"Martyrs are spiritual heroes. Every man has his years of martyrdom. Christ was the great martyr of our race. Through Him martyrdom has become infinitely meaningful and holy. Oh! that I had a taste for martyrdom!" — Novalis
"If you try to see for yourself how human individuals have fared who really wanted to seek Christ Jesus, who really wanted to find the path to Him, it has always been a path of martyrdom. Christ Jesus has always had to be sought in defiance of convention, just as even today He must still be sought in the context of a battle against the conventions that still persist." — Rudolf Steiner