Page:Holmes - World Significance of Mahatma Gandhi.djvu/5

 the loyalty of the people of India to the British crown. As a matter of fact, had the Indians been loyal, there would have been no necessity for a royal visitation. The very exigencies of the situation made inevitable just the opposite result from what was intended or desired. No sooner was the Prince’s journey announced, than Gandhi organized his boycott—not because he had anything against this innocent young man used by a distracted government for a disreputable purpose, but because he saw in his coming a wonderful opportunity to demonstrate how the Indian people felt about English rule. As soon as the Prince arrived this boycott was put into effect. Everywhere he went the natives met him with averted eyes and turned backs. Finally, at Allahabad, they refused to meet him at all. When the Prince of Wales entered this place, it was as though he were arrived at a city of the dead. Streets were deserted; doors were barred, and shutters drawn at the windows; while the people by the thousands swarmed to a rendezvous outside the town to acclaim Swaraj, and pledge themselves to its support. The visit of the Prince of Wales, now drawing to a close, has been simply one vast demonstration of Indian unrest. More than anything else that has happened, or could have happened, it has taught the world of Gandhi and his great crusade for liberty.

Such are some of the events which have conspired in recent months to draw the attention of mankind to India. In so far as these events have enabled men to know who Gandhi is and what he is doing, they are beneficent, for I can imagine no truer baptism of the soul than knowledge of this eastern saint. To those who understand what it means in terms of inward purity and outward devotion, his name falls on the heart “like the gentle dew from heaven.” From another and more important point of view, however, these events must be regarded as unfortunate, for they are tending to present Gandhi to the world simply as a leader of a nationalistic cause. They are teaching men to classify the Indian Mahatma with such historical figures as William Tell, William Wallace, Robert Emmett, Kosciusko, George Washington, and Garibaldi, as the champion of the liberties of an enslaved people. This, of course, he is! Gandhi stands today at the forefront of his nation’s life, as we have seen, and matches in heroic service of freedom the achievements of any of the great nationalistic leaders of the past. But it is a deplorable mistake to look at Gandhi exclusively or even primarily from this standpoint. He is more than the leader of a movement for national independence—