In spite of some high-sounding commonplaces which were at times
enunciated by Roman lawgivers and statesmen, and in which a ring of
utilitarian philosophy is to be recognised,[17] and of the further fact
that, as in the case of Verres, a check was sometimes applied to the
excesses of local Governors, it is almost certainly true that the rulers
of Rome did not habitually act on the recognition of any very strong
moral obligation binding on the Imperial Government in its treatment of
subject races. The merits of any fiscal system were probably judged
mainly from the point of view of the amount of funds which it poured
into the Treasury. The fiscal principles on which the Emperors of Rome
acted survived long after the fall of the Roman Empire. They deserve the
epithet of "barbarous" which Mr. Hodgkin has bestowed upon them.

The point of departure of the British Government is altogether
different. Its intentions are admirable. Every farthing which has been
spent--and, it may be feared, often wasted--on the numerous military
expeditions in which the Government of India has been engaged during the
last century would, in the eyes of many, certainly be considered as
expenditure incurred on objects which were of paramount interest to the
Indian taxpayers. Moreover, a whole category of British legislation
connected with fiscal matters has been undertaken, not so much with a
view to increase the revenue as with the object of distributing the
burthen of taxation equally amongst the different classes of society.
Much of this legislation has been perfectly justifiable and even
beneficial. Nevertheless, it should never be forgotten that it is
generally based on the purely Western principle that abstract justice is
in itself a desirable thing to attain, and that a fiscal or
administrative system stands condemned if it is wanting in symmetry. It
was against any extreme application of this principle that Burke