They are themselves, when invested with office,
treated by the natives with an idolatrous degree of reverence, which
teaches them to expect a similar submission to their will, on their
return to their own country. They have been accustomed to look up to
personages greatly their superiors in rank and riches, with awe; and
to look down on their inferiors in _property_ with supreme contempt,
as slaves of their will and ministers of their luxury. Equal laws and
equal liberty at home appear to them saucy claims of the poor and the
vulgar, which tend to divest riches of one of the greatest charms,
over-bearing dominion. We do, indeed, import gorgeous silks and
luscious sweets from the Indies, but we import, at the same time, the
spirit of despotism, which adds deformity to the purple robe, and
bitterness to the honied beverage." "That _Oriental_ manners are
unfavourable to liberty, is, I believe, universally conceded. The
natives of the East Indies entertain not the idea of independence.
They treat the Europeans, who go among them to acquire their riches,
with a respect similar to the abject submission which they pay to
their native despots.
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