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almost an excuse for the supine contempt with which they were treated.'

disgrace, not only to Great Britain, but to Europe.

There is nothing extraordinary, or at variance with what might have been expected, in this lamentable progress. It was all predicted, before the system of concession began, by those who knew Ireland best on the other side of the water, or who had any historical information on this. Men do not become major at a year old: if we expose early youth to the duties and the temptations of manhood, inevitable ruin must be the consequence. A nation is not fit for free institutions or a liberal system in the infancy of civilisation. Centuries must roll over Ireland before she can bear, without distraction, the political passions of England. When her people are industrious, sober, and rational; when a large proportion of the middling ranks have some property and something to lose by convulsion; when practical information is generally diffused, and useful knowledge spread among the poor; when they have been found, in a word, faithful in a very little, then they may be made rulers over ten cities. But to invest its semibarbarous, destitute, and priest-ridden population with the same political franchises, and the same electoral powers as the sober yeomanry of England; to pour into their ardent and impassioned minds the same passions, as it was not deemed safe to extend to England till the eighth century of its constitutional monarchy, was an act of insanity, to which there is nothing comparable in English history, and shews that our rulers are the worthy imitators of the French National Assembly, who had one system of government ready for men in all stages of civilisation, from the savage to the philosopher, and would willingly have charged themselves with the formation of constitutions for the whole human race. What has now been done, is not to give the least liberty to the people, for they are utterly incapable of either understanding or exercising it; but to bestow an enormous and despotic power upon the priests and the demagogues, the very men whose ambition has proved the ruin of the country.

That evil, however, has been done,

Every man in Great Britain knows that this is the state of Ireland; but it is not generally known, either what is the real cause of this dreadful state of things, or the imminent danger which it threatens to the whole empire. The Whigs, seeing that their darling system of conciliation and concession has brought the country to such an extremity, shut their eyes to the subject altogether, and, without ever thinking of the results in Ireland, resolve the more strenuously to apply it on the most extended scale in this country. It is, therefore, of incalculable importance that it should be constantly repeated, and generally known, that it is the Whigs and the Whigs alone who have brought Ireland to this pass; that it is their ambition and agitation which has for half a century distracted that unhappy country; that it is their principles which have been disseminated through its ruthless inhabitants; their political machinery which has been there erected with such unparalleled consequences, and their system of misrule which has almost extinguished every vestige of order throughout the land. For thirty years past, all that the Whigs recommended and contended for has been done for the Emerald Isle. They recommended the relaxation of the Catholic code, and the Catholic code was relaxed; they strenuously contended for Catholic emancipation, and Catholic emancipation was granted; they incessantly inculcated a conciliatory system, and a conciliatory system was pursued; they boasted, if they had the government of Ireland, they would soon render it tranquil, and they obtained the government; they contended for a wide extension of the electoral franchise to the Catholic, and the extinction of the Protestant corporations, and they have carried both these objects. And under this increasing system of conciliation, weakness, and concession, Ireland has been constantly growing worse, until at length, upon the acquisition of the Reform Bill and the triumph of democratic principles, its state has become absolutely intolerable, and a

and cannot be undone. The point for consideration now is, what is to be the effect, we do not say upon Ireland, but upon the whole empire, of this formidable invasion of democratic violence, and Catholic ambition. Upon this head there is no room, we fear, for any but the most gloomy prognostications. Ireland, under the misrule of the Whigs, has got to such a pitch of anarchy, that it will require all the energy and power of England to put it down. A civil war must be anticipated, in the effort to expel from their minds the inflammatory doctrines with which the Whigs have filled them. And when this calamitous event arrives, are we to suppose that the other powers of Europe will remain unconcerned spectators of the strife? Is there no danger of France lending the hand of fraternity to the ardent spirits on the other side of St George's Channel? Are we sure that they will refuse the proffered alliance and aid of the Hibernian Republic? Are the projects of 1798 quite forgotten? Has England any certainty from the extreme fidelity with which they have kept their promise in regard to Catholic Emancipation, that the Irish demagogues will be perfectly loyal to the Crown of Great Britain under a separate legislature? These are questions which it will become the British legislators to ask themselves, in anticipation of the events which, to all human appearance, will meet them at the very threshold of the New Parliament.

In considering this subject, it is of importance always to bear in mind the profound and inextinguishable jealousy with which all the European powers, and all parties on the Continent, regard the naval superiority and political importance of England. We do not exaggerate when we say that this feeling is universal. All parties, royalists, republicans, aristocrats, democrats, vie with each other in their deep and universal hatred of this country. It is hard to say, whether it is most virulent in the royalist or democratic writers; in Lacretelle or Thiers; or whether it prevails most at the imperial or the republican courts at St Petersburgh or Paris. They may like the English as individuals, they may admire their institutions; but they all

have the most cordial hatred at their political power, and would gladly join in a crusade to restore what they call the Liberty of the Seas; that is, to destroy the English fleet, and with it the political preponderance of this country.

Our West India Colonies also are placed, as it were, within the jaws of a power animated with as bitter a feeling of animosity at England, and possessed of perhaps greater means of injuring it. America has long coveted Jamaica; she openly aspires to the dominion of the Gulf of Mexico; and by the possession of the Havannah and Cuba, she will ere long obtain it. When the evil day comes to England, the Southern States of America will not be slow in coalescing with our West India islands; and with them will fall seven millions annually of exported manufactures and import duties to the British Empire. It is impossible adequately to measure the extent of this calamity. National bankruptcy must immediately ensue from the failure of so large a portion of the revenue, and unheard of distress must spread among our manufactures from the extinction of so great a part of their export sale; but what is that to the Revolutionists? They never have, and never will learn by experience, but will go on in future as in time past, deriding the danger, and regardless of consequences, till it falls upon them.

The situation, therefore, of the English empire is very peculiar. Two large and important parts of, its dominions are ready to break off, to coalesce with any neighbour to sever the connexion with the mother country; and we have at that very moment placed over our heads a legislature, chosen in such a way, as to be of all others the least calculated to hold together the unwieldy dominion. The British cities loudly clamoured at the late elections for immediate emancipation of the negroes; and the West Indies have not one representative of their interest in Parliament. The Reform Bill has effectually disfranchised the colonies; the East and West Indies; and Canada put together could hardly muster up five votes. Instead of men identified with their interests, acquainted with their cir

cumstances, sharing in their feelings, we have the legislature filled with the delegates of deluded manufacturers, pledged to measures that must lead to their destruction. While the Radicals of England are clamouring for instant freedom for the savages of the West Indies; the Repealers of Ireland are struggling for a dissolution of the Union, and uncontrolled license for the savages of Ireland; and the government, which lives upon expedients and concessions, strives to preserve its ascendency, by conceding sometimes to the one faction, and sometimes to the other. In the midst of such agitation and vacillation, industry is paralysed, and property disappears, in both the discontented parts of our dominion; and even the well-affected in Ireland and the West Indies, from a sense of the intolerable evils they are suffering under British rule, insensibly fall into the wishes of those who represent a separation from the mother country as the only remedy for the existing calamities. Is it possible that such a state of things can continue for any length of time; or least of all, that it can continue in presence of powerful and energetic enemies, anxious for the first moment of weakness to combine against this country, and wreak upon Great Britain the fancied wrongs, and real jealousies, of one hundred and fifty years?

The Whigs have been in power little more than two years; but, during that time, they have contrived to furnish precedents for almost every species of disaster which can be accumulated upon the empire. Are the political agitators violent and seditious in their designs; do they threaten the tranquillity or peace of the state; they can appeal to the Ministers of State who corresponded with Political Unions, and expressed their humble thanks to the president of an assemblage of 150,000 men, by whom resolutions to pay no taxes were passed. Is murder or anarchy threatened; they can appeal to a Premier who advised the Bishops to put their houses in order. Do other nations assail Great Britain, while torn by its insurgent provinces, and seek to convert a moment of intestine weakness

into one of foreign subjugation; they have the precedent of Belgium ready to apply to the quarrel between Ireland and England, and will find ample vindication for all they can do in the protocols of Lord Palmerston. Foreign enemies, domestic revolutionists, have been taught by an unprincipled administration, the lessons which they may turn with fatal effect against the peace and independence of the empire. We do not say that our rulers did these things with this intention; what we assert is, that they have this consequence; and such always will be the result of measures pursued by ambitious men, reckless of every thing but their own party purposes.

The system of government pursued of late in Ireland, has been so variable that it is impossible to say on what principle it is founded. They have alternately caressed and fawned on the leaders of agitation, and let loose the vials of their wrath on their misguided followers. Blood, as Mr O'Connel says, has been shed profusely in Ireland since Lord Anglesey's administration began; and the author of all that discord has been placed at the head of the bar. So far as any thing like principle can be discovered in their conduct, they appear to have made it a rule to cringe to the revolutionists of authority, and rage against the revolutionists of no consideration; to act with severity towards the poor, and with weakness towards the depositaries even of rabble authority. The symptoms of a better spirit were once visible, and Mr Stanley's administration began with a vigour which made the hearts of all patriots in the kingdom glad; but the bright dawn was soon overcast, and in the tempest of Reform, all the promises of the morning were overwhelmed. Mr Boyton has well characterized, at one of the late meetings of the Conservative Society in Dublin, their proceedings:

"As long as there was a fair prospect that by our exertions in the different counties we might be enabled to give that support in Parliament to that party to which we are allied, I allude to the English Conservative party-a party from which I trust the Irish Protestant Conservative party never will be disunited

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(cheers)-as long, I say, as there was a fair prospect of supporting those individuals of our party, by opposing the members which were put forward by government, it was plainly our duty to strain every nerve as well to return our own friends, and failing in that, to oust the government candidates-(cheers.) The position in which we are now placed is of a twofold nature-first, with respect to the Roman Catholics on one hand, who are our most formidable opponents (hear, hear.) I do not mean the Roman Catholic proprie tors of Ireland generally-for that there does exist a body of Roman Catholics who possess property in this country, and who are as anxious as we are to stem the mighty movement which is now going forward, there can be no doubt. The conduct of this body has excited the wrath of the demagogues and their agents the priests. Such is the state of thraldom in which they are held, that the Roman Catholic gentry and men of wealth are unable to give utterance to the feelings by which I am confident they are animated(hear, hear.) It must be their interest to preserve their propertiesand, if the present movement be unchecked, the religion of the party possessing wealth will form but an indifferent excuse for his retaining it -(hear, hear, hear.) In addition to the priests and agitators who hold the democracy of the country in their power, we have also to contend with a second foe, namely, the government of this country, which is mainly mischievous by the assistance which it affords to the Roman Catholic democracy in its tremendous efforts to upset Protestantism and property in this country-(hear, hear, hear.) Government partakes of the Manichean principle-namely, that it contains an evil spirit and a good spirit-an evil principle and a good principle. A disposition has been recently evinced by certain members of his Majesty's government to act upon a conservative principle, and make some effort to stop the effects that must follow the ascendency which the democratic party have obtained, the first result of which must be the separation of this country from the parent state-(hear, hear.) So far this good principle

extends-if any thing can be called good that emanates from such a source-(cheers.) We find, however, that this slight exhibition to do good is controlled by another portion of the Irish government-whose exertions are unremitting to render nugatory even this trifling tendency to repair errors."

Of the system pursued by government and its effects, the same eloquent and powerful orator gives the following account:

"My wish is to unite all classes of Protestants, and there are many who are not members of this Society, who are as deeply interested in the maintenance of order as we are, and who, I believe, begin to see, since the result of the elections has become known, the mischievous course they had been pursuing-(hear, hear.)— I should therefore be anxious to submit to the Society an address to proprietors of every denomination in this country-not confining it to the members of the Conservative Society, but to those without its paleshewing them the necessity of uniting upon one principle of rendering innocuous the efforts of Mr O'Connel and his party-and to lay before the government a plain statement of the actual condition of the country, calling upon them to adopt measures to give a permanent security to property, and at the same time to control that agitation which has mainly been encouraged by the government, and which is now in its results devastating the country-(cheers.)-I need not repeat, what I said before, that it is plain to any person that if the same system of government which has been pursued for the last two years be preserved in, no man's life or property will be safe in three of the provinces-and property, even in Ulster, will not be worth five years' purchase-(hear, hear, hear)—therefore any person who has property to lose ought to be equally interested with us in its preservation, even although they may not be imbued with so deep a tinge of party feeling as we are-(hear, hear.) It must be manifest to the most careless observer, that there is a determination on the part of the democracy to make a general attack upon all property in the country-it ought to be our care to effect, if possible, such an organi

zation of Protestant strength as will enable us to repel the attack."(Cheers.)

From this continuance of suffering and anarchy in Ireland, nothing but additional anxiety for a dissolution of the Union can be anticipated. The Irish see, by bitter experience, that it is productive of no other result but misery to them. And how is it to be expected that any class in that country is long to advocate the connexion with a government from which such a result flows? Can we expect that the Irish are to remain loyal to a dynasty under whose rule they have experienced incessant murder, anarchy, and wretchedness? Can we expect that the Protestants are to retain their loyalty when the dagger is perpetually held to their throats, and their lives and properties, even in the most tranquil parts of the country, are not worth two years' purchase? Can we suppose that the English people are long to look on the Irish Union as a public benefit, when they see that country daily getting worse and worse; the army of the empire incesantly absorbed in keeping it from breaking into open insurrection; and its industry constantly overwhelmed by the inundation of its indigence? The thing is obviously out of the question. Mutual recrimination and disgust must ensue on both sides of the Channel, and the people of both countries prepared to relinquish, without a struggle, a connexion from which nothing but mutual calamity has hitherto ensued, but which must, if severed, prove fatal to the independence of both.

Is there any man in his senses, out of the pale of O'Connell's dupes, who imagines that if the union of the Parliaments is dissolved, the union of the Crowns will long survive the separation? With a Parliament chosen by the Catholic ten-pounders, led by O'Connell, and inflamed by the violent hatred at this country which is unhappily so common in the sisterisle, what chance is there that the supremacy of England will be acknowledged? -Will France, which ever since the Revolution has been looking to Ireland as the weak point in the British empire, when the point of the wedge may be inserted, forego the longwished for opportunity of allying itself with the daring and reckless

spirits on the other side of St George's Channel? And what chance has England of maintaining its independence, if pressed by a coalition of the Continental States, eager to humble the mistress of the waves, with Ireland in its rear in a state of fierce and implacable hostility? When the principles we have inculcated in regard to Belgium, and the example we have set at Antwerp are retorted upon ourselves; when the European Powers tell us that we must concede to the insurgent province, and that a separation of the government of the two islands, and a close alliance between the rebels and France is essential to the peace of Europe; with what moral force will we be able to resist the inference, with what physical strength repel the aggression?

Ireland, therefore, is no longer a question from which the people of England can turn with indifference, or banish from their minds as hopeless as if it was the affair of a foreign state. Our own existence as a nation, our national independence, our civil liberties, are at stake. The peril now staring us in the face, may produce consequences which all the might of Napoleon could not effect. The great danger which threatens all democratic states, is the dismember, ment of the distant provinces of the empire. We have chosen to multiply this danger tenfold by the democratic constitution we have given to England, and the free scope to popular passion which we have established in Ireland. By Catholic emancipation, we have opened to the leaders of the Popish hierarchy access to the Legislature. By the Reform Bill, we have placed the Irish representation at the mercy of a furious and empassioned multitude, skilfully directed by cool and able leaders, who wield the energies of that fierce democracy for their own private ambition, and the establishment of an independent republic in that island, in which the whole power will really be in their hands. As the reward of our indulgent and liberal conduct towards that country, we receive a fierce and haughty demand for a separation; accompanied with the threat that they will never cease to agitate and distract both countries till the dismember

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