othing would come of it.
In general, the whole gest of his defence comes to one point, in which
he persists,--that, whatever the act might be, his mind is clear: "My
hands are guilty, but my heart is free." He conceived that it would be
very improper, undoubtedly, to do such an act, if he suspected anything
could happen from it: he, however, let the thing out of his own hands;
he put, it into the hands of others; he put the commission into the
hands of a murderer. The fact was not denied; it was fully before these
severe judges. The extenuation was the purity of his heart, and the bad
situation of the Company's affairs,--the perpetual plea, which your
Lordships will hear of forever, and which if it will justify evil
actions, they will take good care that the most nefarious of their deeds
shall never want a sufficient justification. But then he calls upon his
life and his character to oppose to his seal; and though he has declared
that Mr. Holwell had intended ill to the Nabob, and that he approved of
those measures, and only postponed them, yet he thought it necessary, he
says, to quiet the fears of the Nabob; and from this motive he did an
act abhorrent to his nature, and which, he says, he expressed his
abhorrence of the morning after he signed it: not that he did so; but if
he had, I believe it would only have made the thing so many degrees
worse. Your Lordships will observe, that, in this conference, as stated
by himself, these reasons and apologies for it did not appear, nor did
they appear in the letter, nor anywhere else, till next year, when he
came upon his trial. Then it was immediately recollected that Mr.
Holwell's designs were so wicked they certainly must be known to the
Nabob, though he never mentioned them in the conference of the morning
or the evening of the 15th; yet such was now the weight and prevalence
of them upon the Major's mind, that he calls upon Mr. Hastings to know
whether the Nabob was not informed of these designs of Mr. Holwell
against him. Mr. Hastings's memory was not quite correct upon the
occasion. He does not recollect anything of the matter. He certainly
seems not to think that he ever mentioned it to the Nabob, or the Nabob
to him; but he does recollect, he thinks, speaking something to some of
the Nabob's attendants upon it, and further this deponent sayeth not. On
this state of things, namely, the purity of intention, the necessities
of the Company, the propriety of keeping the Nab