The Story of My Experiments with Truth/Part III/Spirit of Service
Documents libres.
| ←Education of Children | An Autobiography or The Story of my Experiments with Truth ~ Spirit of Service written by Mohandas K. Gandhi | Brahmacharya I→ |
My profession progressed satisfactorily, but that was far from satisfying me. The Question of
further simplifying my life and of doing some concrete act of service to my fellowmen had been
constantly agitating me, when a leper came to my door. I had not the heart to dismiss him with a
meal. So I offered him shelter, dressed his wounds, and began to look after him. But I could not
go on like that indefinately. I could not afford, I lacked the will to keep him always with me. So I
sent him to the Government Hospital for indentured labourers.
But I was still ill at ease. I longed for some humanitarian work of a permanent nature. Dr. Booth
was the head of the St. Aidan's Mission. He was a kind-hearted man and treated his patients free.
Thanks to a Parsi Rustomji's charities, it was possible to open a small charitable hospital under
Dr. Booth's charge. I felt strongly inclined to serve as a nurse in this hospital. The work of
dispensing medicines took from one to two hours daily, and I made up my mind to find time from
my office-work, so as to be able to fill the place of a compounder in the dispensary attached to
the hospital. Most of my professional work was chamber work, conveyancing and arbitration. I of
course used to have a few cases in the magistrate's court, but most of them were of a non-
controversial character, and Mr. Khan, who had followed me to South Africa and was then living
with me, undertook to take them if I was absent. So I found time to serve in the small hospital.
This work brought me some peace. It consisted in ascertaining the patient's complaints, laying
the facts before the doctor and dispensing the prescriptions. It brought me in close touch with
suffering Indians, most of them indentured Tamil, Telugu or North Indian men.
The experience stood me in good stead, when during the Boer War I offered my services for
nursing the sick and wounded soldiers.
The question of the rearing of children had been ever before me. I had two sons born in South
Africa, and my service in the hospital was useful in solving the question of their upbringing. My
independent spirit was a constant source of trial. My wife and I had decided to have the best
medical aid at the time of her delivery, but if the doctor and the nurse were to leave us in the lurch
at the right moment, what was I to do? Then the nurse had to be an Indian. And the difficulty of
getting a trained Indian nurse in South Africa can be easily imagined from the similar difficulty in
India. So I studied the things necessary for safe labour. I read Dr. Tribhuvandas' book, #Ma-ne
Shikhaman# - Advice to a mother - and I nursed both my children according to the instructions
given in the book, tempered here and there by experience as I had gained elsewhere. The
services of a nurse were utilized-not for more than two months each time-chiefly for helping my
wife and not for taking care of the babies, which I did myself.
The birth of the last child put me to the severest test. The travail came on suddenly. The doctor
was not immediately available, and some time was lost in fetching the midwife. Even if she had
been on the spot, she could not have helped delivery. I had to see through the safe delivery of the
baby. My careful study of the subject in Dr. Tribhuvandas' work was of inestimable help. I was not
nervous.
I am convinced that for the proper upbringing of children the parents ought to have a general
knowledge of the care and nursing of babies. At every step I have seen the advantages of my
careful study of the subject. My children would not have enjoyed the general health that they do
today, had I not studied the subject and turned my knowledge to account. We labour under a sort
of superstition that a child has nothing to learn during the first five years of its life. On the contrary
the fact is that the child never learns in after life what it does in its first five years. The education
of the child begins with conception. The physical and mental states of the parents at the moment
of conception are reproduced in the baby. Then during the period of pregnancy it continues to be
affected by the mother's moods, desires and temperament, as also by her ways of life. After birth
the child imitates the parents, and for a considerable number of years entirely depends on them
for its growth.
The couple who realize these things will never have sexual union for the fulfilment of their lust,
but only when they desire issue. I think it is the height of ignorance to believe that the sexual act
is an independent function necessary like sleeping or eating. The world depends for its existence
on the act of generation, and as the world is the play-ground of God and a reflection of His glory,
the act of generation should be controlled for the ordered growth of the world. He who realizes
this will control his lust at any cost, equip himself with the knowledge necessary for the physical,
mental and spiritual well-being of his progeny, and give the benefit of that knowledge to posterity.
