The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 10 (of 12)Burke, Edmund
History
The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 10 (of 12)
Burke, Edmund
Great Britain -- Politics and government -- 1760-1820; Political science -- Early works to 1800
This is to show your Lordships that Mr. Hastings was armed with great
powers to correct great abuses, and that there was reposed in him a
special trust for that purpose. And now I shall show, by the
twenty-fifth paragraph of the same letter, that they intrusted Mr.
Hastings with this very great power from some particular hope they had,
not only of his abstaining himself, which is a thing taken for granted,
but of his restraining abuses through every part of the service; and
therefore they say, "that, in order to effectuate this great end, the
first step must be to restore perfect obedience and due subordination to
your administration. Our Governor and Council must reassume and exercise
their delegated powers upon every just occasion,--punish delinquents,
cherish the meritorious, discountenance that luxury and dissipation
which, to the reproach of government, prevailed in Bengal. Our
President, Mr. Hastings, we trust, will set the example of temperance,
economy, and application; and upon this, we are sensible, much will
depend. And here we take occasion to indulge the pleasure we have in
acknowledging Mr. Hastings's services upon the coast of Coromandel, in
constructing with equal labor and ability the plan which has so much
improved our investments there; and as we are persuaded he will
persevere in the same laudable pursuit through every branch of our
affairs in Bengal, he, in return, may depend on the steady support and
favor of his employers." Here are not only laws to restrain abuse, here
are not only salaries to prevent the temptation to it, but here are
praises to animate and encourage him, here is what very few men, even
bad in other respects, have resisted,--here is a great trust put in him,
to call upon him with particular vigor and exertion to prevent all
abuses through the settlement, and particularly these abuses of
corruption. Much trust is put in his frugality, his order, his
management of his private affairs; and from thence they hope that he
would not ruin his own fortune, but improve it by honorable means, and
teach the Company's servants the same order and management, in order to
free them from temptation to rapacity in their own particular
situations. There have been known to be men, otherwise corrupt and
vicious, who, when great trust was put in them, have called forth
principles of honor latent in their minds; and men who were nursed, in a
manner, in corruption have been not only great reformers by institution,
but greater reformers by the example of their own conduct. Then I am to
show, that, soon after his coming to that government, there were means
given him instantly of realizing those hopes and expectations, by
putting into his hands several arduous and several difficult
commissions.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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