“I may not, now or hereafter, enter into a detailed account of the experiments in dietetics, for I did so in a series of Gujarati articles which appeared years ago in Indian Opinion, and which were afterwards published in the form of a book popularly known in English as A Guide to Health. Among my little books this has been the most widely read alike in the East and in the West, a thing that I have not yet been able to understand. It was written for the benefit of the readers of Indian Opinion. But I know that the booklet has profoundly influenced the lives of many, both in the East and in the West, who have never seen Indian Opinion.”
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Probable attribution
This saying is widely associated with Mahatma Gandhi, but the attribution is not supported by a reliable primary source.
Likely origin: 'An Autobiography: The Story of My Experiments with Truth' (1927-29); passage on his booklet 'A Guide to Health' and Indian Opinion dietetics articles.
About this quote
Plain, practical writing meant for a small local audience ended up shaping lives far beyond it—often more than the work its author prized most. Usefulness travels on its own. When you make something genuinely helpful and simple, you rarely control how far it spreads or who it reaches.
When to use it
- A nurse's plain one-page care sheet gets copied and shared across hospitals she's never visited.
- A teacher's simple study checklist ends up used by students in schools far away.
- A short budgeting note a mother wrote for her kids circulates among strangers online.