Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
There is no yajna (sacrifice) greater than spinning calculated to bring peace to the troubled spirit, to soothe the distracted student's mind, to spiritualize his life.
I submit that scientists have not yet explored the hidden possibilities of the innumerable seeds, leaves and fruits for giving the fullest possible nutrition to mankind.
What you feel and how you react to something is always up to you. There may be a "normal" or a common way to react to different things. But that's mostly just all it is.
Of all the myriads of God, Daridranarayana is the most sacred inasmuch as it represents the untold millions of the poor people as distinguished from the few rich people.
I must dissent emphatically from any proposal to spend any money on preparing a statue of me, more especially at a time when people do not have enough food and clothing.
I have not lost the hope that the masses will refuse to bow to the Moloch of war but they will rely upon their own capacity for suffering to save their country's honour.
Peace is unattained by part performance of conditions, even as a chemical combination is impossible without complete fulfillment of the conditions of attainment thereof.
The moral to be legitimately drawn from the supreme tragedy of the bomb is that it will not be destroyed by counter bombs even as violence cannot be by counter-violence.
Unless nonviolence of the strong is really developed among us, there should be no thought of civil disobedience for Swaraj, whether within the states or in British India.
A man who was completely innocent, offered himself as a sacrifice for the good of others, including his enemies, and became the ransom of the world. It was a perfect act.
I understood . . . that those who desired salvation should act like the trustee who, though having control over great possessions, regards not an iota of them as his own.
Three quarters of the miseries and misunderstandings in the world would finish if people were to put on the shoes of their adversaries and understood their points of view
The satyagrahi general has to obey his inner voice, for over and above the situation outside he examines himself constantly and listens to the dictates of the inner self.
Complete independence through truth and non-violence means the independence of every unit, be it the humblest of the nation, without distinction of race, colour or creed.
Throughout the history of mankind there have been murderers and tyrants; and while it may seem momentarily that they have the upper hand, they have always fallen. Always.
My freedom from hatred - I would even claim for myself individually, my love - for those who consider themselves to be my enemies, does not make me blind to their faults.
I would rather have India resort to arms in order to defend her honour than that she should, in a cowardly manner, become or remain a helpless witness to her own dishonor.
It is a tragedy that religion for us means, today, nothing more than restrictions on food and drink, nothing more than adherence to absence of superiority and inferiority.
In the application of the method of non-violence, one must believe in the possibility of every person, however depraved, being reformed under humane and skilled treatment.
I want to realize brotherhood or identity not merely with the beings called human, but I want to realize identity with all life, even with such things as crawl upon earth.
My patriotism is not an exclusive thing. It is all-embracing and I should reject that patriotism which sought to mount the distress or exploitation of other nationalities.
God's word is: 'He who strives never perishes.' I have implicit faith in that promise. Though, therefore, from my weakness I fail a thousand times, I shall not lose faith.
He who trusts has never yet lost in the world. A suspicious man is lost to himself and the eworld.... Suspicion is of the brood of violence. Non-violence cannot but trust.
In this age of the rule of brute force, it is almost impossible for anyone to believe that any one else could possibly reject the law of the final supremacy of brute force.
It will be necessary for us Indians - Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Jews, Parsis and all others to whom India is their home - to recognize a common flag to live and die for.
I must refuse to believe that the Germans contemplate with equanimity the evacuation of cities like London for fear of destruction to be wrought by man's inhuman ingenuity.
A straight fight in an equal battle takes some bravery, but braver is he who, knowing that he would have to sacrifice ninety-five as against five of the enemy, faces death.
If God holds me to be a pure instrument for the spread of nonviolence in place of the awful violence now ruling the earth, He will give me the strength and show me the way.
Civil disobedience becomes a sacred duty when the state has become lawless or corrupt. And a citizen who barters with such a state shares in its corruption and lawlessness.
It ill becomes us to invoke in our daily prayers the blessings of God, the Compassionate, if we in turn will not practice elementary compassion toward our fellow creatures.
The man who eats to live, who is friends with the five powers - earth, water, ether, sun and air - who is a servant of God, the Creator of all these, ought not to fall ill.
Prayer is not asking. It is a longing of the soul. It is daily admission of one's weakness. It is better in prayer to have a heart without words than words without a heart.
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.
I claim to be a simple individual liable to err like any other fellow mortal. I own, however, that I have humility enough in me to confess my errors and to retrace my steps.
I am just not thinking of India's deliverance. It will come, but will it be worth if England and France fall, or if they come out victorious over Germany ruined and humbled?
God, who is the embodiment of Truth and Right and Justice, can never have sanctioned a religion or practice which regards one - fifth of our vast population as untouchables.
The art of producing good music from a cultivated voice can be achieved by many, but the art of producing that music from the harmony of a pure life is achieved very rarely.
Who can deny that much that passes for science and art today destroys the soul instead of uplifting it and instead of evoking the best in us, panders to our basest passions?
The time is fast coming when politicians will cease to fear the religion of humanity and humanitarians will find entrance into political life indispensable for full service.
The British Government in India constitutes a struggle between modern civilization, which is the Kingdom of Satan, and the ancient civilization, which is the Kingdom of God.
Democracy disciplined and enlightened is the finest thing in the world. A democracy prejudiced, ignorant, superstitious, will land itself in chaos and may be self-destroyed.
It will be hard to find a parallel in history in which unarmed people have represented the urge for freedom, turning their armlessness into the central means for deliverance.
There is little that separates humans from other sentient beings - we all feel joy, we all deeply crave to be alive and to live freely, and we all share this planet together.
It is easy enough to be friendly to one's friends. But to befriend the one who regards himself as your enemy is the quintessence of true religion. The other is mere business.
My mission is to convert every Indian, every Englishman and finally the world to nonviolence for regulating mutual relations, whether political, economic, social or religious.
A democrat should not rely upon the force of the arms his state could flaunt in the face of the world, but on the moral force his state could put at the disposal of the world.
If the village worker is not a decent man or woman, conducting a decent home, he or she had better not aspire after the high privilege and honour of becoming a village worker.
A satyagrahi may not ride two horses, truth and untruth, at the same time, nor, to change the metaphor, trim his sail to catch every breeze as you do in the name of communism.
A thousand candles can be lighted from the flame of one candle, and the life of the candle will not be shortened. Happiness can be spread without diminishing that of yourself.
I felt that God could be realized only through service. And service for me was the service of India, because it came to me without my seeking, because I had an aptitude for it.