When the ablest men turn into cowards, the average men turn into brutes.
“The truly and deliberately evil men are a very small minority; it is the appeaser who unleashes them on mankind; it is the appeaser’s intellectual abdication that invites them to take over. When a culture’s dominant trend is geared to irrationality, the thugs win over the appeasers. When intellectual leaders fail to foster the best in the mixed, unformed, vacillating character of people at large, the thugs are sure to bring out the worst. When the ablest men turn into cowards, the average men turn into brutes.” — Ayn Rand Disclaimer: While we do not support the wordview of Ayn Rand (Objectivism) — to the extent that she uses lumber from a Christian worldview to build her house – we would find agreement. We believe that what Schaeffer called “true truth,” and what Augustine referred to as “plundering the Egyptians,” belongs to God and to us as Christians. Therefore we do not shun truth whether it comes from Rand or pagans such as the philosophers.