ition, which I
know would have been scrupulously observed by him--I mean the condition
of not attributing to him any credit which would properly belong to
others. His work formed part of a process, carried on both by his
predecessors and successors; and it is not always possible to
distinguish his share from that of others.[104]

II. OFFICIAL WORK IN INDIA

A demand for codification was among the traditions of the Utilitarians.
Bentham, born in 1748, had preached to deaf ears during the eighteenth
century; but in the first quarter of the nineteenth he had gathered a
little band of disciples, the foremost of whom was James Mill. The old
philosopher had gradually obtained a hearing for his exhortations,
echoed in various forms by a growing, confident, and energetic body, and
his great watchword was 'Codify.' He had found hearers in foreign
countries, especially in Russia, Spain, and various American States;
but his own countrymen had been among the last to listen. Gradually,
however, as the passion and prejudice of the war period passed away and
the movement which culminated in the Reform Bill of 1832 gathered
strength, it became apparent that the stubborn conservatism, even of the
great tacit corporation of lawyers, would have to yield. The supremacy
of Eldon was beginning to be shaken. Sir Robert Peel began to reform the
criminal law about 1827, taking up the work upon which Bentham's friend
and disciple, Romilly, had laboured for years with infinitesimal
results. Commissions were appointed to work upon legal reforms. With
parliamentary reform an era of rapid and far-reaching changes set in,
though Bentham died on the eve of entering the land of promise.

When, therefore, the charter of the last India Company was renewed in
1833, it was natural that some place should be found for codification.
James Mill, upon whom Bentham's mantle had fallen, held a leading
position at the India House, and his evidence before a parliamentary
committee had an important influence in determining the outlines of the
new system. One of the four members of the Council of the
Governor-General was henceforth to be appointed from persons not
servants of the Company. He was to attend only at meetings for framing
laws and regulations. Macaulay, the first holder of this office, went to
India in 1834 and prepared the penal code. One of his assistants, C. H.
Cameron, was an ardent Benthamite, and the code, in any case, was an
accomplishment of