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There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to find the ways in which you yourself have altered.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
No one is born hating another person because of the colour of his skin, or his background, or his religion. People must learn to hate, and if they can learn to hate, they can be taught to love, for love comes more naturally to the human heart than its opposite.
NELSON MANDELA, Autobiography
[A] new society cannot be created by reproducing the repugnant past, however refined or enticingly repackaged.
NELSON MANDELA, Nobel lecture, 1993
I was called a terrorist yesterday, but when I came out of jail, many people embraced me, including my enemies, and that is what I normally tell other people who say those who are struggling for liberation in their country are terrorists. I tell them that I was also a terrorist yesterday, but, today, I am admired by the very people who said I was one.
NELSON MANDELA, Larry King Live, May 16, 2000
The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.
NELSON MANDELA, Autobiography
Freedom would be meaningless without security in the home and in the streets.
NELSON MANDELA, speech, April 27, 1995
Let there be justice for all. Let there be peace for all. Let there be work, bread, water and salt for all. Let each know that for each the body, the mind and the soul have been freed to fulfil themselves.
NELSON MANDELA, speech, May 10, 1994
The greatest glory in living lies not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall.
NELSON MANDELA, Autobiography
After climbing a great hill, one only finds that there are many more hills to climb.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
When a man is denied the right to live the life he believes in, he has no choice but to become an outlaw.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
When there is danger, a good leader takes the front line; but when there is celebration, a good leader stays in the back of the room.
NELSON MANDELA, O: The Oprah Magazine, Apr. 2001
Freedom is indivisible; the chains on any one of my people were the chains on all of them, the chains on all of my people were the chains on me.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
In court we challenged the government, we said that the government should be in the docket, not us. That was our stand.
NELSON MANDELA, Larry King Live, May 16, 2000
No one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails. A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens but its lowest ones.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
Out of the experience of an extraordinary human disaster that lasted too long, must be born a society of which all humanity will be proud.
NELSON MANDELA, Inaugural celebration address, May 10, 1994
Even if you have a terminal disease, you don't have to sit down and mope. Enjoy life and challenge the illness that you have.
NELSON MANDELA, Readers Digest interview, 2005
In my country we go to prison first and then become President.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
I do not want to be presented as some deity. I would like to be remembered as an ordinary human being with virtues and vices.
NELSON MANDELA, Readers Digest interview, 2005
A leader ... is like a shepherd. He stays behind the flock, letting the most nimble go out ahead, whereupon the others follow, not realizing that all along they are being directed from behind.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
In its proper meaning equality before the law means the right to participate in the making of the laws by which one is governed, a constitution which guarantees democratic rights to all sections of the population, the right to approach the court for protection or relief in the case of the violation of rights guaranteed in the constitution, and the right to take part in the administration of justice as judges, magistrates, attorneys-general, law advisers and similar positions. In the absence of these safeguards the phrase 'equality before the law', in so far as it is intended to apply to us, is meaningless and misleading. All the rights and privileges to which I have referred are monopolised by whites, and we enjoy none of them. The white man makes all the laws, he drags us before his courts and accuses us, and he sits in judgement over us.
NELSON MANDELA, first court statement, 1962
I have never cared very much for personal prizes. A person does not become a freedom fighter in the hope of winning awards.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
Only free men can negotiate; prisoners cannot enter into contracts. Your freedom and mine cannot be separated.
NELSON MANDELA, Time Magazine, Feb. 25, 1985
I learned to have the patience to listen when people put forward their views, even if I think those views are wrong. You can't reach a just decision in a dispute unless you listen to both sides.
NELSON MANDELA, O: The Oprah Magazine, Apr. 2001
If there is a country that has committed unspeakable atrocities in the world, it is the United States of America. They don't care for human beings.... What I am condemning is that one power, with a president [George W. Bush] who has no foresight, who cannot think properly, is now wanting to plunge the world into a holocaust.
NELSON MANDELA, speech at the International Women's Forum in Johannesburg prior to the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Jan. 29, 2003
I like a leader who can, while pointing out a mistake, bring up the good things the other person has done. If you do that, then the person sees that you have a complete picture of him. There is nobody more dangerous than one who has been humiliated, even when you humiliate him rightly.
NELSON MANDELA, O: The Oprah Magazine, Apr. 2001
Education is the great engine of personal development. It is through education that the daughter of a peasant can become a doctor, that the son of a mineworker can become the head of the mine, that a child of farmworkers can become the president of a great nation. It is what we make out of what we have, not what we are given, that separates one person from another.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
I had no epiphany, no singular revelation, no moment of truth, but a steady accumulation of a thousand slights, a thousand indignities and a thousand unremembered moments produced in me an anger, a rebelliousness, a desire to fight the system that imprisoned my people. There was no particular day on which I said, Henceforth I will devote myself to the liberation of my people; instead, I simply found myself doing so, and could not do otherwise.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
There is a universal respect and even admiration for those who are humble and simple by nature, and who have absolute confidence in all human beings irrespective of their social status.
NELSON MANDELA, Conversations with Myself
Part of being optimistic is keeping one's head pointed toward the sun, one's feet moving forward. There were many dark moments when my faith in humanity was sorely tested, but I would not and could not give myself up to despair. That way lays defeat and death.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
- The time for the healing of the wounds has come.
- The moment to bridge the chasms that divide us has come.
- The time to build is upon us.
NELSON MANDELA, Inaugural celebration address, May 10, 1994
There is no easy walk to freedom anywhere, and many of us will have to pass through the valley of the shadow of death again and again before we reach the mountaintop of our desires.
NELSON MANDELA, Long Walk to Freedom
During my lifetime I have dedicated myself to this struggle of the African people. I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black domination. I have cherished the ideal of a democratic and free society in which all persons will live together in harmony and with equal opportunities. It is an ideal which I hope to live for. But, my lord, if needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die.
NELSON MANDELA, statement before Pretoria Supreme Court, Apr. 20, 1964
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