“[T]he devotion required by the Gita is no soft-hearted effusiveness. It certainly is not blind faith. The devotion of the Gita has the least to do with the externals. A devotee may use, if he likes, rosaries, forehead marks, make offerings, but these things are no test of his devotion. He is the devotee who is jealous of none, who is a fount of mercy, who is without egotism, who is selfless, who treats alike cold and heat, happiness and misery, who is ever forgiving, who is always contented, whose resolutions are firm, who has dedicated mind and soul to God, who causes no dread, who is not afraid of others, who is free from exultation, sorrow and fear, who is pure, who is versed in action and yet remains unaffected by it, who renounces all fruit, good or bad, who treats friend and foe alike, who is untouched by respect or disrespect, who is not puffed up by praise, who does not go under when people speak ill of him who loves silence and solitude, who has a disciplined reason. Such devotion is inconsistent with the existence at the same time of strong attachments.
We thus see that to be a real devotee is to realize oneself.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Recall the face of the poorest and weakest man you have seen, and ask yourself if this step you contemplate is going to be any use to him.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Krishna of the Gita is perfection and right knowledge personified; but the picture is imaginary. That does not mean that Krishna, the adored of his people, never lived. But perfection is imagined. The idea of a perfect incarnation is an after growth.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“My shyness has been in reality my shield and buckler. It has allowed me to grow. It has helped me in my discernment of truth.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“In the Gita, the author has cleverly made use of the event to teach great truths.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Besides, I had learnt nothing at all of Indian law. I had not the slightest idea of Hindu and Mahomedan Law. I had not even learnt how to draft a plaint, and felt completely at sea. I had heard of Sir Pherozeshah Mehta as one who roared like a lion in law courts. How, I wondered, could he have learnt the art in England?”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Stoning prophets and erecting churches to their memory afterwards has been the way of the world through the ages. Today we worship Christ, but the Christ in the flesh we crucified.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“Honest differences are often a healthy sign of progress”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“No culture can live, if it attempts to be exclusive.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“To believe that what has not occurred in history will not occur at all, is to argue disbelief in the dignity of man.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“As a rule I had a distaste for any reading beyond my school books.”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
“A commercial company enslaved a nation comprising two hundred millions. Tell this to a man free from superstition and he will fail to grasp what these words mean. What does it mean that thirty thousand people, not athletes, but rather weak and ordinary people, have enslaved two hundred millions of vigorous, clever, capable, freedom-loving people? Do not the figures make it clear that not the English, but the Indians, have enslaved themselves?”
―
Mahatma Gandhi
