Earl of John Dalrymple Stair

“ The merits of the East-India Company towards the nation are great and notorious. Whilst every other country has been taxing their subjects, in order to support their East-India trade, the English East-India Company has been the support, to a good extent directly, and in a very great and eminent degree indirectly, of the British finances ”

“ The consequences of the public taking upon themselves the direction of the Company's trade, or even of their territorial acquisitions, I apprehend would be most ruinous. No nation has ever attempted any thing of this [Pg 17] kind without being greatly losers by it, even where government was carried on principles infinitely more favourable to such an enterprise than the free constitution of this country admits of. ”

“ Those violent measures, palliated by the necessity of self-preservation, excepted, what remains but an ex parte charge, in Reports to the House of Commons, curious and voluminous indeed, but without confrontation of the accused, or any other necessary preliminary to condemnation, sought by private equity, or required by public justice? We have only an inform mass of matter, where disappointment, vanity, and malevolence, are too often prompted by management and design to accuse, and every [Pg 13] accusation is held forth as compleat evidence of guilt. ”

“ But matters of charter and property are of so difficult and delicate a [Pg 22] nature, that it is hard to say, whether any attempt to remedy this might not do more harm than good.
It is related, that Monsieur Colbert, Lewis the Fourteenth's very able minister of commerce and finance, and to whose memory France stands much indebted, called an assembly of the most eminent men in the French king's dominions in the commercial line, to whom he proposed the consideration, if any, and what advantages might accrue to commerce by the interference of Government. ”

“ Should the indecent interruption of every thing that does not promote their own continuance, still prevail in a majority of the House of Commons, the delay of public business will be well compensated by the facilities a new election will probably afford, and by the rapid progress of measures beneficial and necessary to the public that [Pg 26] will take place hereafter, which, under the present jarring situation and equipoise of parties, cannot, in my poor opinion, ever be carried on with either certainty or dispatch. ”

“ A prince so virtuous, who never was even suspected to mean any foul play to the state, ought to command in every honest service, and he will command no other, those servants whom he is now obliged to sue to, and often is refused. ”

“ The onward path, ingenuous openness of fair sincerity and prudent œconomy in private life, lead to peace of mind, and to heaven's best gift, independence; they martial kings to greatness, to awe, and affectionate veneration. ”

“ If they are bankrupt, the law has provided a due course of proceeding: Ministers, or the Deputies of Ministers, are not the proper assignees to the bankrupt's estate: the trade is, moreover, by the civil death of the Company, open to every adventurer. ”

“ The smooth swindling methods of funding, without giving the creditors adequate securities for either principal or interest, are not practicable in Cina. Self-preservation enforced the necessity of violence, more obnoxious in the beginning, but, perhaps, in the end, less ruinous than the soft, sly deceits of Europe. ”

“ The faction has emissaries spread far and wide to pluck allegiance from men's hearts. It will demand, on the part of the King, an active, unremitting attention to replace himself in that state of pre-eminence and influence the constitution allows, and even requires. ”

“ The affairs of the Company have been embarrassed before; they have borrowed large sums from Government, which they have honestly repaid. Their surplus in peaceable times is very large; and if tranquility is any way durable in India, and the administration of the Company's affairs is continued in the hands of that powerful genius of resource, Mr. ”