We can only give a heart as it is; if we can take away from it, we cannot add anything. But if we feel that it is just to sacrifice something, then it is better to sacrifice the heart as it is than to sacrifice nothing at all. Perhaps it is not a worthy gift. But what else can we do if there is no other gift available? What can we do when not only can we not obtain anything better anywhere, but nothing else is accepted as a sacrifice and a gift except our heart, no matter how it is, no matter how much we are ashamed of it, no matter how convinced we are of its devaluation and the shortness of the life it has left. If the heart was not sacrificed earlier, while it was younger, while it was unblemished, while it had a long life ahead of it in which it could grow much love, what remains but to sacrifice the heart as it is. It is not the giver who judges the gift, but the recipient.
(Jaroslav Durych, Heart and Cross, private print of the magazine Na hlubinu, 1932)
