His administration in Java. 38^ 



ailTairs, especially those immediately connected with the free and 

 unchecked pursuit of knowledge; and who take an active part in 

 eflecting or advocating the changes and improvements, which this 

 revolution demands, and will inevitably create. To place the lives 

 and liberties of the people he governed in that security, and to 

 surround them with those comforts, which every individual of the 

 human species has a right to enjoy; and after having thus pre- 

 pared the ground for moral amelioration, to communicate to them 

 freely every species of knowledge, in order that their minds, en- 

 lightened to discern their own real character, might be induced 

 to reject whatever they saw to be of baneful tendency, and to 

 cherish or adopt whatever might lead to virtue and true happi- 

 ness ; — such were the objects, — all pursued with due regard to 

 the interests of his country and his more immediate employers, 

 which Governor Raffles designed to accomplish, in all liis mea- 

 sures of internal polity. And his measures of foreign intercourse 

 embraced every disposition of affairs necessary for the protection 

 and support of the principles and line of conduct he thus pursued 

 in his home-administration. He adopted, above all, as a guiding 

 principle of government, that of regarding every colony as an in- 

 tegrant though distant province of the mother-country; and con- 

 sequently of admitting the native inhabitants, as well as the co- 

 lonists, to all the privileges enjoyed by the people of the mother- 

 country ; so far as might be consistent with their difference in 

 situation and character. 



In agreement with these general views, and in conformity with 

 the wise and benevolent designs of his revered patron the Earl of 

 Minto, the leading features of Mr. Raffles's administration in Java, 

 were the thorough and complete reform of the abuses permitted 

 and even sanctioned by the former Dutch government, and the 

 gradual but effectual improvement of the varied and extensive 

 population subject to his authority. Having in his earlier ap- 

 pointments and residence in the Malayan countries, as already 

 mentioned, become acquainted with the peculiarities of the Ma- 

 layan character, and the elevation of which it appeared susceptible, 

 he aimed at no inferior an atchievement, on assuming the govern- 

 ment of this island, than the complete reformation of the Malays, 



