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The Campaign for Emancipation
Vardhaman found himself busy with the preliminaries attending upon the impending new life freed of the stately responsibilities Nandiwardhan got a whiff of it He approached Mahavira and said, 'We are victims of the twin disaster, brother, first the parents' bereavement and now your more stern decision to renounce family life Shall I survive this jolt? Shall it behove you to add insult to injury? Pray, forsake to do so Snap not the family ties so ruthlessly You ought to bear the responsibilities bequeathed to you by your worthy father I am at your beck and call I again entreat you to abstain from renouncing the family life '1
'Dear brother, the stately duties cease to bind me A system admitting of human misery is least compatible with my ethics I long for emancipation Permit me to move towards my goal'
'Dear brother! Statecraft appears most imperfect to you Little does it do to uplift man morally It, in fact, augments the misery of slavery What prevents you, in the circumstances, from succeeding to the throne in order to tone it up and redeem it?'
We happen to be rulers in a republic, brother A repub-, lican system entails a regard for the consensus of opinion How can a solitary being turn the tide according to his fancy? Let me first change my own heart If providence crowns my experiment with success, I will venture to apply it on a vast social scale'
1
'Awashyakchurni', first part p 248
