There are times when we must sink to the bottom of our misery to understand truth, just as we must descend to the bottom of a well to see the stars in broad daylight.

—Vaclav Havel

truth misery daylight

More quotations from Vaclav Havel

The truth is not simply what you think it is; it is also the circumstances in which it is said, and to whom, why and how it is said.

—Vaclav Havel

You do not become a "dissident" just because you decide one day to take up this most unusual career. You are thrown into it by your personal sense of responsibility, combined with a complex set of external circumstances. You are cast out of the existing structures and placed in a position of conflict with them. It begins as an attempt to do your work well, and ends with being branded an enemy of society.

—Vaclav Havel

politics power responsibility policy circumstances

An enormous conflict between words and deeds is prevalent today: everyone talks about freedom, democracy, justice, human rights, about peace and saving the world from nuclear apocalypse; and at the same time, everyone, more or less, consciously or unconsciously, serves those values and ideals only to the extent necessary to serve himself and his "worldly" interests, personal interests, group interests, power interests, property interests, and state or great-power interests. . . . So the power structures apparently have no other choice than to sink deeper into this vicious maelstrom, and contemporary people apparently have no other choice than to wait around until the final inhibition drops away. But who should begin? Who should break this vicious circle? Responsibility cannot be preached but only borne, and the only possible place to begin is with oneself.

—Vaclav Havel

justice truth power freedom peace words democracy change responsibility talk values

More quotations tagged with “misery”

There is a limit to the amount of misery and disarray you will put up with for love, just as there is a limit to the amount of mess you can stand around a house. You can't know the limit beforehand, but you will know when you've reached it.

love limits misery cleanliness

I can see from your utter misery, from your eagerness to misunderstand each other, and from your thoroughly bad temper that this is the real thing.

—Peter Ustinov

misery eagerness temper

Even for our enemies in misery, there should be tears in our eyes.

—Charan Singh

enemies suffering misery tears

A lifetime of happiness! No man alive could bear it: it would be hell on earth.

—George Bernard Shaw

happiness misery irony

Oftentimes, when people are miserable, they will want to make other people miserable, too.

—Lemony Snicket in The Blank Book

people sadness misery