“Cry, the beloved country, for the unborn child that is the inheritor of our fear.

Let him not love the earth too deeply.

Let him not laugh too gladly when the water runs through his fingers, nor stand too silent when the setting sun makes red the veld with fire.

Let him not be too moved when the birds of his land are singing, nor give too much of his heart to a mountain or a valley. For fear will rob him of all if he gives too much.”

“For it is the dawn that has come, as it has come for a thousand centuries, never failing.

But when that dawn will come, of our emancipation, from the fear of bondage and the bondage of fear, why, that is a secret.”

Mandela quoted this famous book “Cry the Beloved Country” by Alan Paton in his acceptance speech as president. He said:

Cry, the Beloved Country, however, is also a monument to the future. One of South Africa’s leading humanists, Alan Paton, vividly captured his eloquent faith in the essential goodness of people in his epic work. A goodness that helped manage this small miracle of our transition, and arrested attempts by the disciples to turn our country into a wasteland.

Photo Credit: Faith poses for a photograph in Lugari District in Kenya.