Page:Gandhi The Man and His Message.djvu/6

 mass revolution on the one hand, and an unyielding and absolutely uncompromising champion of non-violence on the other, he stands out supreme, unequalled and unsurpassed.

His theory of a non-violent mass revolution aiming at the dethronement of a powerful, well-established and fully equipped militaristic government, like the British Bureaucracy in India, though strange and unpractical at first thought, is yet very simple and straightforward.

“Man is born free, and yet,” lamented Rousseau, “he is everywhere in chains.” “Man is born free, why should he refuse to live free?” questions Gandhi. Freedom is man’s birthright. With unlimited liberty in thought and action, he could live in perfect peace and harmony, only if all men would rigidly observe their own duties and keep “within their own rights.” But men as they are, and not as they should be, possess a certain degree of animal nature. In some it is subdued, while in others, let loose, it becomes the cause of disturbance and dislocation of the rest. To safeguard against such encroachments on their “natural rights” and privileges, men have organised themselves into groups called “states.” By so doing each voluntary member of this family (or state) foregoes some of his personal rights in exchange for certain individual privileges and communal rights to be sought under its joint protection. The government of a country is thus a matter of voluntary choice by its people to carry on such functions as shall conduce to the highest good of the maximum number. When it goes corrupt, when instead of protecting its members from every form of evil and disorder, it becomes an instrument of the forces of darkness, a tool of corruption, citizens have it as their inalienable right to demand a change in the existing order. They might first attempt at a reform. Should such attempts come to nought, the right of revolution is decidedly theirs. It is indeed their right, inviolable and fundamental, not only to non-cooperate with a government, but to permanently refuse as a matter of duty, sacred and divine, their cooperation, direct and indirect, with a government which has been responsible for