We have shown you the servile obedience of the natives of the country;
we have shown you the miserable situation to which a great prince, at
least a person who was the other day a great prince, was reduced by Mr.
Hastings's system. We shall next show you that this prince, who,
unfortunately for himself, became a dependant on the Company, and
thereby subjected to the will of an arbitrary government, is made by him
the instrument of his own degradation, the instrument of his (the
Governor's) falsehoods, the instrument of his peculations; and that he
had been subjected to all this degradation for the purposes of the most
odious tyranny, violence, and corruption.
Mr. Hastings, having assumed the government to himself, soon made Oude a
private domain. It had, to be sure, a public name, but it was to all
practical intents and purposes his park, or his warren,--a place, as it
were, for game, whence he drew out or killed, at an earlier or later
season, as he thought fit, anything he liked, and brought it to his
table according as it served his purpose. Before I proceed, it will not
be improper for me to remind your Lordships of the legitimate ends to
which all controlling and superintending power ought to be directed.
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