Top 115 Quotes & Sayings by Lech Walesa - Page 2

I have a vision, and I know I'm right.

I don't like to look a man in the eye.

I have more than 100 honorary Ph.D.s.

I cannot stand for more than half an hour in one place.

I risked my life.

Tomorrow there will be no division to Europe and Asia. These are old concepts that would remain only on maps. Everything will be united. Companies will be united. It is a process of structures growing due to the technological progress.

After the war, Germany fully confessed to all its dirty tricks. It's necessary to is draw a line under the past, even if people did something evil. Until we do, wounds won't heal.

We have travelled so far in our technical advancements that we are no longer located in our own countries.

Now is the era of intellect, information and the Internet.

I am no politician.

My struggle led to the reunification of Germany and the creation of the state of Europe. We destroyed the borders; globalisation is on the horizon.

My health is very much improved.

Democracy is made up of three elements. One is whether the laws support pluralistic principles. The second is whether the people take advantage of these laws. The third element is whether the peoples' wallets are thick enough to benefit from this democracy.

No minority should climb all over the majority.

Poles finished communism, and Great Britain profited significantly from this.

Communism is a monopolistic system, economically and politically.

We were hoping Obama would reclaim moral leadership for America. That failed.

I will talk and act, not on my knees, but with prudence.

Up to the 20th century, we can say that this whole period was an Earth epoch, 'Earth' meaning the riches of the earth, simple physical work. That is why there were wars, the movement of frontiers, war over riches.

I don't have regrets I didn't spend more time with my family because I've lived my life to the full, and you can't look back in regret.

Communists are great capitalists, so there is no threat anymore.

My character and personality is today and tomorrow; I do not work well remembering further back.

I'm a fatalist.

I represent the concept that pluralism is essential, union pluralism. I made an oath about this.

When I was fighting communism, there was rapid development of satellite television and cell phones, and communism, to survive, would have to block all these information devices.

People always ask me, 'Lech, aren't you afraid of being killed?' And as an answer I shrug my shoulders.

The politicians always told us that the Cold War stand-off could only change by way of nuclear war. None of them believed that such systemic change was possible.

There should be a left leg and a right leg. And I'll be in between

It is not difficult to censor foreign news. What is difficult today is to censor one's own thoughts, To sit by and see the blind man On the sightless horse, riding into the bottomless abyss.

Words are plentiful; deeds are precious.

Communism prevents organizations from developing by stopping the flow of information. The system is based on police and listening devices and triggers the worst characteristics in humans.

I only fear God, and my wife - sometimes.

President Lech Kaczynski is not at all active in Poland and his image abroad leaves a lot to be desired.

If there were fish in the lake, fishing would make no sense.

Power is only important as an instrument for service to the powerless.

In many parts of the world the people are searching for a solution which would link the two basic values: peace and justice. The two are like bread and salt for mankind.

I believed it would succeed. It was Polish Solidarity and its victory that put an end to the old era when what mattered were borders and rival blocs.

We need a global parliament, a global government and possibly a global ministry for security.

The United States is only one superpower. Today they lead the world. Nobody has doubts about it. Militarily. They also lead economically but they're getting weak. But they don't lead morally and politically anymore. The world has no leadership. The United States was always the last resort and hope for all other nations. There was the hope, whenever something was going wrong, one could count on the United States. Today, we lost that hope.

I think if I got a bicycle from my father, I should give a car to my son.

Deep faith eliminates fear.

Without a single shot we've managed to liberate the world of communism but now there is a need for a global solidarity.

He who once became aware of the power of Solidarity and who breathed the air of freedom will not be crushed.

Building democracy as an imposition from abroad is a form of imperialism.

This is the moment of your defeat; you have just put in the last nails in the coffin of communism.

Freedom may be the soul of humanity, but often you have to struggle to prove it.

We respect the dignity and the rights of every man and every nation. The path to a brighter future of the world leads through honest reconciliation of the conflicting interests and not through hatred and bloodshed. To follow that path means to enhance the moral power of the all-embracing idea of human solidarity.

We must be courageous but also reasonable. The world admires us for walking a tightrope without falling off. It asks us to keep our balance.

The world needs leaders of vision instead of leaders on television.

Irrespective of todays judgment and the price we had to pay in this generation, we were able to close an epoch of divisions, different blocs and borders, opening the way for an era of globalization.

When he saw injustice, he wanted to do away with it. He saw communism, and he wanted to put an end to it.

[Without Pope John Paul II] there would be no end of Communism or at least much later, and the end would have been bloody.

"It all came from there," Lech Walesa said, pointing to a TV when a reporter asked him why communism fell.

Everyone wants a voice in human freedom. There's a fire burning inside all of us.

If once again Germany destabilizes Europe, then Germany will be not be divided again, but wiped off the map. East and West have the necessary technology in order to enforce this verdict. If Germany begins again, there is no other solution.