Take too the Irish Home Rule press, and read the floods
of abuse—some spreading out into absolute
obscenity—published by the principal papers
day after day against all their political opponents,
and we can judge of the temper with which the Irish
Home Rulers would administer affairs. Of their
statesmanlike provision—of their patriotism
and care for the well-being of the country at large—the
local war now ruining Tipperary is the negative proof—the
damnatory evidence that they are utterly unfit for
practical power. Governed by hysterical passion,
by mad hatred and the desire for revenge, not one of
the modern leaders, save Mr. Parnell, shows the faintest
trace of politic self-control or the just estimate
of proportions. To spite their opponents they
will ruin themselves and their friends, as they have
done scores of times, and are doing now in Tipperary.
History holds up its hands in horror at the French
Terror—was that worse than the system of
murder and boycotting and outrage and terrorism in
the disturbed districts in Ireland? And would
it be a right thing for England to give the supreme
power to these masked Couthons and Robespierres and
Marats, that they might extend their operations into
the now peaceable north, and reproduce in Ulster the
tragedies of the south and west? Mr. Parnell
puts aside the tyrannous part of the business, and
cleverly throws the whole weight of his argument at
Nottingham into the passionless economic scales.
All that the Nationalist party desires, he says, “is
to be allowed to develope the resources of their own
country at their own expense,” “without
any harm to you (English), without any diminution
of your resources, without any risk to your credit,
or call upon you,” all to be done “at
our own expense and out of our own resources.”
Yet Mr. Parnell in another breath describes Ireland
as “a Lazarus by the wayside”—a
country “where unfortunately there is no manufacturing
industry.” “Ex nihilo nihil fit,”
was a lesson we all learned in our school days.
Mr. Parnell has evidently forgotten his.
I will give a commentary on these brave words which
is better put than I could put it.
TO THE EDITOR OF THE “STANDARD.”
“Sir,—People in England, whatever
political party they belong to, should glance at what
is now going on in the town of Tipperary before finally
making up their minds to hand over Ireland body and
soul to the National League. No country town
in Ireland—I think I may add or in England
either—was more prosperous three months
ago than Tipperary. The centre of a rich and
prosperous part of the country, surrounded by splendid
land, it had an enormous trade in butter and all agricultural
produce, and a large monthly pig and cattle fair was
held there. It possessed (I use the past tense
advisedly) a number of excellent shops, doing a splendid
business, and to the eyes of those who could look
back a few years it was making rapid progress in prosperity
every year.
