"Let me quote here my cable to H. G. Wells in reply to his on the rights of man:
Received your cable. Have carefully read your five articles. You will permit me to say, you are on the wrong track. I feel sure that I can draw up a better charter of rights than you have drawn up. But what good will it be? Who will become its guardian? If you mean propaganda or popular education, you have begun at the wrong end.
I suggest the right way. Begin with a charter of duties of man, and I promise the rights will follow as spring follows winter. I write from experience. As a young man I began life by seeking to assert my rights, and I soon discovered I had none—not even over my wife. So I began by discovering and performing my duty by my wife, my children, friends, companions and society, and I find today that I have greater rights, perhaps, than any living man I know. If this is too tall a claim, then I say I do not know anyone who possesses greater rights than I.
SEVAGRAM, October 8, 1940
Harijan, 13-10-1940"
The utter generosity of the poor humbles us. They give rice to every mendicant even when their rice is getting over. That is what they are defined by.
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