274 
EXPANSION OF ENGLAND. 
[lect. 
to that of the powers which tend to overthrow the Govern 
ment, is that Government’s chance of duration. Now 
I made some inquiry into the strength of the supports 
upon which the Government in India rests, but rather 
with a view of explaining how it stands now than whether 
it is likely to last a long time. Let us reconsider then 
with this other object the conclusions at which we 
arrived. 
We found that the Government did not rest, as in 
England, upon the consent of the people or of some native 
constituency, which has created the Government by a con 
stitutional process. The Government is in every respect, 
race, religion, habits, foreign to the people. There is only 
one body of persons of which we can positively affirm that 
without its support the Government could not stand ; 
this is the army. Of this army one part is English, and 
might be trusted. to stand by the Government in all 
circumstances, but it is less than a third part of the whole. 
The other two-thirds are bound to us by nothing but their 
pay and the feeling of honour which impels a good soldier 
to be true to his flag. This is our visible support. Is 
there beyond it any moral support which, though in 
visible, may be reckoned upon as substantial ? Here is a 
question which affords room for much difference of opinion. 
We are naturally inclined to presume that the benefits we 
have done the country by terminating the chronic anarchy 
which a century ago was tearing it in pieces, and by 
introducing so many evident improvements, must have 
convinced all classes that our Government ought to be 
supported. But such a presumption is very rash. The 
notion of a public good, of a common weal, to which all 
private interests ought to be subordinate, is one which we 
have no right to assume to be current in such a popula-