east satisfaction
concerning his conduct, notwithstanding, as we shall prove, he has
reiteratedly promised, and promised it in the most ample and liberal
manner. But let us see if there be any presumption in his favor to rebut
the presumption which he knew was irresistible, and which, by making no
defence for his conduct, and stopping the inquiry, must necessarily lie
upon him. He reserves his defence, but he promises both defence and
explanation.

Your Lordships will remark that there is nowhere a clear and positive
denial of the fact. Promising a defence, I will admit, does not directly
and _ex vi termini_ suppose that a man may not deny the fact, because it
is just compatible with the defence; but it does by no means exclude the
admission of the fact, because the admission of the fact may be attended
with a justification: but when a man says that he will explain his
conduct with regard to a fact, then he admits that fact, because there
can be no explanation of a fact which has no existence. Therefore Mr.
Hastings admits the fact by promising an explanation, and he shows he
has no explanation nor justification to give by never having given it.
Goaded, provoked, and called upon for it, in the manner I have
mentioned, he chooses to have a feast of disgrace, (if I may say so,) to
have a riot of infamy, served up to him day by day for a course of
years, in every species of reproach that could be given by his
colleagues, and by the Court of Directors, "from whom," he says, "I
received nothing but opprobrious and disgraceful epithets," and he says
"that his predecessors possessed more of their confidence than he had."
Yet for years he lay down in that sty of disgrace, fattening in it,
feeding upon that offal of disgrace and excrement, upon everything that
could be disgustful to the human mind, rather than deny the fact and put
himself upon a civil justification. Infamy was never incurred for
nothing. We know very well what was said formerly:--

"Populus me sibilat; at mihi plaudo
Ipse domi, simul ac nummos contemplor in arca."

And never did a man submit to infamy for anything but its true reward,
_money_. Money he received; the infamy he received along with it: he was
glad to take his wife with all her goods; he took her with her full
portion, with every species of infamy that belonged to her; and your
Lordships cannot resist the opinion that he would not have suffered
himself to be disgraced with the Court