Shimla – Synthesis
KennethMoyle
On my desk, under the pen holder and near the stapler, I keep a small piece of paper with these words: “A small body of determined spirits fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission can alter the course of history.” Gandhi may have put the mark of credibility upon them and they are more concisely phrased than my Irish grandfather may have been capable of, but these are the universal words of human hope and faith. We whisper them in the ears of our unborn children and when our faith in the unseen fails or falters we cling to these shared beliefs: glimpses of an ancient strength that we owned absolutely.
Gandhi also said “Action is no less necessary than thought to the instinctive tendencies of the human frame” and although we cannot see his face, one imagines it carries a patient, benevolent smile at the young boys playing a game on the ground below. From the Jamaican bobsledding team to the Bad News Bears there’s a little of Gandhi’s wisdom in all stories of human triumph. It may not yet be time to give up on the gods, but perhaps the alternative is not so bad as we think?
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