It is not possible to make a person or society non-violent by compulsion.

There is no instinct like that of the heart.

If my brain can tell the difference between noise and signal, my heart cannot.

Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him.

Nothing taught by force stays in the soul.

Non-violence is not inaction. It is not discussion. It is not for the timid or weak... Non-violence is hard work.

If you want peace, you won't get it with violence.

A heart can no more be forced to love than a stomach can be forced to digest food by persuasion.

Non-violence is backed by the theory of soul-force in which suffering is courted in the hope of ultimately winning over the opponent. But what happens when such an attempt fail to achieve the object? It is here that soul-force has to be combined with physical force so as not to remain at the mercy of tyrannical and ruthless enemy.

But intellect does not inform matters of the heart.

Nonviolence in its dynamic condition means conscious suffering. It does not means meek submission to the will of the evil-doer, but it means the putting of one's whole soul against the will of the tyrant. Working under this law of being , it is possible for a single individual to defy the whole might of an unjust empire to save his honor, his religion, his soul and lay the foundation for the empire's fall or its regeneration. And so I am not pleading for India to practice nonviolence because it is weak. I want her to practice nonviolence being conscious of her strength and power. No training in arms is required for realization of her strength. We seem to need it because we seem to think that we are but a lump of flesh. I want India to recognize that she has a soul that cannot perish and that can rise triumphant above every physical weakness and defy the physical combination of a whole world.

The best things in life cannot be willed into being.

Nature never appeals to intelligence until habit and instinct are useless. There is no intelligence where there is no need of change.

Enlightenment and peace can never be achieved by force.