The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke

the government or to the regency of the Mahratta empire, was guilty of a high crime and
misdemeanor in proposing to engage the same British faith to support the pretensions of
another competitor for the same object; and that, in offering to assist the Rajah of Berar to
recover the captures made on his dominions by the Nizam, the said Hastings did endeavor,
as far as depended on him, to engage the British nation in a most unjust and utterly
unprovoked war against the said Nizam, between whom and the East India Company a
treaty of peace and friendship did then subsist, unviolated on his part,—notwithstanding the
said Hastings well knew that it made part of the East India Company's fundamental policy
to support that prince against the Mahrattas, and to consider him as one of the few
remaining chiefs who were yet capable of coping with the Mahrattas, and that it was the
Company's true interest to preserve a good understanding with him. That, by holding out
such offers to the Rajah of Berar, the said Hastings professed to hope that the Rajah would
ardently catch at the objects presented to his ambition: and although the said Hastings did
about this time lay it down as a maxim that there is always a greater advantage in receiving
solicitations than in making advances, he nevertheless declared to the said Rajah that in the
whole of his conduct he had departed from the common line of policy, and had made
advances where others in his situation would have waited for solicitation. That the said
unjust and dangerous projects did not take effect, because the Rajah of Berar refused to join
or be concerned therein; yet so earnest was the said Hastings for the execution of those
projects, that in a subsequent letter he daringly and treacherously assured the Rajah, "that, if
he had accepted of the terms offered him by Colonel Goddard, and concluded a treaty with
the government of Bengal upon them, he should have held the obligation of it superior to
that of any engagement formed by the government of Bombay, and should have thought it
his duty to maintain it, &c., against every consideration even of the most valuable interests
and safety of the English possessions intrusted to his charge." That all the offers of the said

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