le lower in situation and power. All the void has been
filled up with invectives against coalition, with allusions to the loss
of America, with the activity and inactivity of ministers. The total
silence of these gentlemen concerning the interest and well-being of the
people of India, and concerning the interest which this nation has in
the commerce and revenues of that country, is a strong indication of the
value which they set upon these objects.

It has been a little painful to me to observe the intrusion into this
important debate of such company as _quo warranto_, and _mandamus_, and
_certiorari_: as if we were on a trial about mayors and aldermen and
capital burgesses, or engaged in a suit concerning the borough of
Penryn, or Saltash, or St. Ives, or St. Mawes. Gentlemen have argued
with as much heat and passion as if the first things in the world were
at stake; and their topics are such as belong only to matter of the
lowest and meanest litigation. It is not right, it is not worthy of us,
in this manner to depreciate the value, to degrade the majesty, of this
grave deliberation of policy and empire.

For my part, I have thought myself hound, when a matter of this
extraordinary weight came before me, not to consider (as some gentlemen
are so fond of doing) whether the bill originated from a Secretary of
State for the Home Department or from a Secretary for the Foreign, from
a minister of influence or a minister of the people, from Jacob or from
Esau.[52] I asked myself, and I asked myself nothing else, what part it
was fit for a member of Parliament, who has supplied a mediocrity of
talents by the extreme of diligence, and who has thought himself obliged
by the research of years to wind himself into the inmost recesses and
labyrinths of the Indian detail,--what part, I say, it became such a
member of Parliament to take, when a minister of state, in conformity to
a recommendation from the throne, has brought before us a system for the
better government of the territory and commerce of the East. In this
light, and in this only, I will trouble you with my sentiments.

It is not only agreed, but demanded, by the right honorable
gentleman,[53] and by those who act with him, that a _whole_ system
ought to be produced; that it ought not to be an _half-measure_; that it
ought to be no _palliative_, but a legislative provision, vigorous,
substantial, and effective.--I believe that no man who understands the
subject can d