JOHANNESBURG — Well-wishers have gathered at churches. Others have gone to the monuments built in his honor, offering prayers. Some said they hoped he would recover soon, while others said that he had lived a long life and that the country must let him go.

“It is not easy, but we must think of his pain,” said Katlego Tsolanku, a 30-year-old saleswoman at a shopping center near Soweto, preparing herself to let go of a man she idolizes: former President Nelson Mandela.

“He has given us so much,” she said. “He deserves to rest.”

Mr. Mandela spent a fourth day in intensive care at a Pretoria hospital on Tuesday, battling a lung infection that has raised fears that he is nearing the end of his life.

Family members, including his former wife, Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, and several of his grandchildren, have visited him in the last 24 hours. Local news reports said his daughter Zenani Dlamini, the South African ambassador to Argentina, is returning to the country to be at his side. His wife, Graça Machel, a children’s rights advocate, canceled a trip to London, where she had been scheduled to give a speech on hunger.