- RECOMMENDED READINGS -
Several issues ago we suggested that you read the works of Ayn Rand – “Atlas Shrugged” and “Fountainhead”. In this issue, we present several excerpts from “Fountainhead”, because they make so much sense.
But first, in the author’s own words: “My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity and reason as his only absolute.
Man is an end in himself, not a means to the ends of others; he must live for
his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others, nor sacrificing others to
himself; he must work for his rational self-interest, with the achievement of
his own happiness as the highest moral purpose of his life.
Rationality is man's basic virtue, and his three fundamental values are: reason,
purpose, self-esteem.”
And now, let’s get started:
Dominique: "If i found a job, a project, an idea or a a person I wanted - i'd have to depend on the whole world. Everything has strings leading to everything else. We're all in a net, the net is waiting, and we're pushed into it by one single desire. You want a thing and it's precious to you. Do you know who is standing ready to tear it out of your hands? You can't know, it may be so involved and so far away, but someone is ready and you are afraid of them all. and you cringe, and you crawl, and you beg and you accept them – just so they'll let you keep it. And look at whom you come to accept."
Scarret: "If I'm correct in gathering that you're criticizing mankind in general."
Dominique: "You know, it's such a peculiar thing - our idea of mankind in general. We all have a sort of vague, glowing picture when we say that, something solemn, big and important. But actually, all we know of it is the people we meet in our lifetime. Look at them. Do you know any you'd feel big and solemn about?
There's nothing but housewives haggling at pushcarts, drooling brats who write dirty words on the sidewalks, and drunken debutantes. Or their spiritual equivalents. As a matter of fact, one can feel some respect for people when they suffer. They have a certain dignity. But have you ever looked at them when they're enjoying themselves?
That's when you see the truth. Look at those who spend the money they've slaved for - at amusement parks and side shows. Look at those who're rich and have the whole world open to them. Oserve what they pick out for enjoyment. Watch them in the smarter pick-easies. That's your mankind in general. I don't want to touch it"
Dominique: "One can't love man without hating most of the creatures who pretend to bear his name. It's one or the other. One doesn't love God and sacrillege impartially. Except when one does not know that sacrillege has been comitted. Because one deosn't know God.
Howard Roark: "But first, I want you think and tell me what made me give years to this work. money? fame? charity? altruism?" Keating shook his head slowly. "All right, you're beginning to understand [...] Peter, before you can do things for people, you must be the kind who gets things done. But to get things done, you must love the doing, not the secondary consequences. The work, not the people. Your own action, not the possible object of your charity."
Howard Roark: "Look at them. The man who cheats and lies, but preserves a respectgble front. He knows himself to be dishonest, but others think he's honest and he derives his self-respect from that, second-hand. The man who takes credit for an achievement which is not his own. He knows himself to be mediocre but he’s great in the eyes of others. The frustrated wretch who professes love for the inferior and clings to those less endowed, in order to establish his own superiority by comparison. The man whose sole aim is to make money. Now i dont see anything evil in the desire to make money. but money is only a means to some end [...] it's so easy to run to others. It's so hard to stand on one's own record.
You can fake virtue for an audience. You can’t fake it in your own eyes. Your ego is your strictest judge, they run from it. They spend their lives running.
It’s easier to donate a few thousands to charity and think oneslef noble than to base self-respect on personal standards of personal achievement.
It’s simple to seek substitutes for competence - such easy substitutes: love, charm, kindness, charity. But there is no substitute for competence. That precisely is the deadliness of second handers. They have no concern for facts, ideas, work. They're concerned only with people.
They don’t ask: is this true? They ask: is this what others think is true?
Not to judge but to repeat. Not to do but to give the impression of doing.
Not creation but show. Not ability but friendship. Not merit, but pull.
What would happen to the world without those who do, think, work, produce?
Those are the egotists. You don’t think through another's brain and you don’t work through anothers hands. When you suspend your faculty of independent judgement, you suspend your consciousness. To stop consciousness is to stop life. "
Wynand Gail: "I think your second-handers understand this, try as they might not to admit it to themselves. Notice how they'll accept anything except a man who stands alone. They recognize him at once. By instinct. There's a special insidious kind of hatred for him. They forgive criminals, they admire dicatators. crime and violence are a tie. A form of mutual dependence. They need ties.
They’ve got to force their miserable little personalities on every single person they meet. The independent man kills them - because they don’t exist within him and that’s the only form of existence they know. Notice the malignant kind of resentment against any idea that propounds independence. notice the malice against an independent man. "
Howard Roark: "You've wondered why they suffer, why they seek happiness and never find it. If any man stopped and asked himself whether he's ever held a truly personal desire, he’d find the answer. He'd see that all his wishes, his efforts, his dreams, his ambitions are motivated by other men [...] he can find no joy in the struggle and no joy when he has succeeded. He can’t say about a single thing: this is what I wanted because I wanted t, not because it made my neighbours gape at me. Then he wonders why he’s unhappy. Every form of happiness is private. Our greatest moments are personal, self-motivated, not to be touched.
Toohey: "Here’s another way. This is most important. Dont allow men to be happy. Happiness is self-contained and self-sufficient. Happy men have no time and no use for you. Happy men are free men. So kill their joy of living. Take away from them whatever is dear and important to them.
Never let them have what they want. Make them feel that the mere fact of personal desire is evil. Bring them to a state where saying I WANT is no longer a natural right, but a shameful admission.
Altruism is of great help in this. Unhappy men will come to you. They’ll need you. They’ll come for consolation, for support, for escape [...] Look at the moral atmosphere today. Everything enjoyable, from cigarettes to sex to ambition to the profit motive, is considered depraved or sinful. Just prove that a thing makes men happy - and you’ve damned it. That’s how far we’ve come. We’ve tied happiness to guilt. "
Howard Roark: "Throughout the centuries there were men who took first steps down new roads armed with nothing but their own vision. Their goals differed but they all had this in common: that the step was first, the road new, the vision unborrowed, and the response they received - hatred. The great creators - the thinkers, the artists, the scientists, the inventors - stood alone against the men of their time. Every great new thought was opposed. Every great new invention was denounced. The first motor was considered foolish. The airplane was considered impossible.
The power loom was considered vicious. Anesthesia was considered sinful. But the men of unborrowed vision went ahead. They fought, they suffered and they paid. But they won.
No creator was prompted by a desire to serve his brothers, for his brothers rejected the gift he offered and that gift destroyed the slothful routine of their lives. His truth was his only motive.
His own truth and his own work to achieve it in his own way. A symphony, a book, an engine, a philosophy, an airplane or a building - that was his goal and his life...the creation not its users.
The creation, not the benefits others derived from it. The creation which gave form to his truth. He held his truth above all things and against all men.
His vision, his strength, his courage came from his own spirit. A man's spirit, however, is his own self. ...to think, to feel, to judge, to act are functions of the ego. The creators were not selfless . It is the whole secret of their power - that it was self-sufficient, self-motivated, self-generated. A first cause, a fountain of energy, a life fource, a prime mover. The creator served nothing and no one.
HE LIVED FOR HIMSELF. And only by living for himself was he able to achieve the things which are the glory of mankind. Such is the nature of achievement.
...
Nothing is given to man on earth, everything he needs has to be produced. And here man faces his basic alternative: He can survive in only one of two ways - by the independent work of his own mind or as a parasite fed by the minds of others.
The creator originates, the parasite borrows. The creator faces nature alone. The parasite faces nature through an intermediary.
...
The creator lives for his work. He needs no other men. His primary goal is within himself. The parasite lives second-hand. He needs others. Others become his prime motive.
The basic need of the crearor is independence. The reasoning mind cannot work under any form of compulsion... To a creator, all relations with men are secondary. The basic need of a second-hander is to secure his ties with men in order to be fed. He places relations first. He declares that man exists in order to serve others. He preaches altruism.
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The man who attempts to live for others is a dependent. He is a parasite in motive and makes parasites of those he serves. This relationship produces nothing but mutual corruption. It is impossible in concept. The nearest approach to it in reality - the man who lives to serve others - is the slave. If physical slavery is repulsive, how much more repulsive is the concept of servility in the spirit?
...
Men have been thought that the highest virtue is not to achieve but to give. Yet one cannot give that which has not been created. Creation comes before distribution - or there will be nothing to ditribute. The need of the creator comes before the need of any possible beneficiarty. Yet we are taught to admire the second-hander who dispenses gifts he has not produced above the man who made the gifts possible.
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Men have been taught that it is a virtue to swim with the current. But the creator is the man who goes against the current. Men have been taught that it is a virtue to stand together, but the creator is the man who stands alone.
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The egotist in the absolute sense is not the man who sacrifices others. He is the man who stands above the need of using others in any manner. He does not function through them. He is not concerned with them in any primary matter.
...He does not exist for any other man and he asks no man to exist for him. This is the only form of brotherhood and mutual respect possible between men.
DEGREES OF ABILITY VARY, BUT THE BASIC PRINCIPLE REMAINS THE SAME: THE DEGREE OF A MAN'S INDEPENDENCE, INITIATIVE AND PERSONAL LOVE FOR HIS WORK DETERMINES HIS TALENT AS A WORKER AND HIS WORTH AS A MAN.”