"1. That the system on which the trade in India had hitherto been conducted and the possessions administered, was no longer good under present circumstances, but contained in itself the seeds of decline and ruin.
"2. That the exclusive trade was in its nature injurious, and naturally caused the ruin of the colonies.
"3. That under a different system, those colonies would flourish, and yield much greater advantages than ever.
"4. That a revenue, founded on the principles of freedom of trade, property in the soil, and equality of imposts, could be easily introduced.
"5. And finally, that all the benefits which would thereby accrue to the mother country, from the territorial revenue, the duties on trade, the industry and wealth for which that trade would furnish employment, and the treasures which the distribution of produce throughout Europe must bring into the mother country, would greatly exceed the highest advantages that could be calculated upon, even under the most favourable prospects, by the means of the fallen Company or a continuation of its former system."
Many parts of this pamphlet abound in violence and invective, and others are too highly coloured; but with these exceptions, it may be safely asserted that it contains a more correct view of the state of society, and of the resources of the country, than any paper which had preceded it, and the author is most justly entitled to all the credit of having chalked out to his countrymen the road to honour and prosperity, in the future administration of the Dutch East-Indian colonies.
Having, in the course of the foregoing sketch of the decline and fall of the Dutch East-India Company, exhibited a statement of these resources, under the mercantile system of the Company, it may be interesting also to state what, in the opinion of Mr. Hogendorp, the island of Java alone was capable of affording eventually, under a system founded on the principles of property in the soil, freedom of cultivation and trade, and the impartial administration of justice according to equal rights. "When the exclusive and oppressive trade of the Company, the forced deliveries, the feudal services, in short, the whole system of feudal government, is done away with, and when the effects of this important revolution are felt in the certain increase of cultivation and trade, then," observes Mr. Hogendorp, "the limits of probability will by no means be exceeded, in estimating the aggregate of the revenues of Java, in progress of time, at twelve millions of rix-dollars, or twenty-four millions of guilders, annually."