In a society much advanced in arts and the refinements of life, temptations to falsehood become very great, and require strong checks from law, religion, or moral feeling.  Religion is seldom of itself found sufficient; for, though men cannot hope to conceal their transgressions from the Deity, they can, as I have stated, always hope in time to appease Him.  Penal laws are not alone sufficient, for men can always hope to conceal their trespasses from those who are appointed to administer them, or at least to prevent their getting that measure of judicial proof required for their conviction; the dread of the indignation of their circle of society is everywhere the more efficient of the three checks; and this check will generally be found most to prevail where the community is left most to self-government—­hence the proverb, ‘There is honour among thieves’.  A gang of robbers, who are outlaws, are, of course, left to govern themselves; and, unless these could rely on each other’s veracity and honour in their relations with each other, they could do nothing.  If Governments were to leave no degree of self-government to the communities of which the society is composed, this moral check would really cease—­the law would undertake to secure every right, and enforce every duty; and men would cease to depend upon each other’s good opinion and good feelings.[12]

There is perhaps no part of the world where the communities of which the society is composed have been left so much to self-government as in India.  There has seldom been any idea of a reciprocity of duties and rights between the governing and the governed; the sovereign who has possession feels that he has a right to levy certain taxes from the land for the maintenance of the public establishments, which he requires to keep down rebellion against his rule, and to defend his dominions against all who may wish to intrude and seize upon them; and to assist him in acquiring the dominions of other princes when favourable opportunities offer; but he has no idea of a reciprocal duty towards those from whom he draws his revenues.  The peasantry from whom the prince draws his revenues feel that they are bound to pay that revenue; that, if they do not pay it, he will, with his strong arm, turn them out and give to others their possessions—­but they have no idea of any right on their part to any return from him.  The village communities were everywhere left almost entirely to self-government; and the virtues of truth and honesty, in all their relations with each other, were indispensably necessary to enable them to govern themselves.[13] A common interest often united a good many village communities in a bond of union, and established a kind of brotherhood over extensive tracts of richly cultivated land.  Self-interest required that they should unite to defend themselves against attacks with which they were threatened at every returning harvest in a country where every prince was a robber upon a scale more or