REFLECTIONS ON GANDHI
sense which-I think-most people would give to the word, it is in–
human. The essence of being human is that one does not seek perfec–
tion, that one
is
sometimes willing to commit sins for the sake of loyalty,
that one does not push asceticism to the point where it makes friendly
intercourse impossible, and that one is prepared in the end to be de–
feated and broken up by life, which is the inevitable price of fastening
one's love upon other human individuals. No doubt alcohol, tobacco and
so forth are things that a saint must avoid, but sainthood is also a thing
that human beings must avoid. There is an obvious retort to this, but
one should be wary about making it. In this yogi-ridden age, it is too
readily assumed that "non-attachment" is not only better than a full
acceptance of earthly life, but that the ordinary man only rejects it be–
cause it is too difficult: in other words, that the average human being is
a failed saint. It is doubtful whether this is true. Many people genuinely
do not wish to be saints, and it is probable that some who achieve or
aspire to sainthood have never felt much temptation to be human be–
ings.
If
one could follow it to its psychological roots, one would, I be–
lieve, find that the main motive for "non-attachment" is a desire to es–
cape from the pain of living, and above all from love, which, sexual
or non-sexual, is hard work. But it is not necessary here to argue whether
the other-worldly or the humanistic ideal is "higher." The point is that
they are incompatible. One must choose between God and Man, and
all "radicals" and "progressives," from the mildest Liberal to the most
extreme Anarchist, have in effect chosen Man.
However, Gandhi's pacifism can be separated to some extent from
his other teachings. Its motive was religious, but he claimed also for
it that it was a definite technique, a method, capable of producing de–
sired political results. Gandhi's attitude was not that of most Western
pacifists.
Satyagraha,
first evolved in South Africa, was a sort of non–
violent warfare, a way of defeating the enemy without hurting him and
without feeling or arousing hatred. It entailed such things as civil dis–
obedience, strikes, lying down in front of railway trains, enduring police
charges without running away and without hitting back, and the like.
Gandhi objected to "passive resistance" as a translation of
Satyagraha:
in Gujarati, it seems, the word means "firmness in the truth." In his
early days Gandhi served as a stretcher-bearer on the British side in the
Boer War, and he was prepared to do the same again in the war of
1914-18. Even after he had completly abjured violence he was honest
enough to see that in war it is usually necessary to take sides. He did
not-indeed, since his whole political life centered round a struggle for
national independence, he could not-take the sterile and dishonest line
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