On this page
-
Text (2)
-
Untitled Article
-
Untitled Article
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
-
-
Transcript
-
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
Additionally, when viewing full transcripts, extracted text may not be in the same order as the original document.
Untitled Article
Coutt ; of Directors . "What , then , is the Court of Directors ? It is a body formed of qualified holders of stock , partially elected $ > y the proprietary , and partially nominated by the Crown . The Manchester party , or any other set of sincere politicians , might , if so disposed , obtain a powerful voice in the government of India by purchasing East India stock and returning their own nominees to the Court . The Directors exert a large influence over the patronage of the
Three Presidencies ; but , acting with them , is that peculiar institution , -the Board of Control , composed of a President and two Secretaries sitting in parliament , in addition to the Secret Committee , consisting of the Chairman , Deputy Chairman , and Senior Members of the Court ; and with this triple machinery is carried on the administration of our vast Asiatic territories . Now , such a system , if ably worked , might not be superseded for another hundred years ; it might be
perpetuated on the plea that its practical results have been good ; but , unhappily , the tendency of institutions is to decay , and we have at the head of the East India Company Mr . Boss DosrEi-ry Mangles , and at the head of the Board of Control Mr . Ver ^ oit Smith . When matters go wrong , Mr . Mancklxs passes the reproach to MTr . Smith ; Mr . Smith would be glad to mate a scapegoat of Mr . M , ang : les ; but , as that is out of the question , they confabulate and strike out
small schemes which , they assure the country , cannot fail to remedy existing defects . It is said that to Lord Lansdotvite we owe Mr . Veenon Smith , who , as his friends say , could govern India 'if he were able . ¥ e wonder what his Secretary , Sir Gteokoe Ci abk , thinks on that point . All we can tell is , that wherever the name of the yellow-gloved satrap is mentioned , you hear at once of * the most incapable man who ever sat at the head of the Board of Control . '
The Court of Directors is distributed into judicial , financial , political , and military committees . These little conclaves deliberate and make known their decisions to the chairmen . The chairmen ruminate them and make a communicatiou to the President of the Board of Control . But how are the discussions of the Directors carried on ? Not in debates , but by means of papers and minutes , penned by each , and copied by clerks ; for at the weekly and extraordinary courts
have been set aside by the Board of Control ; the Board of Control retorts upon the Company , and indefinite responsibility "becomes no responsibility at all . Especially , we repeat , when the Court is headed by Mr . Mang-i / bs , notoriously unfit as he is for any public position , and the Board T > y Mr . Smith , whowhatever may be his other capacities , is un ,
fitted to govern India . Both these gentlemen have had pressed upon them , repeatedly , the necessity of aa improved administration of jus tice , in Bengal especially , of better securities for life and property , of establishing a plan for protecting- all classes of the population , and of exempting the proprietors and labourers from excessive taxation . What have
they done ? How have they met these claims ? They have talked , and evaded , and wasted time , and they have done nothing more . They were told , upon entering their respective offices , that more magistrates were wanted in Bengal , that there was but one European magistrate to half a million of the population . They did nothing—they did not even inquire .
The truth is , India hag been governed by apathy . The gentlemen in power have not realized the sense of their responsibilities . When the young Englishman arrives in Calcutta , what are his earliest cares ? To wipe out the marks of griffinage . He avoids the sunshine ; lie travels in a palk ; he is pimkaed and tattied ; he ha 3 his
sirdarbearer , hitmutgar and khansaman ; one servant to carry his pipe , a second for his bottle , a third for his umbrella ; he is like a youug cavalry soldier , whose aim it is to ride well , not to study the art of war . Wear off your griffinage and you are fit for Anglo-Indian society—which is the whole duty of th « civilian . So with a President of the Board
of Control ; he is ' the Right Honourable ;' he must talk in Parliament of ' two hundred millions of souls ; ' but , if he should happen to be Mr . "Vebuon Smith , he will staud stupidly gazing , while a tempest gathers , and while the system of which he is the head sinka into dust and destruction . The incompetency of our public men is the key to the late disasters ; but there are innumerable details connected with the civil government of India which it will he necessary to examine . Wo have preferred , at the outset , to deal only with the initials of the subject .
the votes given are almost invariably silent . The matter is then referred to Mr . Vernon Smith , and that gentleman is expected to pronounce judgments affecting the destinies of our splendid Eastern empire . Perhaps it is not his fault that he is feehle ; but if he were only modest , the Government of India might be considerably improved . Mr . Vernon Smith however , is not a diffident man . He has a thirst for distinguishing himself , and has generally imagined that to treat with contempt
the opinions of the Court of Directors is to behave like a statesman . This , however , has been the habitual policy of presidents of the Board of Control . They have almost always set themselves up in opposition to the East India Company . The Earl of Hipon was wiser , but it is well known to many persona that , when a gentleman once called on him for an opinion , he confessed he was incapableof giving
it . Ho made IjorclELLENBOitouau his oracle , and Lord Ellen bo hough waa the very Governor-General who was recalled by the Court of Directors on account of his insolent and overbearing despatches to their chairman . That such squabbles havo gone on for years unnoticed by the public , is a signal illustration of the radical defect underlying our Indian system—irresponsible authority . Civil and nolitial errors aro committed—tl * o Court of Directors offer to provo that their counsels
Untitled Article
hanna Sotjtecote , believe in Christianity and something more . Mahomet , an uneducated man , produced the Koran , which is considered to he his one miracle ; the miracle of the mountain being a failure . In like manner Joe Smith has produced the Book of Mormon , and by the help of his followers lie has also produced a variety of miracles , though strangely enough , he eouTd not work a miracle in his own behalf , and pass scatbless amid the bullets of his pursuers .
That which constitutes the -wonder for us is , that Mormonism is a religion manufactured in the presence of civilization ; as the French say , we ' assist' at its manufacture , and perfectly understand its history while it is developing itself . Born at the very headquarters of Yankee-land , Joe Smith has all the ingenuity and energy of a Northern man . He did not , as some are still doing , go into any branch of ordinary commerce ; he did not set up an Ohio Trust Company , or a bubble railway company ; but he struck out another joint-stock enterprise , which lias
proved to be quite as successful , and much more enduring , than many other schemes in New York . There was no great originality in his plan of action . He * saw visions ; ' he heard a voice call him into a wood ; a great light came upon him ; and he had the honour of an interview with two persons , one sitting on the right hand of the other , who gave him direct and specific instructions as to his mode of action . He found a cyst , or box , containing metal plates , inscribed with hieroglyphical characters ; he copied or burlesqued these in some more voluminous form on paper or parchment ; and an original of the book of Mormon was exhibited to a learned
gentleman . It proved to consist of some ancient characters more or less closely copied , with Roman characters laid down on their backs or sides , as may be seen sometimes in bad printing ; with other fanciful marks . The characters were ranged like those of some . Oriental languages , in lines from top to bottom . Subsequently Smith produced his own translation' of this mystic book , whereof a few brazen or paper leaves only have been seen by . others . In the meanwhile he had procured ' witnesses' of these various
stages—persons who attested to the accuracy of his statements on oath . This is certainly stronger evidence than some religions can boast . Many a prophet has neglected to procure for us an affidavit duly attested before competent magistrates by respectable people . Besides the brazen leaves , visions , and other waifs and strays , Joe Smith seems to have found au unknown fiction , by a Mr . Solomon Spauldinq-, a person who once lived in an obscure part of the State of New York , had alternated commerce aud literature , and had amused the leisure momenta of what seema
THE MOUMONS . The Mormon delusion is a wonder only to those who do not see how many parallels it has had , and still has ; it is a mystery only to those who are too idle to look into the most obvious and common causes . It might be a profitable lesson to us , if we could acquire the capacity of reading it . No doubt it is ridiculous enough , save to those who suffer from it , and are about to suffer worse ; but we have had close counterparts iu different
places and times ; some not far from our own . Johanna Sotjthcotjg was followed by many believers , and , notwithstanding the failure of her announcements , and her own disappearance from the scene , she stilL has believers . Joe Smith was a very uneducated man , but ao was Tjiom of Canterbury , who , as Sir William Courtenay , became a prophet to the peasants of Kent . The closest parallel ,
perhaps , is that furnished by tho mission of Mahomet , which was , and is , so eminently successful . The poor cnmol-driver struck out n new faith Buited to thoae who became his followers , and met a decided ' want of the day ' by the appropriate ' supply . ' Ho baaed his new invention upon a religion already existing ; for tho Mahometans , like tho Mormons , are professedly n sect of Christians , who , in common with tho followers , of
Joto have been an unsuccessful life iu composing rather a dull romance which represented tho origin of the indigenous inhabitants of tho United States . This book we havo not seen ; it appears in some degree to roaemblo the original machinery which introduces tho JPertiviati Tales . It was , however , only tho basis upon which Smith constructed his volume—only tho coarse canvas upon which his embroidery was worked ; for tho sacred . volumo bears tho most manifest truces of Smith's own writing , in ludicrous faults of
grammar . Tho first conference of tho sect wan held at Fayette in 1830—ahout ten years after Smith had begun his mission . Ho then looked out for the site of a ' New Jerusalem , ' and , with considerable following , arrived at a place in Jackson county , Missouri , which became tho land of ' / Aon . Ho returned and preached in the United Stntos , beating up recruits exactly as hia follower * Jvro doing now . Ho
Untitled Article
_ ggg __ THE LEAD E E , jgo . 390 ^ Septembeb 12 , 1857 ,
-
-
Citation
-
Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 12, 1857, page 880, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2209/page/16/
-