one practical lesson which, often as we have on former occasions
inculcated it on you, the present subject suggests to us once more to
enforce. While, on the one hand, it may be anticipated that the range
of public situations accessible to the natives and mixed races will
gradually be enlarged, it is, on the other hand, to be recollected
that, as settlers from Europe find their way into the country, this
class of persons will probably furnish candidates for those very
situations to which the natives and mixed race will have admittance.
Men of European enterprise and education will appear in the field; and
it is by the prospect of this event that we are led particularly to
impress the lesson already alluded to on your attention. In every view
it is important that the indigenous people of India, or those among
them who by their habits, character, or position may be induced to
aspire to office, should, as far as possible, be qualified to meet
their European competitors.

Thence, then, arises a powerful argument for the promotion of
every design tending to the improvement of the natives, whether by
conferring on them the advantages of education, or by diffusing among
them the treasures of science, knowledge, and moral culture. For these
desirable results, we are well aware that you, like ourselves, are
anxious, and we doubt not that, in order to impel you to increased
exertion for the promotion of them, you will need no stimulant beyond
a simple reference to the considerations we have here suggested.

109. While, however, we entertain these wishes and opinion, we must
guard against the supposition that it is chiefly by holding out
means and opportunities of official distinction that we expect our
Government to benefit the millions subjected to their authority.
We have repeatedly expressed to you a very different sentiment.
Facilities of official advancement can little affect the bulk of
the people under any Government, and perhaps least under a good
Government. It is not by holding out incentives to official ambition,
but by repressing crime, by securing and guarding property, by
creating confidence, by ensuring to industry the fruit of its labour,
by protecting men in the undisturbed enjoyment of their rights, and
in the unfettered exercise of their faculties, that Governments best
minister to the public wealth and happiness. In effect, the free
access to office is chiefly valuable when it is a part of general
freedom.