Religion for a long time has come to be static in India. What we want is to make it dynamic. I want it to be brought into the life of everybody.
Religion in India culminates in freedom.
Religion, in India, means realisation and nothing short of that.
Religion in India must be made as free and as easy of access as is God’s air.
Religion is the one and sole interest of the people of India.
The Indian mind is first religious, then anything else. So this is to be strengthened.
This is the line of life, this is the line of growth, and this is the line of well-being in India – to follow the track of religion.
To the Indian mind there is nothing higher than religious ideals, that this is the keynote of Indian life.
We have seen that our vigour, our strength, nay, our national life is in our religion.
The Buddhist tenet, “Non-killing is supreme virtue”, is very good, but in trying to enforce it upon all by legislation without paying any heed to the capacities of the people at large, Buddhism has brought ruin upon India.
The test of Ahimsa is absence of jealousy.
There is no happiness higher than what a man obtains by this attitude of non-offensiveness, to all creation.
There is no virtue higher than non-injury.
These practices – non-killing, truthfulness, non-stealing, chastity, and non-receiving – are to be practised by every man, woman, and child; by every soul, irrespective of nation, country, or position.
There is, however, only one idea of duty which has been universally accepted by all mankind, of all ages and sects and countries, and that has been summed up in a Sanskrit aphorism thus: “Do not injure any being; not injuring any being is virtue, injuring any being is sin.”
To his enemies the householder must be a hero. Them he must resist. That is the duty of the householder. He must not sit down in a corner and weep, and talk nonsense about non-resistance. If he does not show himself a hero to his enemies he has not done his duty.
Man cannot always think of matter, however pleasurable it may be.
According to us, there are three things in the makeup of man. There is the body, there is the mind, and there is the soul.
As long as a man thinks, this struggle must go on, and so long man must have some form of religion.
Each man has a mission in life, which is the result of all his infinite past Karma.