Atlas Shrugged [296]
"He's playing the hero, Mother," said Lillian. She smiled coldly, turning to Rearden. "Don't you think that your attitude is perfectly futile?"
"No."
"You know that cases of this kind are not . . . intended ever to come to trial. There are ways to avoid it, to get things settled amicably -if one knows the right people."
"I don't know the right people."
"Look at Orren Boyle. He's done much more and much worse than your little fling at the black market, but he's smart enough to keep himself out of courtrooms."
"Then I'm not smart enough."
"Don't you think it's time you made an effort to adjust yourself to the conditions of our age?"
"No."
"Well, then I don't see how you can pretend that you're some sort of victim. If you go to jail, it will be your own fault."
"What pretense are you talking about, Lillian?"
"Oh, I know that you think you're fighting for some sort of principle -but actually it's only a matter of your incredible conceit. You're doing it for no better reason than because you think you're right."
"Do you think they're right?"
She shrugged, "That's the conceit I'm talking about-the idea that it matters who's right or wrong. It's the most insufferable form of vanity, this insistence on always doing right. How do you know what's right?
How can anyone ever know it? It's nothing but a delusion to flatter your own ego and to hurt other people by flaunting your superiority over them."
He was looking at her with attentive interest. "Why should it hurt other people, if it's nothing but a delusion?"
"Is it necessary for me to point out that in your case it's nothing but hypocrisy? That is why I find your attitude preposterous. Questions of right have no bearing on human existence. And you're certainly nothing but human-aren't you, Henry? You're no better than any of the men you're going to face tomorrow. I think you should remember that it's not for you to make a stand on any sort of principle. Maybe you're a victim in this particular mess, maybe they're pulling a rotten trick on you, but what of it? They're doing it because they're weak; they couldn't resist the temptation to grab your Metal and to muscle in on your profits, because they had no other way of ever getting rich. Why should you blame them? It's only a question of different strains, but it s the same shoddy human fabric that gives way just as quickly. You wouldn't be tempted by money, because it's so easy for you to make it.
But you wouldn't withstand other pressures and you'd fall just as ignominiously. Wouldn't you? So you have no right to any righteous indignation against them. You have no moral superiority to assert or to defend. And if you haven't, then what is the point of fighting a battle that you can't win? I suppose that one might find some satisfaction in being a martyr, if one is above reproach. But you-who are you to cast the first stone?"
She paused to observe the effect. There was none, except that his look of attentive interest seemed intensified; he listened as if he were held by some impersonal, scientific curiosity. It was not the response she had expected.
"1 believe you understand me," she said.
"No," he answered quietly, "I don't."
"I think you should abandon the illusion of your own perfection, which you know full well to be an illusion. I think you should learn to get along with other people. The day of the hero is past. This is the day of humanity, in a much deeper sense than you imagine. Human beings are no longer expected to be saints nor to be punished for their sins. Nobody is right or wrong, we're all in it together, we're all human-and the human is the imperfect. You'll gain nothing tomorrow by proving that they're wrong. You ought to give in with good grace, simply because it's the practical thing to do. You ought to keep silent, precisely because they're wrong. They'll appreciate it. Make concessions for others and they'll make concessions for you. Live and let live. Give and take. Give in and take in. That's the policy of our