Notes to the Future Quotes

“It will forever remain an accusation and a challenge to all men and women of conscience that it took as long as it has, before all of us stood up to say enough is enough.”
― Nelson Mandela, Notes to the Future: Words of Wisdom

“It is never my custom to use words lightly. If twenty-seven years in prison have done anything to us, it was to use the silence of solitude to make us understand how precious words are and how real speech is in its impact on the way people live and die.”
― Nelson Mandela, Notes to the Future: Words of Wisdom

“I cherish my own freedom dearly, but I care even more for your freedom. From a response to an offer of conditional freedom, read by Zindzi Mandela at a rally, Jabulani Stadium, Soweto, South Africa,”
― Nelson Mandela, Notes to the Future: Words of Wisdom

“But the hard facts were that fifty years of non-violence had brought the African people nothing but more and more repressive legislation, and fewer and fewer rights.”
― Nelson Mandela, Notes to the Future: Words of Wisdom

“A new world will be won not by those who stand at a distance with their arms folded, but by those who are in the arena, whose garments are torn by storms and whose bodies are maimed in the course of the contest. From a letter to Winnie Mandela,”
― Nelson Mandela, Notes to the Future: Words of Wisdom

“Although we had no hope of defeating the enemy in the battlefield, nevertheless, we fought back to keep the idea of liberation alive. From a conversation with Richard Stengel, January 13, 1993”
― Nelson Mandela, Notes to the Future: Words of Wisdom

“We do not want freedom without bread, nor do we want bread without freedom. Investiture, Clark University, Atlanta, Georgia, USA, July 10, 1993”
― Nelson Mandela, Notes to the Future: Words of Wisdom

“The purpose of freedom is to create it for others. Prison desk calendar, written on Robben Island, June 2, 1979”
― Nelson Mandela, Notes to the Future: Words of Wisdom

“Bildung ist der Motor persönlicher Entwicklung. Durch Bildung wird aus der Tochter eines Bauers einen Ärztin, aus dem Sohn eines Mienenarbeiters deren Leiter, aus dem Kind eines Landarbeiter Präsident einer marken Nation. Was wir aus dem machen was uns mitgegeben wird, unterscheidet letztendlich erst einen Menschen vom anderen.”
― Nelson Mandela, Meine Waffe ist das Wort: Mit einem Vorwort von Desmond Tutu

“I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it. I felt fear myself more times than I can remember, but I hid it behind a mask of boldness. The brave man is not he who does not feel afraid, but he who conquers that fear.”
― Nelson Mandela, Notes to the Future: Words of Wisdom