1(3 Mr. Mayne on the Administration of Native Law 



they advance in civilisation, there can be no reason why 

 they should not also come under English law, in preference to 

 any other. In fact neither Hindu, nor Muhammadan law 

 can with propriety be applied to any who do not profess the 

 religion upon which the law is based. The English system 

 has the great advantage of being perfectly neutral. 



The nature of our judicial system supplies very imperfect- 

 ly that which I consider to be the second fundamental re- 

 quirement ; viz., that provision should be made for the gra- 

 dual development and modification of the Native law, in 

 accordance with the growth and improvement of the people 

 themselves. 



It is evident that as civilisation increases, new wants and 

 new habits of life will arise, and these in turn will originate 

 new rights, and call for new remedies. External commerce 

 will multiply ships. Internal communication will introduce 

 carriers. Money-dealings will be conducted by negotiable 

 instruments. All of these will raise questions of law previ- 

 ously unknown, and the answers to these must be supplied, 

 either by invention, or by borrowing from some system which 

 has already solved similar difficulties. Here what is requir- 

 ed is simply to fill up a blank. But from similar causes it 

 will also happen, that rules which were admirably adopted 

 to a nation in their primeval state, become absolute fetters 

 upon them when they are emerging into a higher condition. 

 Laws which assume that every one is in a state of stereo- 

 typed and unambitious simplicity, are absolutely injurious 

 when society is getting broken up into new forms, and when 

 every individual is demanding for himself that liberty of ac- 

 tion, which was formerly reserved for the family or the vil- 

 lage. Here what is required is, not to fill up a blank, but to 

 remove an incumbrance. 



There never has been any difficulty in supplying the 

 former species of want. As all the advances in civilisation 



