380 EARLIER INDIAN SPEECHES
correspondence to the peasant cottage. There will bfl some proportion observed between that cottage and our Parliament House. The nation to-day is in a helpless condition, it does not possess even the right to err. He who has no right to err can never go forward. The history of the Commons is a history of blunders. Man, says an Arabian proverb, is error personified. Freedom to err and the duty of correcting errors is one definition of Swaraj. And such Swaraj lies in Parliament. That Parliament we need to-day. We are fitted for it to-day. We shall, therefore, get it on demand. It rests with us to define ' to-day/, Swaraj is not to be attain- ed through an appeal to the British democracy. The Engli&h nation cannot appreciate such an appeal. Its reply will be : " We never sought outside help to obtain Swaraj. We have received it through our own ability. You have not received it, because you are unfit. When you are fit for it, nobody can withhold it from you.*' How then shall we fit ourselves for it ? We have to demand Swaraj from our own democracy. Our appeal must be to it. When the peasantry of India understand what Swaraj is, the demand will be- come irresistible. The late Sir W.W. Hunter used to say that in the British system, victory on the battfefield was the shortest cut to success. If educated India could have taken its full share in the war, I am certain that we would not only have reached our goal already but the manner of the grant would have been altogether unique. We often refer to the fact that many sepoya of Hindustan have lost their lives on the battle-fields of France and Mesopotamia. It is not possible for the educated classes to claim the credit for this event. It is not patriotism that had prompted those sepoys to go to
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