I 388]

*

they had sold an exclusive privilege to trade, but not a privilege to rob and oppress; and that if what they sold for the purposes of commerce was made the instrument of oppression and pillage, it was their duty, as the guardians of the conduct and happiness of all within the sphere of their influence and controul, to prevent so pernicious an operation. After laying down this as a fundamental principle, he proceeded to argue that there had been, and were, the most flagrant acts of oppression in India by the servants of the Company; that the whole system was oppressive. from the beginning of the acquisition of territorial possession. He entered into a detail of the principal instances of pillage, rapine, violence, and despotism, attributed to the English, and dwelt with great energy and pathos on those acts of which he alledged Mr. Hastings to be guilty.

On this subject he brought forward the principat heads of what afterwards occupied so much of his attention in the prosecution of the Governor-general. His imagination, warming as he went along, figured to him, that the only monuments by which the proceedings of the British were distinguished, were waste and de. solation. Other conquerors, he said, of every description, had left some monument either of state or beneficence behind them. "If their passion or their avarice drove the Tartar hordes to acts of rapacity or tyranny, there had been

K

time enough in the short life of man to repair
the desolations of war by the acts of magnifi-
cence and peace. But under the English go.
vernment all this order was reversed. Our
conquest there, after twenty years, was as crude
'as it had been the first day. The natives scarce
knew what it was to see the grey head of an Eng-
lishman. Young men (almost boys) governed
there, without society and without sympathy with
the natives. They had no more social habits with
the people than if they still resided in England;
nor indeed any species of intercourse, but that
which was necessary to the making a sudden
fortune with a view to a remote settlement.
Animated with all the avarice of age, and all
the impetuosity of youth, they rolled in one
after another, wave after wave, and there was
nothing before the eyes of the natives but an
endless, hopeless prospect of new flights of birds
of prey and passage, with appetites continually
renewing for a food that was continually wast-
ing. Were we to be driven 'out of India this
day, nothing would remain to tell that it had
been possessed during the inglorious period of our
dominion, by any thing better than the ouran.
outang, or the tyger.". The peroration was an
eulogium on his friend Fox as the mover of the
bill. After a very animated general panegyric,
he entered on the praises of the bill, anticipat-
ing the fervent and adoring gratitude with
which he and the supporters of it would be

regarded in India. He said, "There was not
a tongue, a nation, a religion in India, which
would not bless the presiding care and manly
beneficence of that house and of him who pro.
posed to them this great work. Their names
would never be separated before the throne of
the Divine Goodness, in whatever language or
with whatever rites pardon was asked for, sin,
and reward for those who imitated the Godhead
in his universal bounty to his creatures."

The bill passed the House of Conimons by a
very great majority. When it came to the Peers,
it met, if not with an abler opposition, with a
much more numerous in proportion to the num-
ber of the assembly; and talents (with the excep
tion of Lord Thurlow) were chiefly on the side
of Ministry. The acute and comprehensive ge-
nius of Pitt, with the sound sense and extensive
knowledge of India affairs possessed by Dundas,
had exhausted the arguments that could mili
tate against the bill. Even Thurlow brought
forward little new matter on the general merits
of the bill, but confined himself chiefly to the
attack on Hastings. "If (said he) Hastings
be a depopulator of provinces, and an enemy
to the human race, let his crimes be brought
forward." The close habits of judicial investi-
gation of that great man represented invective,
however eloquent, against an individual as
mere inanity, unless supported by proof.

Though defended by the Duke of Portland,

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Lords Stormont, Carlisle, Sandwich, and Loughborough, with all the force of their respective talents, it was thrown out in the House of Peers. Whether the more decisive opposition that it met with in that house was owing to the Lords, from having had more time to consider its principles and effects, being convinced that it was an unjust and dangerous measure, or to some extrinsic cause, I cannot take upon me to determine. It is certain, that of the Peers (with the exception of the Duke of Richmond, Lord Rawdon, Lords Thurlow and Camden, and a few more) those who were most zealous in opposing it, were not those whose talents and habits of discussion rendered them the most competent judges of great political regulations. It was understood in the House of Commons that it had been represented by authority to many Peers, that those would not be considered as the friends of the Sovereign who voted for the bill. Resolutions of great boldness and decision were adopted, after much debate, by the house, declaring that it was derogatory to the honour of the Crown, and subversive of the constitution of the country, to report any opinion or alledged opinion of the King on any proceeding pending in parliament, so as to influence the votes of the members. The King determined on an entire change of Administration. The principal members were immediately dismissed from office, and a very general resignation of

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employments took place. Pitt was appointed Prime Minister. The majority, however, continued in favour of Opposition in the House of 'Commons. A series of motions was proposed and adopted, tending to prove that the Minister ought not to continue in office without the support of the House of Commons. That no one could be long Minister if thwarted by the House of Commons, is obvious; at the same time, neither law nor precedent was brought forward to prove that the continuance of a Minister in office contrary to the approbation of the House of Commons was unconstitutional. The King certainly, as chief executive magistrate, has a right to chuse his own Ministers, (unless under disqualifications ascertained by law) for performing any branch of the executive duties. The House of Commons have a right to impeach, on the ground of malversation in office, any of the Ministers, but not to prescribe to him in his choice of a Minister. Notwithstanding the remonstrances of the House of Commons Pitt continued in office. Although the majority was against him in the house, it was very evident that it was for him in the nation. His Majesty seeing that the opinion of the House of Commons continued contrary to his own, and conceiving it to be contrary to that of his people, determined to put it in the power of the people to manifest their approbation or disapprobation of their present representatives.

1.