attended him in prosecuting his charges against a state delinquent, who was stripped of his power, and even of his rights as a citizen, pending the prosecution, the better to enable his accuser to make out and establish his accusation. He drew a distinction between this facility of coming at a Roman governor, charged with high crimes and misdemeanors, and the extreme difficulty of substantiating an accusation against a British governor. When it was considered that Mr. Hastings had been for fourteen years at the head of the government in India, and that no one complaint during that time had been transmitted to England against him, the House must be convinced of the enormous degree of power he had to contend with, to which alone could be ascribed the silence in question, since it was not in human nature, situated as Mr. Hastings had been, to preserve so pure, even handed, and unimpeachable a conduct, as to afford no room for a single accusation to be stated against him. After this exordium, Mr. Burke stated at large the subject matter of the charge, and concluded a long and eloquent speech, with desiring the clerk to read the resolution of May 1782, to clear himself from the imputation of having rashly and singly meddled with the subject; and to shew that the House had, in very strong terms, already reprobated Mr. Hastings's conduct in the Rohilla war. The motion was supported by Mr. Wilbraham, Mr. Powis, Mr. Montague, Lord North, Mr. M. A. Taylor, Mr. Windham, and Mr. Hardinge; and opposed by Mr. Nicholls, Lord Mornington, Mr. H. Browne, and Lord Mulgrave. At half past three o'clock the debate was adjourned, and renewed the day following by Mr. Francis, Mr. Anstruther, and Mr. Fox, on the one side; and Mr. W. Grenville, Mr. J. Scott, Mr. Burton, Mr. Wilberforce, and Mr. Dundas, on the other. Upon this ocsasion,

Mr. Fox rose, and said:

Mr. St. John, I rise at this hour, to express what I think with regard to this business, after debating two days about the form in which it should be put. It is indeed to me of very little consequence, in what shape the question is brought before us: I want only to come at the ground upon which the matter stands; I wish only to meet the thing itself fairly and openly; the participation, the guilt, the criminality which may justly be imputed to Mr. Hastings, with regard to the war with the Rohillas-a war carried on to their ruin, destruction, extermination, or any other name you may please to give it, for it was certainly more than conquest. This is the object to which I have done all in my power to call the attention of the House; and I must confess that I am not a little surprised that it has been so much evaded, as it certainly has been, and that in a manner so extremely marked.

The first charge exhibited by my right honourable friend appeared not to meet the wishes of the House. A charge specific of particular facts, was called for this was complied with. My right honourable friend brought a charge entirely

of the nature and description of what had been demanded: it was then thought more agreeable to gentlemen to move a question upon the charge as it originally stood: this was acceded to with equal facility.

Had I foreseen the use that would have been made of these concessions, I would never have consented; I do not mean that my consent would have been of any avail, but I would have debated to the last, rather than suffered the motion to take the form it has now assumed. It has, indeed, always been my opinion, that the best mode of proceeding in this business, was to move a general question, whether the whole of the charges contained matter of impeachment; and if this should be the opinion of the committee, to consider what particular articles were to make a part of this impeachment; and had it not been that I confided in the declarations of the right honourable the chancellor of the exchequer, I would have still persisted in this manner of taking up the business. It is my opinion that the number, as well as the weight of the crimes that might be found, should go in the minds of gentlemen who form a resolution for impeachment; that the crimes should be great and enormous; and that not only should they bear that character, but that they should be in number very considerable, in order that the aggregate and not the individuals alone, might form ground for inducing this House to present them before the House of Peers, in the only mode in which they can charge any man, that of impeachment. The right honourable the chancellor of the exchequer professes entirely to agree with me in this point; he has declared that he does not consider the vote upon this article, or any one article, as pledging gentlemen to impeach, if upon a retrospect of the whole, after having gone through each, they do not find grounds to lead them to such a determination.

But although the right honourable gentleman professes this to be his opinion, I must contend he means something else. Why, otherwise, should he be so much for retaining the word impeachment at all in the motion? If, as he declares, the vote is solely whether there are high crimes and misdemeanors imputable to Warren Hastings in this charge, that word can only tend to mislead, and occasion a sense of the motion before the House different from what it really is in its true intention. As I have said a good deal upon this in the course of the evening, I beg only that it may not be misunderstood by gentlemen, and that the motion may be taken in the sense explained by the right honourable gentleman to be his sense, and which certainly is mine, that every gentleman who is convinced that Warren Hastings is criminal, highly criminal, with regard to the Rohilla war, ought to vote for the question.

Much blame has been thrown by an honourable gentleman (Mr. Wilberforce) upon my noble friend in the blue ribbon, for not recalling Mr. Hastings at the time he blamed him, as he declares he did, for the Rohilla war. The fact is, the noble lord did desire to recall Mr. Hastings, but his wishes were opposed by those who were Mr. Hastings's immediate masters. He did all in his power; he sent out General Clavering, Mr. Monson, and Mr. Francis, to examine into his conduct, and to be a check upon the violence of his proceedings. The effect has been as he foresaw, and it has brought to light those actions which are the subject of inquiry this day.

My right honourable friend too, who brought forward this charge, has been accused of a persecuting spirit; of bringing forward actions that had been passed over, and which it was right to bury in oblivion. Such imputations, I believe my right honourable friend will not much regard; but when the honourable gentleman complains of parliament, it is too much to pass it over in silence. This business was first inquired into, in the committee of secresy, in the year 1782; it was then censured, and severely censured; and although it was a transaction which happened so many years before that period, it was not made known to them as a subject of inquiry before the appointment of that committee. It was in consequence of the facts that were discovered by that committee, that the resolutions reprobating the conduct of the governor general were passed by the House of Commons. My right honourable friend, it is true, moved for several papers: some were granted him, many were refused; but the whole had its origin in the year 1782. But why should not the conduct of Mr. Hastings be entered into? If by the resolution of the House not to inquire into the transactions of the year 1781, an act of grace was passed, was all his life to be exempted; or was it only that period of it between the year 1781 and the year 1782? Certainly there must be some time for this purpose; and if the honourable gentleman could prove that the Rohilla war was after this time, in which no inquiry was to be made, he might do something; but let this be left to those who are convinced of the guilt of Mr. Hastings and do not choose to condemn him, as their last subterfuge; but to which, it is to be hoped, they will be ashamed to fly.

It has been said by some, that they see too much of party spirit in this business. I agree that professions are nothing. They have often deceived, and will deceive again; but I rest upon something better than professions. I rest upon my uniform conduct in this business. I was from the first, a sup

porter of an inquiry into the management of the affairs in India: I was in the origin a strong advocate for the necessity of punishing the delinquency that was found there, by the activity of the learned gentleman over against me (Mr. Dundas). Through the whole of that business, I supported that learned gentleman, at a time when I disapproved of his politics as much as I do now: I supported him, even when those who were his friends were against the measures he proposed.

Sir, I can appeal to something better than party spirit. I can show that this has always been the line of my conduct; I can appeal to the part I took upon myself at a much earlier period, in bringing to justice crimes committed in our Asiatic dominions; and there, too, by a man who had great advantages in his favour: for great fame, great glory, great acts for his country, were all in the character of Lord Clive; but these I valued as nothing. Under whose banners did I then contend? It was under the banners of that man, who is now at the head of all the law and religion of this country, the present lord chancellor of England, who treated the subject with that manly eloquence for which he is so much distinguished; who crushed, I may say, to atoms, all those who attempted to set up the services of Lord Clive as a bar to punishment. He would not suffer a word to be heard, he would not allow mention to be made of any thing that was done by him, as any argument to prevent his punishment. I supported him, and if such was my opinion with respect to Lord Clive, I do not see any thing in Mr. Hastings's conduct to induce me to change my mode of action. I do not think that in any capital instance he has been of great use to the company. The Mahratta peace is alledged in his favour. I have my doubts whether this peace had the merit ascribed to it; but if it had, it was a peace only upon a war entered into by himself, on his own wanton provocation; for he does not seem to have been at any time a friend to peaceable measures. He opposed also the forming, and the accomplishment of the treaty of Poonah and Poorunder; he opposed also the peace with Tippoo Saib.

With respect to the particular question, I wish by no means to treat it lightly. I do not approve of making the difference of opinion, in the gentleman at the head of the board, on this subject, an object of pleasantry. The whole business is, in my opinion, solemn and important to the last degree. Much has been said of side questions, but I persuade myself there is a disposition in gentlemen to meet this question fairly and openly. Much disgrace would be upon this country if they should countenance the advice that has

been

been given them by some persons, of assenting to this war, as founded on justice.

As for this war of the Rohillas, it has appeared to all the world so wholly unjustifiable, that there has not been found among any set of men, any person that could defend it. If it shall be supported by a British House of Commons, it will be the greatest misfortune that can befall this nation.

The determination of this night will be attended to by all Europe. The nations around us will form upon it their future measures with regard to their powers in India; and may justly presage the total loss of all confidence in the justice of this nation in that part of the world. What must be thought by our government in India? The rule held out to them they must, no doubt, consider as that by which they are in future to direct their conduct.

It was said, that if we guaranteed Sujah Dowlah, we ought to follow him to the extent of what he proposed, and that there was no medium between forfeiting our faith as guarantees, and joining with him in the destruction of the Rohillas. This is, indeed, horrid policy! Instead of acting the part of an equitable umpire and mediator, what is it but to countenance and assist barbarous vengeance and rapacity? to defend that which has cast indelible stains upon the most brilliant monarchs?

If

any thing similar to this, of which we are speaking, were to happen in Europe, how great would be the cry against it? If Great Britain were to guarantee a truce between the emperor and the Dutch, in which they stipulated to pay a certain sum of money to the emperor, and afterwards were to refuse to perform this, we ought, according to this reasoning, to join with the emperor in the compleat conquest of Holland. A noble lord (Mulgrave) has, indeed, most sagaciously asked, what, in such situation, is a governor of India to do; is he to consult Puffendorf and Grotius? No. But I will tell him what he is to consult-the laws of nature-not the statutes to be found in those books, nor in any books -but those laws which are to be found in Europe, Africa, and Asia— that are found amongst all mankind—those principles of equity and humanity implanted in our hearts, which have their existence in the feelings of mankind that are capable of judging.

I have compared the conquest of the Dutch to the case of the Rohillas-but it was more than a conquest. The word extermination has been used; but if the meaning of it be, that every man, woman, and child was put to death, Mr. Hastings is not guilty of so enormous a crime. Suffer me

to