Overcoming poverty is not a gesture of charity. It is an act of justice.

Our march to freedom is irreversible. We must not allow fear to stand in our way.

No country can really develop unless its citizens are educated.

When the water starts boiling
it is foolish to turn off the heat.

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.

No power on this earth can destroy the thirst for human dignity.

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.

Young people are capable, when aroused, of bringing down the towers of oppression and raising the banners of freedom.

Courage is not the absence of fear, but the triumph over it.

In some ways, I saw the garden as a metaphor for certain aspects of my life. A leader must also tend his garden; he, too, plants seeds, and then watches, cultivates, and harvests the results. Like the gardener, a leader must take responsibility for what he cultivates; he must mind his work, try to repel enemies, preserve what can be preserved, and eliminate what cannot succeed.

Blaming things on the past does not make them better.

The Good News borne by our risen Messiah who chose not one race, who chose not one country, who chose not one language, who chose not one tribe, who chose all of humankind!

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

We signal that good can be achieved amongst human beings who are prepared to trust, prepared to believe in the goodness of people.

I hate race discrimination most intensely and in all its manifestations. I have fought it all during my life; I fight it now, and will do so until the end of my days.

I really wanted to retire and rest and spend more time with my children, my grandchildren and of course with my wife.

I did not enjoy the violence of boxing so much as the science of it. I was intrigued by how one moved one's body to protect oneself, how one used a strategy both to attack and retreat, how one paced oneself over a match.

It is not beyond our power to create a world in which all children have access to a good education.

The process of illusion and disillusionment is part of life and goes on endlessly.

It is in your hands to create a better world for all who live in it.