“On the first day of school, my teacher, Miss Mdingane, gave each of us an English name and said that from thenceforth that was the name we would answer to in school. This was the custom among Africans in those days and was undoubtedly due to the British bias of our education. The education I received was a British education, in which British ideas, British culture, British institutions, were automatically assumed to be superior. There was no such thing as African culture. Africans of my generation—and even today—generally have both an English and an African name. Whites were either unable or unwilling to pronounce an African name, and considered it uncivilized to have one. That day, Miss Mdingane told me that my new name was Nelson. Why she bestowed this particular name upon me I have no idea. Perhaps it had something to do with the great British sea captain Lord Nelson, but that would be only a guess.”
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Nelson Mandela
I never lost hope that this great transformation would occur (...) I always knew that deep down in every human heart, there was mercy and generosity. 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.
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Nelson Mandela
“We must use time creatively, and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right.”
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Nelson Mandela
“after years of imprisonment, physical and emotional abuse, and separation from his family, Mandela said, “I realized that they could take everything from me except my mind and my heart. They could not take those things. Those things I still had control over. And I decided not to give them away.” So Mandela’s story is really the story of those two things he never gave away: his brilliant mind, and his great heart.”
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Nelson Mandela
“Losing a sense of time is an easy way to lose one’s grip and even one’s sanity.”
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Nelson Mandela
“Having resentment against someone is like drinking poison and thinking it will kill your enemy.”
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Nelson Mandela
“Democracy meant all men were to be heard, and a decision was taken together as a people. Majority rule was a foreign notion. A minority was not to be crushed by a majority.”
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Nelson Mandela
“It is said that 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.”
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Nelson Mandela
“Politics can be strengthened by music, but music has a potency that defies politics.”
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Nelson Mandela
“It is music and dancing that make me at peace with the world.”
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Nelson Mandela
“I AM THE MASTER OF MY FATE AND THE CAPTAIN OF MY DESTINY.”
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Nelson Mandela
“Your playing small does not serve the world. There's nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you.”
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Nelson Mandela
“If you want to make peace with your enemy, you have to work with your enemy. Then he becomes your partner.”
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Nelson Mandela
“Sometimes it falls upon a generation to be great, you can be that generation”
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Nelson Mandela
“Niente come tornare in un luogo rimasto immutato
ci fa scoprire quanto siamo cambiati...”
―
Nelson Mandela
