The New Zealand TABLET THURSDAY, MAY 16, 1907. THE STAR IN THE IRISH SKY

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXV, Issue 20, 16 May 1907, Page 21

The New Zealand TABLET THURSDAY, MAY 16, 1907. THE STAR IN THE IRISH SKY

fHERE were many foappy inspirations in Mr. Gladstone's later speeches upon the Irish question. But his great nJind gave out one of its b ightest flashes of ' statesmanlike feel-Sj^-S^jc* ing when he spoke of the Home Rule period @fijjih>y ot I BB^ as one of the golden moments' for 5P* settling the Irish problem and bringing/ peace between the Saxon and the Western Celt. It is (said ho) ' one of those golden moments in our history ; one of those opportunities which may come or may go, but which rarely return, or, if tihey return, return at long intervals, and in circumstances which no man can forecast. There have been several such golden moments, even in the tragic history of Ireland. The long periodic time has once more run out, and again the star is mounted in the heavens '. * Once again ' the long periodic time ' has run out. Once again ' the star is mounted in the heavens '. It shines upon a decimated people ; upon a hundred .years cf quack palliatives, of rank failures by some of the greatest/ names in« British political history to rule Ireland either (Uy coercion or by blundering ' conciliation ', of the wreck of every expedient for governing a people of one race and faith by the tentative ideas of people of (another race and faith. And now the star in the heavens shines on the hope that the one untried remedy for dealing with Ireland's desperate case is to be tried —in some measure or other to trust the people. 'We have not yet in these > countries the details of the latest partial remedy for an ancient wrong. But from the meagre description of it that has tingled through the submarine wire, it seems .to 'be a miserly, unsatisfying, and homoeopathic dose of the self-goverwment that the nation has 1 been demanding for the past century and more. The people are to be trusted, but, it seems, with a niggardly measure of trust that must be somewhat of a disappointment to those who entertained the broader hope. But the smaller trust is coupled with the. promise that it is (as the Lord Chancellor declared) a step that ' necessarily and inevitably leads* you one stlage further in the direction of Home Rule '. And he added to the titled occupants of the gilded oh'amlfoer i: ' I believe— whatever your lordships' prepossessions against it, 'and (however much you may dread its consequences—Home Rule is as certain to fcome as tomorrow's sun to rise, because there are forces working towards it which are beyond the control of this or the other House— great human forces which are working- out their end and their destiny. The first is the inextinguishable love of freedom and self-government in their country which was illustrated in the gift of self-govern-ment to Danada. I agree there is no exact parallel

between Ireland and one of our distant colonies, but human nature is the same -in both, and if you wish) to promote goodwill among, his Majesty's subjects all over the world the way is to have faith in them, and not to tremble always on the verge of reform for fear of remote 'daggers, which, when the time comes, will "be seen to have no substance. We have a still more recent example in the case of the Transvaal. I remember not much miore than a year ago standing here and saying that we intended to deal with absolute justice with all races in that country, and: that we had confidence in the result. I think there is good omen that * that prophecy will be fulfilled. Why is that made possible in this icouai/try which would not have been possible in any other country of the world ? It is because of the indestructible andi deeply- grained lo"ve of indhidual anid constitutional freedom, which has not its exact parallel elsewhere. The effect of gnina; the oolowies self-govern-ment was that if they wished to cut the painter we couM not object. Yet it had led only to a stronger and firmer bond of union. So, be assured, sooner or later, the same feeling ingrained 'in • our people will produce the same result in regard to Ireland, and I say it will be a blessing vnhen the day comes '. Confidence, according to Pitt, is a plant of slow growth. But it is worth tending and watering. For it will do for Ireland what 'the scaffold nor the prisoncell has been able to effect. We have . in the Transvaal a crucial instance of ' the stronger and firmer bond of union ' that may be formed by the sound policy of ' trusting the people.' The Boers have a clear majority in the Transvaal Legislature. Yet the London ' Times '—which, like Russell Lowell's ' pious editor,' iisuallv, ' believes in freedom's cause ' in far-off lands— found it in its icy heart to write as follows of the overwhelming victory won by the Boers in the field of constitutional agitation :—: — ' The Government of the Transvaal now passes into the hands of the men whom, we were still fighting but five years ago. They will henceforth possess, by the decision of the Imperial Government, far greater and more effective powers over their own destinies, and to a great extent over the destinies of South Africa, than do the Germans or the people of many other Continental States over the affairs of thedr several countries. We are reposing an immense trust in the Boers.' It was logically inevitable that ' the immense trust ' reposed by the British Government in the Het Yolk should speedily result in Ireland receiving at least (as the Sprimgfiel | 'd ' Republican ' said at the time) ' about haK as much Home Rule as the Boers have.' * 1 Give us back,' said O'Connell in 1840, ' the Parliament of which you robbed us, and we will close the account.' That is the old demand which nothing short cf its cession can ever satisfy. The first Irish Parliament under British rule was held as far back as the reign of the First Edward, in 1295. It did not owe its existence to any Charter of the British Crown, but (as Sir Charles Gavan Duffy says in his ' New Ireland ') ' sprung out of the natural rights of freemen.' It was confirmed by solemn compact between the two nations in 1j782. That international concordat or • treaty was broken 'by treachery and fraud ' in 1800. But 'no statute of limitation runs against the rights of a nation.' Ireland's true and trusted representatives in 1799 fought the Union inch by inch. Ireland still demands a Legislature for the purposes of her domestic affairs. Said Lord Rosebery in Glasgow in 1887 :— ' There is no principle, gentlemen, which seems so simple— but which seems somehow to need so much instilling into some Of our greatest statestoen I—as1 — as tjh© fact that the potato that one knows and likes is better than the truffle that one neither knows nor likes*. And, therefore, when you wish to give a benefit to a nation, it is better to give something that it likes and understands, rather than something that it neither likes nor understands. ' For the substantive Parliament which Ireland knows and likes, the Liberal Party offers the truffle of the partly elective, partly nominee Council which the country neither knows nor likes. But time and tide are on the sii'de of the demand which the voice of the nation makes for a true measure of Home Rule. It may come

by stages fast or slow, few or many ; it may be checked as it was in- 1886 and J^'93 ; it cannot be. defeated. ' You may slay it, you may bury it,' as Gladstone said of the Russell Reform Bill, l but we will write upon its gravestone for an epitaph this line, .with certain confidence in its fulfilment : " Exoriaro aliqtiis nostris ex ossibus ultor." You cannot fight against the future. Time is on our side. 1