to be protected by it, are oppressed by a most despotic and rapacious tyranny.  The Company and their servants, having strengthened themselves by this confederacy, set at defiance the authority and admonitions of this House employed to reform them; and when this House had selected certain principal delinquents, whom they declared it the duty of the Company to recall, the Company held out its legal privileges against all reformation, positively refused to recall them, and supported those who had fallen under the just censure of this House with new and stronger marks of countenance and approbation.

The late House, discovering the reversed situation of the Company, by which the nominal servants are really the masters, and the offenders are become their own judges, thought fit to examine into the state of their commerce; and they have also discovered that their commercial affairs are in the greatest disorder; that their debts have accumulated beyond any present or obvious future means of payment, at least under the actual administration of their affairs; that this condition of the East India Company has begun to affect the sinking fund itself, on which the public credit of the kingdom rests,—­a million and upwards being due to the customs, which that House of Commons whose intentions towards the Company have been so grossly misrepresented were indulgent enough to respite.  And thus, instead of confiscating their property, the Company received without interest (which in such a case had been before charged) the use of a very large sum of the public money.  The revenues are under the peculiar care of this House, not only as the revenues originate from us, but as, on every failure if the funds set apart for the support of the national credit, or to provide for the national strength and safety, the task of supplying every deficiency falls upon his Majesty’s faithful Commons, this House must, in effect, tax the people.  The House, therefore, at every moment, incurs the hazard of becoming obnoxious to its constituents.

The enemies of the late House of Commons resolved, if possible, to bring on that event.  They therefore endeavored to misrepresent the provident means adopted by the House of Commons for keeping off this invidious necessity, as an attack on the rights of the East India Company:  for they well knew, that, on the one hand, if, for want of proper regulation and relief, the Company should become insolvent, or even stop payment, the national credit and commerce would sustain a heavy blow; and that calamity would be justly imputed to Parliament, which, after such long inquiries, and such frequent admonitions from his Majesty, had neglected so essential and so urgent an article of their duty:  on the other hand, they knew, that, wholly corrupted as the Company is, nothing effectual could be done to preserve that interest from ruin, without taking for a time the national objects of their trust out of their hands; and then a cry would be industriously raised against the House of Commons, as depriving British subjects of their legal privileges.  The restraint, being plain and simple, must be easily understood by those who would be brought with great difficulty to comprehend the intricate detail of matters of fact which rendered this suspension of the administration of India absolutely necessary on motives of justice, of policy, of public honor, and public safety.