Czech playwright, philosopher, dissident, first president of Czechoslovakia, recipient of the Kyoto Prize.
Perhaps hopelessness is the very soil that nourishes human hope; perhaps one could never find sense in life without first experiencing absurdity.
The salvation of this human world lies nowhere else than in the human heart, in human power to reflect.
Keep the company of those who seek the truth; run from those who have found it.
Hope is not the conviction that something will turn out well but the certainty that something makes sense.
You are thrown into it by your personal sense of responsibility, combined with a complex set of external circumstances.
Truth and love must prevail over lies and hatred. This is the only path to dignity.
Human rights are not a privilege, they are the foundation upon which every society rests.