"The want of raiment is scarce an inconvenience; and the most wealthy remain by choice almost naked, when in their own families and free from the intercourse of strangers; so that all the manufacturers of cloth, for which India is so famous, derive more from the decency of their character; the luxurious taste of a rich and enervated people; and from the spirit of commerce which has prevailed among them from time immemorial; than from wants really felt; and if the manufacture of a piece of cloth was not the least laborious task in which a man can be employed in India, it is probable that the whole nation would at this day be as naked as their Gymnosophists, of which the ancients say so much and knew so little."