Page:Speeches And Writings MKGandhi.djvu/725

 THE MORAL ISSUE

We can only therefore argue and reason with our opponents. The extreme to which we may go is non- violent non-co-operation with them even as with the Government. But we may not non-co-operate with them in private life, for we do not non-co-operate with the men composing the Goverment. We are non co-opera- ting with the system they administer. We decline to render official service to Sir George Lloyd the Governor, we dare not withold social service from Sir George Lloyd, the Englishman.

The mischief, I am sorry to say, began among the Hindus and the Musalmans themselves. There was social persecution, there was coercion. I must confess that I did not always condemn it as strongly as I might have. I might have dissociated myself from the move- ment when it became at all general. We soon mended our ways, we became more tolerant but the subtle coercion was there. I passed it by as I thought it would die a natural death. I saw in Bombay that it had not. It assumed a virulent form on the 17th.

We damaged the Khilafat cause and with it that of the Punjab and Swaraj. We must retrace our steps and scrupulously insure minorities against the least molest- ation. If the Christian wishes to wear the European hat and unmentionables, he must be free to do so. If a Parsi wishes to stick to his Fenta, he has every right to do so. If they both see their safety in associating them- selves with the Government, we may only wean them from their error by appealing to their reason, not by breaking their head?. The greater the coercion we use, the greater the security we give to the Govern- ment, if only because the latter has more effective weapons of coercion than we have. For us to resort

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