“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
“I am not a saint, unless you think of a saint as a sinner who keeps on trying.”
―
Nelson Mandela
“I have fought against white domination, and I have fought against black domination,” he told the court. “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 for which I hope to live for and to see realized. But my lord, if it needs be, it is an ideal for which I am prepared to die.”
―
Nelson Mandela
“I remember Mac retorting that hundreds of years ago there was a Hindi word for a craft that flew in the air, long before the airplane was invented, but that did not mean that airplanes existed in ancient India.”
―
Nelson Mandela
“No one is born hating another person because of the color 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
“Don't Judge a person by his success stories, but only with how many times the person stood up, after falling down.”
―
Nelson Mandela
“It is said that no one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails.”
―
Nelson Mandela
“And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
―
Nelson Mandela
“There can be no keener revelation of a society's soul than the way in which it treats its children.”
―
Nelson Mandela
“If I had my time over I would do the same again, so would any man who dares call himself a man.”
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Nelson Mandela
“We do not want freedom without bread, nor do we want bread without freedom.
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Nelson Mandela
“los padres raramente conocen el lado romántico de la vida de sus hijos.”
―
Nelson Mandela
“One day, I was on the front lawn of the property and aimed the gun at a sparrow perched high in a tree. Hazel Goldreich, Arthur's wife, was watching me and jokingly remarked that I would never hit the target. But she had hardly finished the sentence when the sparrow fell to the ground. I turned to her and was about to boast, when the Goldreichs' son Paul, then about five years old, turned to me with tears in his eyes and said, "David, why did you kill that bird? Its mother will be sad." My mood immediately shifted from one of pride to shame; I felt that this small boy had far more humanity than I did. It was an odd sensation for a man who was the leader of a nascent guerrilla army.”
―
Nelson Mandela