The Essential Gandhi (17 page)

[Death] should cause no fear in us if we have lived in the fear of God, and have done nothing in violation of the voice of our conscience. Then, indeed, is death but a change for the better and, therefore, a welcome change which need not evoke any sorrow.… And we in South Africa, especially those who are passive resisters, must learn not only not to fear death, but must be prepared to face it and welcome it when it comes to us in the performance of our duty.… I wish for no better end, and I am sure no other passive resister does.
²³

Of the many accomplishments that passive resisters have to possess, tenacity is by no means the least important. They may find their ranks becoming daily thinned under a hot fire. True passive resisters must still stand their ground. They may be reviled by their own and they must cling to their faith as a child clings to its mother’s breast. They may be misunderstood, and they must be content to labor under misrepresentation. They may be put to inconceivable personal inconvenience and they must suffer it patiently and cheerfully.… They cannot—must not—lose faith in themselves or in their mission because they may be in a minority. Indeed, all reform has been brought about by the action of minorities in all countries and under all climes. Majorities simply follow minorities.…
²⁴

 … Experience has taught me that civility is the most difficult part of Satyagraha. Civility does not here mean the mere outward gentleness of speech cultivated for the occasion, but an inborn gentleness and desire to do the opponent good. These should show themselves in every act of a Satyagrahi.
²⁵

[Though the government officials enforcing the Black Law] were so bad, I had nothing against them personally.…

This attitude of mine put the officials … perfectly at ease, and though I had to fight with their department often, and use strong language, they remained quite friendly with me.…

Man and his deed are two distinct things. Whereas a good deed should call forth approbation and a wicked deed disapprobation, the doer of the deed, whether good or wicked, always deserves respect or pity, as the case may be. “Hate the sin and not the sinner” is a precept which, though easy enough to understand, is rarely practiced, and that is why the poison of hatred spreads in the world.

 … It is quite proper to resist and attack a system, but to resist and attack its author is tantamount to resisting and attacking oneself. For we are all tarred with the same brush and are children of one and the same Creator, and as such the divine powers within us are infinite. To slight a single human being is to slight those divine powers, and thus to harm not only that being, but with him, the whole world.
²⁶

Men of ordinary abilities also can develop morality.… I regard the illiteracy among my people as deplorable, and I consider it necessary to educate them, but it is not at all impossible to imbibe the Satyagraha principle in an absolutely illiterate man. This is my long-standing experience.
²⁷

The end of a Satyagraha campaign can be described as worthy only when it leaves the Satyagrahis stronger and more spirited than they are in the beginning.
²⁸

[The] fateful month of July was gradually drawing to an end, and on the last day of that month [when the Black Act went into effect], we had resolved to call a mass meeting of the Indians.… An attendance at public meetings of two thousand from an aggregate population of ten thousand would be considered large and satisfactory.… A movement of mass Satyagraha is impossible on any other condition. Where the struggle is wholly dependent upon
internal strength, it cannot go on at all without mass discipline.… From the very first [the Satyagrahis] decided to hold public meetings only in the open, so expense was nearly avoided and none had to go back from the place of meeting disappointed for want of accommodation. All these meetings … were very quiet. The audiences heard everything attentively. If those who were far away from the platform could not hear a speaker, they would ask him to speak louder. [There] were no chairs at these meetings. Everyone sat on the ground. There was a very small platform designed to accommodate the chairman, the speaker and a couple of friends, and a small table and a few chairs or stools were placed upon it.

My experience has taught me that no movement ever stops or languishes for want of funds. This does not mean that any … movement can go on without money, but it does mean that wherever it has good men and true at its helm, it is bound to attract to itself the requisite funds. On the other hand, I have also observed that a movement takes its downward course from the time it is afflicted with a plethora of funds. When, therefore, a public institution is managed from the interest of investments, I dare not call it a sin, but I do say it is a highly improper procedure. The public should be the bank for all public institutions, which should not last a day longer than the public wish. An institution run with the interest of accumulated capital ceases to be amenable to public opinion and becomes autocratic and self-righteous.…
²⁹

 … I have observed that voluntary workers are apt to behave as if they were not bound to render a detailed account of the business or monies with which they are entrusted because, like Caesar’s wife, they are above suspicion. This is sheer nonsense, as the keeping of accounts has nothing whatever to do with trustworthiness or the reverse. Keeping accounts is an independent duty, the performance of which is essential to clean work.…
³⁰

[It] was found necessary to readminister the oath of resistance, for safety’s sake, just to reinforce the awakening of the community and to probe the extent of its weakness, if any.…
³¹

[Pledges] and vows are, and should be, taken on rare occasions.… Only those who take a pledge can be bound by it. [A] pledge must not be taken with a view to produce an effect on outsiders.… Everyone must search his own heart, and if the inner voice assures him that he has the requisite strength to carry him through, then only should he pledge himself, and then only will his pledge bear fruit.

 … Everyone should fully realize his responsibility, then pledge himself only independently of others, and understand that he himself must be true to his pledge, even unto death, no matter what others do.
³²

The first of July, 1907, arrived and saw the opening of permit offices. The community had decided openly to picket each office, [posting] volunteers on the roads leading thereto, and these volunteers were to warn weak-kneed Indians against the trap laid for them there. Volunteers were provided with badges and expressly instructed not to be impolite to any Indian taking out a permit. They must ask him his name, but if he refused to give it, they must not on any account be violent or rude to him. To every Indian going to the permit office, they were to hand a printed paper detailing the injuries which submission to the Black Act would involve, and explain what was written in it. They must behave to the police, too, with due respect. If the police abused or thrashed them, they must suffer peacefully; if the ill-treatment by the police was insufferable, they should leave the place. If the police arrested them, they should gladly surrender themselves. If some such incident occurred in Johannesburg, it should be brought to my notice. At other places, the local secretaries were to be informed, and asked for further instructions. Each party of pickets had a captain whose orders must be obeyed by the rest.

This was the community’s first experience.… All who were above the age of twelve were taken as pickets.… But not one was taken who was unknown to the local workers. Over and above all these precautions, people were informed by announcements at every public meeting and otherwise, that if anyone desirous of taking out a permit was afraid of the pickets, he could ask the workers
to detail a volunteer to escort him to the permit office and back. Some did avail themselves of this offer.

 … Generally speaking, there was not much molestation by the police. When sometimes there was … the volunteers quietly put up with it. They brought to bear upon their work quite an amount of humor, in which the police too sometimes joined. They devised various diversions … to beguile their time.…

Although the Indians who wanted to take out permits were … saved from rudeness or violence from the volunteers in public, I must admit that there arose a body of men in connection with the movement who, without becoming volunteers, privately threatened those [taking] out permits with violence or injury.… This was a most painful development, and strong measures were adopted … to stamp it out as soon as it was found out.… The threats left an impression behind them and … far injured the cause. Those who were threatened instantly sought Government protection and got it. Poison was thus instilled into the community, and those who were weak already grew weaker still. The poison thus grew more virulent, as the weak are always apt to be revengeful.

These threats created but little impression, but the force of public opinion … and … the fear of one’s name being known to the community through the presence of volunteers acted as powerful deterrents. I do not know a single Indian who held it proper to submit to the Black Act. Those who submitted did so out of an inability to suffer hardships or pecuniary losses [from white boycotts] and were therefore ashamed of themselves.…
³³

When the Asiatic Department found that, notwithstanding all their exertions, they could not get more than five hundred Indians to register, they decided to arrest someone.… Some malevolent Indians in Germistown suggested to the Asiatic Department that many Indians there would take out permits if Rama Sundara was arrested.… The day on which he was sentenced was celebrated with great éclat. There was no trace of depression but … there was exultation and rejoicing. Hundreds were ready to go to jail. The officers of the Asiatic Department were disappointed.… They did not get a single registrant even from Germistown.…

But Rama Sundara turned out to be false coin. [He] bid a final goodbye to the Transvaal and to the movement. There are cunning men in every community and in every movement, and so there were in ours.…
³⁴

 … I believe cunning is not only morally wrong but also politically inexpedient, and have therefore always discountenanced its use, even from the practical standpoint.…
³⁵

 … The leaders of every clean movement are bound to see that they admit only clean fighters to it. But all their caution notwithstanding, undesirable elements cannot be kept out. And yet, if the leaders are fearless and true, the entry of undesirable persons into the movement without their knowing them to be so, does not ultimately harm the cause. When Rama Sundara was found out, he became a man of straw. The community forgot him, but the movement gathered fresh strength, even through him. Imprisonment suffered by him for the cause stood to our credit, the enthusiasm created by his trial came to stay, and, profiting by his example, weaklings slipped away out of the movement of their own accord.…

Let not the reader point the finger of scorn at Rama Sundara. All men are imperfect, and when imperfection is observed in someone in a larger measure than in others, people are apt to blame him. But that is not fair. Rama Sundara did not become weak intentionally. Man can change his temperament, can control it, but cannot eradicate it.… Although Rama Sundara fled away, who can tell how he might have repented of his weakness? [He] could have taken out a permit and steered clear of jail by submission to the Black Act. Further, if at all so minded, he could have become a tool of the Asiatic Department, misguided his friends, and become persona grata with the Government. Why should we not judge him charitably and say that … he, being ashamed of his weakness, hid his face from the community, and even did it a service?
³⁶

[All] truthful movements spontaneously attract to themselves all manner of pure and disinterested help. [No] other effort whatever was made during the struggle to enlist European sympathy beyond
the effort, if effort it can be called, involved in adherence to Truth and Truth alone. The European friends were attracted by the inherent power of the movement itself.
³⁷

[Some Indians took out permits under the Act, but most did not. A number of Indians were accordingly served with official notices to register or leave the Transvaal. Failing to do either, they were brought before a magistrate on January 11, 1908. Gandhi was among them.]

None of us had to offer any defence. All were to plead guilty.…

 … I said I thought there should be a distinction made between my case and those that were to follow. I had just heard … that my compatriots … had been sentenced to three months’ imprisonment with hard labor and had been fined a heavy amount; in lieu of payment … they would receive a further period of three months’ hard labor. If these men had committed an offense, I had committed a greater offense.… The Magistrate, however … sentenced me to two months’ simple imprisonment.… I was standing as an accused in the very court where I had appeared as counsel. But … I considered the former role as far more honorable than the latter, and did not feel the slightest hesitation in entering the prisoner’s box.

 … On the sentence being pronounced I was at once removed in custody and was then quite alone.… I was somewhat agitated and fell into deep thought.… What will happen in two months? Will I have to serve the full term? If the people courted imprisonment in large numbers, as they had promised, there would be no question of serving the full sentence. But if they failed to fill the prisons, two months would be as tedious as an age. [These thoughts] filled me with shame. How vain I was! I, who had asked the people to consider the prisons as His Majesty’s hotels, the suffering … upon disobeying the Black Act as perfect bliss, and the sacrifice of one’s all and of life itself in resisting it as supreme enjoyment! Where had all this knowledge vanished …?… I began to laugh at my own folly. I began to think of what kind of imprisonment would be awarded to the others and whether they would be kept with me in the prison. But I was disturbed by the police officer [and] driven to Johannesburg Jail.