Page:A Nation in Making.djvu/258

question my answer is an absolute, an unqualified, and an emphatic "No". (Hear, hear, and voice, "Bravo".) I am not here to defend everything that has been said in the Indian Native Press. I ask my brother journalists here from other parts of the Empire if they are prepared to defend everything said in their columns about questions of great public importance. Are we an infallible body? We are not. We are liable to make mistakes, and sometimes very serious mistakes. I shall, therefore, say at once that I am not going to defend the irresponsible utterances, which, unfortunately, have now and then found a place in some of the Indian newspapers; but it must be remembered that those newspapers form an insignificant minor- ity:—(hear, hear)—their circulation is limited, and their hold upon public opinion feeble. Let there be no misconception about my attitude. I do not stand here in justification of those anarchical developments which have unfortunately taken place in Bengal. I express the sense of the better mind of Bengal, and, I may add, of all India, when I say that we all deplore those anarchical incidents. (Cheers.) My Indian colleagues and myself have condemned them in our columns with the utmost emphasis that we could command. They are in entire conflict with those deep-seated religious con- victions which colour, consciously or unconsciously, the everyday lives of our people. Anarchism, if I may say so without offence, is not of the East but of the West. It is a noxious growth which has been transplanted from the West, and we hope that under the conciliatory and ameliorating treatment of Lord Morley it will soon disappear from the land. I feel tempted to enter into those considerations which have brought about these unhappy developments, but I remember that this is a non-political gathering; I will, therefore, resist the temptation, and exercise the self-restraint of the East. (Loud cheers.) We regard a free Press as one of the greatest boons that have been conferred upon us under British rule. It was conferred upon us not merely for political purposes, but as an instrument for the dissemi- nation of knowledge and useful information. At any rate, that was the hope, the aim and the aspiration of the great liberator of the Indian Press. Lord Metcalfe, speaking in reply to a deputation that waited upon him in connexion with the emancipation of the Indian Press, said: "We are not here in India merely to maintain order, to collect the taxes and make good the deficit; we are here for a higher and nobler purpose, to pour into the East the knowedge, the culture, and the civilization of the West." I claim on behalf of my countrymen that they have used this gift for the benefit of the Government, and to the advantage of the people, and I pray that it may long endure to the mutual credit of England and India alike.' (Cheers.)

It is not for me to speak of the effect that the speech produced upon the meeting. When I said that I would not enter into a political controversy, but would exercise the self-restraint of the East, the