Once more from Ayn Rand, then we move on:
...observe that most people are creatures cut in half who keep swinging desperately to one side or the other.
One kind of half is the man who despises money, factories, skyscrapers and his own body. He holds undefined emotions about non-conceivable subjects as the meaning of life and as his claim to virtue. ...he can feel nothing for the [people] he respects, but finds himself in bondage to an irresistible passion for a slut from the gutter. He is the man whom people call an idealist.
The other kind of half is the man whom people call practical, the man who despises principles, abstractions, art, philosophy and his own mind. He regards the acquisition of material objects as the only goal of existence. ...He will not acknowledge, but he knows that sex is the physical expression of a tribute to personal values. So he tries, by going through the motions of the effect, to acquire that which should have been the cause.
2 comments:
Um...wow. Ayn's just all sunshine, rainbows, and unicorns, isn't she?
Well, now that you put it that way.... I am actually finding her writing to be quite stimulating and thought-provoking. Perhaps I've only culled the darker passages and am thus not giving the book a fair representation. She seems so far (I'm on page 568 of about 1,100+) to be using these monologues to build an argument for a more deeply meaningful purpose.
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