Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies - DUBOIS, Abbé Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies, Dubois | Page 30

EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION
xxiv
Mahoiuedan, and to tlie Pagan all these have contributed
more to the consolidation of their power than even their
victories and conquests.
It has been asserted that any great power based neither
on a display of force nor on the affection and esteem of
subject races is bound sooner or later to topple under its
own weight. I am far from sharing this opinion altogether.
The present Government is in a position in which it has
little or nothing to fear from extraneous disturbance.
True
:
.
.
.
'
it is that like all empires it is subject to possible chances of
internal dissension, military revolt, and general insurrection.
But I firmly believe that nothing of this sort will happen to
it so long as it maintains amongst its troops the perfect
discipline and the sense of comfort which at present exist,
and so long as it does all in its power to make its yoke scarcely
perceptible by permitting its subjects every freedom in
the exercise of their social and religious practices.
opinion
It is the poverty of the country which in
gives most cause for apprehension a poverty which is
accompanied by the most extraordinary supineness on the
part of the people themselves. The question is, will a
Government which is rightly determined to be neither unjust
nor oppressive be able always to find within the borders
of this immense empire means sufficient to enable it to meet
the heavy expenses of its administration ? But, after all,
God alone can foretell the destiny of Governments
'
—
my
!
Time has but proved incontestably the truth of these
Even the Mutiny is therein antici-
pated and its chief cause accurately foretold, while nobody
will deny the justice, even at the present day, of the Abbe's
far-seeing criticisms.
observations on the attitude of the natives of India towards
Government and on the difficulties with which
Government has to contend in administering its vast
the British
that
Eastern empire, according to Western notions of civilization
it yields for that purpose.
andprogress, with the resources that
There
is
one other matter which
I feel
to before concluding this brief notice of the
and work
in India,
and that
is
bound
to refer
Abbe's sojourn
the impression he derived