India -- Politics and government -- 1919-1947; Nationalism -- India
EDITOR: This is one of those instances which demonstrate that sometimes
poison is used to kill poison. This, then, will not be a good point
regarding machinery. As it expires, the machinery, as it were, says to
us: "Beware and avoid me. You will derive no benefit from me, and the
benefit that may accrue from printing will avail only those who are
infected with the machinery-craze." Do not, therefore, forget the main
thing. It is necessary to realise that machinery is bad. We shall then
be able gradually to do away with it. Nature has not provided any way
whereby we may reach a desired goal all of a sudden. If, instead of
welcoming machinery as a boon, we would look upon it as an evil, it
would ultimately go.
CHAPTER XX
CONCLUSION
READER: From your views I gather that you would form a third party. You
are neither an extremist nor a moderate.
EDITOR: That is a mistake. I do not think of a third party at all. We do
not all think alike. We cannot say that all the moderates hold identical
views. And how can those who want to serve only have a party? I would
serve both the moderates and the extremists. Where I should differ from
them, I would respectfully place my position before them, and continue
my service.
READER: What, then, would you say to both the parties?
EDITOR: I would say to the extremists:--"I know that you want Home Rule
for India; it is not to be had for your asking. Everyone will have to
take it for himself. What others get for me is not Home Rule but foreign
rule; therefore, it would not be proper for you to say that you have
obtained Home Rule, if you expelled the English. I have already
described the true nature of Home Rule. This you would never obtain by
force of arms. Brute-force is not natural to the Indian soil. You will
have, therefore, to rely wholly on soul-force. You must not consider
that violence is necessary at any stage for reaching our goal."
I would say to the moderates:--"Mere petitioning is derogatory; we
thereby confess inferiority. To say that British rule is indispensable,
is almost a denial of the Godhead. We cannot say that anybody or
anything is indispensable except God. Moreover, commonsense should tell
us that to state that, for the time being, the presence of the English
in India is a necessity, is to make them conceited.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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