THE FUTURE OF THE YOUNG MEN OF IRELAND

From Irish Ideas by William O'Brien, 1893

Page 161

THE FUTURE OF THE YOUNG MEN OF IRELAND

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go on developing and broadening down into a complete apparatus of national self-government such as that for which the genius of Mr. Gladstone has just gained the acceptance of the ancient Commons House of Britain. Grattan had no security for the permanence of his Act of Independence except the elastic word of honour of an English statesman in an hour of emergency, no responsible Ministry, no Parliament that was not stuffed with placemen, no force of public opinion among the Irish masses, no Irish voice of weight or influence of any sort in a hostile English House of Commons except the instinctive chivalry of Burke and Sheridan. We, on the contrary, are armed to the teeth with guarantees for a continuance of the work of liberation that has begun—a franchise which enables the poorest inhabitant of a mud cabin in the most distant glen to raise a voice as potent as that of millionaire or lord in the government of his country and in selecting or displacing Ministries—a public opinion which would smite as with a leprosy the representative of the people who should prove false to the principles of nationality and democracy—an Irish party firmly seated in the inner shrine of the Imperial Parliament, answerable to no whip except the call of the Irish nation, under no obligation to any English party except so far and so long as the Irish cause is indebted to them, and unshakably determined to maintain that independence unspotted, uncompromising, and alert until the satisfaction of Ireland's demand for self-government has been placed beyond the power of duke, aristocrat, or bigot to hinder or to recall—and, finally, outside the circle of Ireland's own strength, a friendly British working population, with grievances and sympathies like our own, a British electorate who make Irish rebels their heroes and Irish Home Rule their slogan-cry at the … continue reading »

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