The Indian National Congress has at all times contained many men of high character and ability, devoted to what they conceived to be the best interests of their country, and at first, at any rate, quite ready to acknowledge the benefits of British rule and to testify to their conviction that the maintenance of British rule is essential to the welfare and safety of India.

Many of them must have seen that the constant denunciation of Government by men who claimed to represent the intelligence of the country must tend to stimulate a spirit of disaffection and revolt amongst their more ignorant and inexperienced fellow-countrymen.

Yet not one of them had the courage to face the risk of temporary unpopularity by pointing out the danger of the inclined plane down which they were sliding, until they actually saw themselves being swept hopelessly off their feet at Surat.

It was then too late to avert the consequences of pusillanimity or to shake off their share of responsibility for the evils which the tolerance they had too long extended to the methods of their more violent colleagues had helped to produce.

One of the main purposes of the Indian National Congress has avowedly been to set up a claim for the introduction of representative government in India.