Sunday Salute XVII

From Wikipedia.

Nelson Mandella (born 18 July 1918) is a South African politician who served as President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999, the first ever to be elected in a fully representative democratic election. Before being elected President, Mandela was a militant anti-apartheid activist, and the leader and co-founder of Umkhonto we Sizwe, the armed wing of theAfrican National Congress(ANC). In 1962 he was arrested and convicted of sabotage and other charges, and sentenced to life imprisonment. Mandela went on to serve 27 years in prison, spending many of these years on Robben Island. Following his release from prison on 11 February 1990, Mandela led his party in the negotiations that led to the establishment of democracy in 1994. As President, he frequently gave priority to reconciliation, while introducing policies aimed at combating poverty and inequality in South Africa.  Mr. Mandella celebrated his 94th birthday on Wednesday. He had a special visitor.

“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.”

“One of the things I learned when I was negotiating was that until I changed myself, I could not change others.”

“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.”

“ As we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same.”

“As I walked out the door toward the gate that would lead to my freedom, I knew if I didn't leave my bitterness and hatred behind, I'd still be in prison.”

“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.”

“There can be no keener revelation of a society's soul than the way in which it treats its children.”

“You will achieve more in this world through acts of mercy than you will through acts of retribution.”

“I have never cared very much for personal prizes. A person does not become a freedom fighter in the hope of winning awards.”

“It is what we make out of what we have, not what we are given, that separates one person from another.

“Success in politics demands that you must take your people into confidence about your views and state them very clearly, very politely, very calmly, but nevertheless, state them openly.”

“If you want to make peace with your enemy, you have to work with your enemy. Then he becomes your partner. -Nelson Mandela, activist, South African president, Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1918)”

“I shall stick to our vow: never, never under any circumstances, to say anything unbecoming of the other...The trouble, of course, is that most successful men are prone to some form of vanity. There comes a stage in their lives when they consider it permissible to be egotistic and to brag to the public at large about their unique achievements.”

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”

― Nelson Mandela

Previous Salutes
Rachael Maddow   Matt Damon  
Jehan Sadat   Jane Goodall    Mohandas Gandhi  
 Eleanor Roosevelt    Lyndon B. Johnson      Michelle Obama
Helen Hayes   Marion Wright Edelman     Bishop Gene Robinson
Bishop Desmond Tutu       Rachel Carson          Helen Keller
Martin Luther King, Jr          Dalai Lama         Dag Hammarskjold