John Morley

Much of this movement arises from the fact that there is now a large body of educated Indians who have been fed, at our example and our instigation, upon some of the great teachers and masters of this country, Milton, Burke, Macaulay…

Surely it is a mistake in us not to realise that these masters should have mighty force and irresistible influence.

Who can be surprised that educated Indians who read those high masters and teachers of ours, are intoxicated with the ideas of freedom, nationality, self-government, that breathes the breath of life in those inspiring and illuminating…

Then why should we be surprised that young Indians feel the same movement of mind, when they are made free of our own immortals.

My warning may be wasted, but anybody who has a chance ought to try to appeal to the better, the riper, mind of educated India.

Nothing strikes me much more than this, when I talk of the better mind of India--there are subtle elements, religious, spiritual, mystical, traditional, historical in what we may call for the moment the Indian mind, which are very hard for…

But our duty, and it is a splendid duty, is to try.

Is there any rational man who holds that, if you can lay down political principles and maxims of government that apply equally to Scotland or to England, or to Ireland, or to France, or to Spain, therefore they must be just as true for the…

But what I submit with the utmost confidence is that the situation to-day is a considerable improvement on the situation that we found, when we assumed power two years ago.

I am not so unwise as to say that the clouds will never come back again; but what has been done by us has been justified, in my opinion, by the event.

To take anybody and deport him without bringing any charge against him, and with no intention of bringing him to trial, is a step that, I think, the House is perfectly justified in calling me to account for.

I hope that your Excellency will on my behalf as Viceroy and as representing the King convey to His Majesty's Indian troops my thanks for the contempt with which they have received the disgraceful overtures which I know have been made to…

The seeds of sedition have been unscrupulously scattered throughout India, even amongst the hills of the frontier tribes.

We are grateful that they have fallen on much barren ground, but we can no longer allow their dissemination.

Let me beseech my hon. friends at least to try for some sense of balanced proportion, instead of allowing their wrath at one particular incident of policy to blot out from their vision all the wide and durable operations, to which we have…

After all, this absence of a sense of proportion is what, more than any other one thing, makes a man a wretched politician.

The present proposals of the Government of India are inadequate to allay the existing and growing discontent.

When you have to deal with complex communities of varied races, and all the other peculiarities of India, you have to think out how your proposals will work.

In this we are making a marked advance in humanity and common sense,--which is itself a kind of humanity.

But show me where it fails--that it is perfect in every respect no sensible man would contend for a moment--but show me at any point, let any of my hon. friends show me from day to day as this session passes, where this bureaucracy, as…

But there must be a thorough comprehension in the mind of the Secretary of State of two things--first of all, of the Indian point of view; and, secondly, the point of view as it appears to those who are the masters of me and of you.

I have had in my days a good deal to do with experts of one kind and another, and I assure you that I do not think an expert is at all the worse when he gets a candid-minded and reasonably well trained amateur.

Our first duty--the first duty of any Government--is to keep order.

A movement for objects which we ourselves have all taught them to think desirable objects.

I would use my best endeavours to make these States independent in matters of administration.