From Substance of the speeches of William Wilberforce, esq. on the clause in the East-India bill for promoting the religious instruction and moral improvement of the natives of the British dominions in India, on the 22d of June, and the 1st and 12th of July, 1813 (1813) Read the full speech here
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But even Swartz’s converts, it is alleged, were all of the lowest class of the people, wretches who had lost caste, or were below it; and the same assertion is generally made concerning the native Christians at this day. This again, Sir, is one of those wretched prejudices which receive easy credence, because they fall in with the preconceived notions of the receiver, and pass current from man to man without being questioned, in spite of the plainest and most decisive refutation. Even our opponents themselves will refer to Mr. Swartz’s own authority; and that excellent man having happened to read in India much such a speech concerning Missionaries as the Honourable Baronet has this day uttered, which had been made in the India-House the year before, by Air. Montgomery Campbell, he positively contradicted all those stale assertions in disparagement of the Missionaries and their followers, which had been so generally circulated ; among the rest, this of the low degraded quality of their converts; by stating, that if Mr. Campbell had even once attended their Church, he would have observed, that more than two thirds were of the higher caste, and so it was, he said, at Tranquebar and Vepery. In like manner, Dr. Kerr, who was officially commissioned by the Madras Government, in 1806, to visit the Malabar coast, for the express purpose of obtaining every possible information in regard to the establishment, &c. of the Christian Religion in that part of the Peninsula, after stating, that the character of the native Christians, whose numbers, according to the best accounts, are estimated at from seventy to eighty thousand, is marked by a striking superiority over the heathens in every moral excellence, and that they are remarkable for their veracity and plain dealing, adds, ” They are respected very highly by the Nairs” (the nobility of the country), ” who do not consider themselves defiled by associating; with them, though it is well known that the Nairs are the most particular of all the Hindoos in this respect ; and the Rajahs of Travancore and Cochin admit them to rank next to Nairs.”
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But the evils of Hindostan are family, fire-side evils: they pervade the whole mass of the population, and embitter the domestic cup, in almost every family. Why need I, in this country, insist on the evils which arise merely out of the institution of Caste itself; a system which, though, strange to say, it has been complimented as a device of deep political wisdom, must surely appear to every heart of true British temper to be a system at war with truth and nature; a detestable expedient for keeping the lower orders of the community bowed down in an abject state of hopeless and irremediable vassalage. It is justly, Sir, the glory of this country, that no member of our free community is naturally precluded from rising into the highest classes in society. And, in fact, we have all witnessed instances of men who have emerged out of their original poverty and obscurity, and have risen to the highest level by the in-born buoyancy of their superior natures ; our free constitution, to which such occurrences are scarcely less honourable than to the individuals who are the subjects of them, opening the way for the developement, and Providence favouring the exercise, of their powers. Even where slavery has existed, it has commonly been possible, (though in the West Indies, alas! artificial difficulties have been interposed,) for individuals to burst their bonds, and assert the privileges of their nature. But the more cruel shackles of Caste are never to be shaken; as well might a dog, or any other of the brute creation, it is the Honourable Gentleman’s own illustration, aspire to the dignity and rights of man.
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Equality, in short, is the vital essence and the very glory of our English laws. Of theirs, the essential and universal pervading character is inequality ; despotism in the higher classes, degradation and oppression in the lower. And such is the systematic oppression of this despotism, such its universal predominancy, that, not satisfied with condemning the wretched Soodras for life to their miserable debasement, (nay, death itself does not mend their condition), and endeavouring to make that degradation sure, by condemning them to ignorance as well as humiliation, the same inequalities pursue and harass their victims, in the various walks and occupations of life. If they engage in commerce, they are to pay 57. per cent, interest for money, while a Bramin pays 1/. and the other two castes 2/. and 3/. per cent. Their punishments are far more severe than those of the higher classes, for all crimes; although, with any but a Hindoo legislator, their inferior measure of knowledge might be held to extenuate their guilt.
