Alan Paton
Alan Paton
Alan Stewart Patonwas a South African author and anti-apartheid activist...
NationalitySouth African
ProfessionNovelist
Date of Birth11 January 1903
knows life secret
who knows what life is, for life is a secret
life wise struggle
Who knows for what we live, and struggle, and die?... Wise men write many books, in words too hard to understand. But this, the purpose of our lives, the end of all our struggle, is beyond all human wisdom.
crop ease judges particular points society tends towards year
This year the crop tends towards the personal, the particular and the recreational. This, the judges believe, points to a society considerably more at ease with itself...
ask
You ask yourself not if this or that is expedient, but if it is right.
beyond hard human knows men purpose wise words
Who knows for what we live, and struggle, and die? Wise men write many books, in words too hard to understand. But this, the purpose of our lives, the end of all our struggle, is beyond all human wisdom.
destroy himself nowhere rather
The Afrikaner has nowhere to go, and that's why he would rather destroy himself than capitulate.
men strive
When men are ruled by fear, they strive to prevent the very changes that will abate it.
offence
But to punish and not to restore, that is the greatest of all offences.
giving unborn-child too-much
For fear will rob him of all if he gives too much.
money children clothes
And money is not something to go mad about ... Money is for food and clothes and comfort, and a visit to the pictures. Money is to make happy the lives of children.
sorrow may cry-the-beloved-country
But sorrow is better than fear. For fear impoverishes always, while sorrow may enrich.
men land care
The ground is holy, being even as it came from the Creator. Keep it, guard it, care for it, for it keeps men, guards men, cares for men. Destroy it and man is destroyed.
heart
For who can stop the heart from breaking?
eye heart men
What broke in a man when he could bring himself to kill another? What broke when he could bring himself to thrust down the knife into the warm flesh, to bring down the axe on the living head, to cleave down between the seeing eyes, to shoot the gun that would drive death into the beating heart?