importance of this object, did not fail to pursue it, and the result was the conquest of Ireland by Henry II. The connection thus commenced could be perpetuated only by one or other of two expedients either by coercion, or by such a modified constitution as left to England a controlling check over the Irish legislature. The former system was rigorously pursued till 1782, when the people of Ireland, with arms in their hands, demanded and obtained an amelioration of their condition. But although the British parliament resigned the right of making laws to bind Ireland, her legislature remained as fully under the control of the English ministry as before. That ministry had indeed resigned the privilege of opposing the introduction of any bill, but retained the power of a veto when it had passed. At the very moment when the Irish legislature was asserting its independence on the principle, that the king governed Ireland, in his right to the Irish crown alone, it was enacted, that the great seal of England should be appended to each act by an officer of the English cabinet, amenable to, and impeachable by, an English parliament alone-an expedient intended to prevent any public or local act being passed in Ireland, which might be incompatible with English interests or might lead to the separation of the two countries. But not only in those measures in which the Irish parliament was allowed to legislate at all was she thus amenable to a superior power; she was, likewise, completely excluded from all external legislation. She was compelled to register the acts of Great Britain, however prejudicial these might be to her interests.

Possessing the right of dissenting from the general policy of the empire, she dared not assert her privilege, as the result might possibly have been hostility with England. With the outward parade of independence, she was controlled by a British cabinet, and she dreaded English policy; her control over the Irish exchequer was annihilated; the viceroy was responsible for his administration to the British parliament alone; the elements of free representation had disappeared amid crowds of placemen and the nominees of patrons; and surely such a system of political imbecility could never be mistaken for national independence. Ireland relied, at that time, on British credit for the security of her supplies; her commerce was indebted to a British navy for its protection, and to British treaties for its extension.

The internal prosperity of Ireland called on her to foster a close connexion with England, which could afford an ample home market for her agricultural produce, and open up to her new channels for the extension of her commerce. Amid the conflicting interests and awakened jealousies of the two countries, a union was found to be the only expedient to allay all apprehensions, to reconcile all differences, and combine the prosperrity with the constitutional rights of both countries. The progressive improvement of Ireland between the years 1782 and 1800, though not equal to advancing prosperity of England or Scotland during the same period, was to be attributed entirely to the general prosperity of the empire, and not to the imaginary influence of her constitutional freedom, or to the dignity and in

the

interests of Britain, in relation to other European powers, demanded that Ireland, if not her friend, should be her dependant. In short, the union was sound in its nature, and beneficial in its results; repeal he considered impracticable, and the simple agitation of such a question fraught at once with mischief and delusion. Admitting that the union had been originally carried by atrocities and corruption, the iniquity of the object was not established by asserting the iniquity of the means. It was to the diffusion of domestic tranquillity and the suppression of agitation that Ireland must look for the return of national prosperity and comfort. Internal dissensions alone had disturbed the tranquillity and retarded the improvement of that country, the union of which with England was essential to the stability of the empire.

Mr. F. O'Connor denounced the amendment as arbitrary in its nature, and calculated to make the house of Commons pledge itself against the consideration of this question. The union, however, it could not be concealed, had already injured, and would continue to prove prejudicial to, the interests of Ireland. The increase of her exports and imports afforded no proof of her growing prosperity, for her exports were articles of food, and her imports consisted only of those things which the decline of her manufactures had rendered her unable to produce. Cattle were exported, because it was found impossible to rear profitably live stock for home consumption, and the exportation of the necessaries of life could not be taken as a proof of the increasing wealth of a country. The annihilation of trade and agriculture, the

poverty and misery which pervaded every district of the island, were merely the results of the union. The large proprietors, who were absentees, could neither know nor mitigate the wretchedness which they did not see. Land had fallen to less than onethird of the value which it bore at the period of the union. The petitions from all quarters of Ireland for a repeal proved, at least, that the people of that country considered the measure essential to their prosperity. They desired neither French connexion nor popish ascendancy; but if the measures of the English parliament continued to be what they had hitherto been towards Ireland, revolution on her part would be legalized and rebellion would become a virtue. In everything around him, he found reason to believe, that neither the one country, nor the other could be happy, while the union continued.

Mr. Littleton condemned the inflammatory language addressed by Mr. O'Connell to the ignorant population of Ireland, and the delusive hopes which he taught them to cherish in regard to the blessings to be enjoyed under a domestic legislature. Ireland was to be regenerated; a tax of seventyfive per cent was to be imposed on absentees; and his expedient for carrying capital into Ireland was, that the proprietor of an estate in that country was to be declared incapable of holding property elsewhere. If the people of Ireland were to be taught such doctrines and deluded by such extravagant opinions as these, the bond of property, which was the strong link between England and Ireland, would be destroyed, and the separation of the two countries would

ere long, be a more practicable scheme. The plan contemplated by the motion before the house would eventually render such a separation inevitable; and the language, by which the doctrine of repeal was enforced, while it disgusted every intelligent man, might ultimately prove dangerous among the ignorant and unwary.* No spectacle could be more contemptible than that of a body of men assuming the title of a deliberative assembly, and quaking, at the same time, under the terror of an armed constituency. Besides, the profligacy of the Irish government, acting in connexion with the Irish house of Commons, exceeded all belief. The pension list, prior to the union, amounted to 85,000l.; lucrative places were bought and sold; the hereditary revenues of the crown were prostituted to the most unworthy purposes; and the spirit of corruption pervaded every department of the public service. There was no knowledge of the principles of government, and no respect for political purity; and these evils, which were formerly connected with the existence, would undoubtedly be revived with the re-establishment, of a domestic legislature. The very agitation of the question was hostile to the social happiness and progressive improvement of Ireland; and the respectable classes of both countries ought to support government in their endeavours to

At the dedication of a Roman Catholic chapel at Kildare, Mr. O'Connell used these words ;-"Why, if the parliament were sitting in Dublin, and your representatives doing wrong, you could take your short sticks in your bands some fine morning, and go up and tell them to vote honestly and rightly."

maintain the institutions of the empire.

Mr. Barron, in supporting the original motion, ascribed all the evils of absenteeism, the ruin of the fisheries, the decline of one species of manufacture and the total disappearance of another, a diminution in the means of employment, and a fall in the wages of labour, to the baneful influence of the union. He complained, likewise, of an undue proportion of the common debt of the kingdom having been assigned to Ireland, and of her taxes having been unduly increased. He pronounced the dread of Catholic ascendancy to be visionary, so long as the three estates of the realm were essentially Protestant; and separation, he thought, would never be contemplated by Ireland, so long as she found England the most favourable market in which to purchase manufactures on the one hand, and dispose of her own agricultural produce on the other. Interest would bind the two countries much more closely together than any system of legislation.

Mr. Ruthven said, that looking at the numerical force of the Irish people, and their dependence on the generosity of England for any degree of prosperity which they enjoyed, it was not surprising that there should be a demand for repeal. Ireland ought to possess as a right what she had hitherto received as a boon. She demanded a federal union on equal and independent terms, which would prove a source of tranquillity to both countries.

Sir D. K. Sanford could not accede to the motion till two points were established, viz. that Ireland had enjoyed prosperity before the union, and, ad

mitting that the union had impeded her advancing welfare, that this was the proper time for making the experiment of repeal. No evils had resulted to Scotland from absenteeism, because the people were submissive to the authority of the law, and exempted from the influence of political agitation. Scotland afforded a proof of the advantages which a poor country might derive from being closely connected with a rich one. He would oppose the measure, because he believed it to be preg nant with evils to both countries.

Mr. Grattan said, that admitting the union to have been a contract, England had failed to fulfil the terms of it. The laws of England, for instance, had not been extended to Ireland, although the latter had contributed to pay the debt, and fight the battles of the United Kingdom. The history of British connexion with Ireland was written in blood; hopes had been blighted, and promises had been broken. The value of property in Ireland had fallen since the union; and official returns proved that her trade and revenue had proportionally suffered deterioration. He had no doubt that a repeal of the union would promote the permanency of a connexion with Great Britain, which was essential to the safety and wellbeing of both countries.

Mr. Lambert was of opinion, that something more distinct and decisive ought to have been submitted to the house than merely a resolution to inquire into the means by which the union had been accomplished, and the probable effects of its continuance. This mode of proceeding could no more lead to any practical result, than the appointment of a com

mittee to inquire into the circumstances attending the original invasion of Ireland. There had not been one-twentieth of the expected number of signatures to petitions for repeal, a deficiency which proved at once the total indifference of the Irish people to this measure. Instead of the misery which had formerly prevailed, rapid improvements had, during the last thirty years, pervaded all the departments of civilized life in Ireland. If there were two independent legislatures, jealousies and collisions would be the inevitable consequences. And how could the Irish parliament, in the event of a difference of opinion, resist the will of England? or, conscious of not having the power of resistance, how could she submit to be merely the instrument of registering the edicts of an assembly, of which she pretended to be perfectly independent. The first measure, in all probability, of an Irish parliament would be the imposition of prohibitory duties on every article imported from England; and this being, of course, met in England by similar duties on all agricultural produce imported from Ireland, the latter would be thrown upon her home consumption without money to pay for it. England would be supplied from the other markets of Europe, and Ireland would be left to prosper on the "great, glorious, and free" principle of Mr. O'Connell. He believed that agitation was fostered in Ireland with ulterior and most dangerous views. It disturbed every social relation, set the tenant against the landlord, and the landlord against the tenant, and involved the whole country in angry and mischievous contentions. The na