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
"I mention only what I was told; but as the rest of the report which was
made to me corresponds exactly with what has happened since, I hope I
shall stand acquitted to my superiors and to the world in having given
so much credit to it as to bring the circumstance upon record. I cannot
recollect the precise time in which this is said to have happened, but I
believe it was either before or at the time of the dispatch of the
'Bute' and 'Pacific.' The charge has since undergone some alteration;
but of the copy of the paper which was delivered to me, containing the
original charge, I caused a translation to be made; when, suspecting the
renewal of the subject in this day's consultation, I brought it with me,
and I desire it may be recorded, that, when our superiors, or the world,
if the world is to be made the judge of my conduct, shall be possessed
of these materials, they may, by comparing the supposed original and
amended list of accusations preferred against me by Nundcomar, judge how
far I am justified in the credit which I give to the reports above
mentioned. I do not mean to infer from what I have said that it makes
any alteration in the nature of the charges, whether they were delivered
immediately from my ostensible accusers, or whether they came to the
board through the channel of patronage; but it is sufficient to
authorize the conviction which I feel in my own mind, that those
gentlemen are parties in the accusations of which they assert the right
of being the judges.
"From the first commencement of this administration, every means have
been tried both to deprive me of the legal authority with which I have
been trusted, and to proclaim the annihilation of it to the world; but
no instance has yet appeared of this in so extraordinary a degree as in
the question now before the board. The chief of the administration, your
superior, Gentlemen, appointed by the legislature itself, shall I sit at
this board to be arraigned in the presence of a wretch whom you all know
to be one of the basest of mankind? I believe I need not mention his
name; but it is Nundcomar. Shall I sit here to hear men collected from
the dregs of the people give evidence, at his dictating, against my
character and conduct? I will not. You may, if you please, form
yourselves into a committee for the investigation of these matters in
any manner which you may think proper; but I will repeat, that I will
not meet Nundcomar at the board, nor suffer Nundcomar to be examined at
the board; nor have you a right to it, nor can it answer any other
purpose than that of vilifying and insulting me to insist upon it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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