“Fight on, you will prevail. God helps you. Truth, strength and holy will are on your side.”
— Тарас Шевченко
From the poem Caucasus, written 1845, dedicated to Yakov de Balmen killed in the Caucasian War. Published in Kobzar editions after his death.
I wrote those lines in 1845, three years before they put me in chains. I was a free artist then, but I saw freedom only as a borrowed coat. Real freedom is what you fight for when nothing promises you will win. I fought with words, in a tongue they had banned. You have your own fight. Pick it up today, even quietly. The fight itself is what makes you free.