139 
natural indolence, displaying instances of self-denial, of laborious 
and painful exertion, which almost exceed belief/' 
“ We may behold the native of Hindostan, whose form is na- 
turally of a tender texture, and whose body is enfeebled by age, 
patient of fatigue, careless of danger, taking his long and painful 
journey from the Ganges to the Volga, to offer up a prayer at the 
shrine of his god. We may behold him at another time, relin- 
quishing every worldly connection, subduing every feeling of self- 
love, and all the sympathies of social life, “ motionless as a tree, 
and fixing his eyes on the solar orb’’ until exhausted nature sinks, 
or despair prompts him to devote himself to the fury of the Hood 
or fire.’ 5 
“ In a country, where the superior orders have repressed every 
hope, and precluded even the possibility of advancement in those 
below them; where indolence may be indulged without any call 
to activity, and where tyranny may be exercised without fear of 
resistance; it is impossible that there should not be, on the one 
hand, capricious rigour, and, on the other hand, ignorance and 
servility. Though such a variety of opinion on religious subjects 
is prevalent throughout Hindostan, and though even the Brahmi- 
nical hierarchy itself is, at the present time, nothing more than an 
oligarchical form of government, yet its power is not less arbitrary 
because its operations are desultory and partial. Its influence is 
felt in a greater or ] ess degree throughout India; and wherever it 
is felt it is converted into an instrument of evading just demand, 
or of enforcing immoderate exactions/’ 
“ Happy then are they, who live under the benign influence of 
