upon his horns ten crowns. And they worshipped the Dragon, which gave power into the beast; and they worshipped the beast, saying, who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him? And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months. - [Here, faid Mr. Scott, I believe there is a mistake of fix months.] - And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their forehead. - [Here places, penfions, and peerages, are clearly marked out.] - And he cried mightily with a strong voice, saying, Babylon the Great (plainly the East-India Company) is fallen, is fallen, and is become the habitation of devils, and the hold of every foul spirit, and the cage of every unclean bird. And the merchants of the earth shall weep and mourn over her, for no man buyeth her merchandise any more; the merchandise of gold and filver, and precious stones, and of pearls, and fine linen, and purple, and filk, and scarlet, and all manner of vessels of ivory, of most precious wood, and cinnamon, and odours, and ointments, and frankincense, and oil, and fine flour, and wheat, and beasts, and sheep, and horses, and chariots, and flaves, and fouls of men. And the fruits that thy foul lufted after are departed from thee, and all things which were dainty and goodly are departed from thee, and thou shalt find them no more at all. The merchants of these things, which were made rich by her, shall stand afar off for the fear of her torment, weeping and wailing, and faying, Alas! alas! that great city, that was cloathed in fine linen, in purple and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones, and pearls! for in one hour so great riches is come to nought. And every ship-mafter, and all the Company in ships, and failors, and as many as trade by fea, ftood afar off, and cried, when they saw the smoak of her burning, faying, What city is like unto this great city? And they caft duft on their heads, and cried, weeping and wailing, faying, Alas! alas! that great city, wherein were made rich all that had ships in the fea, by reason of her costliness! for in one hour is the made defolate."

Mr. Scott observed, the violence with which Ministry attacked the rights of the Company was greater than that of general warrants, which were happily got the better of some years ago; for these alledged a cause of violence: but the bill against the Company alledged not any special act of delinquency. He faid, that acts of power against law had been borne, and might be expected to be yet borne, in this counVOL. XII.

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try: but acts of power against law, supported by the judgements of lawyers and juries, the country never would bear. On this subject he quoted a paffage from the judicious and profound Thucydides, who remarks, that injuftice is more irksome to men than violence; because injustice, seeming to come from equals, provokes indignation: but violence is endured as a matter of inevitable fate or neceffity. He reflected here on the conduct of the Parliament about the middle of laft century, when they were anxious to get up the charters from the burghs. He also reflected on the Parliament taking the command of the militia out of the hands of the Crown, which was a prelude to a war of twenty years. It had been faid, that matters had been grossly mismanaged, and that many enormities had been committed in India, but whose fault was that the fault of the Directors, or of their fervants in India? The Directors, as was confessed, had always transmitted for the direction of their fervants abroad, the purest system of ethics! Why was not that system carried into execution? This was owing to the wickedness of their servants - not to any defect in the conftitution of government. The accomplices in the imprisonment and misfortunes of Lord Pigot, had been brought to justice by the Proprietors before the Court of King's Bench, and fo might other delinquents. But if the power of the Directors be too small, give them more. He defired that it might be confidered that there was no alteration in the law, or the degree of power possessed over the servants of the Company, but only of the perfons who were to inspect their conduct. The effect of this new institution of a Court of Directors was yet doubtful; even they might be found inadequate to the distant government of India. De te fabula narratur, not even mutato nomine. The bankruptcy of the Company was a matter which was at least doubtful, and time ought to be granted for enquiring into it. He repeated that paffage in Othello, where Desdemona cries, Kill me not to-night, my Lord! Let me live but one day - one hour! - This prayer was rejected, and repentance succeeded the fatal deed. It has been faid, that the affairs of the East-India Company are safe, being entrusted to the care of respectable Commiffioners. I like not the idea of their being responsible to men that appointed them, and the rather, that those men are themselves responsible for their conduct. The responsibility of the former will fecure the latter, and place them beyond all refponfibility. If it was right, continued Mr. Scott, to vest the power of nominating the Commissioners in the Crown, why

not

not vest that power in the Crown ab initio? If it was right that it should be placed in Parliament, why not continue it? It had been obferved, that the Crown had in reality enjoyed the power of directing India affairs, through the medium of the Proprietors. If so, why should not the Minifters of the Crown take a share of the blame for the misconduct of those affairs? It was a new thing, Mr. Scott observed, to see the very perfons who had objected to the act of 1773, as a precedent for encroaching on the rights of chartered companies, now quoting that very act as a reason for fupporting the bill under confideration. It was thus that one precedent begot another; and that the beginning of evil was as the letting out of water. The great plea for taking the power out of the hands of both the Proprietors and Directors was, that they clashed with one another. But would it be faid, that when two co-operating powers interfered, there was no remedy but to destroy them both, and to establish a new one on their ruins? Such a doctrine, he prefumed, would not be mentioned in the British Parliament. Mr. Scott also, in the course of his speech, quoted the speech of Brutus, who, speaking of Cæfar, fays,

- He would be crown'd

How that might change his nature, there's the question.

and also a passage from Thucydides.

Mr. Anftruther rose after Mr. Scott, and faid, he did not Mr. Anftru. rise to introduce into the debate the personal characters or ther. honour of the gentlemen who supported either one fide or the other of the question, which had been so much adverted to by those who had spoke before him; before, however, he entered upon the question itself, he could not help taking notice of an argument that had been much dwelt upon, and which feemed to be in some measure the foundation of the violence of the epithets, which had, in his mind, with so little reason, been bestowed upon the bill. Gentlemen had stated, that Committees ought to be instituted to enquire into the accounts of the Company, and that they had been refused permiffion to produce evidence of their situation. It was true it had been afferted, but even the gentlemen themselves, who had asserted it, had never thought of moving for the Committees they talked of, nor attempted to produce the evidence they said was in their poffeffion; that even the Company itself had been heard at the bar, had offered every evidence they had to produce, and never had once attempted to say they had been precluded from bringing forward every thing

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thing they had to produce; he was therefore justified in saying, that every party had been heard, that wished to be heard, and that all the evidence, which either the Company, or the gentlemen opposite, had to produce, had been received. Two schemes had been produced for the future government of India: the one, by the learned General opposite; and the other, by the right honourable Secretary. He would not at that time tire the House by going at large into the question, but would shortly state the reasons which led him to prefer the plan that was the object of the debate that day. To judge of the merit of a plan, it was neceffary to know pre. cisely the evil that was to be remedied, and to apply the remedy exactly to the disease. In his opinion, the defect lay in the government at home, in the weakness, the want of energy, and insufficiency of the Court of Directors. These mischiefs flowed from a simple cause, the error lay in the very formation of the conftitution of the Company; by a strange concurrence of circumstances, a body of merchants had been changed into fovereigns, a counting-house had been converted into a council table. That was the evil; till that was remedied, all reformation was in vain. The conftitution of the India Company reversed the plainest principle of government. The executive government of a large country, of a populous empire, was lodged in a popular afsembly. The Proprietors were the executive governors of the Company; or if that should be denied, the Directors were in a fituation little different; they carried with them all the evils of popular assemblies entrusted with executive power, uncertain in their deliberation, fluctuating in their councils, and 'every executive act under the direction of a large assembly, composed, in a great measure, of those very fervants whom the Directors were to govern.

But this was not all, the government of India lay in the hands of a body of men not responsible for the execution of their trust. How and to whom was a Director responsible? How could he be called to account responsible to those whom he was to control? What punishment could be put upon him, he was in to-day, he was out to-morrow? And left it should be poffible to lay hold of him, by fome small share of refponfibility, the very Constitution had precluded the idea, it had shut the door against every means of reaching them; their votes were in secret by ballot, it was strange, but it was no less true, that in the executive government of India, it was impoffible to know any man's opinion, what principles he supported, or to what measures he gave his affent. Ballet

Ballot took away every responsibility; but these were not the only defects; the Constitution, by the rotation eftablished in 1773, contained in it a fixed principle of change and fituation; it conftantly varied, and was in a state of perpetual change. How often did it happen that orders were sent to India to day, they were difregarded by the fervants there, because they were sure that before the news of their disobedience arrived in England, the direction would be changed; fix of their enemies would be out, and fix of their friends in the direction, and then their disobedience would be attended with impunity. These were not imaginary and theoretical evils, they had produced every effect that was to be expected from a weak, fluctuating, unresponsible executive power lodged in the hands of a multitude. It was because these were the evils, that he preferred the bill before the House, to the one produced last year that went to regulation abroad; the evil he conceived lay at home; and unless the remedy was applied where the disease was, all regulation was in vain; there might be much good in the other, but he could not expect much good from it, unless it was accompanied with regulation at home.

He stated, that he should not take up much time upon the subject of violation of charters; on all hands it was admitted that these might be violated, if the violation was commensurate with the neceffity, then the degree of the neceffity was the only question. If he was right in pointing out where the evil lay, then nothing short of the present bill would do good. If the disease lay in the Conftitution at home, the Constitution at home must be changed. But gentlemen called for proofs of the neceffity; look at the government of the India Company in any pofsible point of view, and every thing is justified. If you look at them in a pecuniary point of view, you find them with five millions of revenue, coming to your bar three times in fifteen years, begging for loans to save them from bankruptcy. If you look upon them as politicians, you find they have broken every treaty they ever made, they have forfeited every engagement they ever entered into. If you look to their operations as fovereigns, you find them at once tearing up the title to the estates of every man in Bengal, by their orders to let the lands to the highest bidder; and yet more strange, look at them in a commercial point of view, and you find that before they got the Dewannee of Bengal, they traded on a small capital, and gained on the Bengal trade near 200,000l. per annum, that now, when the country was their own, and the revenues their own, they