howard-roark

I__l listen if you want me to... But I think I should tell you now that nothing you can say will make any difference. If you don__ mind that, I don__ mind listening.

And isn__ that the root of every despicable action? Not selfishness, but precisely the absence of a self. Look at them. The man who cheats and lies, but preserves a respectable front. He knows himself to be dishonest, but others think he__ 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__ 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 audience looked at him. They felt he had no chance. They could drop the nameless resentment, the sense of insecurity which he aroused in most people. And so, for the first time, they could see him as he was: a man totally innocent of fear.

[Howard Roark] was asked for a statement, and he received a group of reporters in his office. He spoke without anger. He said:'I can't tell anyone anything about my building. If I prepared a hash of words to stuff into other people's brains, it would be an insult to them and to me. But I am glad you came here. I do have something to say. I want to ask every man who is interested in this to go and see the building, to look at it and then to use words of his own mind, if he cares to speak.'The Banner printed the interview as follows:'Mr. Roark, who seems to be a publicity hound, received reporters with an air of swaggering insolence and stated that the public mind was hash. He did not choose to talk, but seemed well aware of the advertising angles of the situation. All he cared about, he explained, was to have his building seen by as many people as possible.

What would happen to the world without those who do, think, work, produce? Those are the egotists. You don__ think through another__ brain and you don__ work through another__ hands. When you suspend your faculty of independent judgment, you suspend consciousness. To stop consciousness is to stop life.

Men have been taught that it is a virtue to agree with others. But the creator is the man who disagrees. 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.

His face was like a law of nature__ thing one could not question, alter or implore. It had high cheekbones over gaunt, hollow cheeks; gray eyes, cold and steady; a contemptuous mouth, shut tight, the mouth of an executioner or a saint.

I think the only cardinal evil on earth is that of placing your prime concern within other men. I__e always demanded a certain quality in the people I liked. I__e always recognized it at once__nd it__ the only quality I respect in men. I chose my friends by that...A self-sufficient ego. Nothing else matters.

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. Not in his aim, not in his motive, not in his thinking, not in his desires, not in the source of his energy. He does not exist for any other man__nd he asks no other man to exist for him.

All that which proceeds from man__ independent ego is good. All that which proceeds from man__ dependence upon men is evil.

And, after all, you__e got to live.___ot that way,_ said Roark.

Keating felt naked...People were his protection against people. Roark had no sense of people. Others gave Keating a feeling of his own value. Roark gave him nothing.

Don__ you know that most people take most things because that__ what__ given them, and they have no opinion whatever? Do you wish to be guided by what they expect you to think they think or by your own judgment?