508 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
extending over 400 years. They might have converted the whole of Untouchables and the Backward Classes if they had begun with them first.
Attention may be drawn to the entry of Christianity in Rome. For it is very instructive. From the pages of Gibbon’s “Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire” it is clear that Christianity entered first among the lower classes as Gibbon says among the poor and the dispized section of the Roman population. The higher classes came in later on. Gibbon ridicules Christianity as a religion of the poor and the downtrodden. In holding this view Gibbon was thoroughly mistaken, he failed to realize that it is the poor who need religion. For religion, if it is right religion, gives hope of betterment to the poor who having nothing else need as a soothing suction. The rich have everything. They need not live on hope. They live on their possession. Secondly, Gibbon failed to realize that Religion, if it is of the right type, ennobles people and elevates them. People do not degrade religion.
I will now turn to the preliminary step which must he taken for the revival of Buddhism in India. I mention below those that occur to me :
(i) The preparation of a Buddhist Gospel which could be a constant companion of the convert. The want of a small Gospel containng the teachings of the Buddha is a great handicap in the propagation of Buddhism. The common man cannot be expected to read the 73 volumes of the Pali Cannon. Christianity has a great advantages over Buddhism in having the message of Christ contained in a small booklet ‘The Bible’. This handicap in the way of the propagation of Buddhism must be removed. In regard to the preparation of Buddha’s Gospel care must be taken to emphasise the social and moral teachings of the Buddha. I have to emphasise this because what is emphasised is meditation, contemplation and Abhidhamma. This way of presenting Buddhism to Indians would be fatal to our cause.