“But I knew the truth and that's why I was so sad. Every moment before this one depends on this one. Everything in the history of the world can be proven wrong in one moment.”

Source: Closer

Speech to a joint session of the US Congress (12 March 1947), outlining what became known as The Truman Doctrine
Context: At the present moment in world history nearly every nation must choose between alternative ways of life. The choice is too often not a free one.
One way of life is based upon the will of the majority, and is distinguished by free institutions, representative government, free elections, guarantees of individual liberty, freedom of speech and religion, and freedom from political oppression.
The second way of life is based upon the will of a minority forcibly imposed upon the majority. It relies upon terror and oppression, a controlled press and radio; fixed elections, and the suppression of personal freedoms.
I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.
I believe that we must assist free peoples to work out their own destinies in their own way.

The Beginning and the End (1947)

Tattoo

Source: Tsurezure-Gusa (Essays in Idleness), p. 92

Pearls of Wisdom

Knowing Yourself: The True in the False (1996)

Source: Pandora