“Human beings, who are almost unique in having the ability to learn from the experience of others, are also remarkable for their apparent disinclination to do so.
You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“When there is no desire for fruit, there is no temptation for untruth or himsa (violence). Take any instance of untruth or violence, and it will be found that at its back was the desire to attain the cherished end. But it may be freely admitted that the Gita was not written to establish ahimsa. It was an accepted and primary duty even before the Gita age. The Gita had to deliver the message of renunciation of fruit. This is clearly brought out as early as the second chapter. 26. But if the Gita believed in ahimsa or it was included in desirelessness, why did the author take a warlike illustration? When the Gita was written, although people believed in ahimsa, wars were not only not taboo, but nobody observed the contradiction between them and ahimsa.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Je dois dire qu'en dehors des cas où elle m'exposa au ridicule, cette timidité insurmontable n'a jamais tourné à mon désavantage. Bien au contraire, j'ai mis ce handicap à profit en apprenant à devenir concis.
Jadis je cherchais mes mots. Aujourd'hui je prends plaisir à en réduire le nombre.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“All that appears and happens about and around us is uncertain, transient.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“I simply want to tell the story of my numerous experiments with Truth, and as my life consists of nothing but those experiments; it is true that the story will take the shape of an autobiography. But”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Purification being highly infectious, purification of oneself necessarily leads to the purification of one's surroundings.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Live as if you were to die tomorrow. Learn as if you were to live forever.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“A reformer cannot afford to have close intimacy with him whom he seeks to reform. True friendship is an identity of souls rarely to be found in this world.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Non-violence, which is the quality of the heart, cannot come by an appeal to the brain.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“But you can wake a man only if he is really asleep. No effort that you make will produce any effect upon him if he is merely pretending sleep.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Friendship that insists upon agreement on all matters is not worth the name. Friendship to be real must ever sustain the weight of honest differences, however sharp they be.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Nor is the Gita a collection of do’s and dont’s. What is lawful for one may be unlawful for another. What may be permissible at one time, or in one place, may not be so at another time, and in another place. Desire for fruit is the only universal prohibition. Desirelessness is obligatory.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
