To forgive is not to forget. The merit lies in loving in spite of the vivid knowledge that one that must be loved is not a friend. There is not merit in loving an enemy when you forget him for a friend.
Poverty is the worst form of violence.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Poverty causes immense suffering and can be more destructive than physical violence.
Mahatma Gandhi's assertion that 'poverty is the worst form of violence' emphasizes the profound impact that economic deprivation has on individuals and society. By equating poverty with violence, he highlights how the lack of basic resources can lead to suffering, degradation, and loss of dignity, effectively inflicting harm on those who experience it without any physical confrontation. This perspective urges us to view poverty not merely as a socio-economic issue but as a moral one that requires our attention and action.
Themes
In practice
Example use cases
In a speech addressing social justice, one might quote Gandhi to emphasize the need for economic reforms.
More from Mahatma Gandhi
All quotes βLove never claims, it ever gives. Love ever suffers, never resents never revenges itself.
Strength does not come from physical capacity. It comes from an indomitable will.
The real test of nonviolence lies in its being brought in contact with those who have contempt for it.
Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.
The devotion of such titans of spirit as Lenin to an Ideal must bear fruit. The nobility of his selflessness will be an example through centuries to come, and his Ideal will reach perfection.
Similar quotes
Impelled by feelings that were primal yet paradoxically wholly impersonal. Feelings of contempt born of inchoate, unacknowledged fear--civilization's fear of nature, men's fear of women, power's fear of powerlessness. Man's subliminal urge to destroy what he could neither subdue nor deify.
The use of the atomic bomb, with its indiscriminate killing of women and children, revolts my soul.
Oh, gentlemen, perhaps I really regard myself as an intelligent man only because throughout my entire life I've never been able to start or finish anything. Granted, granted I'm a babbler, a harmless, irksome babbler, as we all are. But what's to be done if the sole and express purpose of every intelligent man is babble--that is, a deliberate pouring from empty into void.
We have used the Bible as if it were a mere special constable's handbook, an opium dose for keeping beasts of burden patient while they are overloaded.
Religion is like a map. The route isn't important. It's the destination that matters.
By using money as the scapegoat and work as our all-consuming routine, we are able to conveniently disallow ourselves to do otherwise: 'John, I'd love to talk about the gaping void I feel in my life, the hopelessness that hits me like a punch in the eye every time I start my computer in the morning, but I have so much work to do! I've got at least three hours of unimportant email to reply to before calling prospects who said 'no' yesterday. Gotta run!