Hope is a path on the mountainside. At first there is no path. But then there are people passing that way. And there is a path.

I thought: hope cannot be said to exist, nor can it be said not to exist. It is just like roads across the earth. For actually the earth had no roads to begin with, but when many men pass one way, a road is made.

Let those who hanker after the past return to the past! Let those who want to leave the world leave the world! Let those who want to ascend to heaven do so! Let those whose souls want to leave their bodies expire quickly! The earth today should be inhabited by man with a firm hold on the present, a firm hold on the earth.

The most horrible thing is not a government that stages public executions, but a government that secretly disposes of its victims.

Despair is as hollow and deceptive as hope!

The most important thing... was to change their spirit; and since at that time I felt that literature was the best means to this end, I decided to promote literary movement.

I felt that if a man's proposals met with approval, it should encourage him; if they met with opposition, it should make him fight back; but the real tragedy for him was to lift up his voice among the living and meet with no response neither approval nor opposition just as if he were left helpless in a boundless desert.