“People get discouraged. They should remember, from me, it takes courage not to be discouraged.”

I don’t say they’re naive, I say they’re stupid. Stupid to an incredible degree to send young people out to kill other young people they don’t even know, who never did anybody any harm, never harmed them. That is the current system. I am naive? That’s insane.

Look what’s happened to the same-sex marriages. To tell somebody a man can become a woman, a woman can become a man, and a man can marry a man, they would have said,

I prefer law to war under all circumstances.

What has happened here [aftermath of 9/11] is not war in its traditional sense. This is clearly a crime against humanity.

If it’s naive to want peace instead of war, let ’em make sure they say I’m naive. Because I want peace instead of war.

“You’re crazy.” But it’s a reality today. So the world is changing. And you shouldn’t – you know – be despairing because it’s never happened before. Nothing new ever happened before.

And I also learned that if we did not devote ourselves to developing effective world law, the same cruel mentality that made the Holocaust possible might one day destroy the entire human race.

Well, if it’s naive to want peace instead of war, let ’em make sure they say I’m naive. Because I want peace instead of war. If they tell me they want war instead of peace.

Nuremberg taught me that creating a world of tolerance and compassion would be a long and arduous task.

War makes murderers out of otherwise decent people. All wars, and all decent people.

I don’t think I’m an idealist. I’m a realist. And I see the progress. The progress has been remarkable. Look at the emancipation of woman in my lifetime. You’re sitting here as a female.

A surgeon is surrounded by people who are sick, discouraged, afraid, embittered, dying – but also courageous, loving, wise, compassionate and alive.