The attempt to stultify the findings of the Commission on the ground that its report was based on a fallacy, since Ireland has no more right to be considered as a separate entity than an English county, is remarkably disingenuous in view of the acknowledgment of this in the separate treatment which she received in the matter of grants made in relief of local taxation and for the establishment of free education in the years 1888 and 1890 and 1891.  Moreover, it was impliedly admitted that she was a separate entity in the appointment of a Select Committee on taxation in 1864, and again by Lord Goschen in 1890, and the whole history of her separate legislation bears the same construction.  One cannot give a better commentary on what has been seen of the economic condition of the island than by quoting the peroration of the speech of John Fitzgibbon, Earl of Clare, the “great father of the Union,” speaking in the Irish House of Parliament:—­“It is with a cordial sincerity and a full conviction that it will give to this, my native country, lasting peace and security for her religion, her laws, her liberty, and her property, an increase of strength, riches, and trade, and the final extinction of national jealousy and animosity, that I now propose to this grave assembly for their adoption an entire and perfect Union of the Kingdom of Ireland with Great Britain.  If I live to see it completed, to my latest hour I shall feel an honourable pride in reflecting on the little share I may have in contributing to effect it.”

CHAPTER III

THE ECONOMIC CONDITION OF IRELAND

“When the inhabitants of a country leave it in crowds because the government does not leave them room in which to live, that government is judged and condemned.”—­JOHN STUART MILL, Political Economy.

I have shown something of the incubus of taxation which overpowers Ireland from the fact that she—­the poorest country in Western Europe—­is bound to the richest in such a manner that the latter has not the common prudence to recognise the flagitious injustice which she is inflicting, while, by a refinement of cruelty, she repeats her assurances that Ireland is a spoilt child, and for this reason alone does not appreciate the blessings of British rule.  In the light of the facts before us one may well ask whether it was an extreme hyperbole of which Grattan made use when he declared that “Ireland, like every enslaved country, will be compelled to pay for her own subjugation.”

When we are urged to put into practice the counsels of perfection and study the virtue of patience while we wait for the opportune moment for reform, from the point of view of English party politics, our reply is that things have reached so desperate a pass that to submit to the delays entailed by the exigencies of political strategy is a suicidal policy which we cannot afford to endure without protest.