<P> Tolstoy presented excerpts from magazines and newspapers relating various personal experiences, and gave keen insight into the history of non-resistance from the very foundation of Christianity, as being professed by a minority of believers . In particular, he confronts those who seek to maintain status quo: </P> <P> "That this social order with its pauperism, famines, prisons, gallows, armies, and wars is necessary to society; that still greater disaster would ensue if this organization were destroyed; all this is said only by those who profit by this organization, while those who suffer from it--and they are ten times as numerous--think and say quite the contrary ." </P> <P> Mohandas Gandhi wrote in his autobiography The Story of My Experiments with Truth (Part II, Chapter 15) that this book "overwhelmed" him and "left an abiding impression ." Gandhi listed Tolstoy's book, as well as John Ruskin's Unto This Last and the poet Shrimad Rajchandra (Raychandbhai), as the three most important modern influences in his life . Reading this book opened up the mind of the world - famous Tolstoy to Gandhi, who was still a young protester living in South Africa at the time . </P> <P> In 1908 Tolstoy wrote, and Gandhi read, A Letter to a Hindu, which outlines the notion that only by using love as a weapon through passive resistance could the native Indian people overthrow the colonial British Empire . This idea ultimately came to fruition through Gandhi's organization of nationwide nonviolent strikes and protests during the years 1918--1947 . In 1909, Gandhi wrote to Tolstoy seeking advice and permission to republish A Letter to a Hindu in his native language, Gujarati . Tolstoy responded and the two continued a correspondence until Tolstoy's death a year later in 1910 . The letters concern practical and theological applications of nonviolence, as well as Gandhi's wishes for Tolstoy's health . Tolstoy's last letter to Gandhi "was one of the last, if not the last, writings from his pen ." </P>

Where is the kingdom of god is within you