Atlas Shrugged

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 "I know it," said Rearden.
The guilt is ours, he thought. If we who were the movers, the providers, the benefactors of mankind,
were willing to let the brand of evil be stamped upon us and silently to bear punishment for our
virtues—what sort of "good" did we expect to triumph in the world?
He looked at the people around him. They had cheered him today; they had cheered him by the side of
the track of the John Galt Line.
But tomorrow they would clamor for a new directive from Wesley Mouch and a free housing project
from Orren Boyle, while Boyle's girders collapsed upon their heads. They would do it, because they
would be told to forget, as a sin, that which had made them cheer Hank Rearden.
Why were they ready to renounce their highest moments as a sin?
Why were they willing to betray the best within them? What made them believe that this earth was a
realm of evil where despair was their natural fate? He could not name the reason, but he knew that it had
to be named. He felt it as a huge question mark within the courtroom, which it was now his duty to
answer.
This was the real sentence imposed upon him, he thought—to discover what idea, what simple idea
available to the simplest man, had made mankind accept the doctrines that led it to self-destruction.
"Hank, I'll never think that it's hopeless, not ever again," said Dagny that evening, after the trial. "I'll never
be tempted to quit. You've proved that the right always works and always wins—" She stopped, then
added, "—provided one knows what is the right."
Lillian said to him at dinner next day, "So you've won, have you?"
Her voice was noncommittal; she said nothing else; she was watching him, as If studying a riddle.
The Wet Nurse asked him at the mills, "Mr. Rearden, what's a moral premise?" "What you're going to
have a lot of trouble with."
The boy frowned, then shrugged and said, laughing, "God, that was a wonderful show! What a beating
you gave them, Mr. Rearden! I sat by the radio and howled." "How do you know it was a beating?"
"Well, it was, wasn't it?" "Are you sure of it?" "Sure I'm sure." "The thing that makes you sure is a moral
premise."
The newspapers were silent. After the exaggerated attention they had given to the case, they acted as if
the trial were not worthy of notice. They printed brief accounts on unlikely pages, worded in such
generalities that no reader could discover any hint of a controversial issue.
The businessmen he met seemed to wish to evade the subject of his trial. Some made no comment at all,
but turned away, their faces showing a peculiar resentment under the effort to appear noncommittal, as if
they feared that the mere act of looking at him would be interpreted as taking a stand. Others ventured to
comment: "In my opinion, Rearden, it was extremely unwise of you. . . . It seems to me that this is hardly
the time to make enemies. . . . We can't afford to arouse resentment."
"Whose resentment?" he asked.