CHAPTER III*
INDIA ON THE EVE OF THE CROWN GOVERNMENT
More than anything else in the world, Imperialism stands in greater need of defence and Imperialists have not been wanting in their duty.
Unlike the Greeks who did not have even a word for imperialism nor knew the idea of the federation of city states, the Romans were the world’s first and greatest imperial people and they coined a justification for imperialism that became the heritage of their successor.
They proclaimed that they were a people of superior race with a culture too high to be compared with any other, that they had better system of administration, that they were versed in the arts of life. They also proclaimed that the rest were people of inferior race with a very low culture and were absolutely devoid of the arts of life, and that their administration was very despotic. As a logical consequence of this the Romans argued that it was their divine mission to civilize their low lying brethern, nay to conquer them and superimpose their culture in the name of humanity.
The British have justified their imperial policy in India by similar argumentation. The British historian of India have a kind of Leues Boswelliana—disease of admiration. Their optical vision somehow or other has magnified the vices, not the virtues, of the predecessors of the British in India. Not only have they been loud in their denunciation of the Moghul and the Maratha rulers as despots or brigands, they cast slur on the morale of the entire population and their civilization. This is but natural for individuals as well as states can raise themselves only by lowering the merits of others.
Historians of British India have often committed the fallacy of comparing the Rule of the British with their immediate or remote predecessors. In deference to historical methodology. They
***** In the MS., this Chapter No. is V. Chapter III and IV are not forthcoming—ed.