Page:Speeches And Writings MKGandhi.djvu/657

 We cannot get Swaraj if not one class in the country Is prepared to work and sacrifice for it. The Government wrill yield not to the logic of words. It knows no logic but that of brave and true deeds.

Bravery of the sword they know. And they have nade themselves proof against its use by us. Many of them vill welcome violence on our part. They are unconquer- ible in the art of meeting and suppressing violence. We )ropose, therefore, to sterilize their power of inflicing vio- lence by our non-violence. Violence dies when it ceases to evoke response from its object, Non-violence is the corner-stone of the edifice of Non-Co-opera- tion. You will, therefore, not be hasty or over- -zealous in your dealings with those who nuy not see eye to eye with you. Intolerance is a species of violence and therefore against our creed. Non- violent Non-Co-operation is an object lesson in democracy. The moment we are able to ensure non- violence, even under circumstances the most provoking that moment we have achieved our end, because that -is the moment 'when we can offer complete Non-Co- operation.

I ask you not to be frightened at the proposition just -stated. People do not move in arithmetical progression, not even in geometrical progression. They have beea known to perish in a day : they have been known to rise In a day. Is it such a difficult thing for India to realise that thirty crores of human beings have but to feel their strength and they can be free without having to use it / As we had not regained national consciousness, the rulers have hitherto played us against one another. We have to refuse to do so, and we are masters, not they.

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