CnAP. III.] HINDOO GOVERNMENT. 85
of which the population of India have had to complain, to rash tampering with a.d. —
the modes of government to which they had been accustomed, and the rights
which they had acquired under them. After the lapse of nearl}^ a century,
there is reason to suspect that, within the limits of the three provinces of which
the dewannee was obtained by Clive from Shah Alum, abuses still exist, and
much unintentional injustice is committed, merely because the tenures under
which property was held and occupied in early Hindoo times were imperfectly
understood. So far, therefore, from thinking that the subject of the present
chapter might have been omitted, our only regret is, that it must be treated
within limits bearing no proportion to its intrinsic importance.
In form Hindoo government was an absolute monarchy, the nature of which Hindoo gov- ernment IS fully described in the Institutes of Menu. The rajah or king, though presumed monarciiicai.
to rule in accordance with a code of written laws, is represented as holding his power immediately from the Supreme Being, and subject to no restraint but that which his sense of duty or fear of the consequences of misgovernment might impose. As if he were of a different nature from his subjects, he is said to have been formed " of eternal particles drawn from the substance of Indra, and seven other named divinities;" and in consequence ".surpasses all mortals in glory." "Like the sun, he burns eyes and hearts; nor can any human creature even gaze on him." " He is a powerful divinity, who appears in a human shape." He must not suppose, however, that he is born only for himself He was created, because, " if the world had no king, it would quake on all sides through fear;" and because, if the guilty were not punished, "the stronger would roast the weaker, like fish on a spit." His great duty therefore is, to "prepare a just compensation for the good, and a just punishment for the bad." The latter of these two appears to be regarded as the more important and effi- cacious, and is hence eulogized in such terms as the following: — "Punishment governs aU mankind; punishment alone preserves them; punishment wakes while their guards are asleep ; the wise consider punishment as the perfection of justice.
Should the king, instead of faithfully discharging his duty, be "crafty, xoconstitu- voluptuous, and wrathful," he must not hope to escape with impunity; for "criminal justice, the bright essence of majesty, . . . eradicates a king who swerves from his duty, together with all his race ; punishment shall overtake his castles, his territories, his peopled land, with all fixed and moveable things that exist on it ; even the gods and the sages will be afflicted and ascend to the sky." In aU this, however, he suffers only by a kind of divine retribution. His own will, if he chooses to make it so, may be his only law. No hint is given of the existence of any con.stitutional check on the abuse of his power, and it is hence left to be inferred that if he played the tyrant his subjects were entirely at his mercy. Having no recognized right to call him to account for mis-
conduct, they had no alternative but to submit, and wait patiently for the
