Mahatma Gandhi

Faith is not something to grasp, it is a state to grow into.

The moment there is suspicion about a person's motives, everything he does becomes tainted.

It is my own firm belief that the strength of the soul grows in proportion as you subdue the flesh.

For me every ruler is alien that defies public opinion.

Just as a man would not cherish living in a body other than his own, so do nations not like to live under other nations, however noble and great the latter may be.

Healthy discontent is the prelude to progress.

The law of sacrifice is uniform throughout the world. To be effective it demands the sacrifice of the bravest and the most spotless.

Spiritual relationship is far more precious than physical. Physical relationship divorced from spiritual is body without soul.

I claim that human mind or human society is not divided into watertight compartments called social, political and religious. All act and react upon one another.

Commonsense is the realised sense of proportion.

Constant development is the law of life, and a man who always tries to maintain his dogmas in order to appear consistent drives himself into a false position.

One's own religion is after all a matter between oneself and one's Maker and no one else's.

We do not need to proselytise either by our speech or by our writing. We can only do so really with our lives. Let our lives be open books for all to study.

There is no principle worth the name if it is not wholly good.

Increase of material comforts, it may be generally laid down, does not in any way whatsoever conduce to moral growth.

Sense perceptions can be and often are false and deceptive, however real they may appear to us. Where there is realization outside the senses, it is infallible. It is proved not by extraneous evidence but in the transformed conduct and character of those who have felt the real presence of God within.

Rights that do not flow from duty well performed are not worth having.

Is it not enough to know the evil to shun it? If not, we should be sincere enough to admit that we love evil too well to give it up.

Violent men have not been known in history to die to a man. They die up to a point.

God cannot be realized through the intellect. Intellect can lead one to a certain extent and no further. It is a matter of faith and experience derived from that faith.

What is true of the individual will be tomorrow true of the whole nation if individuals will but refuse to lose heart and hope.

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.

We win justice quickest by rendering justice to the other party.

Unwearied ceaseless effort is the price that must be paid for turning faith into a rich infallible experience.

A weak man is just by accident. A strong but non-violent man is unjust by accident.

All the religions of the world, while they may differ in other respects, unitedly proclaim that nothing lives in this world but Truth.

Let everyone try and find that as a result of daily prayer he adds something new to his life, something with which nothing can be compared.

God sometimes does try to the uttermost those whom he wishes to bless.

Capital as such is not evil; it is its wrong use that is evil. Capital in some form or other will always be needed.

Intolerance betrays want of faith in one's cause.

Fear of death makes us devoid both of valour and religion. For want of valour is want of religious faith.

Measures must always in a progressive society be held superior to men, who are after all imperfect instruments, working for their fulfilment.

I will far rather see the race of man extinct than that we should become less than beasts by making the noblest of God's creation, woman, the object of our lust.

Religion is more than life. Remember that his own religion is the truest to every man even if it stands low in the scales of philosophical comparison.

Moral authority is never retained by any attempt to hold on to it. It comes without seeking and is retained without effort.

Every formula of every religion has in this age of reason, to submit to the acid test of reason and universal assent.

Though we may know Him by a thousand names, He is one and the same to us all.

We may have our private opinions but why should they be a bar to the meeting of hearts?

I would heartily welcome the union of East and West provided it is not based on brute force.

Only he can take great resolves who has indomitable faith in God and has fear of God.

Man's nature is not essentially evil. Brute nature has been known to yield to the influence of love. You must never despair of human nature.

Non-violence requires a double faith, faith in God and also faith in man.

A vow is a purely religious act which cannot be taken in a fit of passion. It can be taken only with a mind purified and composed and with God as witness.

Service which is rendered without joy helps neither the servant nor the served. But all other pleasures and possessions pale into nothingness before service which is rendered in a spirit of joy.

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.

To deprive a man of his natural liberty and to deny to him the ordinary amenities of life is worse then starving the body; it is starvation of the soul, the dweller in the body.

I do all the evil I can before I learn to shun it? Is it not enough to know the evil to shun it? If not, we should be sincere enough to admit that we love evil too well to give it up.

Let not the 12 million Negroes be ashamed of the fact that they are the grandchildren of slaves. There is dishonor in being slave-owners.

Ours is one continued struggle against degradation sought to be inflicted upon us by the European, who desire to degrade us to the level of the raw Kaffir, whose occupation is hunting and whose sole ambition is to collect a certain number of cattle to buy a wife with, and then pass his life in indolence and nakedness.

Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is the truth.