The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 03 (of 12)

Edmund Burke wasn't interested in comfortable politics. This volume collects his devastating attacks on British corruption in India, centered on the infamous speech concerning the Nabob of Arcot's debts. Here is Burke at his most passionate: exposing how British merchants and East India Company officials collaborated with an Indian prince to saddle his people with fraudulent debts, extracting wealth while millions suffered. It's an indictment of imperial greed, of the moral bankruptcy that attends unchecked power, and of a Parliament that looked away. Written in 1785, these speeches still crackle with moral fury. For readers interested in the origins of anti-colonial thought, the foundations of ethical governance, or simply one of the finest prose stylists in the English language.