Nelson Mandela

I learned that courage was not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it.

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

Let freedom reign. The sun never set on so glorious a human achievement.

I am the captain of my soul.

Nothing is black or white.

To deny people their human rights is to challenge their very humanity.

No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism.

A man’s house burns down. The smoking wreckage represents only a ruined home that was dear through years of use and pleasant associations. By and by, as the days and weeks go on, first he misses this, then that, then the other thing. And when he casts about for it he finds that it was in that house. Always it is an essential – there was but one of its kind. It cannot be replaced. It was in that house. It is irrevocably lost. It will be years before the tale of lost essentials is complete, and not till then can he truly know the magnitude of his disaster.

There is no excellent beauty that hath not some strangeness in the proportion.

That man is rich whose pleasures are the cheapest.

Of all debts men are least willing to pay the taxes. What a satire is this on government! Everywhere they think they get their moneys worth, except for these.

Hasty resolutions are of the nature of vows, and to be equally avoided

Never waste jealousy on a real man: it is the imaginary man that supplants us all in the long run.

The thirst for adventure is the vent which Destiny offers; a war, a crusade, a gold mine, a new country, speak to the imagination and offer swing and play to the confined powers.

A man should be just cultured enough to be able to look with suspicion upon culture at first, not second hand.

Most people have never learned that one of the main aims in life is to enjoy it.

The one who prosperity takes too much delight in will be the most shocked by reverses.

Cultivate the habit of being grateful for every good thing that comes to you, and to give thanks continuously. And because all things have contributed to your advancement, you should include all things in your gratitude.

Curiosity is lying in wait for every secret.

You’ve got a big, big problem if you get caught up in what people say. If you’re gonna live for what people say, you might as well lay down and forget it. Because it doesn’t work that way.

Nay, be a Columbus to whole new continents and worlds within you, opening new channels, not of trade, but of thought.