The fountainhead by Ayn Rand

particularly--the selection of a future career.
When consulted on love affairs, Toohey counseled surrender, if it concerned a
romance with a charming little pushover, good for a few drunken parties--"let us
be modern"; and renunciation, if it concerned a deep, emotional passion--"let us
be grownup." When a boy came to confess a feeling of shame after some unsavory
sexual experience, Toohey told him to snap out of it: "It was damn good for you.
There are two things we must get rid of early in life: a feeling of personal
superiority and an exaggerated reverence for the sexual act."
People noticed that Ellsworth Toohey seldom let a boy pursue the career he had
chosen. "No, I wouldn’t go in for law if I were you. You’re much too tense and
passionate about it. A hysterical devotion to one’s career does not make for
happiness or success. It is wiser to select a profession about which you can be
calm, sane and matter-of-fact. Yes, even if you hate it. It makes for
down-to-earthness."..."No, I wouldn’t advise you to continue with your music.
The fact that it comes to you so easily is a sure sign that your talent is only
a superficial one. That’s just the trouble--that you love it. Don’t you think
that sounds like a childish reason? Give it up. Yes, even if it hurts like
hell."..."No, I’m sorry, I would like so much to say that I approve, but I
don’t. When you thought of architecture, it was a purely selfish choice, wasn’t
it? Have you considered anything but your own egotistical satisfaction? Yet a
man’s career concerns all society. The question of where you could be most
useful to your fellow men comes first. It’s not what you can get out of society,
it’s what you can give. And where opportunities for service are concerned,
there’s no endeavor comparable to that of a surgeon. Think it over."
After leaving college some of his protégés did quite well, others failed. Only
one committed suicide. It was said that Ellsworth Toohey had exercised a
beneficent influence upon them--for they never forgot him: they came to consult
him on many things, years later, they wrote him, they clung to him. They were
like machines without a self-starter, that had to be cranked up by an outside
hand. He was never too busy to give them his full attention.
His life was crowded, public and impersonal as a city square. The friend of
humanity had no single private friend. People came to him; he came close to no
one. He accepted all. His affection was golden, smooth and even, like a great
expanse of sand; there was no wind of discrimination to raise dunes; the sands
lay still and the sun stood high.
Out of his meager income he donated money to many organizations. He was never
known to have loaned a dollar to an individual. He never asked his rich friends
to assist a person in need; but he obtained from them large sums and endowments
for charitable institutions: for settlement houses, recreation centers, homes
for fallen girls, schools for defective children. He served on the boards of all
these institutions--without salary. A great many philanthropic undertakings and
radical publications, run by all sorts of people, had a single connecting link
among them, one common denominator: the name of Ellsworth M. Toohey on their
stationery. He was a sort of one-man holding company of altruism.
Women played no part in his life. Sex had never interested him. His furtive,
infrequent urges drew him to the young, slim, full-bosomed, brainless girls--the
giggling little waitresses, the lisping manicurists, the less efficient
stenographers, the kind who wore pink or orchid dresses and little hats on the
back of their heads with gobs of blond curls in front. He was indifferent to
women of intellect.
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He contended that the family was a bourgeois institution; but he made no issue
of it and did not crusade for free love. The subject of sex bored him. There
was, he felt, too much fuss made over the damn thing; it was of no importance;
there were too many weightier problems in the world.
The years passed, with each busy day of his life like a small, neat coin dropped
patiently into a gigantic slot machine, without a glance at the combination of
symbols, without return. Gradually, one of his many activities began to stand
out among the others: he became known as an eminent critic of architecture. He
wrote about buildings for three successive magazines that limped on noisily for
a few years and failed, one after the other: New Voices, New Pathways, New
Horizons. The fourth, New Frontiers, survived. Ellsworth Toohey was the only
thing salvaged from the successive wrecks. Architectural criticism seemed to be
a neglected field of endeavor; few people bothered to write about buildings,
fewer to read. Toohey acquired a reputation and an unofficial monopoly. The
better magazines began calling upon him whenever they needed anything connected
with architecture.
In the year 1921 a small change occurred in Toohey’s private life; his niece
Catherine Halsey, the daughter of his sister Helen, came to live with him. His
father had long since died, and Aunt Adeline had vanished into the obscure
poverty of some small town; at the death of Catherine’s parents there was no one
else to take care of her. Toohey had not intended to keep her in his own home.
But when she stepped off the train in New York, her plain little face looked
beautiful for a moment, as if the future were opening before her and its glow
were already upon her forehead, as if she were eager and proud and ready to meet
it. It was one of those rare moments when the humblest person knows suddenly
what it means to feel as the center of the universe, and is made beautiful by
the knowledge, and the world--in the eyes of witnesses--looks like a better
place for having such a center. Ellsworth Toohey saw this--and decided that
Catherine would remain with him.
In the year 1925 came Sermons in Stone--and fame.
Ellsworth Toohey became a fashion. Intellectual hostesses fought over him. Some
people disliked him and laughed at him. But there was little satisfaction in
laughing at Ellsworth Toohey, because he was always first to make the most
outrageous remarks about himself. Once, at a party, a smug, boorish businessman
listened to Toohey’s earnest social theories for a while and said complacently:
"Well, I wouldn’t know much about all that intellectual stuff. I play the stock
market."
"I," said Toohey, "play the stock market of the spirit. And I sell short."
The most important consequence of Sermons in Stone was Toohey’s contract to
write a daily column for Gail Wynand’s New York Banner.
The contract came as a surprise to the followers of both sides involved, and, at
first, it made everybody angry. Toohey had referred to Wynand frequently and not
respectfully; the Wynand papers had called Toohey every name fit to print. But
the Wynand papers had no policy, save that of reflecting the greatest prejudices
of the greatest number, and this made for an erratic direction, but a
recognizable direction, nevertheless: toward the inconsistent, the
irresponsible, the trite and the maudlin. The Wynand papers stood against
Privilege and for the Common Man, but in a respectable manner that could shock
nobody; they exposed monopolies, when they wished; they supported strikes, when
they wished, and vice versa. They denounced Wall Street and they denounced
socialism and they hollered for clean movies, all with the same gusto. They were
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strident and blatant--and, in essence, lifelessly mild. Ellsworth Toohey was a
phenomenon much too extreme to fit behind the front page of the Banner.
But the staff of the Banner was as unfastidious as its policy. It included
everybody who could please the public or any large section thereof. It was said:
"Gail Wynand is not a pig. He’ll eat anything." Ellsworth Toohey was a great
success and the public was suddenly interested in architecture; the Banner had
no authority on architecture; the Banner would get Ellsworth Toohey. It was a
simple syllogism.
Thus "One Small Voice" came into existence.
The Banner explained its appearance by announcing: "On Monday the Banner will
present to you a new friend--ELLSWORTH M. TOOHEY--whose scintillating book
Sermons in Stone you have all read and loved. The name of Mr. Toohey stands for
the great profession of architecture. He will help you to understand everything
you want to know about the wonders of modern building. Watch for ’ONE SMALL
VOICE’ on Monday. To appear exclusively in the Banner in New York City." The
rest of what Mr. Toohey stood for was ignored.
Ellsworth Toohey made no announcement or explanation to anyone. He disregarded
the friends who cried that he had sold himself. He simply went to work. He
devoted "One Small Voice" to architecture--once a month. The rest of the time it
was the voice of Ellsworth Toohey saying what he wished said--to syndicated
millions.
Toohey was the only Wynand employee who had a contract permitting him to write
anything he pleased. He had insisted upon it. It was considered a great victory,
by everybody except Ellsworth Toohey. He realized that it could mean one of two
things: either Wynand had surrendered respectfully to the prestige of his
name--or Wynand considered him too contemptible to be worth restraining.
"One Small Voice" never seemed to say anything dangerously revolutionary, and
seldom anything political. It merely preached sentiments with which most people
felt in agreement: unselfishness, brotherhood, equality. "I’d rather be kind
than right."
"Mercy is superior to justice, the shallow-hearted to the contrary
notwithstanding."
"Speaking anatomically--and perhaps otherwise--the heart is our most valuable
organ. The brain is a superstition."
"In spiritual matters there is a simple, infallible test: everything that
proceeds from the ego is evil; everything that proceeds from love for others is
good."
"Service is the only badge of nobility. I see nothing offensive in the
conception of fertilizer as the highest symbol of man’s destiny: it is
fertilizer that produces wheat and roses."
"The worst folk song is superior to the best symphony."
"A man braver than his brothers insults them by implication. Let us aspire to no
virtue which cannot be shared."
"I have yet to see a genius or a hero who, if stuck with a burning match, would
feel less pain than his undistinguished average brother."
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"Genius is an exaggeration of dimension. So is elephantiasis. Both may be only a
disease."
"We are all brothers under the skin--and I, for one, would be willing to skin
humanity to prove it."
In the offices of the Banner Ellsworth Toohey was treated respectfully and left
alone. It was whispered that Gail Wynand did not like him--because Wynand was
always polite to him. Alvah Scarret unbent to the point of cordiality, but kept
a wary distance. There was a silent, watchful equilibrium between Toohey and
Scarret: they understood each other.
Toohey made no attempt to approach Wynand in any way. Toohey seemed indifferent
to all the men who counted on the Banner. He concentrated on the others,
instead.
He organized a club of Wynand employees. It was not a labor union; it was just a
club. It met once a month in the library of the Banner. It did not concern
itself with wages, hours or working conditions; it had no concrete program at
all. People got acquainted, talked, and listened to speeches. Ellsworth Toohey
made most of the speeches. He spoke about new horizons and the press as the
voice of the masses. Gail Wynand appeared at a meeting once, entering
unexpectedly in the middle of a session. Toohey smiled and invited him to join
the club, declaring that he was eligible. Wynand did not join. He sat listening
for half an hour, yawned, got up, and left before the meeting was over.
Alvah Scarret appreciated the fact that Toohey did not try to reach into his
field, into the important matters of policy. As a kind of return courtesy,
Scarret let Toohey recommend new employees, when there was a vacancy to fill,