The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 01, No. 02, December, 1857: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and PoliticsVarious
History
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 01, No. 02, December, 1857: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics
Various
American periodicals
The struggle of the trained and ambitious classes against the English
power will but have served to confirm it. The revolt overcome, the
last great danger menacing English security in India will have
disappeared. England will have learnt much from the trials she has had
to pass through, and that essential changes will take place within a
few years in the constitution of the Indian government there can be no
doubt. But it is to be remembered that for the past thirty years,
English rule in India has been, with all its defects, an enlightened
and beneficent rule. The crimes with which it has been charged, the
crimes of which it has been guilty, are small in amount, compared with
the good it has effected. Moreover, they are not the result of
inherent vices in the system of government, so much as of the
character of exceptional individuals employed to carry out that
system, and of the native character itself.--But on these points we do
not propose now to enter.
If the close of this revolt be not stained with retaliating cruelties,
if English soldiers remember mercy, then the whole history of this
time will be a proud addition to the annals of England. For though it
will display the incompetency and the folly of her governments, it
will show how these were remedied by the energy and spirit of
individuals; it will tell of the daring and gallantry of her men, of
their patient endurance, of their undaunted courage, and it will tell,
too, with a voice full of tears, of the sorrows, and of the brave and
tender hearts, and of the unshaken religious faith supporting them to
the end, of the women who died in the hands of their enemies. The
names of Havelock and Lawrence will be reckoned in the list of
England's worthies, and the story of the garrison of Cawnpore will be
treasured up forever among England's saddest and most touching
memories.
[Footnote 1: It is earnestly to be hoped that the officers in command
of the British force will not yield to the savage suggestions and
incitements of the English press, with regard to the fate of
Delhi. The tone of feeling which has been shown in many quarters in
England has been utterly disgraceful. Indiscriminate cruelty and
brutality are no fitting vengeance for the Hindoo and Mussulman
barbarities. The sack of Delhi and the massacre of its people would
bring the English conquerors down to the level of the conquered. Great
sins cry out for great punishments,--but let the punishment fall on
the guilty, and not involve the innocent. The strength of English rule
in India must be in her justice, in her severity,--but not in the
force and irresistible violence of her passions. To destroy the city
would be to destroy one of the great ornaments of her empire,--to
murder the people would be to commence the new period of her rule with
a revolting crime.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 01, No. 02, December, 1857: A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics — John Shaqi
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