THERE IS NO UNITY

 

          THERE IS NO UNITY

The phrase “Unity in Diversity” is admirable  but not so true as it should have been .

 According to one popular definition “it refers to the unity of people with different cultural, religious, social, and other demographic differences.”

A UNESCO book about the life history of Indian anti-colonialist Mohandas Karamchand  Gandhi (2^nd October 1869- 30 January 1948) bears the title “All Men Are Brothers.”

A Sanskrit saying “Vasudhaive Kutumbakam” means “The World is One Family”. According to the vision of this saying there should be no discrimination and violence among the people of the world. Sadly enough it is not so. We are living in a divided and violent world. There is disunity, rather than unity in diversity.

English poet and translator James Kirkup (1918-2009) said in his poem “No Men Are Foreign:

“Remember, no men are strange, no countries foreign,

Beneath all uniforms, a single body breathes

Like ours; the land our brothers walk upon

Is earth like this, in which we all shall lie.”

 

Scottish essayist Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881) wished that men’s hearts ought not to be set against one another, but set with one another, and all against evil only.

 

French philosopher Blaise Pascal (1623-62) believed that the multitude which does not reduce itself to unity is confusion; the unity which does not depend upon the multitude , is tyranny.

 

English clergy James Martineau (1805-1900) claims that what science calls the unity and uniformity of nature, truth calls the fidelity of God.

 

Finally, this quote: “Our ability to reach unity in diversity will be the beauty and the test of our civilization.”                                                                               **************

G.R.Kanwal

11 December 2024