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of the most philanthropic establishments ever adopted, for pro- 

 mulgating knowledge, literature, and science, throughout an ex- 

 tensive empire, especially in promoting a jurisprudence founded 

 on the principles of the Mahomedan and Hindoo codes, improved 

 by the spirit of those laws which form the glorious constitution of 

 Great Britain. Without adulation to any living character, as 

 without invidious reflection on the memory of men long since 

 called to their final audit by an unerring Judge, who thought so 

 very differently of one of these distinguished benefactors, I can- 

 not suppress my own estimation of such inestimable advantages 

 to the British empire in India, nor withhold the conclusion of 

 Marquis Wellesley's address to the students of the college at Fort 

 William in 1805, wherein the noble visitor asserts, that " the due 

 administration of just laws within these flourishing and populous 

 provinces, is not only the foundation of the happiness of millions 

 of people, but the main pillar of the vast fabric of the British em- 

 pire in Asia; the main-spring of our empire is situated here; 

 and it is supplied and guarded by the laws and regulations of this 

 government. From the prosperity of these provinces are derived 

 all the sources of our revenue and commerce and public credit; 

 and the origin and stability of that prosperity are to be found in 

 the code of laws which you are now directed to study, and here- 

 after destined to administer, to expound, and to amend. 



" Subject to the common imperfection of every human institu- 

 tion, this system of laws is approved by practical experience, 

 (the surest test of human legislation) and contains an active prin- 

 ciple of continued revision, which affords the best security for pro- 

 gressive amendment. It is not the effusion of vain theory, issuing 



