insure its future peace? Answers Romain Rolland: “Half a century ago might dominated right. To-day things are far worse. Might is right. Might has devoured right.”
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No people, no nation has ever won or can ever win real freedom through violence. Violence implies the use of force, and force is oppressive. Those who fight and win with force, ultimately find it both convenient and expedient to follow the line of least resistance; and they continue to rely upon force in time of peace as well, ostensibly to maintain law and order, but practically to suppress and stifle every rising spirit. The power may thus change hands and yet the evil process continues without a moment’s break. Non-violence does not carry with it this degeneration which is inherent in the use of violence. Mr. Gandhi is highly eloquent on this score when he says:
“They may forget non-cooperation, but they dare not forget non-violence. Indeed, non-cooperation is non-violence. We are violent when we support a government whose creed is violence. It bases itself finally not on right but might. Its last appeal is not to reason, nor the heart, but to the sword. We are tired of this creed and we have risen against it. Let us not ourselves belie our profession by being violent.” ******** “Non-violence is complete innocence. Complete non-violence is complete absence of ill-will against all that lives,—and in its active form, good will towards all life. It is pure love, as I read it in the Hindu Scriptures, in the Bible, in the Koran. Non-violence is a perfect state. It is a goal towards which mankind moves naturally, though unconsciously. Man does not become divine when he personfies innocence in himself. Only then does he become truly man.
“Restraint is the law of our being. Highest perfection is unattainable without highest restraint. Suffering is thus the badge of the human tribe .... Satisfaction lies in the effort, not in the attainment.....”
“One must love one’s enemies while hating their deeds; hate Satanism while loving Satan” is the principal article of Gandhi’s faith, and he has proved himself worthy of all his
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