Three passions have governed my life:
The longings for love, the search for knowledge,
And unbearable pity for the suffering of [humankind].

Love brings ecstasy and relieves loneliness.
In the union of love I have seen
In a mystic miniature the prefiguring vision
Of the heavens that saints and poets have imagined.

With equal passion I have sought knowledge.
I have wished to understand the hearts of [people].
I have wished to know why the stars shine.

Love and knowledge led upwards to the heavens,
But always pity brought me back to earth;
Cries of pain reverberated in my heart
Of children in famine, of victims tortured
And of old people left helpless.
I long to alleviate the evil, but I cannot,
And I too suffer.

This has been my life; I found it worth living. 

Local copy of the adapted quote found
athttp://www.wisdomquotes.com/000541.html

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"I had supposed until that time that it was quite common for parents to
love their children, but the war persuaded me that it is a rare
exception. I had supposed that most people liked money better than
almost anything else, but I discovered that they liked destruction
even better. I had supposed that intellectuals frequently loved truth,
but I found here again that not ten per cent of them prefer truth to
popularity." -BR

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We are speaking on this occasion, not as members of this or that
nation, continent, or creed, but as human beings, members of the
species Man, whose continued existence is in doubt.

..    * We have to learn to think in a new way. We have to learn to
ask ourselves, not what steps can be taken to give military victory to
whatever group we prefer, for there no longer are such steps; the
question we have to ask ourselves is: what steps can be taken to
prevent a military contest of which the issue must be disastrous to
all parties?


...Here, then, is the problem which we present to you, stark and
dreadful and inescapable: Shall we put an end to the human race; or
shall mankind renounce war? People will not face this alternative
because it is so difficult to abolish war.


...There lies before us, if we choose, continual progress in
happiness, knowledge, and wisdom. Shall we, instead, choose death,
because we cannot forget our quarrels? We appeal as human beings to
human beings: Remember your humanity, and forget the rest. If you can
do so, the way lies open to a new Paradise; if you cannot, there lies
before you the risk of universal death."

-The Russell-Einstein Manifesto (1955)