Page:On the education of the people of India (IA oneducationofpeo00trevrich).pdf/79

Rh acquainted both with oriental and European literature to be able to form a correct opinion of their relative value. His address to Lord Amherst on this occasion deserves the eulogium bestowed on it by Bishop Heber; and as it is quite to the point, I shall quote it entire.

“To His Excellency the Right Honourable Lord Amherst, Governor General in Council.

“My Lord, “Humbly reluctant as the natives of India are to obtrude upon the notice of government the sentiments they entertain on any public measure, there are circumstances when silence would be carrying this respectful feeling to culpable excess. The present rulers of India, coming from a distance of many thousand miles to govern a people whose language, literature, manners, customs, and ideas, are almost entirely new and strange to them, cannot easily become so intimately acquainted with their real circumstances as the natives of the country are themselves. We should therefore be guilty of a gross dereliction of duty to ourselves, and afford our rulers just ground of complaint at our apathy, did we omit on occasions of importance like the present to supply them