V?clav Havel

The truth is not simply what you think it is; it is also the circumstances in which it is said, and to whom, why and how it is said.

Hope is a state of mind, not of the world. Hope, in this deep and powerful sense, is not the same as joy that things are going well, or willingness to invest in enterprises that are obviously heading for .success, but rather an ability to work for something because it is good.
V?clav Havel - Disturbing the Peace, ch. 5 (1986; tr. 1990).
Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It is not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out.

- V?clav Havel