CH. XIV. DIFFICULTIES OF BRITISH EULE IN INDIA. 353 



within the limits of an old society, and the sense, invigo- 

 rating to the whole nation, of accomplishing a useful part 

 in the world's development. 



Objections to every attempt on the part of a modern 

 civilised State to undertake the government of inferior 

 races have been urged on various grounds by writers of 

 the highest reputation. 



The barriers established by diflferences in mental con- 

 dition, in traditions, and inherited ideas, between peoples 

 in a different stage of development, are easily shown to 

 create formidable difficulties in the way of mutual under- 

 standing and appreciation, which must precede all useful 

 effijrts to carry the less advanced races along the path of 

 progress. The history of British India where, at least 

 during the present century, the experiment has been tried 

 on the largest scale, and with the most genuine regard for 

 the welfare of the governed populations, supplies many 

 an example of the errors inevitable in so difficult an 

 enterprise. Measures devised with the best intentions 

 have sometimes failed altogether in achieving the ex- 

 pected effect, or, when this has been attained, have created 

 discontent, because not corresponding with the ideas of 

 the native population. 



How much better it would be, say objectors of this 

 class, to let these backward races work out for themselves 

 the problems of material and mental development, in con- 

 formity with the conditions which nature and history have 

 imposed, than to attempt, in the face of your own ad- 

 mitted ignorance, to play the part of Providence towards 

 them. 



If the discussion were to turn upon the destiny of a 

 country wherein the elementary conditions of social order 

 had been secured, wherein progress of some kind, at how- 

 ever slow a pace, was not an impossibility, it might be 

 possible to admit the force of these arguments. But it is 

 forgotten that in point of fact most barbarous countries 

 have failed to reach this indispensable preliminary stage. 



