paralytic on that side, his muscles there have lost their very tone and
character--they cannot move. In short, the accomplishment of any thing
good is a physical impossibility for such a man. There is decrepitude as
well as distortion: he could not, if he would, is not more certain than
that he would not, if he could." To this sentiment the allusions in the
following passage refer:--

"I am perfectly convinced that there is one idea, which must arise in
Your Lordships' minds as a subject of wonder,--how a person of Mr.
Hastings' reputed abilities can furnish such matter of accusation against
himself. For, it must be admitted that never was there a person who seems
to go so rashly to work, with such an arrogant appearance of contempt for
all conclusions, that may be deduced from what he advances upon the
subject. When he seems most earnest and laborious to defend himself, it
appears as if he had but one idea uppermost in his mind--a determination
not to care what he says, provided he keeps clear of fact. He knows that
truth must convict him, and concludes, _a converso_, that falsehood
will acquit him; forgetting that there must be some connection, some
system, some co-operation, or, otherwise, his host of falsities fall
without an enemy, self-discomfited and destroyed. But of this he never
seems to have had the slightest apprehension. He falls to work, an
artificer of fraud, against all the rules of architecture;--he lays his
ornamental work first, and his massy foundation at the top of it; and
thus his whole building tumbles upon his head. Other people look well to
their ground, choose their position, and watch whether they are likely to
be surprised there; but he, as if in the ostentation of his heart, builds
upon a precipice, and encamps upon a mine, from choice. He seems to have
no one actuating principle, but a steady, persevering resolution not to
speak the truth or to tell the fact.