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"I learned long ago that when one gives violence, one can only expect violence in return, no more, no less. I have scars to prove it."
He pointed to the scars across his feet and left leg. "After getting caught up in the violent phase of the freedom movement, I was imprisoned and tortured. It was a time of seeming alienation for me. But that pain put me to the test. It was given for my understanding. I saw that I had invited that pain myself. It dawned on me that even the smallest anger and violence in the mind can create a bigger violence. The tiniest speck of resentment and frustration can end up in killing and war. Think for a moment where your angry thoughts are Jeading you."
They responded, "Yes, but Gandhiji's way is so slow. How can it bring us freedom soon?"
"Gandhiji's way is the way of Mahavir whom he read and absorbed into his own life. He is convinced that non-violence and friendship for all are the only means which can terminate the entire cycle of violence and war. Those relatives who go on telling their children of the wars their forefathers fought breed even more dissension. They sow the seeds of more grudges. Who will extinguish this fire except those who see that this fire is consuming their own energy and corroding their own hearts? Who will remove the bitter taste from the mouth except those who see that in retribution and revenge there is no gain?"
Munishree was the peer of these young people, in his twenties, outwardly youthful, but inwardly seasoned in wisdom and experience. They started to listen to him.
Still they asked, "But if we jump in and fight the British now, while their attention is focused on the larger war, we have a chance to win and stop this exploitation from dragging on longer."
"Where is the gain in which mothers lose their beautiful sons? Where is the gain in which wives lose their sweet husbands? Where is the gain in which sisters lose their brave brothers? Those who are defeated on the battlefield are dead, and those who call themselves winners are themselves defeated, for they have externalized their own self-hatred and made enemies of themselves and others."
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