Page:Speeches And Writings MKGandhi.djvu/609

 vast majority of cases it is the duty of a subject to submit to wrongs on failure of the usual procedure* so long as they do not affect his vital being. But every nation and every individual has the right and It is their duty, to rise against an intolerable wrong. I do not believe in armed risings. They are a remedy worse than the disease sought to be cared. They are a token of the spirit of revenge and impatience and anger. The method of violence cannot do good in the long run. Wit- ness the effect of the armed rising of the allied powers against Germany. Have they not become even like the Germans, as the latter have been depicted to us by them/

We have a better method. Unlike that of violence it certainly involves the exercise of restraint and patience ; but it requires also resoluteness of will. This method is to refuse to be party to the wrong. No tyrant has ever yet succeeded in his purpose without carrying the victim with him, it may be, as it often is, by force. Most people choose rather to yield to the will of the tyrant than to suffer for the consequence of retiscence. Hence does terrorism form part of the stock-in-trade of the tyrant. But we have in- stances in history where terrorism has failed to impose the terrorist's will upon his victim. India has the choice be- fore her now. If then the acts of the Punjab Government be an insufferable wrong, if the report of Lord Hunter's Commitee and the two despatches be a greater wrong by reason of their grievous condonation of these acts, it is clear that we must refuse to submit to this official violence, Appeal the Parliament by all means if necessay but if the Parliament fails us an d if we are worthy to call ourselves a nation, we must refuse to uphold the Government by withdrawing co-operation from it.

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