“A violent man’s activity is most visible, while it lasts. But it is always transitory… Hitler, Mussolini, and Stalin are able to show the immediate effectiveness of violence… But the efforts of Buddha’s non-violent action persist and are likely to grow with age. And the more it is practiced, the more effective and inexhaustible it becomes, and ultimately the whole world stands agape and exclaims, “A miracle has happened.” All miracles are due to the silent and effective working of invisible force. Non-violence is the most invisible and the most effective.”
~ Gandhi

We could not ask for a clearer picture of what Gandhi called the “living force” that is in fact “the greatest power humankind has been endowed with.” Here he makes the fascinating point that the deeper a spiritual force is, the more invisible to us on the physical plane and the more powerful its operation. Again, an entirely scientific model—if we only had the science to expose it to view. It is so clear from this description why we have found it so easy to believe in violence and so difficult to believe in nonviolence. We are born, as the Upanishad puts it, with our senses cranked outwards, showing us the transitory world and not the eternal world on which it rests. All life is a struggle to reorient our vision, from the surface, with all its negativity and destructiveness, to the core, the inexhaustible source of goodness and life.

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About Daily Metta

Stephanie Van Hook, the Metta Center’s executive director, launched Daily Metta in 2015 as a way to share Gandhi’s spiritual wisdom and experiments with nonviolence.

Our 2016 Daily Metta continues with Gandhi on weekdays. On weekends, we share videos that complement Michael Nagler’s award-winning book, The Search for a Nonviolent Future: A Promise of Peace for Ourselves, Our Families, and Our World. To help readers engage with the book more deeply, the Metta Center offers a free PDF study guide.

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