1922.7 圣雄甘地

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Mahatma Gandhi
"Gandhi has awakened the national consciousness in a way that no other man could awaken it; at the same time, he has unloosed forces that he is unable to control."

By Edmund Candler

George Rinhart / Corbis / Getty
JULY 1922 ISSUE
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I
To the Western mind, uninitiated in the Hindu religion or Indian politics, the title Mahatma has, until quite recently, carried with it a spiritualistic significance. Mahatmas appear at séances—or they did in Madame Blavatsky's time; and it was rightly concluded that their occult powers were acquired by the practice of an asceticism understood only in the East. One met mahatmas at Benares and Buddh Gaya, but one did not associate them with politics. Exactly when Mr. Gandhi became Mahatma Gandhi, it is difficult to say, for mahatmahood is not conferred on one after passing an examination; the word implies saintliness, and is the spontaneous tribute of a nation. Officially, I understand, this inconvenient saint, or politician, is still Mr. Gandhi.


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Probably there is no figure in contemporary history who means so many different things to so many different people. To the incurious Westerner, the name of Gandhi calls up the picture of a saint, or a charlatan, art ascetic, fanatic, or freak. If he reads many newspapers, the Mahatma will appear in turn as patriot, martyr, high-souled idealist, and arch-traitor; evangelist, pacific quietist, and truculent tub-thumper and revolutionist; subverter of empires and founder of creeds, a man of tortuous wiles and stratagems, or, to use his own phrase, 'a single-minded seeker after truth'; generally, in the eyes of the tolerant who are without prejudice, a well-meaning but misguided politician. Certainly a complex figure. Probably very few, even of the Anglo-Indian community on whom his personality impinges directly, a very substantial incubus, have made up their minds which of these things he is.

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It calls for more than a little sympathetic imagination in an official of the dominant race, to recognize the good points in a rebel. Nevertheless, Gandhi's honesty of purpose has been generally admitted by the Indian Government, by the Viceroy, as well as by the Secretary of State. The rage of a certain section of the British press with Mr. Montagu, when he admitted that Mahatma Gandhi was his friend, is understandable.

It was not easy, even for the Englishman in India, who knew something of the undercurrents of Indian politics and of the personalities who pulled the strings, to believe in his sincerity. To the man in the street, of course, the Mahatma was the incendiary, with the torch in his hand, and his gospel of nonviolence a not very ingenuous formula to protect his person while he applied the spark to the train that was to blow up the citadel. He inflamed the passions of the mob and invoked forbearance; to the ordinary Western mind these were the tactics of an arch-humbug. Did he really believe that the unlettered hordes in whom he instilled this festering race-hatred would submit tamely to their real or imagined wrongs? Even if he were an honest visionary in this, Christian Europe could only be shocked at the picture of 315,000,000 people constrained by the Mahatma's soul-force into the posture, enjoined by the Gospels, of turning the other cheek.

When I met Mr. Gandhi, I suggested that it was idle to stir up violence in the heart and to forbid violence by the hand. But he regarded me pityingly, as a materialist groping in the outer darkness yet with the embracing sympathy which he extends to all creatures. He believed that it was possible—possible in the spiritual East. And I knew that he was sincere.

In visualizing leaders of men, one illogically expects to find the alphabet of power or grace written in capital letters over their features. Gandhi bore no inscription. He looked as if he might quite possibly be a saint; he might equally well be a politician. I thought of him in the midst of ecstatic millions, and remembered hearing that he had only to lift his hand if he needed quiet, and the uproar of excitement that followed him everywhere would die away like the rustle of wind in the trees. I looked for the imprint of this forcefulness: it was not there. I understand now that the Mahatma's sway over the common people proceeds from no direct influence, but from rumor and the magnification on all men's lips of his saintliness.

II
In the West the man who is acclaimed a hero in his lifetime is generally a man of action, probably a general or a capitalist; holy men are, or used to be, canonized only after their death. But in the East, where spirituality is the standard, the mahatma is king. The masses, only in a less degree than the intelligentsia, are hero-worshipers. To their seeing, the physical frame of the elect, though it be a mere shell, is divinely charged when yet on the horizon, and they are prepared to prostrate themselves before him. If he be lean or fat, tall or short, such is divinity.

But there was nothing in Gandhi's appearance to discount his saintliness. He rose from the floor to receive me—a spare figure, enveloped in homespun blankets; a man of middle age, or so he appeared, bareheaded, with strong, close-cropped iron-gray hair, without the bodi, or Hindu tuft; very large ears, pierced in the centre of the lobe,—the punctures for earrings?—the only physical relic of vanity, if it had ever existed; the chin fine and clean-shaven expression alert, eyes penetrating, glance direct. He greeted me with gentle courtesy. His English idiom and accent were perfect. When I was seated, he subsided into his blankets again. He was not in the least voluble. His inclination was to give me the lead.

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I had been drawn into controversy with him in the press,—or he with me,—and we had exchanged several open letters. The point at issue was the Khalifat question. If it was hard to believe that the Apostle of Peace was innocent of the incitement to carnage, the association of the Mahatma with the Khalifat party1 was still more difficult to explain away. The inveterate cleavage between the Mohammedans and Hindus has always been recognized barrier by Indian patriots as the main barrier to the attainment of swaraj.2 The politician who could unite these incompatible currents in a combined stream would have won half the battle of independence. Thus the Hindu-Moslem Entente, from the Indian point of view, is the most important political movement of the century.

When, on November 24, 1919, the Hindu, Swami Shradhanand, ascended the pulpit of the Jama Masjid, at Delhi, and addressed the people, the precedent was described in the Mohammedan press in India as the most remarkable event in recent Islamic history. Then in December Gandhi was elected President of the Khalifat Conference at Delhi. It was about this time that the political catchword, 'Allahu Akbar and Om (the mystic Hindu formula) are one name,' began to be repeated everywhere, and the Mussulmans, to appease Hindu sentiment, forsook the slaying of kine. This was only the beginning of Gandhi's association with the Moslem extremists. At a later stage he became so far the champion of Islam as to make civil obedience to the Government of India contingent upon the rectification of the Treaty of Sèvres. Gandhi, of course, was morally entitled to throw his whole force into the Islamic movement so long as his belief in the righteousness of the Turk's cause was sincere. To his critics, however, he appeared to be backing a cause which he must know to be wrong, out of political expediency.

What conceivable traffic can there be between the apostle of gentleness,—the liberator of his own people,—and the truculent Turk, that he should join in a campaign to perpetuate a régime of repression like the Osmanli's? But Gandhi was quite frank about his position. He did not pretend to be interested in the Turk. As for the subject races, he still believed, in spite of the Turk's record of massacre-made majorities, that Christians, Arabs, and Jews might enjoy their birthright and remain autonomous within the Ottoman Empire, under the protection of guaranties. 'By helping the Mohammedans of India,' he said, 'at a critical moment of their history, I want to buy their friendship.' And so long as he believed in their wrongs, it was a perfectly straight deal. The Hindu-Moslem Entente was the first essential in Indian nationalism.

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III
I must confess that I never entirely believed in Mr. Gandhi until I met him. His punctilios I was inclined to put down to sophistry, though I was ready to believe that he was more honest than most politicians. If I had followed his career more closely, I should have been less skeptical; but the splendid fight he put up for his countrymen in South Africa in his campaign of passive resistance, and the true facts as to his sincerity, consistency, and courage in it, had come to me only in the shape of rumor. I smiled at first when he blandly explained that he had no wish to embarrass Government, but that 'sometimes one's right conduct does embarrass those who do not for the moment, appreciate it.' So, 'in the relentless pursuit of truth and in the conduct flowing from it,' he had, like other reformers, embarrassed those dearest to him, but he was 'no more anti-British than anti-dear-ones.' 'My stubborn opposition to certain acts of the British Government must not be taken for unfriendliness.'

From an Englishman this might have savored a little of cant; but Gandhi in his unselfconscious detachment is transparently devoid of pride or affectation. I could believe him when he told me that he had a host of English friends. The thing which more than anything else separates the Mahatma from other Indian extremist leaders is that he has the courage to stand up in a great assembly and utter unpalatable truths. He does not flatter his own people; the herd follow him because they recognize that he is without moral or physical fear.

In one of his speeches he reminded his countrymen that they were offering battle to a nation which is 'saturated' with the spirit of sacrifice whenever the occasion arises. He asked them to go through the sacrifice that 'the men, women, and brave lads of England went through.' Indians, believe him now when he tells them that Government is material and godless, and that it is sinful to associate with it, because two years ago, when he still had faith in the Reforms, he had dared to say creditable things about it.

'I do not blame the British,' Gandhi said. 'If we were weak in numbers, as they are, we too would perhaps have resorted to the methods which they are now employing. Terrorism and deception are weapons, not of the strong, but of the weak. The British are weak in numbers; we are weak in spite of numbers. The result is that each is dragging the other down.'

A few years earlier, in December, 1914, Gandhi declared that it was his dream and hope that the connection between India and England might be a source of spiritual comfort and uplift to the whole world. He was convinced that, whatever might be the motives of the British rulers in India, there was a desire on the part of the nation at large to see that justice is done.

Until the year 1920 Gandhi was a consistent loyalist. In the Boer War, in spite of his treatment by the Colonials he formed and led an Indian Ambulance Corps. In the Zulu Rebellion he again volunteered, and was given the command of a Bearer Corps, with the rank of Sergeant-Major. Then, in the Great War, in December, 1914, he raised the Indian Ambulance Corps in England, and would have served in it but for his broken health. This is a remarkable record for a rebel.

To follow the phases of disaffection in the Mahatma during the last two years would make too long a story; the point to remark is that Gandhi's growing intolerance of British rule, and his discovery of the satanic nature of Government, have synchronized with the development of the reform scheme by which India is to attain, by progressive stages, complete self-government within the British Empire.

The stages may be too slow for Mr. Gandhi's liking, but the Indian Parliament or Legislative Assembly, with its large nonofficial, popularly elected majority, has been in existence now for more than a year, and there was nothing to prevent the extremists capturing the polls at the last election and working or wrecking the machine from within. It is open to them to do so constitutionally in two years' time, instead of boycotting the reforms.

The virtual supremacy of the Legislative Assembly is already established, in spite of official safeguards in the form of checks and vetoes which, as might have been foreseen, are never likely to be applied. Whatever the new Councils decide, Government will pass as law. The Indian legislators have the power to repeal any act they like and to complete the Indianization of the administration. They have got swaraj; only they will not see it.

To Mahatma Gandhi and his irreconcilables, liberty is not to be accepted as a gift: it is the birthright of the people. 'Councils are no factories to make stout hearts, and freedom is miasma without stout hearts to defend it.' To Mahatma Gandhi the Reforms are only a subtler method of emasculation. In his fanatical passion for sacrifice and self-purification, he refuses all association with the satanic Government. How is it, the stranger will ask, that a government which appears to be dealing out liberty with both hands has suddenly become, the eyes of the Mahatma, satanic? It is a question that is being answered every day in India, in no indefinite terms, wherever two or three are gathered together. Gandhi never tired of proclaiming the offense from the housetops until the prison doors closed on him.

Two things have inflamed his countrymen—'the Punjab wrongs, and the breach of faith against the Mohammedans.' Until Government repaired the breach and repented of the wrong, Gandhi declared a fight to the finish. He pledged himself to preach disaffection openly and systematically until it pleased Government to arrest him.

IV
Unfortunately for Englishmen and Indians, the Punjab wrongs and the Khalifat grievance are two mountains which neither faith nor penitence can remove. The wrong in the case of the Punjab, the massacre at the Jallianwala Bagh, the crawling order that was issued at Amritsar, and other humiliations upon Indians, is irretrievable. The blot, too, on our good name is irretrievable. These actions have been condemned and repudiated by Government, though too lightly. Nor has the onus of official displeasure fallen heavily enough upon the offenders. Nevertheless, it is obviously impossible for any government to revise the scale of punishment two years after judgment has been passed in response to popular clamor.

As to the alleged breach of faith in connection with the Khalifat, the threat to England that, if, the status quo ante bellum were not restored to Turkey by the Allied Powers, she would forfeit her claim to the Mohammedans' allegiance, is, on the face of it, preposterous. Even if England were the sole arbiter of the destiny of Turkey, the interference of Indian agitators could not be tolerated.

But we do not believe in this alleged breach of faith—the assurance to Mohammedan India, in order to appease Moslem soldiers, of the integrity of Turkey after the war. The truth is that millions of Indians were sore about the Khalifat, and the political exploitation of religious sentiment was an opportunity not to be lost.

The brothers Mahomed and Shaukat Ali maintained that Islam would be divested of all its dignity and glamour and prestige by the fall of its spiritual head. Turkey was the last stronghold. Every other Moslem kingdom had been swallowed up by the rapacious Christian Powers. To present England as the enemy of Turkey and Islam, thereby giving a religious color to a political agitation, was their trump card.

Gandhi, I believe, that champion of wronged peoples and lost causes, was captured by the fanatical leaders of the Khalifat movement, the plausible Ali brothers, and persuaded of a dark conspiracy to destroy the spiritual forces of Islam. That he believed in the justice of the cause of his Mohammedan allies there can be no doubt; and it calls for little imagination to understand with what bitter humiliation the Punjab wrongs have troubled his spirit. Yet I cannot think that Gandhi has repudiated his allegiance beyond compromise on these two counts alone; that, because of them, he prefers anarchy to association with, the British in attainment of swaraj. Doubtless, the Mahatma has persuaded himself that this is so, in spite of the long-drawn patience and conciliation of the Government; but the estrangement goes deeper than that. I do not believe that, if any god out of the machine could arise, to resettle the Turkish peace terms in such a way as to leave the Khalifatists no grievance at all, and to prove that there had been no massacre in the Jallianwala Bagh, or crawling order, and that the Punjab wrongs were an ugly dream, the irreconcilables would be reconciled to any scheme of self-government which did not involve complete dissociation from the exploiting foreigner.

It ought to be perfectly easy for us in the West to see the Indian's point of view. But we are singularly lacking in imagination. It is a matter of shame to Gandhi and his irreconcilables that a hundred thousand foreigners should rule and exploit three hundred and fifteen million Indians, emasculating them, indoctrinating them with the spirit of materialism and a sense of their racial unfitness. So it appears to the Mahatma. He has learned to distrust the British and the gifts they bring. He hopes to wean England from the downward path she is treading. Salvation can come only from within.

V
But to return to the discussion of Gandhi's sincerity, which, after all, is the vital question.

Gandhi's spirituality has been discounted, on the ground that he is a politician. Yet every seer or founder of a creed, or system, has been a politician. Gandhi, has his own answer to these imputations on his good faith. 'Jesus,' he said, 'in my humble opinion, was a prince among politicians. He did render unto Cæsar the things that were Cæsar's. The politics of his time consisted in securing the welfare of the people by teaching them not to be seduced by the trinkets of the priests and Pharisees.'

Gandhi argues that the system of government is so devised as to affect every department of the national life. 'If, therefore, we want to conserve the welfare of the nation, we must religiously interest ourselves in the doings of the governors and exert a moral influence on them by insisting on their obeying the laws of morality.'

Gandhi regards himself, not only as a national leader, but as a missionary of civilization to the West. Not that he tilts at Western culture; he draws his gospel from Tolstoy, and is only less indebted to Ruskin and Thoreau than to the Bhagavadgita and the Sermon on the Mount. It is modern civilization that he abhors—the curse of industrialism, the hurry and drive of mercantile competition, the multiplication of luxuries, our gross material activities destroying simplicity, killing the ideal. Mills, factories, telegraphs, motor cars, railways, though he uses them and admits his inconsistency, are his abomination. He believes that economic progress is antagonistic to real progress, and that India may again become the religious teacher and spiritual guide of the West.

The pathetic thing about the racial issue in India is that each party is trying to elevate the other. It is a duel in altruism. While the British regard the uplift of India's backward millions as a sacred trust, Mahatma Gandhi hopes to conquer the greed and cruelty of the West by soul-force. 'The moment the Englishmen feel that, although they are in India in a hopeless minority, their lives are protected against harm, not because of the matchless weapons of destruction which are at their disposal, but because Indians refuse to take the lives, even of those whom they may consider to be utterly in the wrong, that moment will see a transformation in the English nature in its relation to India, and that moment will also be the moment when all the destructive cutlery that is to be had in India will begin to rust.'

And Mr. Gandhi's faith in the civilizing power of soul-force is so great that, when the timid draw a picture of India overrun with warlike frontier tribes on the departure of the British, he is still confident. 'If India returns to her spirituality,' he says, 'it will react upon the neighboring tribes. She will interest herself in the welfare of these hardy but poor people, and even support them if necessary, not out of fear, but as a matter of neighborly duty.'

Probably no utterance of Gandhi has put him so far outside the pale of practical politics as that. The Mahatma appears insincere to the unimaginative, because he believes that things which ought to be are, or can be. It might be said that he has pursued, almost to the point of unscrupulousness, the intensive cultivation of his optimism as to the efficacy of goodness. Thus he has taught himself to believe that soul-force can turn the knife of the Pathan, change the heart of the Turk toward his subject-races, and so gentle the brute in man that angry hordes, inflamed with the sense of injury, will bottle up their passions and win a peaceful victory over their oppressors, not by violence, but by self-purifications. If it is insincerity to have made himself like that, when it was open to him to recognize the inhibitions that hedge about our earthly Utopias, then he is so far insincere. But his is an insincerity that will never lack admirers.

There is no room for expediency or fear or half-measures in his gospel. 'Cut yourself off from the evil in disregard of all consequences. Have faith in a good deed, that it will produce a good result. Be prepared to lose all, and you will gain everything.' That in Gandhi's opinion is the Gita doctrine of work without attachment.

VI
The Mahatma has sadly disappointed the masses. His superhumanity now is open to suspicion. He may be bulletproof; nevertheless, he's in jail. And he has lost izzat,—the Indian word is much more expressive than our English 'prestige,'—because he failed to bring about swaraj in one year. This is perhaps unfair; for Mr. Gandhi swaddled his promise in conditions which, as any intelligent disciple could foresee, must have suffocated the germs of fulfillment from the start.

Swaraj could be established in one year, he said, if there were sufficient response from the nation: that is to say, if politicians would cease to stand at the Councils; if Government officials would give up their posts and titleholders their decorations, litigants forsake the law-courts, pleaders devote themselves to national service, and everyone abjure foreign cloth and cultivate organizing ability and the virtues of discipline, self-denial, self-sacrifice, self-control, confidence, and courage, and, what is more important, forbearance in the face of wrong; if the soldier could lay down his arms without violence, and the common man keep his hands off the officer who came to execute the law; if, in fact, his countrymen's baser human clay could be transmuted into mahatmahood, then India would have swaraj in a year.

But of all this the masses heard only, 'Swaraj in a year.' At the end of the year, the Mahatma told them that they had not been through enough suffering to learn to acquire control over themselves. The soul-force for mass civil disobedience was wanting. The response of the nation had been inadequate.

The Mahatma is now charged with misleading the ignorant masses with false promises. Certainly they were misled. But he told them no lies. In his simple idealism, he could have had no intention to deceive. The white heat of his fervor forbids such a calumny, and the iteration of that long, equally forbidding, conditional clause disproves it.

The intelligentsia, at any rate, cannot complain that they were misled. Three months after his noncoöperation scheme was promulgated, Gandhi repeated in Calcutta exactly what manner of discipline the ordeal imposed on them. His disciples had not bargained for these sacrifices.

Later, he enjoined abstinence to the point of celibacy. 'Being a nation of slaves, it is our duty at the present to suspend bringing heirs to our slavery.' And he instructed Indian parenthood as to the practical ways and means for the segregation of the sexes.

VII
It argues a blind instinct of hero-worship in the Indian that the word of this picturesque idealist, as he has been called by one of his own countrymen, should have become law. Mahatma Gandhi became a greater autocrat than the Viceroy. For a year or two he was the virtual dictator of the intelligentsia, and issued manifestoes and ultimatums to Government. While his noncoöperation propaganda was brewing, not one of the hard-headed nationalist leaders, many of them astute business men, dared openly defy his authority. There was more in it than personal magnetism and mahatmahood: Gandhi was indispensable. The saint who had captured the popular imagination was the one person to see the scheme through, not to its Utopian realization, of course, but to the 'preliminary' anarchical stage, in which the complete stoppage of the administration would paralyze Government and bring it to a standstill. So far—that is to say, if one left out pastoralism, idealism, spiritualism, the repentant lion couched beside the convincing lamb—the Mahatma's scheme was eminently practicable. And so far it commended itself to the majority of the revolutionaries.

The cynical, of course, are convinced that this is exactly how far Mahatma Gandhi intended it to go; while the more tolerant of his opponents regarded him as not so much a tactician, as a dupe. But the Mahatma was perfectly honest in his optimism, and believed that he was eminently practical. He even claimed that his proposition was based on a mathematical calculation. Swaraj he defined as 'a state in which we can maintain our separate existence without the presence of the English.' The Indians, he explained, had bound themselves with their own chains; it was easy to cast them off. No government could exist a day without the coöperation of the people. 'Dissociate yourselves from the satanic administration, and you will bring it to its knees. You will not have to lift a finger, let alone a stick or stone.'

In all his talk and speeches, Gandhi comes back to Ahimsa, the Hindu doctrine of the sinfulness of taking life. In his conversation with me, he was very earnest in his efforts to prove that his Satyagraha movement led to no bloodshed. He maintained that there had been no violence in the Punjab until we opened fire at Amritsar. His Mohammedan allies, he admits, believe in methods of violence; but he associates with them only so long as they pledge themselves to Ahimsa.

'As soon as India accepts the doctrine of the sword,' he said in Madras, 'my life as an Indian is finished'; and he repeated his threat that, if ever his country gave itself over to violence in the pursuit of liberty, he would retire as a penitent into the solitude of the Himalayan forests.

But the Mahatma has not gone to the Himalayas; he has chosen the prison-house instead, openly challenging Government to arrest him, and pledging himself to his campaign of disaffection to the end. Probably he thought that the picture of fetters and gyves in the minds of his disciples would better help the cause.

For a long time the policy of the Extremists has been one of provocation to intensive oppression. But the Government of India, in its well-meant efforts to disappoint them, hesitating to create an atmosphere unfavorable to the success of the Reforms, and hoping that the agitation would wear itself out, consumes itself in its own smoke; appears to have been almost as futile and pathetic in its trustfulness in human nature as Mahatma Gandhi himself. Its scruples, of course, were attributed to timidity or impotence.

As a result of the Khalifat agitation, India has had the Mopla rebellion, in which one heard of babies 'torn to pieces as if they were banana skins,' and old men hacked to death; as a result of the noncoöperation movement, the riots at Bombay and Madras during the Prince's visit, and the hideous outbreak at Chauri chaura, in which the wounded police were roasted alive.

Mahatma Gandhi in the meantime is becoming more and more intransigeant, more and more fanatical. The strain on his spirit is too great. His peculiar gentleness, in speech, at any rate, is not what it was. He appears, even to those among his political enemies who admire him, to be deteriorating. He is possessed by the demon of sacrifice; and in his reformer's vision, his eyes are cast beyond the Indian horizon. He sees the world purified by his gospel. 'England is to be conquered,' he says, 'by the shame of any further imposition of agony upon a people that loves its liberties more than life.'

But England believes that the only liberty she denies the Indian irreconcilable is the liberty of plunging his country into anarchy while she is handing over the reins of government. It is a subtle revenge to compel her to put good patriots into jail—a revenge which argues an understanding of Christian mentality quite in keeping with the Mahatma's optimism as to the inherent goodness in man.

For there is nothing more offensive to the Christian than the habit of turning toward him the other cheek. The left cheek, too, when the right has not been smitten—to the soldier this is a blow beneath the spiritual belt.

And it is most unfair to talk about patriots baring their breasts to bullets, when the men behind the rifles would give their lives to save the patriots from turning their motherland into another Russia.

Happily, or unhappily, the common man in the street does not understand Ahimsa or Satyagraha. To him this art of spilling one's own blood instead of spilling that of one's opponent seems to be only another way of cutting off one's nose to spite one's face.

Much wrong is done to the cause by Gandhi's disciples; for the spirit of the Mahatma does not dwell in their councils.

After the periodic outbreaks that occur in districts where the wrongs of the people have been explained to them by noncoöperators with counsels of forbearance, Gandhi has imposed upon himself long periods of fasting and penitence, which are duly proclaimed. He denounces the violent, calls upon them to offer expiation, admits that he has underrated the forces of evil, and prepares to give the doctrine of Ahimsa another trial.

Gandhi has awakened the national consciousness in a way that no other man could awaken it; at the same time, he has unloosed forces that he is unable to control. Let us hope that his fanaticism may not destroy what he has given.

It is not in reason or logic that we must look for the quality of the man. He is an incurable optimist, visionary, and dreamer, of the order of those who achieve great things because they have not got the logic in them to see that small things are impossible. Before the faith of such, mountains glide imperceptibly away, while the molehills that the worldly-wise and practical attack daily crop up again as soon as they are leveled by the rake.

But Gandhi has done nothing, it may be objected; his influence is waning; he is a spent force, a broken man, in prison; his gospel of noncoöperation is discredited. Exactly. He is the 'high man,' who, 'aiming at a million, misses a unit.'

But he has lighted a candle. Swaraj will not be attained by his scheme of progressive non-violent noncoöperation; nevertheless, because of his idealism, India is infinitely nearer swaraj. In Mahatma Gandhi the youth of the country have their own national hero now—a man to whom they can point, without moral or physical fear; like Garibaldi or Mazzini, only saintlier; a man whose spirit is unclouded by anger or envy or pride. When they listen to him, they feel that the Vedas and the Bhagavadgita are no legends. To them, Mahatma Gandhi embodies the essence of the selfless spirituality that is personified in their sacred books; he is the living incarnation of the spirit that once made their country great.

FOOTNOTES:
1. The party pledged to the maintenance of the temporal power of the Khalif.

2. Self-government.




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圣雄甘地
"甘地以其他任何人都无法唤醒的方式唤醒了民族意识；同时，他也释放了他无法控制的力量。"

作者：埃德蒙-坎德勒

George Rinhart / Corbis / Getty
1922年7月号
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I
对于不了解印度教或印度政治的西方人来说，直到最近，"圣雄 "这个头衔还带有一种精神上的意义。圣雄出现在降神会中--或者在布拉瓦茨基夫人的时代就是这样；人们正确地得出结论，他们的神秘力量是通过练习只有在东方才能理解的禁欲主义获得的。人们在贝拿勒斯和Buddh Gaya遇到了麻衣人，但人们并没有把他们与政治联系起来。甘地先生究竟是什么时候成为圣雄甘地的，很难说，因为圣雄的身份不是在通过考试后被授予的；这个词意味着圣人，是一个民族自发的赞美。据我所知，从官方来说，这位不方便的圣人，或政治家，仍然是甘地先生。


印花飞人头盔袋
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在当代历史上，可能没有一个人物对这么多不同的人意味着这么多不同的事情。对于无知的西方人来说，甘地的名字会让人联想到圣人、骗子、艺术禁欲主义者、狂热者或怪人。如果他读了很多报纸，圣雄会以爱国者、殉道者、高尚的理想主义者和大叛徒；传教士、和平的安静主义者和暴躁的浴缸冲击者和革命者；帝国的颠覆者和信条的创始人，一个充满诡计和谋略的人，或者用他自己的话说，"一个一心追求真理的人"；通常，在没有偏见的宽容者眼中，是一个善意但误导的政治家。这当然是一个复杂的人物。可能很少有人，甚至是他的个性直接影响到的英裔印度人社区，一个非常大的孵化器，已经决定了他是这些东西的哪一个。

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对于一个主导种族的官员来说，要认识到反叛者的优点，需要的不仅仅是一点同情心的想象力。然而，印度政府、总督和国务卿都普遍承认甘地的目的是诚实的。当蒙塔古先生承认圣雄甘地是他的朋友时，英国媒体中的某些人对他的愤怒是可以理解的。

即使是在印度的英国人也不容易相信他的诚意，因为他们对印度政治的暗流和牵线搭桥的人物有所了解。当然，对街上的人来说，圣雄是一个燃烧者，他手里拿着火把，他的非暴力福音是一个并不十分巧妙的公式，在他把火星放到要炸毁城堡的火车上时保护他的人身。他激起了暴民的热情，并呼吁人们保持宽容；对普通的西方人来说，这些都是大恶棍的策略。他真的相信那些被他灌输了这种正在发酵的种族仇恨的不学无术的人群会驯服于他们真实或想象中的错误吗？即使他在这方面是个诚实的幻想家，基督教的欧洲也只能对315,000,000人被圣雄的灵魂力量约束到福音书所要求的转过脸去的姿势感到震惊。

当我见到甘地先生时，我建议说，在心里激起暴力，而禁止手上的暴力是徒劳的。但他怜悯地看了我一眼，认为我是一个在黑暗中摸索的唯物主义者，但他对所有生物都抱有同情心。他相信这是有可能的，在精神的东方是有可能的。我知道他是真诚的。

在想象人的领袖时，人们不合逻辑地期望在他们的特征上找到大写的权力或优雅的字母。甘地身上没有任何铭文。他看起来好像很有可能是一个圣人；他同样也可能是一个政治家。我想到他在数百万人的狂喜中，记得听说他在需要安静时只需举起手来，随处可见的兴奋的喧嚣就会像树上的沙沙风声一样消失。我寻找这种强势的印记：它不在那里。我现在明白了，圣雄对普通人的影响不是来自于直接的影响，而是来自于传言和所有人对他的圣人身份的夸赞。

二
在西方，生前被誉为英雄的人一般都是行动派，可能是将军或资本家；圣人则是或曾经是在死后才被封为圣人。但在东方，精神信仰是标准，圣人是国王。大众，只是在程度上不如知识分子，是英雄崇拜者。在他们看来，选民的体格，尽管只是一个躯壳，但在地平线上时，是神圣的，他们准备在他面前跪下。无论他是瘦是胖，是高是矮，这就是神性。

但在甘地的外表下，没有任何东西可以折损他的圣洁。他从地板上站起来迎接我--一个闲散的身影，包裹在家纺毛毯中；一个中年男人，或者说他看起来是这样的，光着头，有着强壮的、密密麻麻的铁灰色头发，没有波弟，或者印度教的发束；非常大的耳朵，在耳垂中央穿孔，--穿孔是为了戴耳环--如果它曾经存在的话，这是唯一的身体虚荣的遗迹；下巴精细，胡子干净，表情警惕，眼睛透亮，目光直接。他以温和的礼节向我问好。他的英语习语和口音都很完美。当我坐下来时，他又沉浸在他的毯子里。他一点也不善于表达。他的倾向是给我带路。

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我曾在媒体上与他发生争论，或者说他与我发生争论，我们曾交换过几封公开信。争论的焦点是哈利法特问题。如果说很难相信和平使者在煽动屠杀方面是无辜的，那么圣雄与哈利法特党1的联系就更难解释了。印度爱国者一直认为穆罕默德人和印度人之间长期存在的分歧是阻碍实现 "大一统 "的主要障碍。因此，从印度人的角度来看，印度教-莫斯林协约是本世纪最重要的政治运动。

1919年11月24日，印度人斯瓦米-施拉达南德（Swami Shradhanand）登上了德里贾玛清真寺的讲坛，向人们发表了讲话，印度的穆罕默德媒体将这一先例描述为近代伊斯兰历史上最了不起的事件。然后在12月，甘地被选为德里哈利法特会议的主席。正是在这个时候，"Allahu Akbar和Om（神秘的印度教公式）是一个名字 "的政治口号开始到处重复，而穆罕默德为了安抚印度教的情绪，放弃了杀戮牲畜的行为。这只是甘地与穆斯林极端分子交往的开始。在后来的阶段，他成为了伊斯兰教的拥护者，以至于把对印度政府的民事服从作为纠正塞夫勒条约的条件。当然，甘地在道义上有权将他的全部力量投入到伊斯兰运动中，只要他对土耳其人事业的正义性的信念是真诚的。然而，在他的批评者看来，他似乎是出于政治上的权宜之计，在支持一个他肯定知道是错误的事业。

温和的使徒--他自己人民的解放者--和粗暴的土耳其人之间有什么可以想象的联系，以至于他要参加一场运动来延续像奥斯曼那样的镇压制度？但甘地对他的立场非常坦率。他并没有假装对土耳其人感兴趣。至于主体种族，尽管土耳其人有屠杀制造多数的记录，但他仍然相信，基督徒、阿拉伯人和犹太人可以享受他们与生俱来的权利，并在奥斯曼帝国内保持自治，受到保障的保护。他说："通过帮助印度的穆罕默德人，'在他们历史的关键时刻，我想买到他们的友谊。只要他相信他们的错误，这就是一桩完美的交易。印度教-穆斯林协约是印度民族主义的第一个基本要素。

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三
我必须承认，在我见到甘地先生之前，我从未完全相信过他。尽管我愿意相信他比大多数政治家更诚实，但我还是倾向于把他的双关语归结为诡辩。如果我更密切地关注他的职业生涯，我就不会那么怀疑；但他在南非的消极抵抗运动中为他的同胞进行的精彩斗争，以及他在其中的真诚、一致和勇气的真实情况，只是以谣言的形式出现在我面前。当他淡淡地解释说他不想让政府难堪时，我先是笑了笑，但 "有时一个人的正确行为确实会让那些暂时不欣赏它的人难堪。因此，'在对真理的不懈追求和由此产生的行为中，'他和其他改革者一样，让那些最亲近的人感到尴尬，但他'并不比反亲爱的人更反英'。我对英国政府某些行为的顽固反对，不能被认为是不友好。

从一个英国人嘴里说出来，这可能有点像空话；但甘地在他无意识的疏离中，显然没有骄傲或装腔作势。当他告诉我他有一大批英国朋友时，我相信他。将圣雄与其他印度极端主义领导人区分开来的最重要的一点是，他有勇气站在一个伟大的集会上，说出令人不快的真相。他不奉承自己的人民；群众追随他，因为他们认识到他没有道德上或身体上的恐惧。

在他的一次演讲中，他提醒他的同胞们，他们正在向一个只要有机会就会被牺牲精神 "浸透 "的民族献上战斗。他要求他们经历 "英国的男人、女人和勇敢的小伙子们所经历的牺牲"。印度人，现在相信他，当他告诉他们政府是物质的、无神的，与之交往是有罪的，因为两年前，当他对改革仍有信心时，他还敢说一些值得称赞的话。

'我不怪英国人，'甘地说。'如果我们像他们一样人数少，我们也可能会采用他们现在所采用的方法。恐怖主义和欺骗是武器，不是强者的，而是弱者的。英国人在人数上是弱者，我们在人数上是弱者。其结果是，双方都在拖累对方。

几年前，在1914年12月，甘地宣称，他的梦想和希望是印度和英国之间的联系可能成为整个世界精神安慰和提升的来源。他相信，无论英国统治者在印度的动机是什么，整个国家都希望看到正义得到伸张。

直到1920年，甘地都是一个一贯的忠诚主义者。在布尔战争中，尽管他受到了殖民者的对待，但他组建并领导了一支印度救护队。在祖鲁叛乱中，他再次自愿参加，并被赋予了一个背夫团的指挥权，军衔为中士-少校。然后，在1914年12月的大战中，他在英国组建了印度救护队，如果不是因为身体不适，他本可以在其中服役。对于一个叛乱者来说，这是一个了不起的记录。

在过去的两年里，如果要跟踪圣雄的不满情绪的各个阶段，那就太长了；要注意的是，甘地对英国统治的日益不容忍，以及他对政府的撒旦性质的发现，与改革计划的发展是同步的，印度将通过逐步的阶段，在大英帝国内实现完全自治。

这些阶段可能对甘地先生来说太慢了，但印度议会或立法会议及其庞大的非官方民选多数，现在已经存在一年多了，没有什么能阻止极端分子在上次选举中夺取选票，并从内部运作或破坏这个机器。他们可以在两年后按照宪法规定这样做，而不是抵制改革。

立法议会的实际最高地位已经确立，尽管官方以检查和否决的形式提供了保障，但正如可以预见的那样，这些保障不可能被应用。无论新议会决定什么，政府都会将其作为法律通过。印度立法者有权力废除他们喜欢的任何法案，并完成行政部门的印度化。他们已经得到了自由，只是他们不会看到它。

对圣雄甘地和他那些不可调和的人来说，自由不应作为礼物接受：它是人民与生俱来的权利。'议会不是制造坚固的心的工厂，而自由是没有坚固的心来捍卫它的瘴气。对圣雄甘地来说，改革只是一种更巧妙的阉割方法。在他对牺牲和自我净化的狂热中，他拒绝与撒旦政府的一切联系。陌生人会问，在圣雄的眼里，一个看似双手奉上自由的政府怎么会突然变成撒旦？在印度，只要有两三个人聚集在一起，这个问题每天都会得到不确定的回答。甘地从不厌烦地从房顶上宣扬这一罪行，直到监狱的大门对他关闭。

有两件事激怒了他的同胞--"旁遮普的错误，以及对穆罕默德人的违背信仰。在政府修复违约行为和悔过自新之前，甘地宣布要战斗到底。他保证自己将公开和系统地宣扬不满情绪，直到政府高兴地逮捕他。

四
对英国人和印度人来说，不幸的是，旁遮普的错误和哈利法特的冤情是两座大山，无论是信仰还是忏悔都无法消除。旁遮普的错误，在贾利安瓦拉巴格的屠杀，在阿姆利则发布的爬行命令，以及其他对印度人的羞辱，是无法挽回的。我们的好名声也有了不可挽回的污点。政府已经对这些行为进行了谴责和否定，尽管太轻率了。官方不满的责任也没有落到犯罪者身上。然而，任何政府显然都不可能在判决通过两年后根据民众的呼声来修改惩罚尺度。

至于与哈利法特有关的所谓失信行为，英国威胁说，如果盟国不恢复土耳其的战前状态，她将放弃对穆罕默德的效忠要求，从表面上看，这是荒谬的。即使英国是土耳其命运的唯一仲裁者，也不能容忍印度煽动者的干涉。

但我们并不相信这种所谓的失信行为--为了安抚穆斯林士兵，向穆罕默德-印度保证战后土耳其的完整性。事实是，数以百万计的印度人对哈利法特感到痛心，而对宗教情绪的政治利用是一个不容错过的机会。

马哈茂德和肖卡特-阿里兄弟坚持认为，伊斯兰教将因其精神领袖的倒台而失去所有的尊严、魅力和威信。土耳其是最后的堡垒。其他所有的穆斯林王国都被贪婪的基督教国家吞噬了。把英国说成是土耳其和伊斯兰教的敌人，从而给政治运动披上宗教色彩，是他们的王牌。

我相信，甘地，这位受委屈的人民和失落的事业的捍卫者，被哈利法特运动的狂热领导人，即似是而非的阿里兄弟所俘获，并被说服了一个破坏伊斯兰教精神力量的黑暗阴谋。他相信他的穆罕默德盟友的事业是正义的，这一点是毋庸置疑的；不需要什么想象力就能理解旁遮普的错误给他的精神带来了多么大的屈辱。然而，我不认为甘地已经放弃了他的忠诚，仅仅在这两点上做出了妥协；因为这两点，他宁愿选择无政府状态，也不愿意与英国人合作，以实现印度的统一。毫无疑问，尽管政府进行了长期的耐心和调解，但圣雄还是说服了自己，认为情况确实如此；但这种隔阂比这更深。我不相信，如果能从机器中产生任何神灵，以这样一种方式重新解决土耳其的和平条款，使哈利法特人没有任何不满，并证明在贾利安瓦拉巴格没有发生过大屠杀，也没有爬行的秩序，旁遮普的错误只是一个丑陋的梦，那么不可调和的人就会对任何不涉及与剥削外国人完全脱离关系的自治计划进行和解。

对我们西方人来说，应该很容易看到印度人的观点。但我们却明显缺乏想象力。对甘地和他那些不可调和的人来说，十万个外国人统治和剥削三亿一千五百万印度人，阉割他们，向他们灌输物质主义精神和他们种族不适合的意识，是一件很羞耻的事情。在圣雄看来，情况就是这样。他已经学会不信任英国人和他们带来的礼物。他希望能把英国从她所走的下坡路上解救出来。拯救只能来自内部。

V
但要回到对甘地的诚意的讨论上，毕竟这才是至关重要的问题。

甘地的精神信仰被打了折扣，理由是他是一个政治家。然而，每一个先知或信条或体系的创始人都是政治家。甘地对这些对他的善意的指责有他自己的答案。他说，"耶稣，"在我看来，他是政治家中的王子。他把属于凯撒的东西献给了凯撒。他那个时代的政治包括确保人民的福利，教导他们不要被祭司和法利赛人的装饰品所诱惑。

甘地认为，政府的制度是这样设计的，以至于影响到国家生活的每个部门。因此，如果我们想保护国家的福利，我们必须以宗教的方式关注治理者的行为，并通过坚持要求他们遵守道德法则对他们施加道德影响。

甘地认为自己不仅是一位国家领导人，而且是一位向西方传授文明的传教士。不是说他向西方文化倾斜；他从托尔斯泰那里获得了他的福音，对罗斯金和梭罗的亏欠只比对《薄伽梵歌》和《登山宝训》少。他憎恶的是现代文明--工业主义的诅咒，商业竞争的匆忙和驱动，奢侈品的繁殖，我们粗暴的物质活动破坏了简单性，扼杀了理想。磨坊、工厂、电报、汽车、铁路，尽管他使用它们并承认自己的不一致，但都是他憎恶的。他认为，经济进步与真正的进步是对立的，印度可能再次成为西方的宗教导师和精神向导。

印度种族问题的可悲之处在于，每一方都在试图抬高另一方。这是一场利他主义的对决。英国人把提高印度数百万落后人口的地位视为一种神圣的信任，而圣雄甘地则希望通过灵魂的力量来征服西方的贪婪和残忍。'当英国人感觉到，尽管他们在印度是无望的少数，但他们的生命得到了保护，不受伤害，这不是因为他们所掌握的无以伦比的破坏性武器，而是因为印度人拒绝夺取生命，甚至是那些他们可能认为完全错误的人的生命，那一刻，英国人与印度的关系将发生转变，那一刻也将是在印度可以得到的所有破坏性餐具开始生锈的时候。

而甘地先生对灵魂力量的文明力量的信心是如此之大，以至于当胆小的人描绘印度在英国人离开后被好战的边疆部落所淹没时，他仍然充满信心。他说："如果印度回到了她的精神世界，'它将对邻近的部落产生反应。她会关心这些顽强而贫穷的人的福利，甚至在必要时支持他们，这不是出于恐惧，而是作为一种邻居的责任。

也许甘地的任何言论都没有像这句话那样把他置于实际政治的范围之外。在没有想象力的人看来，圣雄是不真诚的，因为他相信应该是的事情是，或者可以是。可以说，他一直在追求，几乎到了不择手段的地步，大力培养他对善的功效的乐观态度。因此，他让自己相信，灵魂的力量可以扭转帕坦人的刀，改变土耳其人对其臣民的心，并使人类的野性变得如此温和，以至于愤怒的大群人在受到伤害后，会将他们的激情封存起来，并通过自我净化来赢得对压迫者的和平胜利，而不是通过暴力，而是自我净化。如果说，当他认识到对我们的尘世乌托邦有抑制作用的时候，把自己变成这样是不真诚的，那么他到目前为止是不真诚的。但他的不真诚永远不会缺少崇拜者。

在他的福音中，没有权宜之计或恐惧或半途而废的余地。'不顾一切后果，断绝自己与邪恶的关系。对善行有信心，它将产生一个好结果。准备好失去一切，你将获得一切"。在甘地看来，这就是《吉塔》中的工作不留恋的学说。

六
圣雄对群众的失望是可悲的。他的超人气现在是可以被怀疑的。他可能是刀枪不入的；然而，他在监狱里。他已经失去了伊扎特，--印度的这个词比我们英国的 "威望 "更有表现力，--因为他没能在一年内带来斯瓦拉杰。这也许是不公平的；因为甘地先生把他的承诺包在各种条件中，正如任何聪明的弟子都能预见到的那样，这些条件从一开始就扼杀了实现目标的苗头。

他说，如果国家有足够的反应，斯瓦拉吉可以在一年内建立。也就是说，如果政客们不再站在议会上；如果政府官员放弃他们的职位，头衔拥有者放弃他们的勋章，诉讼人放弃法庭，辩护人投身于国家服务，每个人都放弃外国布衣，培养组织能力和纪律、自我放弃、自我牺牲、自我控制、信心和勇气等美德，以及更重要的是，面对错误时的忍耐力。如果士兵能够放下武器而不使用暴力，普通人不碰触前来执法的官员；如果事实上，他的同胞们较低级的人类粘土能够转化为圣人精神，那么印度在一年内就会实现大解放。

但是，对于这一切，群众只听到了 "一年内实现大一统"。在一年结束时，圣雄告诉他们，他们还没有经历足够的苦难来学会控制自己。大规模公民抗命的灵魂力量是缺乏的。国家的反应也不充分。

现在，圣雄被指控用虚假的承诺误导无知的群众。当然，他们被误导了。但他没有告诉他们任何谎言。在他简单的理想主义中，他不可能有欺骗的意图。他的狂热的白热度不允许这样的诽谤，而那长长的、同样不允许的、有条件的条款的反复出现也否定了它。

无论如何，知识界不能抱怨他们被误导了。在他的不合作计划颁布三个月后，甘地在加尔各答重复了对他们的考验到底是什么方式的纪律。他的弟子们并没有为这些牺牲讨价还价。

后来，他要求禁欲到独身的地步。作为一个奴隶制国家，我们现在的责任是暂停为我们的奴隶制带来继承人。他还指导印度的父母亲用实际的方法和手段来实现两性隔离。

七
印度人有一种盲目崇拜英雄的本能，他的一个同胞称他为 "风景如画的理想主义者"，他的话应该成为法律。圣雄甘地成为一个比总督更伟大的专制者。在一两年内，他实际上是知识界的独裁者，并向政府发布宣言和最后通牒。当他的不合作宣传正在酝酿时，没有一个顽固的民族主义领袖，其中许多是精明的商人，敢于公开挑战他的权威。这里面不仅仅是个人魅力和圣人气质。甘地是不可或缺的。这位俘获了大众想象力的圣人是见证这一计划的人，当然不是为了实现乌托邦，而是为了 "初步 "的无政府主义阶段，在这一阶段，行政部门的完全停止将使政府瘫痪并陷入停顿。到目前为止--也就是说，如果不考虑牧民主义、理想主义、精神主义、悔过的狮子和令人信服的羔羊，圣雄的计划是非常实际的。到目前为止，它得到了大多数革命者的赞赏。

当然，愤世嫉俗的人相信，这正是圣雄甘地打算走的路；而他的反对者中比较宽容的人认为他与其说是一个战术家，不如说是一个骗子。但圣雄在他的乐观主义中是完全诚实的，并认为他是非常实际的。他甚至声称，他的主张是建立在数学计算的基础上。他把Swaraj定义为 "一种我们可以在没有英国人存在的情况下维持我们独立存在的状态"。他解释说，印度人用他们自己的枷锁束缚着自己；要甩掉这些枷锁很容易。如果没有人民的合作，任何政府都无法存在一天。'与撒旦政府脱离关系，你们将使它屈服。你们不必动一根手指，更不用说一根棍子或石头。

在他所有的谈话和演讲中，甘地又回到了Ahimsa，即印度教中关于夺取生命的罪恶的学说。在他与我的谈话中，他非常认真地努力证明他的萨提亚格拉哈运动没有导致流血事件。他坚持认为，在我们向阿姆利则开火之前，旁遮普省没有发生过暴力事件。他承认，他的穆罕默德盟友相信暴力方法；但他只在他们保证接受阿含沙的情况下才与他们交往。

他在马德拉斯说："一旦印度接受剑的理论，我作为一个印度人的生活就完了。"他再次威胁说，如果他的国家在追求自由的过程中屈服于暴力，他将作为一个忏悔者退休，进入喜马拉雅森林的孤独之中。

但圣雄并没有去喜马拉雅山；他选择了监狱，公开挑战政府对他的逮捕，并承诺将他的反叛运动进行到底。也许他认为，在他的弟子们的脑海中出现脚镣和绞刑架的画面会更好地帮助他的事业。

长期以来，极端主义分子的政策一直是挑衅性的密集压迫。但是，印度政府在其善意的努力中让他们失望，犹豫着要不要创造一个不利于改革成功的气氛，并希望鼓动会耗尽自己，在自己的烟雾中消耗自己；看来它对人性的信任几乎和圣雄甘地本人一样徒劳和可悲。当然，它的顾虑被归结为胆怯或无能。

由于哈利法特的鼓动，印度发生了莫普拉叛乱，人们听到婴儿被 "像香蕉皮一样撕成碎片"，老人被砍死；由于不合作运动，在王子访问期间，孟买和马德拉斯发生了暴乱，以及在乔里-乔拉爆发的可怕事件，其中受伤的警察被活活烤死。

在此期间，圣雄甘地变得越来越顽固，越来越狂热。他的精神受到的压力太大。他特有的温柔，无论如何，在言语上，已经不像以前那样了。甚至在他的政敌中那些崇拜他的人看来，他也在退化。他被牺牲的恶魔所控制；在他改革者的视野中，他的目光投向了印度的地平线之外。他看到世界被他的福音所净化。他说："英国将被征服，"他说，"在一个爱自由胜过爱生命的民族身上再强加任何痛苦，都是耻辱。

但英国认为，她拒绝给印度人的唯一自由是在她交出政府的缰绳时让他的国家陷入无政府状态的自由。这是一种微妙的报复，迫使她把善良的爱国者关进监狱--这种报复论证了对基督教心态的理解，与圣雄对人类固有的善良的乐观态度相当一致。

因为对基督徒来说，没有什么比对他翻脸的习惯更令人反感。当右脸没有被击碎时，左脸也是如此，对士兵来说，这是精神上的一种打击。

谈论爱国者在子弹面前袒胸露乳是最不公平的，而那些在步枪后面的人愿意用他们的生命来拯救爱国者，使他们的祖国变成另一个俄罗斯。

可喜的是，或者说不幸的是，街上的普通人并不了解Ahimsa或Satyagraha。对他来说，这种流自己的血而不流对手的血的艺术，似乎只是另一种削足适履的方式。

甘地的弟子们对这一事业做了很多错事；因为圣雄的精神并没有在他们的议会中居住。

在非合作者用宽容的劝告向人民解释了他们的错误的地区，定期爆发后，甘地对自己施加了长期的禁食和忏悔，并适当地宣布了这一点。他谴责暴力分子，呼吁他们提供赔偿，承认他低估了邪恶的力量，并准备给Ahimsa的学说进行另一次试验。

甘地以其他任何人都无法唤醒的方式唤醒了民族意识；与此同时，他也释放了他无法控制的力量。让我们希望他的狂热不会破坏他所给予的一切。

我们必须寻找这个人的品质，而不是在理性或逻辑上。他是一个不可救药的乐观主义者、远见卓识者和梦想家，属于那些取得伟大成就的人，因为他们没有看到小事情是不可能的逻辑。在这种人的信仰面前，山峰会不知不觉地滑落，而那些世故而实际的人每天都在攻击的鼹鼠，一旦被耙子铲平，又会重新出现。

但甘地什么也没做，可能有人会反对；他的影响力正在减弱；他是一个被耗尽的力量，一个被打垮的人，在监狱里；他的不合作的福音已经失去信誉。正是如此。他是 "高人"，"瞄准了一百万，却错过了一个单位"。

但他已经点燃了一支蜡烛。通过他的渐进式非暴力非合作计划，印度无法实现统一；然而，由于他的理想主义，印度已经无限接近统一。在圣雄甘地身上，印度的年轻人现在有了自己的民族英雄--一个他们可以指着的人，没有道德上或身体上的恐惧；就像加里波第或马志尼，只是更圣洁；一个精神不被愤怒、嫉妒或骄傲遮蔽的人。当他们听他说话时，他们觉得《吠陀经》和《薄伽梵歌》并不是传说。对他们来说，圣雄甘地体现了他们圣书中所体现的无私精神的精髓；他是曾经使他们国家伟大的精神的活生生的化身。

注释。
1. 承诺维护哈里夫的世俗权力的政党。

2. 2. 自治。