“An unjust law is itself a species of violence. Arrest for its breach is more so.”

“No problem is too small or too trivial if we can really do something about it.”

“I have from my experience come to the conclusion that Gita has been composed to teach this one truth which I have explained. We can follow truth only in the measure that we shed our attachment to the ego.”

“Întâi te vor înjura. Pe urmă vor râde de tine. Apoi, te vor declara nebun. După aceea vor încerca să te compromită. Într-un târziu, vor face tot posibilul să te lichideze. Dacă scapi cu viaţă din toate acestea, vei fi un om mare.”

“Intolerance is a species of violence and therefore against our creed.”

“As a rule I had a distaste for any reading beyond my school books.”

“Behaviour is the mirror in which we can display our image.”

“As long as you derive inner help and comfort from anything, keep it.”

“A man of few words will rarely be thoughtless in his speech; he will measure every word.”

“Lebe, als würdest Du morgen sterben und lerne, als ob Du ewig leben würdest.”

“I realised that even a man’s reforming zeal ought not to make him exceed his limits. I also saw that in thus lending trust-money I had disobeyed the cardinal teaching of the Gita, viz., the duty of a man of equipoise to act without desire for the fruit. The error became for me a beacon-light of warning.”

“Where choice is set between cowardice and violence, I would advise violence ... I prefer to use arms in defense of honor rather than remain the vile witness of dishonor...”

“A person who is of fixed mind in a small matter can be so even in a big matter. If he is asked to make an ellipsoid of clay and concentrate on it, he would do so. In trying to concentrate on any object, one is likely to be distracted by all manner of troublesome thoughts. A person to whom this happens may be described as one whose intellect is not fixed on one aim. One who would succeed in the yoga of works must be of a fixed mind in small matters as well as big.”

“I had learnt at the outset not to carry on public work with borrowed money. One could rely on people’s promises in most matters except in respect of money.”

“Children inherit the qualities of the parents, no less than their physical features. Environment does play an important part, but the original capital on which a child starts in life is inherited from its ancestors. I have also seen children successfully surmounting the effects of an evil inheritance. That is due to purity being an inherent attribute of the soul. Polak and I had often very heated discussions about the desirability or otherwise of giving the children an English education. It has always been my conviction that Indian parents who train their children to think and talk in English from their infancy betray their children and their country. They deprive them of the spiritual and social heritage of the nation, and render them to that extent unfit for the service of the country. Having these convictions, I made a point of always talking to my children in Gujarati. Polak never liked this. He thought I was spoiling their future. He contended, with all the vigour and love at his command, that, if children were to learn a universal language like English from their infancy, they would easily gain considerable advantage over others in the race of life. He failed to convince me. I do not now remember whether I convinced him of the correctness of my attitude, or whether he gave me up as too obstinate. This happened about twenty years ago, and my convictions have only deepened with experience. Though my sons have suffered for want of full literary education, the knowledge of the mother-tongue that they naturally acquired has been all to their and the country’s good, inasmuch as they do not appear the foreigners they would otherwise have appeared. They naturally became bilingual, speaking and writing English with fair ease, because of daily contact with a large circle of English friends, and because of their stay in a country where English was the chief language spoken.”