Freedom Through Disobedience

by Chitta Ranjan Das

THE FRENCH REVOLUTION

The history of the French Revolution is the history of a struggle at the first instance between the Crown and the nobility on one side and the Representative Assemblies with armed Paris on the other. Both took to violence, one to the bayonet and the other to the pike. The pike succeeded because the bayonet was held with uncertain hands. And then, as is usual after the victory gained with violence, the popular party was sharply divided between two sections—the Girondins and the Jacobins. Again there was an appeal to force. The Girondins asked the provinces to rise in arms, the Jacobins asked Paris to rise in arms. Paris being nearer and stronger, the Girondins were defeated and sent to the guillotine—the Jacobins seized the power. But it did not take them many months to fall out among themselves. First Robespierre and Danton sent Hebert and Chanmette to the guillotine, then Robespierre sent Danton to the guillotine. Robespierre in his turn was guillotined by Collot, Billand and Tallien. These men again were banished by others to the far-off South America. If there was a slight difference of views between the Girondins and the Jacobins there was practically none between the different sections of the Jacobins. The whole question was which of the various sections was to rule France. Force gave way to stronger force and at last under Napoleon, France experienced a despotism similar to if not worse than the despotism of Louis XIV. As regards liberty there was not more liberty in France under the terrible Committee of Public Safety, and Napoleon than under Louis XIV or Louis XV. The law of Prairial was certainly much worse than Lettres de Cachet. And the people—? On the Pont au Change, on the Place de Greve, in long sheds, Mercier, at the end of the Revolution, saw working men at their repast. One’s allotment of daily bread had sunk to an ounce and a half. “Plates containing each three grilled herrings, sprinkled with shorn onions, wetted with a little vinegar; to this add some morsel of boiled prunes, and lentils swimming in a clear sauce; at these frogal tables I have seen them ranged by the hundred; consuming, without bread, their scant messes, far too moderate for the keenness of their appetite, and the extent of their stomach.” “Seine water,” remarks Carlyle grimly—“rushing plenteous by, will supply the deficiency.” One cannot forget the exclamation of Carlyle in this connection:

“O Man of Toil! Thy struggling and thy daring, these six long years of insurrection and tribulation, thou hast profited nothing by it, then? Thou consumest thy herring and water, in the blessed gold-red of evening. O why was the Earth so beautiful, becrimsoned with dawn and twilight, if man’s dealings with man were to make it a vale of scarcity, of tears, not even soft tears? Destroying of Bastilles, discomfiting of Brunswicks, fronting of Principalities and Powers, of Earth and Tophet, all that thou hast dared and endured,—it was for a Republic of the Saloons? Aristocracy of Feudal Parchment has passed away with a mighty rushing; and now, by a natural course, we arrive at Aristocracy of the Moneybag. It is the course through which all European Societies are, at this hour, travelling. Apparently a still baser sort of Aristocracy? An infinitely baser the basest yet known.”

Even to-day France is plodding her weary way towards Swaraj.

REVOLUTIONS IN ENGLAND

The history of England proves the same truth. The revolution of the Barons in 1215 took away or purported to take away the power from the King but the power fell into the hands of the aristocracy, and democracy did not share in the triumph of the Barons. Thus the great Charter, as a great historian has observed, was thus not a Charter of Liberty but of liberties. The revolution in the reign of Charles I. produced a new dictator who suppressed freedom. The work which the Long Parliament began was interrupted by the Revolution which followed the execution of the King, and it required another Revolution, this time a bloodless Revolution, to complete the work. I deny that the work is yet complete. The continual class war and the obvious economic injustice do not proclaim that freedom which England claimed for herself. I maintain that no people has yet succeeded in winning freedom by force and violence. The truth is that love of power is a formidable factor to be reckoned with, and those who secure that power by violence will retain that power by violence. The use of violence degenerates them who use it and it is not easy for them, having seized the power, to surrender it. And they find it easier to carry on the work of their predecessor, retaining their power in their own hands. Non-violence does not carry with it that degeneration which is inherent in the use of violence.

REVOLUTIONS IN ITALY AND RUSSIA

The Revolutions in Italy and Russia illustrate the same principle. The Italian Revolution inspired by Mazzini and worked out by Garibaldi and Cavour, did not result in the attainment of Swaraj. The freedom of Italy is yet in the making, and the men and women of Italy are to-day looking forward to another revolution. If it results in a war of violence it will again defeat its purpose, but only to allow Freedom and Non-violence to triumph in the end.

The recent revolution in Russia is a very interesting study. The shape which it has now assumed is due to the attempt to force Marxian doctrines and dogmas on the unwilling genius of Russia. Violence will again fail. If I have read the situation accurately I expect a counter-revolution. The soul of Russia must struggle to free herself from the socialism of Carl Marx. It may be an independent movement or it may be that the present movement contains within itself the power of working out that freedom. In the meantime the fate of Russia is trembling in the balance.

NON-VIOLENT NON-CO-OPERATION: THE ONLY METHOD