A Reverend Dudley once asked Ayn Rand, “What are we going to do with the two billion [now almost eight billion] people that populate the Earth?”
She replied:
The only thing to do with them is to do nothing. The only good thing we can do for mankind is to leave it alone, which means to leave it free. Men do have the capacity to work out their own destiny, and nobody else can work it out for them, and the only obstacle that stops them and destroys them is the interference of other men. All tyrannies have originated, not for an evil, but for an altruistic purpose—the desire “to do something” with mankind.
This quote comes from one of two letters that Rand wrote to clergymen, one in 1943, another in 1965.
“Do nothing!” Ayn Rand’s advice to leave men alone to live their own lives is what we desperately need to do today. What an amazing world it would be if that were the status quo.
Those interested in reading more about liberty may find value in this pamphlet created by me and Craig Biddle.
Can you provide a referenece or link to those letters which Miss Rand wrote? I have a conservative friend who, knowing my interst in Rand’s work, has asked me to send him some of her nonfiction. Thank you.
Hi Doug, the letters are linked in the post—just click the words “two letters” and you should be good to go 🙂