A sanction was hereby given to all future defiance of every authority in this kingdom.  Several other matters of complaint against Mr. Hastings, particularly the charge of peculation, fell to the ground at the same time.  Opinions of counsel had been taken relative to a prosecution at law upon this charge, from the then Attorney and the then Solicitor-General and Mr. Dunning, (now the Lords Thurlow, Loughborough, and Ashburton,) together with Mr. Adair (now Recorder of London).  None of them gave a positive opinion against the grounds of the prosecution.  The Attorney-General doubted on the prudence of the proceedings, and censured (as it well deserved) the ill statement of the case.  Three of them, Mr. Wedderburn, Mr. Dunning, and Mr. Adair, were clear in favor of the prosecution.  No prosecution, however, was had, and the Directors contented themselves with censuring and admonishing Mr. Hastings.

With regard to the Supreme Council, the members who chose (for it was choice only) to attend to the orders which were issued from the languishing authority of the Directors continued to receive unprofitable applauses and no support.  Their correspondence was always filled with complaints, the justice of which was always admitted by the Court of Directors; but this admission of the existence of the evil showed only the impotence of those who were to administer the remedy.  The authority of the Court of Directors, resisted with success in so capital an instance as that of the resignation, was not likely to be respected in any other.  What influence it really had on the conduct of the Company’s servants may be collected from the facts that followed it.

The disobedience of Mr. Hastings has of late not only become uniform and systematical in practice, but has been in principle, also, supported by him, and by Mr. Barwell, late a member of the Supreme Council in Bengal, and now a member of this House.

In the Consultation of the 20th of July, 1778, Mr. Barwell gives it as his solemn and deliberate opinion, that, “while Mr. Hastings is in the government, the respect and dignity of his station should be supported.  In these sentiments, I must decline an acquiescence in any order which has a tendency to bring the government into disrepute.  As the Company have the means and power of forming their own administration in India, they may at pleasure place whom they please at the head; but in my opinion they are not authorized to treat a person in that post with indignity.”

By treating them with indignity (in the particular cases wherein they have declined obedience to orders) they must mean those orders which imply a censure on any part of their conduct, a reversal of any of their proceedings, or, as Mr. Barwell expresses himself in words very significant, in any orders that have a tendency to bring their government into disrepute.  The amplitude of this latter description, reserving to them the judgment of any