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Untitled Article
a more powerful people , who allow it to govern as it pleases , and only step in to shield it from the consequences ^ there is generated a prodigy of odious tyranny , such as in no other cofctibinatioti of circumstances could possibly exist . It is so found in the native states of India , a ( Country in many respects bearing no
slight resemblance to Ireland ; and that it has beeii so found in Ireland , the whole of Irish history , and the habits of the whole Irish people , high and low together * bear witness . By persisting iii this wretched system from century to century i we have lost the opportunity of preparing the Irish nation for
self-government . They have not acquired that experience of lawful rule , ahd that reverence for law , without which no people can be any thing but , according to their physical temperament , savages or slaves . In England , notwithstanding the defects of our laws and of thfcir administration , the law , if thought of at all ,
is always thought of as the shield of the oppressed . In Ireland it has never been known but as an additional engine in the hands of the oppressor . This is not declamation or exaggeration , but a matter-of-fact statement of the feeling which is in the people ' s minds .. What they want is , what they have never yet had ,
protection for the weak against the strong . When they have had this for a sufficient time , they will be ripe for every other political benefit ; but that is the condition which must precede all others That benefit they would even now most readily obtain , if they were treated as an English province ; if all the powers of government in the island were in the hands of functionaries
responsible to England alone , and not one of whom should be an Irishman . But this caiihot be . Though the habits of civilisation , and its powers , are far from always propagating themselves by proximity , its aspirations do . We havexnanaged to prevent Ireland from being ripe for self- government ; we have not been able to prevent her from
demanding it . Communication with England has stimulated the democratic spirit to a premature growth , before the country had reached the point of advancement at which that spirit grows up spontaneously . And we , instead of employing our opportunities to hasten forward the civilisation of Ireland , have , by our deplorable misgoverntnent , left her far more destitute of the feelings ,
ideas , and modes of conduct of a civilized people , than she p robably would have been if we had managed her avowedly as an estate for our own benefit . We now find her in that unhappy state , qua nee mala nee remedia ferre potent ; unfit for freedom , yet resolved to be no longer enslaved . And in that state we seem likely to to
leave her ; for as there appears no prospect , for a long time Come , of our finding statesmen who can apply intellects above those of babies to the government of a country which , like ours , could go on almost without any govefntnent at all—it is vain to hope for such aa fchall redeem a people fot whotn every thing &
Untitled Article
ST 4 Note en ite Netoijtojph .
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Citation
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Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), May 2, 1834, page 374, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2633/page/62/
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