge, so now you surrender to them when they shriek that immorality consists of pronouncing moral judgment.†
Chpt 3.7
- At the end of your road of successive betrayals, stripped of weapons, of certainty, of honor, you commit your final act of treason and sign your petition of intellectual bankruptcy: while the muscle-mystics of the People's States proclaim that they're the champions of reason and science, you agree and hasten to proclaim that faith is your cardinal principle, that reason is on the side of your destroyers, but yours is the side of faith.†
Chpt 3.7
- To the struggling remnants of rational honesty in the twisted, bewildered minds of your children, you declare that you can offer no rational argument to support the ideas that created this country, that there is no rational justification for freedom, for property, for justice, for rights, that they rest on a mystical insight and can be accepted only on faith, that in reason and logic the enemy is right, but faith is superior to reason.†
Chpt 3.7mystical = relating to realities beyond scientific understanding OR inspiring a sense of wonder or mystery; or beyond human comprehension
- You blank out the fact that most mystics of muscle started out as mystics of spirit, that they keep switching from one to the other, that the men you call materialists and spiritualists are only two halves of the same dissected human, forever seeking completion, but seeking it by swinging from the destruction of the flesh to the destruction of the soul and vice versa-that they keep running from your colleges to the slave pens of Europe to an open collapse into the mystic muck of India, seeking any refuge against reality, any form of escape from the mind.†
Chpt 3.7mystics = people said to comprehend reality using supernatural means
Definition:
a person who seeks or claims to have direct spiritual insight beyond ordinary understanding; or an experience that feels deeply spiritual, mysterious, or otherworldly
In common usage, mystic is more likely to be used in reference to a practitioner of a less mainstream religion than a more mainstream religion -- possibly because the former is more mysterious to the writer.