Abstract

Mahatma Gandhi's philosophy, which he called "an experiment with truth," was not a philosophy in which he merely interpreted or analysed things for himself. It was an experience, or experiment, in which he changed himself and his environment. In the process, Gandhi re-oriented many traditional ideas of Hindu thought and practice. He said: "I do not claim to have originated any new principle. I have simply tried in my own way to apply eternal truths to our daily life and problem." He was an ordinary man who became a mahätmä, "a man of great soul": indeed, "in a beggar's garb."