Quotes About Independence

Blood on India's streets was not what the Raj desired, yet Hindu-Muslim disputes were preferable to India-England ones.

If the price of peace on India's streets was capitulation to the Empire and its threats, Gandhi was not willing to pay that price.

the speed with which the British left after announcing Independence and Partition may have been, in his words, 'the most contemptible single act in the annals of the Empire' (p 77).

Churchill's keenness on dividing India, his instruction to Viceroy Wavell in 1945 that he should not leave India before splitting it into 'into Pakistan, Hindustan, Princestan etc.'

Avoid the crowd. Do your own thinking independently. Be the chess player, not the chess piece.

I was pulled this way and that for longer than I can remember. And my problem was that I always tried to go in everyone's way but my own. I have also been called one thing and then another while no one really wished to hear what I called myself. So after years of trying to adopt the opinions of others I finally rebelled. I am an invisible man.

Always remember, Son, the best boss is the one who bosses the least. Whether it's cattle, or horses, or men; the least government is the best government.

I once said to my father, when I was a boy, 'Dad we need a third political party.' He said to me, 'I'll settle for a second.'

Our founders did not oust George III in order for us to crown Richard I.

We are content with discord; we are content with alarms; we are content with blood; but we will never be content with a master. —A PASHTUN LEADER TO BRITISH MAJOR-GENERAL WILLIAM EPHINSTONE

The characteristic of genuine heroism is its persistency. All men have wandering impulses, fits and starts of generosity. But when you have resolved to be great, abide by yourself, and do not try to reconcile yourself with the world. The heroic cannot be common, nor the common heroic.

Discontent is want of self-reliance; it is infirmity of will.

The basis of good manners is self-reliance.

When I go into my garden with a spade, and dig a bed, I feel such an exhilaration and health that I discover that I have been defrauding myself all this time in letting others do for me what I should have done with my own hands.

If the single man plant himself indomitably on his instincts, and there abide, the huge world will come round to him.

It is easy in the world to live after the worlds opinions; it is easy in solitude to live after your own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.

Good breeding, a union of kindness and independence.

Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members…. The virtue in most request is conformity. Self-reliance is its aversion. It loves not realities and creators, but names and customs.

A man must consider what a rich realm he abdicates when he becomes a conformist.

Discontent is the want of self-reliance: it is infirmity of will.

Self-reliance, the height and perfection of man, is reliance on God.

Can anything be so elegant as to have few wants, and to serve them one's self?

We must be our own before we can be another's.

Good-bye, proud world! I'm going home;Thou art not my friend and I'm not thine.