330 



are not available, is a great social injustice. The class that 

 feels in this manner, though numerically small, is an in- 

 fluential one growing in intelligence and importance day by 

 day. The fact of the laws of devolution of property running 

 counter to natural sentiment must necessarily lead to the 

 adoption of devices to counterwork it, giving rise to litiga- 

 tion among members belonging to the same family, and to 

 dissipation of the family propei'ty which it is the object of 

 the tarwad system to preserve intact. The State is also 

 interested in seeing that the institutions of society are so 

 modified as to ensure that the care, nurture and education of 

 the young, according to modern requirements — matters in 

 which it is deeply interested — are entrusted to those who 

 may be trusted under the impulse of natural sentiment to 

 aischarge the duties with the greatest fidelity and to be 

 likely to submit to great personal sacrifices in the attain- 

 ment of this object and not to those who in the majority of 

 cases will be content to do the minimum that they are bound 

 legally or by social opinion to do. This is one side of the 

 case. On the other side, it has to be remembered that the 

 existing institutions have struck their roots so deep in the 

 past, affect so many relations of life and the subsistence of 

 such large numbers of persons, that any sudden modification 

 of them is likely to give rise to many unexpected evils, dis- 

 appoint many just expectations and cause suffering and 

 widespread discontent. The Government cannot possibly, by 

 enquiries by means of commissions and such like bodies im- 

 provised for the time, be able to determine in projects for 

 legislation of this kind, having such wide-reaching issues, 

 whether after balancing the conflicting considerations, the 

 gain to the community is suflficiently great to justify legis- 

 lation and if legislation is resolved on, what precautions shall 

 be taken to minimize the evils of the change. Even where 

 the gain is beyond question, the feeling of the community 

 itself as to the necessity for legislation is a factor which 

 must necessarily be taken into account. 



Legislation, then, in such cases can only be carried out 

 in a spirit of compromise and should provide for a gradual 

 modification of the institutions found unsuitable without 

 causing any violent breach of social continuity. For work 

 of this kind, the provincial legislature composed, as it must 

 be, of members, the majority of whom are of diiferent habits 

 and ways of thinking from those whom the proposed legis- 

 lation is to affect, must be entirely unsuited, unless it is aided 

 in its deliberations by other bodies constituted by law and 

 composed in the main of members belonging to' the commu- 



