Papers 
 
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 Author and Librarian 
 Curator of the Irish Collection 
 

 
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OCCASIONAL 
 
 PAPERS AND ADDiiESSES. 
 
OCCASIONAL 
 
 PAPERS AND ADDRESSES, 
 
 BY 
 
 LORD O'HAGAK K.P. 
 
 LONDON : 
 KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, & CO., 1, PATERNOSTER SQUARE. 
 
 1884. 
 

 The rights of Translation and of Reproduction arc reserved. 
 
PEEFACE, 
 
 rpHE Papers and Addresses contained in this 
 volume liave been selected from a larger 
 number, composed, at distant intervals, as the 
 occasions to which they have reference successively 
 arose. They were published separately, from time 
 to time, and are now reprinted in a collective 
 form. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Criminal Law: Punishment and Reformation 
 
 The Study of Jurisprudence — Eoman, English, and Celtic 
 International Law. — Conference at Antwerp, 187' 
 Economic and Statistical Inquiry 
 
 Daniel O'Connell 
 
 Thomas Moore 
 
 Samuel Taylor Coleridge ... 
 
 Cardinal Newman 
 
 Charles William Russell, D,D. 
 
 Henry G-rattan 
 
 Sir Alexander Macdonnell, Bart. 
 Ireland in 1853. — Hopes of Progress 
 
 The Tralee Election, 1863 
 
 Legal, Educational, and Social Reforms in Ireland 
 A Literary Institute in Donegal, and its Uses 
 
 Farje 
 
 7 
 
 . 47 
 . 91 
 . 107 
 . 127 
 . 163 
 . 197 
 . 241 
 . 247 
 . 263 
 . 267 
 . 271 
 . 317 
 . 341 
 . 379 
 
CRIMINAL LAW: PimiSHMENT AND 
 EEFORMATION. 
 
Criminal Law : Pimish7nent and 
 Reformation, 
 
 [In 1861 the Social Science Association met in Dublin, and the pro- 
 ceedings of its Section on "Punishment and Keformation," were 
 opened bj the following Address.] 
 
 rpHROUG-HOUT tlie wide range of social science, I 
 -■- believe that few things can be found of more im- 
 portance than the subjects to which the attention of this 
 department has been specially directed. They touch the 
 foundations of order, and the security of peace in the 
 world. They affect the protection of property and the 
 sacredness of life. They have the closest relations with 
 the material well-being of communities ; and they have 
 higher relations still — with the purity of public morals, and 
 the redemption of multitudes from sin and suffering. More 
 directly than many other of the topics which worthily claim 
 the care of this association, they address at once the in- 
 tellect and the feelings, and attract equally the statistician 
 and the philanthropist — the statesman, who deals with the 
 interests of nations, and the Christian, whose thoughts are 
 in eternity. 
 
 Therefore, I may confidently say, that our peculiar in- 
 vestigations have been and will be especially pleasant and 
 fruitful j and not the less so, I trust, because we pursue them, 
 on this occasion, upon Irish ground. For I may assert, 
 in no boastful spirit, that Ireland has done very much in 
 
lo Criminal Law : 
 
 aid of tlie cause which we have all at heart — that efforts 
 have been made^ and experiments conducted, and diffi- 
 culties surmounted, and results achieved, in the manage- 
 ment and reformation of criminals amongst us, which 
 have much advanced that cause, and fitly received the 
 praise and excited the emulation of other countries. Of 
 these things I shall have occasion to speak a little, by- 
 and-by, and you will all have the opportunity of verify- 
 ing any statements which I or others have made, or may 
 make, about them, by observing the actual condition of 
 institutions which, in some respects, are amongst the 
 most remarkable in the empire. 
 
 The subjects which our section is invited to discuss are 
 two — Punishment and Reformation — properly connected, 
 and each of great importance; and it is my duty to 
 advert to both. But my own views as to their relative 
 present interest, and the estimate of it which has been 
 indicated by the course of our inquiries since our meet- 
 ing began, induce me to think that I shall best dis- 
 charge that duty by glancing briefly at the first, and 
 dwelling more particular!}^ upon the second. And I have 
 come to that conclusion, as well because the Reforma- 
 tory system of our time is of special novelty, and there- 
 fore justifies special attention, and may need, for some, 
 special elucidation ; as because the doctrine of punishment 
 and the principles which should regulate its infliction 
 have been largely discussed, and may be taken now to 
 be tolerably settled and generally agreed upon, amongst 
 mankind. 
 
 Unfortunately, for long generations, that doctrine and 
 those principles were very much misunderstood. Extreme 
 severity was regarded as the best, if not the only, agent for 
 the repression of offences. Men forgot the wise maxim^ 
 *' P7'cjcstat cautela quarn medela/' and made their laws merely 
 
Punishment and Reformation. 1 1 
 
 vindictive^ in disregard of tlie benefits of prevention,, and 
 in disbelief of tlie possibility and value of reformation. 
 Our own statutes were mischievously cruel^ and our gaols 
 were nurseries of crime. In tliese respects^ we had a bad 
 eminence amongst the nations of the earth. The evil 
 doctrine^ that criminal legislation should only labour to 
 make punishment deterrent^ pervaded the codes of Europe^ 
 and had sanguinary issues in our own. 'Ense recidendum ! 
 was the key note of them all. The ancient legislator 
 thought death merely an adequate punishment for the 
 smallest offence, and knew no greater for the gravest ; and 
 very much upon that savage theory did the English law 
 proceed. There was no consideration for the individual 
 criminal — no memory of his claim to it, as a responsible 
 creature with. an immortal soul — no thought of his value 
 as a meuiber of society, who might be utilised, if he was 
 not destroyed. That law had more tenderness for the 
 right of property than for the right of life — guarded it 
 more jealously — estimated it more dearly. Hence, for a 
 lengthened period, grievous barbarities characterised the 
 action of our tribunals. The accused and the convicted 
 were treated equally with excessive harshness; and the 
 scaffold groaned with the multitudes who were sent pre- 
 maturely to their account — people of both sexes and of 
 every age — for offences, often, of the most trivial character. 
 Lord Coke, as certain incidents in the State Trials demon- 
 strate, was not a man of very delicate emotions, or much 
 given to " the melting mood.'-' Yet he exclaims in his 
 Third Institute : — " What a lamentable case it is, to see so 
 many Christian men and women strangled on that accursed 
 tree of the gallows ; insomuch, that if a man might see 
 together the Christians that but in one year, throughout 
 Euglaud, come to that untimely and ignominious death, if 
 there were any spark of grace or charity in him, it would 
 
12 C^Hmtnal Law : 
 
 make his heart to bleed with pity and compassion/' The 
 softening of manners and the progress of civilisation led, 
 by degrees, to a continually increasing diminution of 
 this annual butchery, but the code which authorised it 
 remained, with too little mitigation or amendment, down 
 even to our own time. 
 
 Opinion mastered law, and the humanity of jurors, 
 sometimes at the cost of paltering with their legal duty 
 and their oaths, refused the wholesale sacrifice of their 
 fellow men. But, within the memory of many of us, the 
 supreme penalty of death struck equally the parricide and 
 the starving wretch who committed a larceny of five shil- 
 lings. Even in the eighteenth century, the Legislature 
 made capital the breach of the mound of a fishpond, the 
 cutting down of a cherry-tree in an orchard, and other 
 offences of no greater seriousness. In that century, a child 
 eleven years old was executed for witchcraft ; a man, for 
 refusing to plead, was pressed to death in the market-place 
 of Kilkenny ; and towards the close of it, in 1 788, we have 
 the record of the condemnation to death by fire, and the 
 actual execution, of a woman, before Newgate, for the 
 offence of coining. Horrors of this kind might be multi- 
 plied to any extent, but I shall not sicken you by a 
 repetition of them. 
 
 In vain, for many a year, the doctrine of Beccaria, that 
 ^''crimes are more effectually prevented by the certainty 
 than by the severity of punishment,^^ was urged upon the 
 Legislature. In vain was the appeal to the teaching of a 
 sad experience, to the wisdom of the statesman, and the 
 mercy of the Christian. Parliament, under high guidance, 
 stood upon the ancient ways, and the slightest departure 
 from the barbarism of its traditional policy was denounced 
 as full of danger to society, and injury to the Constitution 
 of the realm. By slow degrees, however, the barriers of 
 
PiLuishment and Reformation, 13 
 
 prejudice and ignorance were beaten down. Earnest and 
 faithful men arose to assail tliem ; and, in the face of fre- 
 quent defeat and deep discouragement^ their mission was 
 bravely pursued, until^ at last_, the truth manifested its 
 always prevailing power. The results have disappointed 
 the gloomy anticipations of the prophets of evil^ and 
 verified the promises of those who denied that sanguinary 
 laws were essential to the maintenance of the social system. 
 Commerce is not ruined because the forger escapes the 
 gallows, and the householder has less fear of burglary 
 than in the days when it was a capital oflfence. What sound 
 theory and some experience led wise men to expect 
 has come to pass. The certainty of punishment has 
 increased_, in proportion to the diminution of its extrava- 
 gant severity. Public sentiment approves the vigorous 
 administration of the law^ which, formerly revolted it by 
 inflictions, terrible in themselves, and out of all proportion 
 with the offences to which they were applied. Prosecutors 
 are not deterred from entering criminal courts by fear of 
 becoming the agents of cruelty and injustice ; and jurors 
 do not shrink from conviction because of penal conse- 
 quences outraging their reason and shocking their moral 
 sense. Crime, therefore, does not go unpunished, and its 
 diminution has been great. Executions have grown rare. 
 In this city, there has not been a single one, since 
 1842 ; yet property is incomparably more secure and life 
 less endangered, than at any period to which it is possible 
 to point. 
 
 The last penalty is now enforced only against the shedder 
 of human blood; and, even as to him, thinkers raise the 
 question — Whether the time may not come, when secondary 
 punishment may be found universally sufficient for the pro- 
 tection of society — as effective as that which, destroying the 
 life of man, puts out of account one of the great objects of 
 
14 Criminal Law : 
 
 penal infliction — the reformation of the offender — in con- 
 sideration of the necessity of repressing crime by the dread 
 example of his death ? That there resides in every com- 
 munity the right of self-preservation^ to be exercised even at 
 the expense of the destruction of those whose acts endanger 
 its essential well-being, not many will be found to dispute ; 
 but, on the other hand, fewer than at most former times 
 will contend that there is any moral or religious necessity 
 to make man answer with his own life for that which he 
 has taken, unless the exigencies of the State require the 
 sacrifice. Whether they do require it is, indeed, a subject 
 of momentous import; or whether, consistently with their 
 requisitions, which are plainly paramount, consideration 
 may not be fairly given to the importance of avoiding, if 
 possible, an act which is irrevocable, and may be erroneous 
 — which has sometimes stricken down the innocent, design- 
 ing to reach the guilty — which involves the earthly anni- 
 hilation of a creature bearing the image of God, however 
 distorted by passion or deformed by sin, deprives him of 
 all opportunity of compensation to those who have suffered 
 through his crime, and shortens the period of his pre- 
 paration to meet his Eternal Judge ? Thoughts like these 
 have passed through many minds, and will arise in many 
 more. They are not without encouragement from the 
 course and the results of modern penal legislation, or 
 without countenance from striking passages in the history 
 of other lands. 
 
 But, be the solution of this great problem what it may, 
 we have gathered from the experience of the past some 
 truths as to the theory of punishment, which have received 
 very general acceptance. And amongst them, I think, are 
 these : — 
 
 That, for practical purposes, human law should deal with 
 crime, not to avenge, but to prevent, and to reform ; 
 
Ptuiishment and Reformation. 15 
 
 That merely vindictive and repressive action often de- 
 feats its own purpose, and increases the mischief it would 
 do away ; 
 
 That severity, disproportioned to the character of 
 offences, and pressed beyond the point at which it may 
 suffice to check by example, and restrain from repetition, 
 is at once unnecessary and injurious ; 
 
 That the justice of human punishment is bounded by its 
 necessity; and while the wise legislator should labour to 
 make it fall with certainty on guilty and carry it out with 
 unflinching firmness, he should reconcile, so far as may be 
 permitted, the claims of the community to complete pro- 
 tection against crime, with the reformation of the convict, 
 and make that reformation, where he can, the aid and the 
 instrument for securing that protection. 
 
 And these considerations lead me naturally from one 
 division of the labours of our section to another. Hereto- 
 fore, I have dealt briefly with the history and doctrine of 
 Punishment; I turn to the scheme and principle of the 
 Reformatory movement, which has been one of the most 
 signal illustrations of social progress in our time. It is 
 a time full of material wonders. Almost every year pro- 
 duces something stranger than the last, and imagination 
 halts behind reality. Physical science annihilates space 
 and time. Thought flashes instantaneously from continent 
 to continent; and distant nations are brought into that 
 closeness of neighbourhood, which, by identifying their 
 interests and dispelling their prejudices, must needs con- 
 tinually, more and more, consolidate, in spite of every 
 obstacle, their happy union for their mutual benefit. But I 
 venture to doubt whether, amongst all these mighty 
 changes — so astounding in their grandeur, so bewildering 
 in the rapidity with which they have been wrought — there 
 is anything more full of interest and true delight to the 
 
1 6 Criminal Law : 
 
 lover of his kind than in this quiet movement^ which has 
 its dealings amongst the outcasts of the earth, and its noise- 
 less triumphs within prison bars. 
 
 In these countries, the changes of which I have spoken 
 had been accomplished, and, in others, similar results had 
 been attained. Howard had not vainly " cast his bread 
 upon the waters.^' His great apostleship of charity did not 
 end with himself, and the penal system of this empire and 
 of Europe had been much improved. Classification and 
 order, though they are still very imperfect here and else- 
 where, had been introduced largely and beneficially amongst 
 convicts in most civilised lands. But this was not sufficient 
 — did not seem at all sufficient to many, who thought that 
 it was right to regard their ultimate destiny, after the time 
 of their imprisonment had passed. Such persons looked 
 abroad upon the prison world, and they marked some things 
 which were very notable. They saw that, in general, 
 human law made no distinction between the crime of the 
 child and of the adult ; that the innocence which had been 
 defiled by a single error, the growth of temptation or 
 necessity acting on an infant's unformed mind and feeble 
 purpose, was dealt with, too often, as the crime of the 
 hoary ruffian, stained with many infamies, and hardened 
 in his sins. They saw the juvenile offender passing, per- 
 haps, from an honest home to a felon^s gaol, corrupted by 
 contact with its abandoned inmates, graduating through all 
 the stages of immorality, and then sent forth to prey upon 
 his kind. And, seeing these things, they saw that it should 
 be otherwise ; that the child's crime was not the man's 
 crime, or to be dealt with, as if it were ; that their dif- 
 ferent conditions of intellect and morals called for different 
 treatment, and that the system which made the man's 
 prison also the child's was often responsible for steeping 
 him in iniquity, and robbing him of hope here and happi- 
 ness hereafter. Further, they saw that the traditional 
 
Funis Jnnent and Reformation. ly 
 
 and settled discipline of the gaol, modified though it had 
 been, made no sufficient provision for the moral culture 
 of the criminal — no preparation for his transfer to the 
 world, in a condition fitting him to take his place amongst 
 men, as a useful and prosperous citizen — no training which 
 might fit him to walk forth, self -relying and self-dependent, 
 without new contamination from his former comrades, and 
 certain return to the evil courses from which the coercive 
 power of the law had withheld him for a time. And, 
 finally, they saw that, equally in the cases of the child 
 and the adult, imprisonment involved loss of character 
 and caste ; involved, in multitudinous instances, loss of 
 the means of an honourable livelihood; deprived the un- 
 happy convict, even if disposed to return to a better state, 
 of the opportunity of redemption, in the aid of friends, or 
 the confidence of employers ; and drove him, in utter and 
 despairing helplessness, very often to lead a life of wicked- 
 ness, and, sometimes, to die a death of shame. 
 
 Observations such as these, occurring to persons of 
 generous nature and clear intellect, bore fruit in time; 
 and we have seen that fruit developed in institutions of 
 rare excellence — Reformatories for the young. Intermediate 
 Prisons for adults, and Patronage Associations, Refuges, 
 and Aid Societies for prisoners disposed to amend their 
 lives. To each of these subdivisions, constituting together, 
 I conceive, the Reformatory System, which tends to give 
 a special character to the criminal jurisprudence and ad- 
 ministration of our age, I propose, in a few words, to 
 invite your attention — not with any effort of reasoning or 
 elaborateness of detail, for these may well be left to the 
 able men who have instructed the section by papers on 
 special subjects ; but, mainly, that I may indicate how 
 remarkable has been its success in Ireland, and how strongly 
 that success should encourage further effort to push it to 
 still more effective issues. 
 
 B 
 
l8 Criminal Law : 
 
 Let me say, in tlie first instance, tliat the moral state 
 of this country, as it is demonstrated by the condition of 
 our gaols and the proceedings of our criminal tribunals, 
 furnishes ground for congratulation and hopefulness. For- 
 merly, the crime of Ireland was heavy in amount and serious 
 in character. Even then, there were too many found, at 
 home and abroad, to exaggerate its enormity; but, un- 
 questionably, it thronged the prison and crowded the 
 convict -ship and sent many to the scaffold. Now, the 
 judges are enabled to speak, with a happy unanimity, to 
 the unwonted absence of grave violations of the law. At 
 the assizes which have lately terminated, they were very 
 often, and in many counties, without occupation in the 
 trial of prisoners ; and, everywhere throughout the island^ 
 they found peace and order, obedience to authority, and 
 security for the possessions and persons of the people. And 
 this is no accidental or abnormal condition of affairs. The 
 improvement has been gradual, steadily progressive, and, 
 therefore, likely to be permanent. The late report of the 
 Inspectors- General of Prisons shows, by very clear statis- 
 tics, that, year by year, for a long period past, the number 
 of criminals has been steadily diminishing, until that 
 number, which, in 1850, amounted, throughout our gaols, 
 to 10,967, has dwindled, in 1861, to 2,488. In 1822, 
 there were 101 executions in Ireland; in 1861, I know of 
 only a single conviction for a capital offence. This moral 
 revolution is as remarkable as it is gratifying; and we 
 may confidently say to our distinguished visitors from 
 the Continent and Great Britain, that, though we have 
 our weaknesses, our follies, and our faults, they will find 
 amongst us now, not only the religious earnestness and 
 the domestic purity, which were never wanting in the 
 worst days of the past to vindicate for us something of 
 the traditional fame of our Nation as the Insula Sanctorum^ 
 
Punishment and Reformation. 19 
 
 butj also, an absence of crimes of fraud or violence, 
 wbich it will not be easy to parallel in any country of tlie 
 world. 
 
 But, passing from this glance at our general state, let me 
 speak shortly of tbose efforts in tbe reformatory cause which 
 have aided in making it, for the time, so fortunate and happy. 
 And first, of the reformation of the young — a thing much 
 to be regarded, whether we consider the facility for making 
 it effectual, which arises from tenderness of age and suscep- 
 tibility of good impressions ; or the advantages it offers t© 
 society, in penetrating to the springs of crime and cutting 
 off the supply of criminals. In this department of social 
 progress, as in many others, we must acknowledge a large 
 debt of obligation to our Continental neighbours. They led 
 the way, set the example and indicated the course which 
 might be followed with advantage. In France, in Belgium, 
 in Germany, and in Prussia, at no very distant time, good 
 men and holy women began the charitable work, and 
 established institutions of which, to an audience so in- 
 formed as this, it would be idle to attempt minute 
 description. But one of them eminently attracted notice 
 throughout Europe, and had, I believe, very special in- 
 fluence as an exemplar and encouragement in England- 
 It was commenced at Mettrai, by a man who abandoned 
 the dignity and emoluments of a judicial position to dwell 
 with the young criminals of his country, and labour un- 
 ceasingly for their redemption. In the noblest spirit of 
 self-sacrifice, M. de Metz dedicated his life to this labour 
 of love. He found the way to the hearts of thousands who, 
 but for him, would have grown up in vice and misery ; and 
 gave them back to the nation which, but for him, also, they 
 would have continued to disgrace — virtuous men, and loyal 
 and productive citizens. They obtained private employment 
 and public office j they thronged into the army and navy of 
 
 B 2 
 
20 Crimiyial Law : 
 
 France; and I remember how pleasant it was to see_, at 
 Mettrai, the memento of the visit of one of its former 
 colonists, who returned, after years of successful struggle, 
 to show proudly to his youthful successors the cross of the 
 Legion of Honour, glittering upon the breast which had 
 once been covered with the uniform of the child of crime. 
 The success of this noble institution for a long series of 
 years has been uninterrupted, save for a short period, at a 
 time of political convulsion; and we have all heard, with 
 great gratification, from a paper of the highest interest, 
 communicated to the section by Miss Hill, that its efficiency 
 and means of usefulness are at this moment greater than 
 they ever were. She states a very assuring fact : that, of 
 1,646 young criminals subjected to its discipline, and re- 
 stored to liberty, only eighty-five returned to crime ; or, as 
 the French Minister of Police has shown, 5*43 per cent, of 
 the whole. Ninety-five other youths, for various sufficient 
 causes, were removed from the colony. 
 
 In England, a good many years ago, similar under- 
 takings, with a similar object, were attempted by private 
 benevolence. They had much success. They got earnest 
 support from many generous hearts and able intellects; 
 and some of those who have honoured our meeting with 
 their presence — Miss Carpenter, the learned Recorder of 
 Birmingham, and Mr. Baker, my most efficient colleague, 
 who has so often, during this meeting, given us the great 
 assistance of his clear judgment and large experience — 
 laboured, as they labour still, in season and out of season, 
 to promote the interests of a cause with which their names 
 will for ever be identified in gratitude and honour. But 
 private benevolence needed the aid of law, and at last, after 
 some difficulty, the Juvenile Reformatory i\ct was passed 
 for England (the 17 & 18 Yict., cap. ^'^S), which did not 
 recognise reformatories as purely State institutions, but 
 
PitnisJwient and Reformation. 21 
 
 afforded them, upon their establisliment by voluntary contri- 
 bution, legal power of control, pecuniary aid, and government 
 inspection. How well that Act, although in some respects, 
 perhaps, imperfect and needing change, has worked in 
 England, there are many here who can tell with knowledge 
 and authority to which I cannot pretend. But I may state 
 that the diminution of juvenile crime in that country is 
 very remarkable, indeed. In 1856, 11,808 English and 
 Welsh boys were committed; in 1860, the number had 
 diminished to 6,765; in 1156 the committals of English 
 and Welsh girls were 2,308; in 1860 they were 1,269. 
 And it has been stated to us, on high authority, that 
 the beginning of the decrease, in the various districts, 
 towns and counties, has generally been contemporaneous 
 with the commencement of reformatory action on their 
 populations. The effect has also been to weed away 
 the youthful criminals most thoroughly trained and most 
 competent to lead others into error. Mr. Baker instituted 
 an inquiry very lately, in the Coldbath Fields district of 
 London, with the assistance of the justices, and the results 
 were these: — that an average of 350 boys had been re- 
 duced to an average of 89 ; that, whilst about a fourth of 
 the 350 used to be boys who had been several times con- 
 victed, and were adepts in crime, there were only ten such 
 under sixteen, or one-eighth of the number, in custody at 
 the time of the examination ; and that of the 300 persons 
 last committed, there were only 42 who had been in the 
 prison before — some 14 per cent., instead of the former 
 average of 50 per cent. And that this individual instance 
 not unfairly represents the general working of the English 
 reformatory system has been demonstrated to us, in the 
 course of this meeting, by the most conclusive testimony as 
 to other districts of England. 
 
 The Irish Reformatory Act was framed on the model of 
 
22 Criminal Law: 
 
 the English^ some time after it liad come into operation. 
 Like the English statute, it does not aim to establish 
 reformatory schools, but to sustain, and make them 
 effective, when individual effort has called them into being. 
 It gives to the managers the same means of restraint and 
 detention, the same claim to assistance from the Treasury, 
 the same right and benefit of inspection, and the same 
 power of enforcing the wholesome principle of Parental 
 Kesponsibility, which casts upon the father, whose evil 
 example or culpable neglect has produced the immorality 
 of his child, the necessity of contributing to its main- 
 tenance, according to his ability. In one respect only does 
 it differ in substance from the English statute, by expressly 
 r€q;uiring, that the inmates of each reformatory shall be 
 under the control of persons of the same religious per- 
 suasion as their parents or guardians respectively. That 
 difference was introduced upon full deliberation, and with 
 the entire concurrence of men of various creeds and parties, 
 in and out of Parliament, who took part in the promotion 
 of the measure. It had some regard to the peculiar con- 
 dition of things in Ireland, and the manifest difiiculty, if 
 not the total impossibility, of working such establishments 
 here upon any other principle. But it had a broader 
 ground, and a higher justification. It proceeded on the 
 belief that, for the reformation of the youthful convict, the 
 influence of religion was absolutely essential ; and that the 
 exercise of that influence, in the permanent association and 
 the family life of the Eeformatory, could not be satisfactory 
 or complete, if jarring controversies or various forms of 
 worship found entrance there. That belief was warranted 
 by sound theory, and confirmed by a very wide experience. 
 Before the Act was passed, I occupied a portion of a long 
 vacation in visiting many of the prisons and most of the 
 reformatories in Continental countries, and I sought to 
 
Pumshnent and Reformation. 23 
 
 ascertain the opinion of the best and the wisest^ connected 
 with them, on this subject. I found it everywhere the 
 same — at Mettrai and at Saint Foix, at Bordeaux and 
 Berne, at Euysellede and Strasburg. The same answer 
 was given to the interrogatory by the CathoHc priest and 
 the Calvinistic minister — by the Sister of Charity in France 
 and the Protestant Deaconess in Prussia. Universally, they 
 said that, for reformation, they needed religion above every- 
 thing — religion, as in the life of the family — religion, in all 
 its saving integrity and unbroken power ; and that, there- 
 fore, they needed separate establishments for the children 
 of their respective communions. And, in fact, it was so. 
 Though, at Mettrai, de Metz was associated in his great 
 work with a most excellent man, who lived and died a 
 Protestant, Mettrai had no Protestant colonist ; and I had 
 to go far into the South to find the Protestant institution 
 at Saint Foix, conducted almost exactly on the system of 
 Mettrai, under the control of M. le Pasteur Martin, a 
 Protestant clergyman, who received only Protestant in- 
 mates, and held the separation absolutely necessary for the 
 useful effect of the teaching to which he and his lady had 
 dedicated their lives. And in England, practically, the 
 Protestant and the Catholic reformatories are equally the 
 objects of the bounty of the Treasury — standing apart, that 
 each may do its blessed task more surely ; but combining 
 in the accomplishment of the great result, which empties 
 the prison, and gives honest workmen to the community 
 and law-respecting subjects to the State. And it has been 
 very agreeable to hear from men like the Rev. Mr. Fish 
 and Mr. Baker, that the schools, so constituted, go on har- 
 moniously, and that the Protestant manager and the Catholic 
 have generally the best and most cordial relations, each act- 
 ing honestly and exclusively for the benefit of the children 
 of his own faith, and avoiding interference with any others. 
 
24 Criminal Law : 
 
 The Irisli Act lias been worked^ on all sides, witli great 
 energy and remarkable success. The various sections of 
 the community have contributed for this purpose very 
 liberally ; but not so liberally as they would have done if 
 they had had a full appreciation of the advantages, social, 
 moral and economical, which reformatories, rightly con- 
 ducted, must secure to them. The Grand Jury of the 
 county of Dublin and the Corporation of the city were 
 prompt to use the powers entrusted to them by the Act 
 in the most generous spirit ; and, though their example 
 has not been followed by similar bodies, as widely as 
 might be desired, in aiding schools already opened or 
 creating others, I have not the least doubt that, when 
 they come to be familiar with the great advantages which 
 those schools hold forth to every district of the kingdom, 
 they will emulate the example which has been set in 
 Dublin. The Catholic institution at Glencree, under 
 the able presidency of the Rev. Mr. Lynch, was opened 
 in the year 1859, and, since that time, eight others have 
 been established in the Metropolis, in Cork, Belfast, 
 Limerick, and Monaghan. Three of these are Protestant 
 Reformatories, and the residue Roman Catholic — the 
 Catholic population, from its great extent, furnishing, of 
 necessity, by far the larger number of persons requiring 
 reformatory care. The beneficial operation of the system 
 in Ireland must, of course, require time for its develop- 
 ment, and we have yet had scant opportunity of judging 
 what that development may ultimately be. But, already, 
 the indications are in the highest degree encouraging. 
 Comparing the years 1858 and 1859, we find the reduction 
 of the number of juvenile committals to have been very 
 great — 30 J per cent, less for boys, and, for girls, 9^ per 
 cent, in the latter year, than in the former. And on a 
 comparison of 1859 with 18C0, the committals show a 
 
Pttnishment and Reformation, 25 
 
 reduction of 13 per cent, as to tlie boys, and 11 per cent, 
 as to the girls. These results appear to me to tend to the 
 conclusion^ that the action of the system, although still 
 only in its infancy, is vigorous, and healthy; and T have to 
 add another statement which is scarcely of a less gratifying 
 nature. 
 
 The principle of Parental Responsibility has had effect in 
 Ireland, even beyond reasonable expectation. It was not 
 supposed, by those who most highly estimated its value, 
 that it could be of much avail amongst us, regard being 
 had to the poverty of the classes, which must supply the 
 occupants of our juvenile reformatories. And, certainly, 
 the eflSciency for good of such establishments, or rather the 
 avoidance of one main peril to which many have believed 
 them liable, must depend, in a large degree, on the enforce- 
 ment of this salutary principle. Its importance consists, 
 not only in the influence which it must exert upon parents, 
 whom fear of compelled contribution to the support of 
 children in a Reformatory may incline, in the absence of 
 higher motives, to a greater care of their education and 
 conduct, so that such a burden may be escaped ; but, also, in 
 the prevention of the danger, — sometimes exaggerated, 
 but certainl}^ not to be ignored, and requiring to have 
 every legitimate caution provided against it — of such 
 parents seeking to cast on the community and the State 
 the maintenance of their own ofi'spring. I am very glad to 
 be enabled to say that, since the opening of the Irish 
 Reformatories, a sum of nearly £300 has been recovered 
 from the parents of their inmates. And this sum, though 
 apparently small, is really considerable, when we remember 
 the shortness of the period of their existence, the com- 
 paratively small number yet committed to them, and the 
 further fact that, in 1859 and 1860, 60 per cent, of the 
 children, convicted in Ireland, are reported to have been 
 
26 Criminal Law : 
 
 orplians^ or to have lost either father or mother_, and so to 
 have been in the exact condition in which it became a 
 special duty and a plain economy for the State to aid in 
 snatching them from a life of crime. It is a pleasant 
 surprise to find this valuable agent of the system of so 
 much practical influence in this country, and likely to be of 
 so much more in the probable future, when its machinery, 
 from use, will come into more effective action. 
 
 Whilst we have thus great reason for congratulation in 
 the prosperity which, so far, has waited on all our re- 
 formatory schools, we may anticipate a much larger 
 measure of it when experience shall afford a more general 
 knowledge of their utility, and those who have to deal 
 judicially with criminal children shall become more familiar 
 with the rules of procedure, by which they may be 
 worked to the best advantage. Two things I take leave 
 to note, which I regard as of practical and pressing im- 
 portance. In the first place, when a child is found to be a 
 fit subject for moral treatment in a Eeformatory, it is 
 absolutely necessary that he should be subjected to it for a 
 long period, in order to the production of any permanently 
 beneficial result. He either ought not to go to the school 
 at all, or he ought to go for such a period. The object of 
 the treatment is to conquer his habits of evil, and train 
 him in the ways of virtuous industry, — to separate him 
 definitively from connexion with his associates in crime, — 
 to take from him the desire and the tendency to herd with 
 them again, — and so to discipline him that he may go back 
 into the world with some settled principle and some steady 
 purpose, and be prepared to ^^ walk undefiled in the taber- 
 nacles of corruption.^^ To accomplish these changes, time, 
 and a considerable time, is manifestly essential, and all, 
 without exception, who have given intelligent attention to 
 the subject, concur in believing that short sentences, in 
 
PitnisJiment and Reformatio7t. 27 
 
 the majority of cases^ are useless and pernicious. They 
 may be lengthened_, without apprehension of mischief, as 
 the Act provides the means for the abridgment of them, 
 should the conduct and circumstances of the child make 
 his liberation, before the completion of their appointed 
 periods, desirable and safe. In this respect, there is 
 danger of error, from the spirit of leniency in the adminis- 
 tration of the criminal law, which has grown so strong in 
 latter times, and works evil sometimes only less to be 
 deplored than the harshness we condemn in the times that 
 are gone. It is as much the duty of a judge to be sternly 
 resolute in the infliction of necessary pain, as it is his duty 
 to decline the infliction of any which is not necessary; and, 
 especially, where the object is not so much to punish, as to 
 redeem, there • should be no hesitation in pronouncing a 
 sentence adequate to the accomplishment of that great 
 purpose. The sentence, whose briefness deprives the child 
 of the full advantage of reformatory influences, is to him a 
 cruelty and not a mercy. 
 
 The second practical observation I desire to make is this, 
 that judicial persons, having a great discretion vested in 
 them by the Legislature in the matter with which we deal, 
 have corresponding responsibility, which should make them 
 careful in the selection of the children whom they consign 
 to Reformatories. Every child who comes under the ban 
 of the law ought not to be sent to them. First ofi'ences 
 rarely justify such a course, and very rarely when they are 
 trivial ; and, in all cases, great vigilance should be used in 
 ascertaining, so far as may be possible, that the young 
 ofi"ender is really under the age fixed by the statute, and 
 that he is not afifected by such physical disease or extra- 
 ordinary moral depravity, as may render him a fitter inmate 
 of the hospital or the convict-prison. I know, perfectly 
 well, how very difiicult it may be to act on sach a 
 
2 8 Criminal Law: 
 
 suggestion — liow impossible it is that mistakes should not 
 occur — but the subject is worthy of attention ; especially as 
 I learn that within the last two years several young persons^ 
 sentenced for various periods to our reformatories, have 
 not obtained admission to them^ some having been beyond 
 the age prescribed^, and, therefore, not legally detainable ; 
 and others having been, for reasons such as I have in- 
 dicated, held inadmissible by the managers. Occurrences 
 of this kind should be avoided with anxious care, for they 
 are full of mischief to the individuals excluded, and to the 
 whole community. 
 
 But though, for a time, there must be errors and short- 
 comings in the administration of this novel statute, they 
 have not been at all more numerous than might have been 
 anticipated. Magistrates have, generally, been cautious in 
 their judgments; and I do not find that the managers of 
 the schools are in any case obnoxious to blame for the 
 exercise of the authorit}^, necessarily reposed in them, to 
 which I have alluded. Such things will diminish as time 
 runs on; and the Act, under God^s blessing, will realise 
 the highest hopes of its most sanguine advocates. 
 
 Ireland has always appeared to me to afford peculiar 
 facilities for its beneficent action. The spirit of our people is 
 ductile and impressible. They are keenly alive to the appeal 
 of kindness ; capable of appreciating justice, even when it 
 bears hard upon them ; and universally susceptible of the 
 influences of religion. They have little of hardened, 
 ingrained, hereditary guilt; and there never has existed 
 amongst them a very large class of trained and professional 
 criminals. In such a state of things, the reformatory 
 principle, energetically and wisely worked upon the young, 
 must have special chances of success ; and when we 
 remember what I have stated as to its operation upon the 
 youth of France, and learn from Mr. Turner's recent 
 
Punishment and Reforniation. 29 
 
 report that, of 1,000 boys discharged in England, 600 are 
 known to be doing well, and less than 120 have been again 
 convicted, we may anticipate progress at least as gratifying, 
 in this country, when the same saving power shall have 
 been as long in operation here, under conditions certainly 
 quite as favourable, as in France or England. It will 
 amply reward the bounty of individuals in establishing 
 Keformatories, and of public bodies and the State in 
 contributing freely to their maintenance. 
 
 Passing from this reference to the treatment of juvenile 
 crime, I had intended to speak, at some length, of the 
 systems which have prevailed in our prisons for adults ; but 
 that subject has already been dealt with so ably and so 
 exhaustively in this department, that many of the observa- 
 tions I was disposed to make would be superfluous, especi- 
 ally to those who have been present at our most satisfactory 
 and most harmonious meetings. To those who were not, 
 I may say, summarily, that the questions as to secondary 
 punishment, which have been always among the most 
 diflBcult of all which engage the attention of the jurist 
 and the statesman, became peculiarly embarrassing in these 
 countries on the abolition of transportation, partially in 
 1853, and absolutely, I may say, in 1857. That abolition 
 was warranted by abundant reason, and at last made un- 
 avoidable by the resolution of various colonies to refuse the 
 further admission of convicts. Penal servitude — confine- 
 ment in prisons at home, with hard labour — became the 
 substitute, and the problem was, how it could best be 
 applied with a view to the great objects of punishment, 
 the prevention of crime, and the reformation of offenders. 
 The new necessity compelled, and still compels, attention 
 to this problem, which had never been afforded in times 
 when the compendious process of wholesale execution saved 
 trouble as to the worldly future of the criminal, or when 
 
30 ' Criminal Law : 
 
 his removal to the antipodes relieved us from his presence, 
 and all care about him. As to th^ English system of 
 convict prisons, and tickets- of-leave, and its merits in com- 
 parison with that which has happily "been established in 
 Ireland during the last seven years, there has been some 
 controversy, which must issue, as all free and fair discus- 
 sion amongst good men issues, in the discovery of the truth 
 and the advancement of the public interests. We have had 
 the high authority of the Recorder of Birmingham for the 
 statement, that the English system has been a great im- 
 provement on all that had preceded it. But, speaking here 
 in no controversial spirit, and venturing only to judge of 
 that which, from its inception, and through all the stages 
 of its progress, has come much under my own observation, 
 I may say, with confidence, that the Irish Convict Prisons 
 have been managed with great ability and eminent success ; 
 and that the system which has grown up under my dis- 
 tinguished friend. Captain Crofton, and his able colleagues, 
 both as to the principles on which it has proceeded, and the 
 results it has attained, is entitled to the applause it has 
 received, and the consideration it has commanded from 
 thoughtful men throughout the empire and the world. 
 
 The establishment of that system has been prompted by 
 an inspiring faith in the capability of human beings, 
 although stained with crime, to be won back to virtue. 
 Before our own time, that faith had found little acceptance 
 amongst publicists and legislators, and, even yet, it is 
 repudiated by some leaders of opinion, and many whom we 
 encounter in social life. And, of course, it is to be taken 
 with reasonable limits and qualifications ; for there are 
 moral incurables, as there are men and women whom 
 physical disease has put beyond the aid of the healing art. 
 I was much struck by a statement of the Rev. Mr. Fish, 
 whose great experience and vigorous intelligence have so 
 
Punishment and Reformation, 31 
 
 mucli aided us in our labours^ when lie said^ on Thursday 
 that, after long familiarity and large acquaintance with 
 them, he believed some three or four per cent, of English 
 juvenile offenders to be incorrigible. There may be such 
 a proportion_, or, probably, a larger proportion of adult 
 incorrigibles, also. But, in general, the faith is sound and 
 true, that the majority of prisoners, properly dealt with, 
 are certainly reformable. And those who founded the Irish 
 system had the further faith, that they are reformable 
 through the same machinery of motives, attractive and 
 deterring, applied to their peculiar state, which governs the 
 conduct of their happier brethren. Its whole aim and 
 object has been, acting on that faith, to apply those 
 motives — sternly, but kindly — with careful adaptation to 
 particular cases, but with steady adherence to certain 
 great rules of action, — dealing with convicts, not as a 
 chaotic mass of criminal mortality, but as men, having 
 the peculiarities which distinguish one man from another, 
 and to be swayed and moulded, like other men, by personal 
 influence and individual care. 
 
 I pause to note the fact, that the very system which has 
 now been established in Ireland was shadowed forth, more 
 than a hundred years ago, by a great Irishman, who antici- 
 pated our progress, and pointed out the path it should 
 pursue. Most of us have been familiar, at some period of 
 our lives, with the good Dr. Primrose in Oliver Goldsmith's 
 famous tale. And some of you may remember how, when 
 he was cast into prison by the Squire, and found it, as 
 prisons then generally were, full of vice, and brutality, and 
 vile disorder, he set himself to improve the occasion, and 
 essay the seemingly hopeless task of amending the unhappy 
 inmates ; and how, when his family received the announce- 
 ment of his purpose with ^'^ universal disapprobation, '^ — as 
 many would still receive the announcement of such a 
 
32 Criminal Law : 
 
 purpose^ under such circumstances — " alleging tlie impossi- 
 bility and impropriety of it ; and adding, that his endea- 
 vours would in no way contribute to their amendment, but 
 might possibly disgrace his own calling/^ — his answer 
 was: — ''^ These people, however fallen, are still men, and 
 that is a very good title to my affections. Good counsel 
 rejected returns to enrich the giver's bosom ; and, though 
 the instruction I communicate may not mend them, it will 
 assuredly mend myself. If these wretches were princes, 
 there would be thousands ready to offer their ministry ; 
 but, in my opinion, the heart that is buried in a dungeon 
 is as precious as that which is seated on a throne. 
 If I can mend them, I will. Perhaps they will not all 
 despise me. Perhaps, I may catch up even one from the 
 gulf, and that will be great gain ; for is there, upon earth, 
 a gem so precious as the human soul ?'' As he spoke, he 
 acted ; and he tells us, how the criminals with whom he 
 dwelt were mastered by his gentle wisdom and Christian 
 firmness ; and how, when some had become penitent and 
 all attentive, he tried to change their habits of evil by 
 getting them a little profitable employment and enabling 
 them to earn some trifling wages ; and how he then 
 addressed their susceptibilities of hope and fear, and insti- 
 tuted fines for immorality, and rewards for industry ; 
 and how, at last, he formed them into ^^ something social 
 and humane.'' And then the simple man goes on to 
 speculate : — " And it were highly to be wished, that legis- 
 lative power would direct the law rather to reformation 
 than to severity ; that it would soon be convinced that the 
 work of eradicating crimes is not by making punishments 
 familiar, but formidable. Then, instead of our present 
 prisons, which find or make men guilty : which enclose 
 wretches for the commission of one crime, and return them, 
 if returned alive, fitted for the perpetration of thousands; 
 
Pitnishnient and Reformation, 
 
 oo 
 
 it were to be wished we had, as in other parts of Europe^ 
 places of penitence and solitude, where the accused might 
 be attended by such as would give them repentance, if 
 guilty, or new motives to virtue, if innocent. And this, 
 but not the increasing punishment, is the way to mend a 
 
 state It were to be wished that power, instead 
 
 of contriving new laws to punish vice — instead of drawing 
 hard the cords of society till a convulsion come to burst 
 them — instead of cutting away wretches as useless before 
 we have tried their utiHty — instead of converting correction 
 into vengeance — it were to be wished that we tried the 
 restrictive acts of government, and made law the protector 
 and not the tyrant of the people. We should then find that 
 creatures whose souls are held as dross, only wanted the 
 hand of a refiner. We should find that wretches now 
 stuck up for long- tortures, lest luxury should feel a 
 momentary pang, might, if properly treated, serve to sinew 
 the state in times of danger ; that, as their faces are like 
 ours, their hearts are so too ; that few minds are so base as 
 that perseverance cannot amend ; that a man may see his 
 last crime without dying for it, and that very little blood 
 will serve to cement our security.''^ I recal your recollec- 
 tion to these pregnant passages, partly because they may 
 tittach something c>f local interest to speculations and dis- 
 cussions such as ours, in the country of a man who, so long- 
 ago, when our laws were written in blood, and still barbar- 
 ously executed — ^wlien our gaols were earthly Pande- 
 moniums, in which all hope was excluded, all virtue mocked 
 at and all reformation unknown — was enabled, with the 
 instinct of genius, quickened by the benevolence of a 
 kindly and gentle heart, to proclaim this beautiful gospel 
 of humanity. Honour to Oliver Goldsmith ! And when 
 we shall come to pay him the homage too long delayed, and 
 his statue, which i> in preparation, — on the suggestion of 
 
 c 
 
34 Criminal Law , 
 
 our accomplislied and beneficent Viceroy^"!^ who in tMs^ as in 
 so many other things, has proved himself Ifsis Hibemis 
 Hihernior, — shall be raised in the centre of our metropolis, 
 let us remember him_, not merely as the sweet poet, the 
 accomplished dramatist, the genial painter of the nature and 
 life of man, but, also, as one who preached remission to the 
 captive, recognised in the criminal the fallen child of God, 
 and sought to bring him comfort, in the desolation and 
 despair to which he had been utterly abandoned ! And I 
 have also produced these passages as containing intimations 
 of almost every improvement, in the matters on which they 
 touch, which can be boasted by the active philanthropy 
 of our time ; and because the system begun amongst us, 
 in 1856, will not be less valued by the Irish people, or 
 the world, for carrying into effect the great principles 
 which Oliver Goldsmith announced, a century before, to 
 deaf ears and stony hearts. 
 
 Throughout the whole prison life of the convict, prin- 
 ciples like these regulate his treatment. He enters Mount- 
 joy prison, and he has there to undergo the hard discipline 
 of cellular incarceration. He works alone; not often 
 visited by any one, and with ample opportunity for medi- 
 tation and repentance, during the nine months of his 
 probationary state. But, he is allowed to have hope of the 
 future, and hope to be realised by himself. The shorten- 
 ing of the period of his separation depends on his good 
 conduct; and he knows that, when it shall have ended, he 
 will have still further opportunity of improving his con- 
 dition by his own endeavours. This expectation produces 
 its natural result in his quiet and orderly demeanour, and 
 his obedience to authority; and, in most instances, the 
 period of his cellular confinement is accordingly abridged. 
 
 '"■ Lord r.-irlisle. 
 
Pzmishment and Reformation. 35 
 
 Then, lie passes to Spike Island or Philipstown, where he 
 labours in association with others, under the strictest sur- 
 veillance, and where continuing good behaviour enables 
 him to rise from class to class, gaining, all the while, some- 
 thing for himself from the fruit of his toil, until he 
 becomes fit for an intermediate prison, where he has more 
 of freedom and a larger share of his own earnings, and 
 where the same stimulating and sustaining influence of hope 
 still operates upon him. By his own eiforts, he can lay up 
 a little store for the day of liberation ; and, by his own 
 efforts, too, he can quicken the coming of that happy day. 
 If he will so act as to obtain good marks, it is hastened ; 
 if he fails to obtain them, it is postponed. Then, during 
 the period of his detention in the intermediate prison, he 
 has, in a larger degree, the benefit of intellectual and moral 
 culture, which has been offered to him continually, — with 
 the higher blessing of the religious care of a zealous and 
 instructed chaplain, — from the commencement of his im- 
 prisonment. A lecturer — a gentleman very competent and 
 very devoted to his duty — addresses to him plain speech on 
 subjects calculated to arouse his interest and awaken his 
 faculties, delivered simply, and in words within the range 
 of his comprehension. And, when years have thus gone 
 by, and the prisoner has profitably passed through all the 
 stages of trial and improvement — when his relations with 
 the wickedness of the outer world have been broken, and he 
 has become inured to the ways of penitence and peace — 
 when he has acquired knowledge, suitable to his condition, 
 from the schoolmaster and the lecturer, and moral and 
 religious principles from the minister of God — when he 
 has formed the habit of honest labour, and learned to 
 taste the sweetness of its reward — when he has gathered a 
 little capital, hardly earned, and greatly valued, which 
 may sustain him when he passes beyond the prison gate, 
 
 c 2 
 
o 
 
 6 C^nrninal Law : 
 
 — lie is, in general,, enabled to obtain liis discharge, con- 
 ditionally, before the period of his sentence is complete. 
 And, in very many cases, as a part of his final probation, 
 he is employed, at large, in this city and its neighbourhood, 
 on such service as the convict directors deem suitable for 
 him, or at Lusk, where you will see him discharging the 
 ordinary duties of an agricultural labourer, without en- 
 closure or confinement of any kind. And it is found that he 
 can be so trusted safely, and that neither the city messenger 
 nor the Lusk workman ever dreams of escaping from a 
 control which has no apparatus of bolts and bars to make 
 it efi'ectual. And so, the man passes from the prison to his 
 place in society — not his old place, but a higher and a 
 better. He does not make the passage abruptly, or without 
 reasonable preparation. He has been fitted for it, by 
 exchanging cellular separation for associate labour; and 
 this, for the greater freedom and enlarged privileges of the 
 intermediate prison; and this, again, very often, for actual 
 liberty, before he can claim that liberty as a right. And, 
 even when he can so claim it, the guardianship which has 
 directed him, for years, does not at once abandon him to 
 his own devices. Generally, he obtains his liberation, as the 
 recompense of meritorious conduct, before the expiration 
 of his sentence; and the liberation is conditional, subject 
 to be ended if he falls again. For a time, he is under the 
 eye of authority, and finds confirmation of his good purposes 
 in the checks which its supervision puts upon him, and the 
 iipprehension of the evil consequences of a return to crime. 
 But, more than this, the continuing guardianship is not 
 all repressive and minacious. To the liberated convict, it is 
 a protection ngainst the influence of those who would 
 lure him back to vice, and gives him a shield against many 
 mischiefs and many misconceptions, which would be 
 entailed by his tainted character, if he had not the oppor- 
 
Piuiishment and Reformation. 37 
 
 tunity of appeal to the officers of justice as to his changed 
 life and renewed trustworthiness. Besides^ effort has been 
 made^ and made with extraordinary success^ to help the 
 prisoner to employment on his discharge. Agriculturists 
 and traders have been sought and founds ready to accept his 
 services. When the system was first established^ and for a 
 long time afterwards^ there was, of course, unwillingness 
 to do anything of the kind. Those who have never fallen 
 do not like contact with the criminal; and the indisposition 
 to put him in a place of trust is very natural, indeed. But, 
 some good people were got to try the experiment, and it 
 was found safe and profitable, as it was full of charity. 
 The workmen were as true and as useful, as those who had 
 never passed under the dishonouring shadow of the prison 
 wall. And I am assured by Mr. Organ, whose services in 
 this matter have been most praiseworthy and effective, that 
 employers seek voluntarily for convict labourers and 
 artisans, and that the demand for them has often exceeded 
 the supply. In the city and the county of Dublin, very 
 many of them are now actually engaged. They and those 
 who employ them may be seen and interrogated ; and it will, 
 I believe, be discovered that their lives afford the most 
 persuasive testimony of the power and the worth of the 
 system, without which, according to all the experience of 
 the past, instead of becoming absorbed in the community, 
 and having a long career of utility and happiness opened 
 before them, they would, probably, have left the gaol ouly 
 to return to it, time after time — at each relapse, more 
 abandoned and hopeless than before. 
 
 The same course of training is applied to female convicts, 
 and with nearly similar results — with results, at least, as 
 satisfactory. They also run through the several stages 
 of the established discipline which I have described, but 
 its termination is accomplished in institutions which have 
 
38 Criininal Law : 
 
 received the name of Eefuges, and to wliich women whose 
 good conduct, through the long probationary period, en- 
 titles them to special trust and favour, have access towards 
 the end of their prison life. There is a Protestant Refuge 
 in Heytesbmy Street, which is sedulously cared for by 
 benevolent ladies^ who voluntarily superintend the conduct 
 of its inmates and their matron. We have had strong- 
 evidence that it is admirably managed, that situations are 
 obtained without much difficulty for those of the women, 
 who have given assurance of true repentance and amend- 
 ment, and that it has had the best results in the permanent 
 reclamation of very many. The Catholic Refuge at Golden 
 Bridge is under the management of the Sisters of Mercy, 
 and has, of necessity, a much more extensive organisation, 
 from the much larger number of Catholic convicts. At 
 the head of it is a lady, whose great administrative 
 ability, and extraordinary power of influencing for good 
 the women committed to her care, make fruitful the ab- 
 solute devotedness with which she spends her life in that 
 mission of mercy. Nothing can be more wise than the 
 arrangements, nothing more effective than the working, 
 of this establishment ; and the relations of the religious 
 ladies who control it, with the Catholic community 
 throughout Ireland and in various countries, have enabled 
 them to find employment at home or abroad, for, I believe, 
 every one of the convicts who have proved worthy of it. 
 Similar efforts, as I have observed, have been made by the 
 ladies who manage the Protestant Refuge, with propor- 
 tionate success, and the result is, that a very small number, 
 indeed, of the women who have passed from both (not 
 more, I understand, than four per cent, upon the whole) 
 have again fallen back to their former condition. The 
 value of such refuges is as great, as the necessity for them 
 is plain and pressing. It is peculiarly difficult to establish 
 
Punislrrnent and Refomiation. 39 
 
 a trustworthy aud proper surveillance, by the police or 
 otherwise^, over female convicts, after their discharge ; and 
 it is of great importance that they should, so far as may 
 be possible, be kept in safe asylums, under the control of 
 persons of their own sex, until they have a fair opportunity 
 of obtaining reputable service or emigrating with advan- 
 tage. And, on the w^hole, I may add, it seems to me, 
 from all the information which has reached me, that, in 
 the majority of such cases, emigration is desirable, when 
 it can be effected. 
 
 I might easily dwell far longer on a theme so grateful ; 
 but many of my auditors are already f amihar with it ; and 
 I think that, in the observations I have made, I have 
 indicated to those who are not, the sum and substance of 
 that Irish system to which good men have begun to look 
 with so much hope and confidence. There is no mystery 
 about it — no startling appliance of any novel power. It 
 carries to a farther result the doctrines which have already 
 had their application to some extent in England, and more 
 largely on the Continent of Europe, and in particular 
 instances, with special success, under Montesinos and 
 Obermaier, in Bavaria and Spain. It is not my province 
 to judge how far it may be available in other lands — how 
 far it may have had, as I think it has had, some peculiar 
 facilities for fortunate employment, from the circumstances 
 of Ireland, and the character of her people — how far there 
 may be difficulties to overcome in applying it to larger 
 prison populations, more deeply steeped in crime. These 
 are questions of w^eight and importance, on which there 
 may be difference of sentiment. I am content to know, 
 that a great good has been done, and a great example 
 afforded — that careful effort, perseveringly pursued, has 
 been found undoubtedly efficacious in the reformation of 
 convicts and the diminution of crime — and that our country 
 
40 Criminal Law : 
 
 lias reason to be proud of the achievement^ and grateful 
 for the benefits it confers. And I am more than willinor 
 
 o 
 
 to believe, that as '^ of one blood God formed all the 
 nations of the earth," as we are endowed with the same 
 nature, prompted by the same impulses, and stimulated or 
 controlled by the same affections and desires, there is no 
 good reason for supposing that the experiment which has 
 been so successful in Ireland should fail in other countries, 
 or that, according to their various circumstances and neces- 
 sities, they should not be able, most profitably, to apply 
 the principles which have been so well tested here. 
 
 According to the latest information available to us, 
 the inmates of the Government prisons, who, in 1854, 
 numbered 3,933, are, in the present year, reduced to 
 1,492 ; — 5,560 convicts having been discharged on licence 
 from those prisons between the 1st of January, 1854, and 
 the 1st of January, 1861, and only bO of the licences 
 having been revoked, including those of 30 convicts whose 
 conduct had been irregular, but not criminal. These are 
 suggestive figures ; and they are entitled to the fullest con- 
 sideration, because the completeness of the police surveil- 
 lance, and the promptness with which any breach of the 
 conditions of the licence in any individual case is noted and 
 punished, give them special accuracy. 
 
 I may add, that I see no reason to doubt the applicability 
 of the discipline I have been describing to other prisons, 
 also, under any difference of conditions which different 
 circumstances, especially as to the length of confinement, 
 may seem to make essential. The reformatory principle, 
 if it be sound and just, will work universally with most 
 wholesome influence. But, the branch of our social 
 arrangements to which it has been applied is new in its 
 character and necessarily imperfect. Only a little time 
 has passed, since men's thoughts were turned to it with 
 
PunisJiriicnt and Reformation. 41 
 
 any earnestness, and tlie wonder is that, in so short a 
 period, so mucli should have been done. The progress, 
 once begun, will happily continue; and I hope yet to see 
 all the departments of our punitive and reformatory insti- 
 tutions, — the school of the juvenile and the gaol of the 
 adult, the government prison and the prison of the county, 
 — moulded into one consistent and homogeneous system; 
 its parts mutually sustaining and answering to each other ; 
 and the whole animated by the same spirit, aiming at the 
 same objects, and subject, perhaps, — without the loss of 
 the advantages of voluntary aid and effort, where they are 
 available, — to the same central control. 
 
 I spoke originally of three great divisions of the subject 
 with which I have been engaged, — the treatment of the 
 young criminal, the treatment of the adult, and that which 
 is equally, for their moral efficiency, the necessary condition 
 and complement of both, the preparation necessary to re- 
 store them to society, so that we may not lose the benefit 
 of all the care which has been spent upon them. I have 
 spoken of the first and the second. I have left myself no 
 time to speak to you fully of the third. But, it is essential 
 to be carried out in every effective plan of reformatory 
 punishment. In vain, will you give the convict, old or 
 young, an improved mind and a chastened heart; in vain, 
 will you give him capacity of continuous labour, and a 
 desire to advance himself by worthy means, if, when his 
 prison doors are opened, he finds the world, as it were, in a 
 conspiracy against him, and bent upon his ruin — no one to 
 trust him — no one to meet him kindly — no one to give him 
 the opportunity of earning honest bread! So it has been, 
 too often and too generally; so it is, still. And, whilst it 
 is so, what hope is there, in many cases, of permanent re- 
 formation ? The willing labourer can get no work to do. 
 The man who yearns to make himself worthy of association 
 
42 Criminal Law : 
 
 with his kind is repelled^ as if his presence were pestilential. 
 His good purposes are defeated. His hope of redemption 
 vanishes away. If he will live at all^ he must live as a 
 criminal; — and he is clutched again by his old associates, 
 and drawn back to the depths of the abyss of sin, from 
 which he had vainly prayed and laboured to emerge. 
 Realise the condition of a convict coming* forth at the 
 conclusion of his imprisonment, with the brand upon his 
 brow, — without, it may be, a relative or a friend in the 
 wide world, — without food to eat or the chance of fairly 
 getting it, — and you will believe that there is no exag- 
 geration in this miserable picture. And such a picture 
 — of a creature hopeless, helpless, utterly abandoned, 
 driven to outrage the law that he may exist, and to pur- 
 chase in a prison, by new offences, the shelter which society 
 denies him — has moved in other countries many a kind 
 heart to pity, and the result has been that in France, in 
 Belgium, in Bavaria, and most Continental nations, societies 
 and individuals have combined to watch over prisoners 
 disposed to lead virtuous lives, and afford them an oppor- 
 tunity of doing so. In Bavaria, for example, there is a 
 complete national organisation to this end, including a 
 society for every province and a committee for every 
 district. Six weeks before the discharge of a prisoner, 
 notice of it is given by the governor of the gaol to the 
 district committee, with a full account of his character and 
 habits, the amount of money he may have earned in prison, 
 and the circumstances which may be supposed to justify 
 the extension of assistance to him ; and the committee, 
 exercising its discretion as to each individual case, supplies. 
 to those who are worthy of it, productive occupation and 
 maintains a watchful supervision over them. In France, 
 the great Association of St. Vincent de Paul numbers the 
 care for prisoners amongst its noblest and most cherished 
 
Piinishineiit and Reformation. 43 
 
 works j and there are Societes cle Patronage in that country 
 which have long laboured^ most successfully, for the assist- 
 Huce, equally, of the young and the adult. In Miss HilFs 
 admirable paper on Mettrai, she informed us that more than 
 1 ,500 individuals discharged from that institution actually 
 receive the benefit of this assistance, and paid a touching 
 tribute to Paul Louis Yerdier; who sacrificed his life in his 
 eflforts to bestow it, and left a name which is in benedic- 
 tion in many a poor Parisian dwelling. 
 
 I am happy to say that, in England also, institutions 
 conceived in a like spirit^ and working on like principles, 
 are beginning to spring up. In Birmingham,, the Dis- 
 charged Prisoners^ Aid Society has existed since the 1st of 
 July, 1856, \^dth the most beneficial results, attained at the 
 expense of a very trifling outlay. The last report of the 
 society I have received through the kindness of Mr. 
 Charles Eadcliff", and it describes a system in many 
 respects most worthy of study and imitation. It states, 
 that the object of the association is neither to maintain 
 discharged prisoners in idleness, nor to furnish them with 
 work by a forced or artificial supply, but to aid them to 
 obtain employment in the ordinary labour market. It 
 speaks of the special disabilities to which I have pointed, 
 precluding such persons from being employed; and it 
 states further, that its plan has acted with entire success, 
 no difficulty having been expeiienced in finding temporary 
 lodgings for prisoners, and little in obtaining employment 
 for those who were willing to work, and that money to a 
 very small amount, wisely distributed amongst hundreds 
 of persons, at an expenditure of about £1. 7s. 6d. for each 
 individual aided, has proved to many of them of the 
 greatest importance, in keeping them up until they could 
 find engagements for themselves. The proceedings of this 
 society are very encom^aging, as are those of the Prisoners' 
 
44 CriiPiinal Lazv : 
 
 Aid Society of London, wliicli was mainly^ I believe^ 
 established through the efforts of ^Ir. AVhitbread. And 
 the statements which the section heard with such pleasure 
 from the Rev. Mr. Fish as to the complete facility of 
 obtaining employment for the children of the Yorkshire 
 Reformatories were demonstrative,, that what has been done 
 so successfully in France may be most hopefully attempted 
 in England. 
 
 In Ireland^ the progress of the reformatory movement 
 has already originated some partial efforts of this kind. I 
 have spoken of the individual labours of Mr. Organ^ which 
 have prospered so remarkably — of the establishment of the 
 inmates of the Heytesbury Refuge in honest service, and of 
 the larger cares of the ladies of Golden Bridge, which have 
 resulted, under God^s blessing, in giving blameless lives 
 and happy homes to hundreds of female convicts. But: 
 far more is necessary — larger and more permanent arrange- 
 ments^ which shall pervade the country, and supply the 
 means of salvation, temporal and eternal, wherever — and 
 only where — they are truly needed and really desired. The 
 experience of the Continent and of England demonstrates 
 by what a small expenditure, made judiciously, and in 
 the proper spirit^ a vast amount of good may be accom- 
 plished in this direction. The State can do the rest. It 
 can establish sound discipline and appoint able governors 
 in the prisons under its control. It can assist and regulate 
 institutions which may be founded by voluntary effort. 
 But, I repeat^ both for the child and for the adult, it is 
 essential that benevolence should bend itself to aid autho- 
 rity, and make the reformation of the prison and the school 
 rich in real usefulness, by providing for those who have 
 passed through its purifying ordeal a field for industry and 
 an opportunity of progress. 
 
 Let no man say that those who are friends of reformatory 
 
Punishment and Reformation. 45 
 
 institutions aspire after an impossible Utopia, or indulge in 
 dreams of tlie perfectibility of our eartldy state, such, as 
 deluded many in tlie generation wLicli went before us. 
 \Yhilst time lasts, there will be poverty and sin. Society 
 will need to resist its enemies, and subdue them by 
 stringent laws and heavy penalties. None know better 
 than those who labour to improve it how deceitful and 
 wicked is the human heart. But we do not refuse, be- 
 cause we cannot make our world a Paradise, to strive for 
 its amendment ; and thougb, amongst the young and tbe 
 old, we may not hope to extinguish crime, which will 
 surge or subside according to circumstances, we are surely 
 bound to do what we can, that its evils may be mitigated 
 and its sphere contracted. We are yet far from the com- 
 plete development of a well-ordered system, in which punish- 
 ment shall be moderate, but certain — merciful, but adequate 
 and just — and which shall regard as its paramount object, the 
 safety of society through the prevention of offences, with- 
 out forgetting the mighty agency to that good end which 
 is supplied in the reformation of the criminal. But we 
 have made great and cheering progress. The work has been 
 well begun, and it will surely prosper. Meanwhile, wo 
 may address to those who can help it forward, in any of its 
 departments, the words of one of the great sages of our 
 law, who longed for reforms which the revolution of cen- 
 turies, since his day, has failed fully to accomplish — ^' The 
 consideration of preventing justice were worth}^ of the 
 wisdom of Parliament ; and, in the meantime, expert and 
 wise men to make preparation for the same. As the text 
 saith — ' lit henedicat els Domimis.' Blessed shall he be that 
 iayeth the first stone of the building, more blessed that pro- 
 ceeds with it, most of all that finisheth it, to the glory of 
 God and the honour of our Queen and nation." 
 
THE STUDY OF JTJEISPEUDENCE-EOMAN, 
 ENGLISH. AND CELTIC. 
 
The Study of Jttrisprtcdence — Roman, 
 English, and Celtic, 
 
 [In 1867 the Social Science Association met in Belfast, and the pro- 
 ceedings of its Section on " Jurisprudence " were opened hy the 
 Address which follows.] 
 
 NOT wifchout reason lias tlie Association^ wliich I have 
 the honour to address, placed the Science of Juris- 
 prudence foremost amongst the great subjects of social 
 interest. Whether we regard the foundations on which it 
 is established, the faculties it exercises, the knowledge it 
 exacts, or the influence it wields in the affairs of life and 
 the intercourse of nations, we shall not wonder that it was 
 described, by one of the wisest of men,^ as " the pride of 
 the human intellect, which, with all its defects, redund- 
 ancies, and errors, is the collected reason of ages, com- 
 bining the principles of original justice with the infinite 
 variety of human concerns/^ 
 
 Although it may not claim, for the purpose of our 
 inquiries, so large a range as the definition of the Institutes 
 would challenge for it, — ^^Divinarum atque humanarum 
 rerum notitia : justi atque injusti scientia,^^ — we know that 
 its culture lifts us to the highest regions of ethical specula- 
 tion ; and compels us to become familiar with the noblest 
 pages in the history of man, and the best achievements of 
 
 * Burke, 11., 134. 
 
50 The Study of Jtirispritdcnce — 
 
 his intellect. It makes us conversant with tlie practical 
 agencies wliicli shape our civil state, and the expediencies 
 needful to be regarded for its judicious government ; and 
 prepares us to adapt legislation to the shifting necessities of 
 the world, and the progressive development and ameliora- 
 tion of humanity. 
 
 ^^The Spirit of Law, the lute of Amphion, the harp of 
 Orpheus/^* which holds in harmony the atoms of the 
 material universe, pervades, as certainly, man^s moral being, 
 subordinating his liberty of will, without diminution of his 
 responsibility, to the accompHshment of God^s designs. 
 And the Science, which, for our social purposes, is its ex- 
 ponent and minister, should operate with living force, in 
 every field of human activity. 
 
 You have four various sections — of Education, and 
 Health, and Social Economy, and Trade — and in each of 
 them you deal w4tli matters of great importance ; but to 
 make the results of your inquiries fruitful of lasting profit, 
 you need, in all, the aid of the statesman, who must be a 
 jurist also, if he would be worthy of his high calling, that 
 by wise legislation he may maintain the settled order in 
 which progress grows, and give sanction, vitality, and 
 permanence to the inventions of genius and the schemes of 
 philanthrop}-. 
 
 Eecognising thus the importance of Jurisprudence, in 
 its wide and various relations with the w^orld's afiairs, 
 your Association has done rightly in making the recog- 
 nition prominent and impressive. Unfortunately, in the 
 cultivation of it, and of its great subdivisions of the 
 Natural Law, the Law of Nations, and the Municipal Law 
 of individual states, we, in these countries, lawyers and 
 laymen alike, have long been inferior to the learned of 
 
 * Coleridge, " The Friend," p. 106. 
 
Roviaii, English, and Celtic. 5 1 
 
 Continental nations. From the revival of letters until the 
 present hour^ those nations have produced an unbroken 
 series of ilkistrious jurist s_, and maintained legal schools of 
 world-wide renown. They have found in the Code, the 
 Pandects, and the Institutes of Rome, although not the 
 best safeguards for political liberty, the completest develop- 
 ment of the theory of civil justice ; and they have been led, 
 by the study of those immortal works, to deal with Law in 
 a philosophic spirit, to seek its origin in the principles of 
 morals and the nature and history of man, to find for it a 
 true scientific expression, and appreciate it as a consistent, 
 coherent and systematic whole. 
 
 On the other hand, since the time when the Barons 
 made their famous proclamation — Noluimts leges Anglice 
 mutari! — and the struggle began between the Civil and 
 the Common Law, the legal intellect of England has 
 been over -much concentrated on her own juridical in- 
 stitutions, based as they have been upon positive au- 
 thority, rather than on the foundations of theoretic prin- 
 ciple. They were built up, bit by bit, as decision 
 succeeded decision, upon the questions of the hour, with- 
 out reference to any view of integral construction, or any 
 nice proportion in the parts of the accumulating mass : 
 and thus — 
 
 Broadening down, from precedent to precedent, — 
 
 they grew into a vast and ponderous system, which, though 
 it may not have been "^ the perfection of reason,'' as its 
 idolaters have proclaimed it, was yet, in spite of many 
 l^lemishes, generally informed with the spirit of wisdom 
 and equity ; and had its advantage in securing some cer- 
 tainty of judicial action, by the assurance that recorded 
 judgments would be faithfully followed, on the recurrence 
 of the circumstances in which they had their origin. It 
 
 D 2 
 
52 The Study of Jurisprudence — 
 
 lacked tlie order and the clearness of a code, enunciating 
 general propositions, to be variously applied in special 
 instances ; but, at the same time, it bridled that licence of 
 decision which Lord Camden called ^^the law of tyrants,^^ 
 and claimed for itself some of the warmth of admiration 
 which Sir James Mackintosh * contemplated as the noblest 
 of spectacles, ^^ The cautious and unwearied exertions of 
 a succession of wise men through a long course of ages, 
 withdrawing every case from the dangerous power of dis- 
 cretion, and subjecting it to inflexible rules, extending the 
 dominion of justice and reason, and gradually contracting, 
 within the narrowest possible limits, the domain of brutal 
 force and arbitrary will.''^ 
 
 The honours and profits of professional success have not 
 been generally enhanced, in England or in Ireland, by 
 acquaintance with the works of foreign jurists, and the 
 records of legislation in other lands, — whilst it is effort 
 enough for a laborious life to approach a mastery of our 
 own laws and procedure. And thus it came to pass that, 
 though the faculties of our pleaders and conveyancers were 
 sharpened, to almost preternatural acuteness, and the case- 
 learning of the Bar was varied and profound, and it was con- 
 tinually adorned by advocates of great power and eloquence 
 — the range of legal thought, amongst us, was narrow ; the 
 general culture of the lawyer was thin and poor ; and ho 
 had no care for the learning which, elsewhere, was deemed 
 essential to the instructed members of his profession, 
 makincr them familiar with the labours of their fellows in 
 
 o 
 
 other times and nations ; and uniting them in a brother- 
 hood of endeavour and acquirement with the famous 
 magistrates and jurisconsults of Imperial Rome and 
 Modern Italy, of Holland, and Spain, and Germany, and 
 France. 
 
 * Woik^ I.. 381. 
 
Roiuan, English, and Celtic. 53 
 
 In this respect; as in so many others^ we are improving 
 our condition. The English Inns of Court have now their 
 professors of Civil Law, and the lectures and examinations 
 they have instituted direct attention to a far more liberal 
 course of studies, than was deemed sufficient for the legal 
 apprentice in my early days. In Ireland, also, we have 
 had such lectures and examinations on our own Law for a 
 considerable period, though the study of the Roman and 
 general Jurisprudence must still be pursued in collegiate 
 institutions. The programme of the new teaching for the 
 current year is very rich and various. We have made pro- 
 gress; but, to this hour, there is a startling difference 
 between these kingdoms and the Continent of Europe, in 
 the matter to which I have referred. Here, it has been 
 possible for an • able man to reach the topmost heights of 
 professional success, in reliance merely on his knowledge 
 of the doctrines and technicalities necessary to his ordinary 
 practice, though ignorant of the very names of the great 
 jurists of antiquity and later times, and holding in con- 
 tempt the Science to which those names gave lustre. 
 
 It behoves us to go on with the work we have well begun. 
 I would fain assist, however humbly, to advance it; and, 
 to that end, I shall briefly suggest some of the motives 
 which prompt to its vigorous prosecution, for the sake of 
 the future lawyers and statesmen of the Empire. I cannot 
 range through the wide field of legal education, and must 
 content myself with a glance at the importance of culti- 
 vating a knowledge of the general principles which should 
 underlie all legislative action, in their connexion, especially, 
 with the study of the Civil Law. 
 
 Although, as I have said, we have lagged behind others 
 in the liberal culture of Law as a Science, we have not been 
 without jurists to lessen that reproach, — few in number, but 
 
54 The Study of Jimsp7'iidence — 
 
 of signal eminence, — who have given example which may 
 well inspirit imitation. 
 
 Great men have been amongst us ; hands that penn'd 
 And tongues that utter'd wisdom, better none I 
 
 The labours of Romilly, and Mackintosh, and Brougham 
 should stir to honourable rivalry the best minds of the 
 generation which now reaps their ample fruit in a human- 
 ised criminal code; in the promptness and accessibility of 
 civil justice ; in the abolition of outworn fictions and cum- 
 brous and costly forms of procedure, and the gradual 
 harmonising of our entire legal system with sound reason 
 and true public policy. The name of Bentham, well 
 described as one of the seminal intellects of England, 
 whose best conceptions these men and others reduced to 
 action, in spite of all discouragement, need not fear com- 
 parison with that of any thinker of his age. I shall not 
 refer to the older works of More, of Selden, of Harrington, 
 and Locke. What has been done, within living memory, 
 by Austen and others, is suflScient to make further effort 
 feasible and hopeful. 
 
 We cannot expect that Jurisprudence should command 
 more than a comparatively moderate attention, save from 
 those whose special vocations, legal or political, put them 
 in close connexion with it, at this time of hot and bustling 
 progress, when it is so hard to keep up with the perennial 
 growth of a multitudinous literature. AVc shall not again 
 see, what Fortescue describes, the thronging of 2,000 filil 
 nohiles — the children of the gentle-folks of England — to 
 the Inns of Court and Chancery, to be indoctrinated in a 
 knowledge of the laws, as a part of their common edu- 
 cation ; but we may suggest to the student who would bo 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic. 55 
 
 more tlian a mere workman at the Bar^ and rise to tlie 
 proper level of his order^ that he will find_, in cultivating a 
 knowledge of the system which still_, more than all others^ 
 protects the interests and regulates the action of civilised 
 men throughout the world, a needful aid towards the true 
 appreciation of the law he designs to practise, and may be 
 called to administer. 
 
 Great English judges have pointed to the connexion of 
 the law of England with the Roman Jurisprudence. Lord 
 Holt speaks of it in a solemn judgment:* and we are in- 
 formed by Bishop Burnet that " Lord Hale often said the 
 true grounds and reasons of law were so well determined 
 in the (Roman) digest, that a man could never understand 
 law as a science so well as by seeking it there ; and^ there- 
 fore, lamented much that it was so little studied in Eng-- 
 land/^ t That Jurisprudence,, although it was worsted in 
 the contest with the Common Law, left its mark deeply on 
 English thought and the English judicature. Lord Bacon 
 says, somewhere, "Our laws are as mixed as our language ■''; 
 and, undoubtedly, during the Roman occupation of Britain, 
 for nearly five hundred years, the native views of justice 
 and its administration were interfused much with those 
 of the invaders. And, when the composite system, so 
 created, came afterwards to be shaped and expanded, the 
 early masters of it, — Fleta and Grianville, and eminently 
 Bracton, the great legal classic of England, — were versed 
 in that of Rome, and drew from it many a doctrine and 
 many a form of thought and speech. The early judges got 
 much of their wisdom there; and their decisions, so in- 
 spired, became part of the Common Law. The old inimical 
 principles ran thus into each other, and were, to a large 
 extent, indistinguishable in the stream of legal tradition 
 
 -- 12 Mod. 482. t Life, p. 7. 
 
56 TJic Study of Jurisprudence — - 
 
 and judicial resolution, as it moved downward, with ever- 
 gathering volume, from century to century. Still more 
 clearly and directly, the Eoman Code operated on the 
 action of the Courts of Equity and Admiralty, the Eccle- 
 siastical Courts and the Courts Martial, and, in all of 
 these, knowledge of it could not be dispensed with by 
 a practitioner who valued the accomplishments becoming 
 his position. Therefore, because of its connexion with the 
 laws of his own land, the study of the Jurisprudence of 
 Kome should be full of interest to the English and the 
 Irish student. 
 
 But, more than this, and beyond our need of the know- 
 ledge to be derived from it, as to the sources and the 
 doctrines of our ancient laws, the study of the Roman Code 
 — although it is not free from shortcomings and imper- 
 fections in definition, arrangement, and principle, — is 
 commended to us, as that of the most perfect scheme of 
 Jurisprudence which the wit of man has ever devised. It 
 was the creation of Imperial power; and it has too largel}^ 
 subserved the purposes of despotism. Our political rights 
 and liberties have another origin and other guarantees; 
 but, regarding it as a system of Civil Law, the greatest 
 thinkers of the modern world have exhausted all forms of 
 eulogy in describing its excellence. St. Augustine says 
 that '^ Providence made use of the Roman people to subdue 
 the Universe and govern it the better by their laws, after 
 their empire had been destroyed." Fortescue speaks of 
 the Civil Law as exalted by fame throughout the earth, 
 above all other laws; — ''Super Jmmanas- cunctas leges alias 
 fiima 2^^^^ orhem extoU'd gloriosa.^' Bacon approves Jus- 
 tinian's own description of his work, as '' a fitting and most 
 sacred temple dedicated to justice; — '' Proprium et sai-rctls- 
 slmiim tempjhnn jusfitice consecratumJ' The Chancellor 
 D'Aguesseau adopts the idea of the great Bishop of Hippo, 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic. 57 
 
 declaring that '^ the grand destinies of Kome are not yet 
 accomplished ; she reigns throughout the world by her 
 reason^ after having ceased to reign by her authority " : — 
 Non ratione imperii sed imperio rationis. And Gibbon calls 
 it "the fair and everlasting monument ^^ of the Emperor 
 whose name it bears. 
 
 The wonderful method which pervades the juridical 
 writings of the Eomans^, has been truly said to render them 
 models to all succeeding ages, and pre-eminently to fit them 
 for producing and developing the qualities of the mind 
 which are to form a Jurist ; * and it is surely of conse- 
 quence to us, whose scheme of law has been fashioned, as 
 I have said, from the accidental and undirected accretion 
 of decisions in particular cases, and can, therefore, have 
 very little of scientific accuracy or ordered arrangement, 
 to become acquainted with a system which is the highest 
 expression of science and order in the legislation of man- 
 kind. "I know of nothing,^^ says Leibnitz, "which ap- 
 proaches so near to the precision of geometry as the Koman 
 law.^' t ■^'^^ habits of method and precision we are bound 
 to cultivate, not more for the improvement of our mere 
 professional training, than for the creation of a better 
 practical statesmanship. 
 
 Consider the value of such habits even in the department 
 of Parliamentary conduct, which has to do with the pre- 
 paration of our Statutes. 
 
 We have had admirable Acts framed, from time to time 
 — by Mr. Brodie, by the present accomplished counsel to 
 the Home Ofiice, Mr. Thring, and by other competent 
 drauofhtsmen, — Acts in which each word has its value, and all 
 the clauses hang together, in clear logical depenaence and 
 
 ^- Falck. Jur. Enc, c. 2, s. 109. Austin's Lectures, III., 360. 
 t Op. lY., 254. 
 
58 The Study of Jurisprudence — 
 
 full harmony with each other. * But the Bills which are 
 ordinarily introduced into the Legislature are too often 
 inexact in their phraseology and slipshod in their frame ; 
 and when they have run the gauntlet of the Houses, and 
 been modified according to the crude notions of individual 
 members,, importing special clauses for particular objects, 
 without any reference to, or care for, their general scheme 
 and scope, they receive the assent of the Sovereign in a 
 condition of obscurity and confusion, puzzling to the judges 
 who must interpret them, fruitful of vexatious litigation, 
 and necessitating speedy and difiicult amendment. They 
 want the certainty and settled character which society 
 should claim, in the work of those to whom it delegates the 
 function of the Legislator. 
 
 In this respect, we have poorly profited by the teachings 
 of experience. Centuries ago, the Statutes of the English 
 Parliament had a lucid terseness which is wanting to those 
 of modern days, as any one may see who will study, in the 
 Statute of Uses, an a^lmost matchless piece of legislative 
 art, or compare the early Acts, copied by Mr. Froude, in 
 his history, with those of the last quarter of a century. 
 No doubt, the greater complication of affairs and interests 
 increases the difficulty of providing, with brevity and clear- 
 ness, for possible contingencies ; but the evil is far greater 
 than it need be, and, seeking for a remedy, we should look, 
 not merely to good English models, but to the examples of 
 consummate skill, in expression and arrangement, presented 
 by the Codes of antiquity and of some of the modern nations 
 which have been wise enough to imitate them. For, as 
 examples, they are admirable, not merely in their methodical 
 order, but also in their precise and compressed phraseology. 
 '^ The style of the Eoman lawyers,^' says Mr. Austin, " was 
 
 * Note A. 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic, 59 
 
 always simple and clear^ commonly brief and nervous. . . . 
 It bears tlie same relation to that of Blackstone and Gravina 
 which a Grecian statue bears to a milliner^s doll in the 
 finery of the season/^ * I should have been better pleased 
 if the scornful reference to our polished commentator had 
 been spared; but there can be no doubt that the inartistic 
 and bungling performances of many of our law-makers 
 would be much improved, if they could learn something of 
 the simple clearness and nervous brevity of the old Eoman 
 time. 
 
 The day is coming fast, when the body of our Law must 
 be digested, and reduced to the proportions of a simple 
 and manageable Code. The work effected for Eome when 
 Tribonian and his fellows digested such a Code from the 
 chaotic mass of judgments and ordinances, which is said to 
 have burthened many camels — the work which Bacon was 
 willing to undertake for England, in the midst of his mighty 
 labours — for which Eomilly pleaded, with persuasive elo- 
 quence — of which all thoughtful men have long appreciated 
 the importance, whilst they have felt the difficulty — that 
 work, I repeat, by some means, and in some fashion, must 
 at last be done. Its beginnings are prosperous, and its 
 completion is assured. What is, at this moment, in pro- 
 gress for our Indian empire, — what has been accomplished 
 so well in New York, for the English law — mainly through 
 the persisting devotedness and high ability of a distin- 
 guished jurist (Mr. Dudley Field), who has crossed the 
 Atlantic to honour this Congress with his presence — 
 cannot be incapable of imitation and extension in the 
 country which produced it. We have already consoHdated 
 our criminal legislation, and the success of the experiment 
 must urge to further effort in the same direction. And, if 
 
 * Lectures, III., 361. 
 
6o The Stiidy of Jurisprudence — 
 
 tliis be so^ and if an imminent duty of the time may prove 
 to be, the digest and the codification of our statutes and 
 reports, it behoves those on whom that duty may be cast 
 to look behind them and around them, and see what has 
 been achieved, in other times and countries, that they may 
 be guided to avoid mistakes, and obtain encouragement 
 and wise direction for the worthy completion of their 
 appointed task. 
 
 They will find that what remains to be done for us has 
 been efiected for many other nations. They will find, in 
 Bavaria, the oldest of the recent Codes ; in Prussia, the 
 Landrecht, which Savigny holds in the highest estimation ; 
 in Austria, the Gesetzbucb, originated by the genius of 
 Maria Theresa ; in Eussia, the Zakonow, the corpus juris 
 of that great empire, framed by continuing commissions 
 under successive sovereigns; and, in France, the Code 
 Kapoleon, not very complete and too hastily prepared, but 
 the purest, perhaps the only unstained, glory of the won- 
 derful man, whose boast was that he would go down to 
 posterity with that Code in his hand. They will see that 
 all these various systems have derived their animating 
 principles of equity and order largely from the Roman 
 precedents ; and that, even as to the last, though it rose 
 from the chaos of the Revolution, it owed to the training 
 and traditions of the French Bar, in the great days of the 
 Parliaments, when the study of the Civil Law was essential, 
 not only to the advocate, but to candidates for high public 
 office, the shape and substance which it ultimately took 
 through the learned toil of Cambaceres and Tronchet, 
 and Napoleon's keen intuition and energetic will. If the 
 business of the Digest or the Code is to be fitly done for 
 us, the ancient Jurisprudence and its emanations through- 
 out modern Europe must not be unknown to those who 
 undertake it. They will need large acquaintance with the 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic. 6 1 
 
 details of practice, enactments, and decisions ; but they 
 must also understand the Science of Law, and be trained 
 to apply it, by familiarity with its great creations. 
 
 But, further still, the knowledge of these things may be, 
 in the coming time, of value and significance in other ways. 
 We live in a period of transition. Many old things are 
 vanishing. We have seen political changes, which cannot 
 be barren of great results for evil or for good. Of these 
 results we have no sure prevision ; no man can pretend to 
 have it. But we may look confidently forward, sustained 
 and heartened by the teachings of political history, in which 
 we have so often seen gloomy anticipations falsified, and 
 unreal terrors turned to hope and joy. 
 
 The Future hides in it 
 Good hap and sorrow : 
 Still we go thorow : 
 Nought that abides in it 
 Daunting us, Onward 1 
 
 Though we cannot foresee the doings of the morrow, we 
 know that momentous interests need to be guarded, and 
 great social problems press for a solution ; and we shall do 
 well, if we learn to deal with them from that old experience 
 which is, indeed, ^' philosophy instructing by example.^' 
 We may so avoid the risks of empirical adventure ; and 
 enrich ourselves with wisdom, purchased by our fellow - 
 beings at a heavy cost. Our statesmanship will hereafter 
 be hardly tested in encountering the difficulties which attach 
 to the settlement of vexed questions, as to the relations of 
 property and labour and of the owners and occupiers of the 
 soil, as to the devolution of estates and the regulation of 
 inheritance, as to the education of the masses, the civil 
 establishment of religion, the limits and the means of 
 punishment and reformation; and upon these, and many 
 
62 TJic Study of Jurisprudence — 
 
 anotlier subject of weary controversy, assistance may be 
 bad from the results of buman tbougbt and effort as tbey 
 are noted, in tbeir varying pbases, by tbe legislation 
 whicb, tbrougliout tbe world, bas given to tbem a faitbful 
 and enduring record. 
 
 A knowledge of tbat legislation will enlarge tbe range 
 of our intellectual vision, beyond tbe limits sometimes pre- 
 scribed to it by insular isolation and insular conceit. It 
 will make us conversant witb tbe many forms of social life, 
 and tbe inventions and devices wbicb bave been applied, 
 tbrougb tbe course of ages, to clotbe tbat life witb order, 
 dignity, and comfort ; and it may tbus aid us to encounter, 
 witb prepared intelligence, tbe difficulties wbicb certainly 
 await us, and to mould our institutions, witb confidence 
 and safety, according to tbe varying exigencies of political 
 and commercial progress. 
 
 And, finally, I would say, tbat not onl}^ is tbe study of 
 Jurisprudence, in its largest sense, tbus useful in making 
 us more cognisant of tbe principles of our own Law, pre- 
 paring us to codify and digest it, providing tbe macbinery 
 and means of efficient legislation, and giving to public men 
 strengtb and insigbt to encounter tbe perplexities of tbeir 
 position, — it will be useful, also, witb reference to our inter- 
 national arrangements witb otber countries. In tbis spbere 
 of action, we are familiar witb strange events. Settled 
 doctrines and rules of conduct, wbicb were long sacred to 
 statesmen and diplomatists, bave fallen into desuetude. AV'e 
 bear no more of tbe old Balance of Power or tbe value of 
 Treaties, wbicb were once bold to be tbe essential basis of 
 tbe public law of Europe. Agencies, of wbicb our fatbers 
 never dreamt, bave wrougbt effects tbey must bave deemed 
 incredible. A seven days' campaign begins and ends a 
 migbty war, and eff*ects dynastic revolutions wbicb seven 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic. 63 
 
 years, or four times seven, on tlie same battle-grounds, 
 could not liave formerly accomplislied. The ocean bears 
 in its bosom tbe medium of instant communication between 
 the continents, which it invites to moral union, whilst it 
 holds them for ever in physical severance. The rail and 
 the telegraph bring all mankind together; and we begin 
 to doubt whether the " Federation of the World ^^ may not 
 prove more than the dream of a poet, when we see the 
 Sultan lunch with Queen Victoria, and share the loving cup 
 with the shopkeepers of London. 
 
 And whilst thus, as never before since the creation, the 
 earth spins forward, 
 
 Down the ringing grooves of change, — 
 
 International law must undergo modifications, and adapt 
 itself to the altered time. It will still subsist, and be con- 
 solidated and extended. Nations must retain a common 
 standard of judgment, — a common appeal to the reason and 
 conscience of the race. War must have its settled usages ; 
 embassies must enjoy their privileges; diplomacy must 
 continue to recognise the obligations of its canons and 
 traditions. And, besides, civilised states will feel an ever- 
 growing need of reciprocal protection for the interests of 
 commerce ; reciprocal enforcement of righteous laws ; re- 
 ciprocal security for the property which intellect creates; 
 reciprocal encouragement for the interchange of useful 
 thought and effort, and that mixing of tongues and peoples 
 which expands and strengthens the souls of men. The 
 want of these things, and things such as these, will more 
 and more compel the formation of a common Code — the 
 principles of which have already had wide though imperfect 
 recognition, — to regulate human intercourse ; and, for the 
 formation of it, they must seek assistance in that Science 
 which, by the authority of its teaching, has so largely com- 
 
64 The Study of J^irispriidence — 
 
 manded tlie respect of sovereigns^ and so often modified the 
 relations of their subjects. 
 
 Before I pass from this cursory indication of some of the 
 reasons for the culture of Jurisprudence, in a large and 
 liberal spirit, I would say a word of another, which addresses 
 itself peculiarly to the students of the Law. 
 
 The nobler education each man must give himself; and 
 with himself it rests whether he shall be a mere toiler at 
 the profitable drudgery of the Bar, or exalt and adorn his 
 position by enriching his intellect and improving his moral 
 nature. If he 
 
 Scorns delights, and lives laborious days, 
 
 he may secure the technical endowments which will win him 
 rank and wealth. But the mere leo'al trainincf which skives 
 acuteness to the mind sometimes contracts its powers and 
 abases its aspirations ; and, to counteract that evil tendency, 
 he should possess himself, in addition, of the larger intelli- 
 gence and the more generous spirit which come of extended 
 culture and liberal thought. 
 
 Lord Bacon has written words, which cannot too often be 
 repeated, in the preface to his " Maxims of the Law ^^ : — 
 '^ I hold every man a debtor to his profession ; from the 
 which as men, of course, do seek to receive countenance 
 and profit, so ought they to endeavour, themselves, by way 
 of amends, to be a help and ornament thereunto. This is 
 performed, in some degree, by the honest and liberal prac- 
 tice of a profession . . . but much more ... if a man bo 
 able to visit and strengthen the roots of the Science itself, 
 thereby not only gracing it in reputation and dignity, but 
 also amplifying it in perfection and substance.''^ * 
 
 The counsel is wise and generous, and should not be less 
 
 * Works, IV., 10. 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic. 65 
 
 approved because, by the payment of tlie debt, we sliall not 
 be impoverisbed, but rather advanced in prosperity and 
 honour. The Science by which Lord Bacon would have us 
 to help and ornament the practice of the Law, may not, as 
 I have said, be indispensable to the practitioner^s attain- 
 ment of lucrative employment or lofty station ; although, 
 even to this result, it may very much conduce. No man 
 need doubt that he will find profitable service for every 
 species of faculty and endowment, in the infinitely varied 
 exercises of that arduous vocation, which Dr. Johnson 
 admired, as applying '^the greatest powers of the under- 
 standing to the greatest number of facts. '^ But the Science 
 which may thus help the practice will do still more, in 
 giving grace and brilliancy to success, and qualifying its 
 possessor to transcend the bounds of mere forensic efi"ort, 
 and, according to his capacity and occasions, to make some 
 useful contribution towards the improvement of his fellow- 
 men. 
 
 The debtor to his profession is also a debtor to society; 
 and they who have most faithfully discharged the double 
 obligation have most commanded the reverence of man- 
 kind. Sir Thomas More was not the less a great Lord 
 Chancellor, because he proved himself also a prescient 
 jurist, anticipating, in dark and evil days, the estabhshment 
 of free representative institutions ; the reform of a merciless 
 criminal code ; the substitution of certainty for severity of 
 punishment; the recognition of the rights of conscience, 
 and the final triumph of Religious Liberty. Bacon did not 
 fear to match himself against Lord Coke^ as an athlete in 
 the narrow arena of the English law, because he had passed 
 beyond it to far larger spheres, and was, indeed, — 
 
 A man so various that he seem'd. to be 
 Not one, but all mankind's epitome ! 
 
 Lord Mansfield ruled the Bar of England for twenty 
 
 E 
 
66 TJic Study of Jurisprudence — 
 
 years witli at least as high a mastery as if he had not been 
 devoted to the cultivation of letters, and imbued with that 
 knowledge of the principles of the Jurisprudence of the 
 old and the modern world, which emancipated him from 
 superstitious reverence for the rigidity of the system of his 
 own country, and fitted him to win enduring fame as the 
 creator of our Commercial Code, and take his place, in the 
 esteem of intellectual Europe, with Grotius, Filangieri, and 
 D^Aguesseau. Sir Samuel Romill}^ would have given no 
 better service to his clients, if he had failed to keep abreast 
 with the current of literary progress, and strive, laboriously 
 and bravely, for the amendment of the law. And, if we 
 needed other illustration of the truth I labour to impress 
 by great examples, I might point to the eminent person to 
 whom our Association mainly owes its being,* as having 
 combined earnest devotion to his profession, and high 
 success in it, with a wide range of scientific and literary 
 acquisition, and an untiring endeavour for the advance- 
 ment of human happiness and freedom. AYe lament his 
 absence. We shall miss, in all our sections, his careful 
 supervision and his weighty words. But he will not be lost 
 to our grateful remembrance. We honour him not the less 
 because he is not here : — 
 
 Eo magis pra'fulgebat, quia non visebatur I 
 
 Thus far, in suggesting some of the considerations which 
 coaimend to us the study of historical and scientific eTuris- 
 ])rudence, I have dealt with a topic which might have been 
 discussed anywhere, by any of the distinguished men who 
 have held the place which I now occupy. And I have dealt 
 with it, as well because they have generally addressed them- 
 selves to other subjects,t as because this appeared to me 
 worthy of present attention, in aid of that ameudment of 
 
 ■•• Lord Brougham. t Note B. 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic. 7 
 
 legal education wliicli is lionourably characteristic of our 
 time. But it seems to me that^ as we are assembled liere 
 in Ireland, I should make some portion of my address ^''racy 
 of the soil/^ by speaking of matters which are not merely 
 important in relation to the general business of this section, 
 but have peculiar connexion wdth our own Law and Pro- 
 cedure. It is right that we should all, in turn, contribute 
 something special to the sum of the knowledge of our 
 friends, when they favour us, on occasions like this, by 
 comiug to our homes. 
 
 The question as to the assimilation of the law^s of England 
 and Ireland is, I observe, with great propriety, submitted 
 to our consideration. I cordially approve the applicatiou 
 of the principle, w^ienever it can be made, in fair consis- 
 tency with local needs and feelings. We should not assi- 
 milate merely for the purpose of assimilation ; but it is very 
 desirable that we should interchange good institutions, and 
 make our entire system of judicature as uniform and homo- 
 geneous as may be reasonably possible. AVith a view to 
 this desirable result, I mean to point to some noteworthy 
 portions of our legal system, which belong to us peculiarly, 
 and in which, to some extent, we have outrun the legislation 
 of England. 
 
 The formation of a general Kegister of Deeds and Assur- 
 ances has, for several centuries, occupied the attention of 
 English statesmen and lawyers. Its great necessity was 
 recognised by Parliament, so long ago as the year 1535 
 (27 H. yill., c. 6), and again, during the Chancellorship of 
 Lord Bacon, in 1617; but nothing came of the attempts, 
 abortively made, at both those periods. In 1703, a Register 
 was provided, by statute, for the county of York ; and, in 
 1708, a similar statute gave its Register to the county of 
 Middlesex. 
 
 Ko further provision of the kind was made for England. 
 
 E '1 
 
68 The Shtdy of Jurisprudence — 
 
 The seventeenth century passed. The want continued to 
 be acknowledged. Lord Hale^ and others of high 
 authority, recognised and lamented it ; but nothing was 
 done. In 1815 and 1816, Sir Samuel Eomilly and Sergeant 
 Onslow tried, severally, to induce the House of Commons 
 to approve of Bills for a general registration; and both 
 failed to carry their measures beyond a second reading. 
 Bepeated commissions have since given solemn considera- 
 tion to the subject, and produced elaborate reports. Re- 
 peated attempts were made, in the Houses of Lords and 
 Commons, by Lord Campbell, Lord Cranworth, Mr. 
 William Brougham, and others, to pass into law various 
 schemes which had high approval. But they were one and 
 all defeated. To this hour, England remains without any 
 general Register of Conveyances ; and the latest Commis- 
 sion which dealt with the matter, in 1857, preferred to such 
 a Register a Register of Titles. Legal opinion appears to 
 declare itself in favour of that preference ; and, perhaps,^ 
 for sufficient reasons, to which I cannot here advert. 
 
 Now, it is very remarkable that Ireland has possessed 
 such a Register since the sixth year of Queen Anne. It 
 was established by an Act of the Irish Parliament, passed 
 in that year " to secure purchasers, and prevent forgeries 
 and fraudulent gifts, &c.,'' which provided for that object, 
 by authorising the registry of deeds, and giving a subse- 
 quent conveyance, if registered, priority over a prior 
 conveyance, if unregistered. The Act directed the forma- 
 tion of a full official staff; and prescribed minutely the 
 formalities needful to be observed for validating the 
 registry. From the date of this Statute until the present 
 time, it has been in full and effective operation, modified by 
 various intermediate Acts, but unchanged in its essential 
 character ; and, upon the whole, working well and satis- 
 factorily for the security of purchasers and the prevention 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic, 69 
 
 of frauds. Some amendments in tlie system are required, 
 nnd would liave been accomplislied, three years ago, but for 
 difficulties with the Treasury. They have been considered 
 in an elaborate report by Mr. Lane, Q.C., and an able 
 paper by Colonel Roberts, and they can be easily carried 
 into effect. A Bill for the purpose was prepared, with 
 great skill and ability, by my friend, Mr. James McDonnell, 
 at my instance, when I was Attorney- General, and went 
 to a second reading, but no further. I trust the alterations 
 it designed may be soon effected. They are of great and 
 pressing necessity to Ireland. I am not here, however, 
 concerned with the details of the scheme, or its prospective 
 changes. I desire only to point to our registry office as an 
 Irish institution, which has supplied to us, for a century 
 and a half, a social want keenly felt for three hundred years 
 in England, and still existing there ; and to invite to it and 
 its machinery, the consideration of those who have intelli- 
 gent interest in the matter, and may profit, in the work of 
 assimilation, by our long experience. 
 
 We are not yet in a condition to judge how far the 
 Registration and Record of Title systems which were intro- 
 duced in the House of Commons, for England, by Lord 
 Cairns in 1859, and, for Ireland, by myself, in July, 1864, 
 in Bills which have since substantially become law, may 
 hereafter affect the operation and necessity of a Registration 
 of Assurances. The Irish measure applies only to cases in 
 which the Landed Estates Court has given a Parliamentary 
 Title; and does not extend to ordinary transactions of 
 purchase and incumbrance. By-and-by, I trust that its 
 operation may be enlarged, so as to assist still better in 
 making the transfer of land simple, cheap, and easy. I agree 
 with Mr. Mill in holding this to be '^ one of the greatest 
 economical improvements which could be bestowed on a 
 country ^' : — and especially, I will add, on a country like 
 
/O The Study of Jurisprudence — 
 
 Ireland, whicli so eminently needs tlie creation of a small, 
 independent proprietary, — an industrious middle class — 
 witli a settled interest in tlie soil, attaching them to the 
 maintenance of our laws and institutions. I am glad to be 
 able to say, that, although the Irish Act has been scarcely 
 twelve months in real working order, and in spite of the 
 peculiar difficulties, professional and other, which at first 
 obstruct endeavours to simplify and cheapen legal pro- 
 cedure, no less than two hundred and twelve properties 
 have already been completely registered under it, the value 
 of which, determined by the amount of the purchase-money, 
 is £657,074. This seems, in a high degree, satisfactory and 
 encouraging ; and the importance of the fact will justify the 
 small digression which has enabled me to mention it in con- 
 nexion with the registry of Assurances. If, in the course 
 of time, it be found possible to substitute for Registration 
 of Deeds a universal and complete Record of Title, so much 
 the better. But the question of that substitution is very 
 difficult, and may be long postponed; I do not stay to 
 discuss it ; and, in the meantime, our system has its value 
 for use, in Ireland, and for example, elsewhere. 
 
 Another legal institution in which the Parliament of 
 Ireland anticipated English progress, and which has still 
 some special qualities inviting imitation, is that of our 
 County Courts. The proceeding by English — afterwards 
 Civil — Bill for the recovery of small debts existed, in 
 Ireland, from an early period. It was originally enter- 
 tained by the Judges of Assize, and was regulated by 
 various Statutes, from the reign of George the First down- 
 wards. In the year 1796, the Irish Parliament, by an Act 
 (36 Geo. III., c. 25), after reciting, that 'Mt would contri- 
 bute much to the ease of the poor, whose causes principally 
 were tried by Civil Bills, and who were frequently brought 
 far from their homes and unavoidably kept for many days 
 
Roman^ English^ and Celtic, 71 
 
 at tlie assizes,, as parties or witnesses on sucli Civil Bills, 
 and sometimes at an expense exceeding the sum in contest, 
 if there should be more frequent opportunities of hearing 
 and determining causes by Civil Bill, within the several 
 counties of this kingdom/' created the oflBce of Assistant 
 Barrister, providing that he should be a lawyer of a certain 
 standing, appointed to aid and advise the Justices at 
 Quarter Sessions, and, at the same time, to hold a civil 
 court, of which he was constituted the sole judge, with a 
 specified jurisdiction, in cases of tort and contract. The 
 Sessions Court, so arranged, worked well and became 
 popular. The Assistant Barrister soon assumed the lead- 
 ing position in the despatch of Crown business, which his 
 training and knowledge qualified him to hold; and he is 
 now made, by Statute, the permanent Chairman of the 
 Justices. His Jurisdiction, as civil judge, has been greatly 
 extended, and a large proportion of the legal controversies 
 of the country come before his tribunal. 
 
 Thus, in the Irish Civil Bill Court, the English County 
 Courts found a model, existing for full half a century before 
 they were established, and operating with an efficiency 
 which they have fully emulated. The old local jurisdictions 
 of England, which were greatly favoured by the Common 
 Law, had become effete and generally useless for public 
 purposes; and the County Courts took their place in the 
 year 184(5. 
 
 It is remarkable that, in the Civil Bill procedure of 
 Ireland, we find the germ of that fusion of Law and 
 Equity, towards the consummation of which we are daily 
 advancing. The Civil Bill Court is a Court of Equity for 
 the defendant; and was so long before the Statute per- 
 mitted the pleading of equitable pleas in the Superior 
 Law Courts ; or armed them with the powers of injunction, 
 mandamus, and compulsory accounting, which enables the 
 
72 The Study of Jztrispritdencc — • 
 
 suitor^ sometimes with great advantage^ to dispense with the 
 intervention of a proceeding in Chancery. We are destined, 
 I have no doubt, to witness, more and more, that consoli- 
 dation of jurisdictions with w^hich our Scottish brethren are 
 famiUar, and which the experience of the American tribunals 
 seems to assure us may be safely, though cautiously, intro- 
 duced amongst us, for the more speedy and economical 
 decision of causes, and the removal of the reproach that, in 
 the same country, with the same subject matter separate 
 courts are required to deal, on different and sometimes con- 
 flicting principles. 
 
 I would add the expression of my opinion, that the 
 equitable jurisdiction which belongs to the Judge of the 
 English County Court, should be given, \vithin proper 
 limits, to the Irish Chairman of Quarter Sessions. It will 
 be well and wisely used; and, in many cases, it will prevent 
 the defeat of justice, which the impossibility of a poor 
 man^s access to the Court of Chancery sometimes makes 
 inevitable. 
 
 I do not presume to judge of the condition of the local 
 tribunals of England ; but, certainly, our Irish ascertain- 
 ment of the value of a skilled, capable, and independent 
 lawyer, in directing and controlling criminal trials at Ses- 
 sions, is not unw^orthy the consideration of those who have 
 not had the advantage of the services of such a functionary. 
 And our experience in this respect, may, perhaps, lead us 
 hereafter to raise the question, whether those services might 
 not be more efficiently bestow^ed on circuits travelled, as at 
 Assizes, by changing Judges, with a diminished probability 
 of the undue exercise of local influence, and without the 
 intervention of those who, having been mixed up, minis- 
 terially, with the initiative of criminal proceedings, in con- 
 ducting preliminary inquiries, may not always find it 
 possible to preside, at the close oi them, with that absence 
 
Roman y English, and Celtic. 73 
 
 of pre-conception and foregone conclusion^ which is essen- 
 tial to the complete integrity of judicial action ? 
 
 I was surprised^ when I had the pleasure of meeting this 
 Association in Dublin, in 1861, to hear that a very distin- 
 guished visitor from England — a man equally eminent in 
 law and letters — declared he had never known of our 
 possession of a system of public prosecution in Ireland. 
 It was an illustration of the truth, that some of the people 
 of these kingdoms are better acquainted with the customs 
 of ancient tribes and the doings of foreign nations, than 
 with the condition of their own fellow subjects, to whom, 
 though divided from them by a narrow channel, they are 
 bound by identity of language, intelligence, and interest, 
 making it their common duty and manifest advantage to 
 cultivate that knowledge of each other, which, among 
 civilised men, breeds kindly feeling and stimulates to 
 mutual service. 
 
 We have, in fact, had a Public Prosecutor for a very 
 lengthened period. The Attorney-General of the time dis- 
 charges the duties of the office; and he is assisted by a 
 large staff of counsel and attorneys, who act under his 
 control, at the Commission Court in Dublin, the Assize 
 Courts, and the Courts of Quarter Sessions. The more im- 
 portant criminal cases are all submitted to him, in the first 
 instance, that he may consider as to the propriety of pro- 
 ceeding with them, and give such directions as he may 
 deem proper. And only when he declines to prosecute, 
 are private persons allowed to intervene. Ev^en so, he 
 retains his right to prevent them from proceeding, by 
 entering, at his discretion, a nolle iJroseq_ui on any indict- 
 ment they may be permitted to prefer. These are the 
 general outlines of our system, on the details of which, of 
 course, I do not enter. It is capable of much improve- 
 ment ; but, upon the whole, it works efficiently, for the 
 
74 The Study of Jurispr'tidencc — 
 
 accomplisliment of impartial justice, and to the general 
 satisfaction of the community. 
 
 This is another of the singular instances in which Ireland 
 has outstripped her more favoured sister. England has no 
 public prosecutor. The Attorney- General^ save in cases in 
 which he is specially engaged^ has nothing to do with the 
 management of criminal trials. The duty of prosecution is 
 cast upon the injured ; and the Executive Government does 
 not charge itself with the responsibility of prompting them 
 to activity, restraining their excesses or assisting them to 
 secure just and reasonable convictions. ^' The most exalted 
 functions of the Crown, and the most sacred rights of the 
 subject, are left to the discretion of attorneys and police- 
 men.^^ These strong words are not mine. They were spoken 
 by Mr. Phillimore, when he introduced into Parliament a 
 Bill to supply the want which he so earnestly deplored. 
 
 And this condition of things is allowed to continue, 
 although the appointment of a Public Prosecutor has been 
 urged for many years, by the best and wisest men in 
 England — including her three last Chief Justices, — and has 
 had the emphatic sanction of a Eoyal Commission, in 1844, 
 and a Parhamentary Committee, in 1850. 
 
 I know that the principle of action involved in such an 
 appointment has been, more or less, the subject of contro- 
 versy. I have, myself, been obliged, in the House of 
 Commons, to defend the Irish practice against an able 
 Anglo-Irish friend of mine ; but it seems to me very plain 
 that that practice, at least in its general scheme and opera- 
 tion, is worthy the best attention of jurists in England, 
 with a view to its absolute or modified adoption there. 
 
 The supreme law of social safety is the warrant, as it 
 should be the bounding measure, of the infliction of punish- 
 ment, by man on man. That infliction is not designed to 
 compensate for individual wrong, or satisfy individual vcn- 
 
Roman, E^iglish, and Celtic. 75 
 
 geaiice. The ''Mex talionis ^' of the Hebrews is obsolete; 
 and we hold in horror the Southern "vendetta," and the 
 ^^ deadly feud ^^ of the North. "We punisli crime, that we 
 may prevent the repetition of it, and work the amend- 
 ment of the criminal. Vindictive iustice does not belono' 
 to human law. It cannot penetrate the depths of the soul ; 
 and gauge the wortli of actions by reaching their hidden 
 springs, in the tangled motives and the various training, 
 which make men what they are. It must be guided, in its 
 conflict with fraud and violence, mainly by a regard for the 
 results to the community which requires protection, and 
 to the offender who needs reform. 
 
 Such are the principles which, in my judgment, should 
 govern all penal jurisprudence. They are recognised by 
 our ancient law,, which institutes prosecutions universally in 
 the name of the Sovereign, as the representative of out- 
 raged society ; and makes the accused responsible, not to 
 his accuser, but to the State. 
 
 The course of our criminal procedure, pursued in the 
 light of these principles, should be stately, calm, and 
 passionless. The prosecutor should act in a judicial spirit. 
 He should be impregnable to any influence of fear or 
 favour. He should labour to discover truth and do justice, 
 without any wavering from the clear line of duty, to undue 
 pressure on the one side, or imbecile tenderness on the 
 other. He should be conscious of his great responsibility 
 in dealing with the interests of liberty and life ; and beware, 
 whilst he deals with them, of displaying temper, or indulg- 
 ing self-will, or making those sacred interests the subject of 
 an unseemly wrangle for forensic victory. 
 
 Such conduct of criminal causes the public prosecutor 
 can secure ; but, if they be committed to the management 
 of individuals — who may be poor, or corrupt, or revenge- 
 ful — it will be sought in vain. The poor man may not have 
 
76 The Study of Jitrisprudence — 
 
 the time or the means to prosecute effectually. The corrupt 
 man will compromise with his adversary. The revengeful 
 man will violate honour and falsify fact^ to glut his ma- 
 lignant hatred. And so, the law will not be enforced at all, 
 or enforced unjustly. Surely, the system under which such 
 results are possible is a reproach to the great country which 
 has so long endured it ; and almost deserves the condemna- 
 tion pronounced on it in the speech to which I have already 
 adverted, as ^^ unwise, preposterous, and indecent/^ 
 
 I have ventured to invite notice to our Irish practice, in 
 this respect, as furnishing a safe and well-tried model for 
 imitation ; and it is not less worthy of that notice, because 
 a practice, in many respects similar, has long prevailed 
 in Scotland, with great public advantage. Ours may, 
 perhaps, have more adaptation to England, from the 
 substantial identity of the English and Irish criminal law ; 
 but it might profitably be modified by the adoption of 
 something like the Scotch machinery of the Procurator 
 Fiscal's office, for the conduct of the early stages of penal 
 procedure. We rely too much upon the Coroner : he is 
 an ancient and venerable officer, but ^'' crowner's quest 
 law ^^ has been ever in disrepute ; and my experience is, 
 that the preliminary investigations, which he institutes in 
 this country, tend often and in various ways to the 
 ultimate defeat of justice. I have no time to discuss the 
 grounds of this opinion. I do not mean to extend it to the 
 disparagement of many of the functions of the Coroner, 
 with which I have nothing* here to do ; but, lauding our 
 Irish practice, I think it right to qualify my commendation, 
 by indicating the improvement which it may usefully derive 
 from the example of Scotland. 
 
 Another Irish institution I cannot pass without a word, 
 in this hurried reference to those which peculiarly belong 
 to us. The calamity which swept myriads of our people 
 
Rojuan, English, and Celtic . yy 
 
 from the earthy in 1847 and 1848, whilst it filled the 
 country with mourning and desolation, was made, by that 
 Providence which draws the ^^soul of goodness ^^ from evil 
 things, fruitful of vast results. It precipitated the progress 
 of events, compelled statesmanship to action through the 
 teaching of a terrible necessity, and aided in securing 
 commercial freedom for the empire and the world. To that 
 great achievement, Ireland gave her help, although to 
 herself its immediate consequences — affecting rudely a dis- 
 eased society and a defective land system — were not likely 
 to be beneficial. She strove for true prmciples, and the 
 cause of universal progress, and not for profit to herself. 
 
 That was one great collateral result of the dread Irish 
 famine. Another was the establishment of the Incumbered 
 Estates Court, which wrought essential public good, at the 
 expense of much individual loss and suffering; removed 
 an insolvent proprietary, with which true national progress 
 was incompatible; and prepared the way for a sounder 
 state of things. That temporary tribunal has grown into 
 permanence, with extended j)Owers, and continues to confer 
 upon us many benefits, — cheapening conveyances, facili- 
 tating the disposal of estates and making titles clear and 
 indefeasible; and so, in connexion with the recording 
 scheme of which I have already spoken, preparing for a 
 gradual distribution of landed property more largely 
 amongst the occupants of the soil, which w411 yet conduce, 
 with other influences, to give tranquil order, industrial 
 energy, and a hopeful future to the Irish people. 
 
 Something has been done in the same direction for 
 England. Lord Cairns endeavoured, in 1859, to establish, 
 for her, also, a Landed Estates Court ; but his Bill was not 
 passed, and subsequent legislation has not reached the 
 point at which he aimed. It seems desirable, that the 
 success of the Irish experiment should secure its effective 
 
7 8 The Study of Jurispmidence — - 
 
 repetition. England, also, needs the disencumbering of 
 embarrassed properties, tlie clearing of complicated titles, 
 and the relief of the land from the feudal fetters and the 
 ponderous conveyancing', which impede its free transfer. 
 And she, as well as Ireland, will find safety and profit in a 
 change, which, healthily diffusing small estates amongst 
 multitudes of honest purchasers, may, more or less, antago- 
 nise the growing tendency to excessive territorial accumu- 
 lation in few hands, and close the widening chasm which 
 separates great wealtli from toil and poverty, with possible 
 results of serious interest to the thoughtful student of the 
 history of the decline of empires. 
 
 I have no space to speak of one of the most remarkable 
 of our special institutions — the Irish Convict system. Nor 
 is this needful. It has gained the applause of Europe ; 
 and obtains continually larger and more cordial acceptance, 
 in England. Its great principles of individualised discipline 
 during imprisonment, progressive reformation through the 
 varying stages of it, and protective supervision at the close, 
 are working, everywhere, the best results. And I am glad 
 to learn that the Irish Refug-e for fallen women finds itself 
 reproduced in the great English towns. I shall say no 
 more of assimilation, in this respect, especially as the 
 subject will be more fitly considered in another section ; 
 but, feeling strongly its importance, I would repeat the 
 statement of an opinion which I uttered before, at our 
 Dublin meeting, — that the entire of the prison arrange- 
 ments of Ireland should be conducted on the same prin- 
 ciple and controlled by the same authority. The reasons 
 for amalgamating the county and the convict systems are 
 patent in the increased economy, eJSiciency, and complete- 
 ness which the amalgamation would certainly afford ; and 
 we are encouraged to attempt it promptly, by the wonder- 
 ful diminution of offences, which is a fortunate charac- 
 
RoniaUy English, and Celtic. 79 
 
 teristic of our social state. Our gaols are comparatively 
 empty. We may easily bring them under one central 
 government^ and so approach, a solution of a much- vexed 
 problem. The circumstances of Ireland were especiallj- 
 favourable for the great experiment of the convict system. 
 They are no less favourable for testing the possibihty^ and 
 discovering the means,, of establishing a general uniformity 
 in prison discipline. 
 
 There are other portions of our Irish law and procedure 
 to which I would willingly advert^ as illustrating our 
 national progress, and suggestive, in some respects, of 
 beneficial assimilation, e.g., our Bankruptcy Code, and our 
 Resident Magistracy and Police ; but I must forbear 
 further trespass on your patience. I shall only say, as to 
 our Court of Bankruptc}^, that, in the very confused and 
 unsettled condition of the English system, it may not be 
 unworthy of intelligent examination. The Act of 1857, 
 by which it was established, was prepared, with great care 
 and labour, by a combiuation of the best legal capacity and 
 the largest mercantile experience of this countr}'. It has 
 worked, ever since, satisfactorily for our local interests; 
 and, though it may be improved, especially by an extension 
 of jurisdiction, according to the English plan, to the affairs 
 of the non-trading classes, great caution should be used in 
 accommodating it to that plan, so far as such a change 
 would alter the action of the Ofiicial Assignee and the 
 regulation of the Traders^ arrangements, which have been 
 proved to suit the circumstances, and satisfy the wants, of 
 the commerce of Ireland. 
 
 I have left myself no time, even if I had the disposition, 
 to discuss, at any leugth, the legislation of the past Session, 
 and its bearings on the special subjects of our inquiries 
 here, according to the example of some of my predecessors. 
 But, in truth, I do not res^ret that it is so. Save in one 
 
8o The Study of Jttrispj'iidence — 
 
 great Act, that legislation lias Lad no very remarkable 
 results. The mighty birth of the Reform Bill — of good or 
 evil portent as men variously regard it_, and time may shape 
 its unseen issues — exhausted the forces of the labouring 
 Parliament, and left it barren of other fruit. Bankruptcy 
 Reform has made no progress ; the Criminal Law is nearly 
 as it was, with some little change as to the costs of prose- 
 cutions ; the Law of Evidence has had no improvement ; 
 the Extradition Act has not been mentioned in the House 
 of Commons ; and the guards against electoral corruption 
 which may be found desirable, when milHonaires come to 
 operate on the enfranchised masses, remain to be devised. 
 New laws affect the relations of master and servant, the 
 conduct of auctions, the jurisdiction of the English 
 Admiralty, and some other things of local and personal 
 importance, but without much general interest. Ireland 
 has, at last, had the system of her Court of Chancery 
 assimilated to that of the English Court ; and her Court of 
 Admiralty fashioned, also, according to Enghsh precedent, 
 — relieved of its exclusive character, opened to the whole 
 profession, and endowed with larger powers and greater 
 facilities of profitable action. With our progress in these 
 instances, and in others, we have every reason to be 
 gratified. 
 
 The revision of the English Statute Law proceeds with 
 vigour and success, and has been advanced, in the past 
 Session, by the publication of, perhaps, the longest Act 
 which ever went through Parliament. 
 
 I lament that this needful work has not yet been effec- 
 tually begun for Ireland. Competent lawyers, I am aware, 
 have proceeded a considerable way in the revision of the 
 Ante-Union Statutes ; but their labours have not seen the 
 light, and no portion of them has received the sanction of 
 the Legislature. In this matter, there should be no more 
 
Ro7naii, English, and Celtic. 8 1 
 
 delay. The IrisTi revision should proceed, "pari passu, with 
 the English. The want is as great in the one case as in the 
 other ; and_, in both, quick progress is indispensable. 
 
 Speaking thus, with regret, of the delay in the revision 
 of our Statute-Book, on the other hand, I am glad to be 
 able to congratulate you on the successful commencement 
 of the publication of the ancient Laws of Ireland. Many 
 whom I address may not be aware that, in the year 1852, 
 a Commission was charged with the duty of procuring the 
 transcription and translation of those Laws. So long ago 
 as 1782, Edmund Burke conferred upon his native country 
 one of the many benefits for which we owe gratitude to 
 that great Irishman, by obtaining for the library of Trinity 
 College the Seab right MSS., collected originally by Mr. 
 Lhwyd, and urging that the originals should be published, 
 with a literal translation into Latin or English. Time 
 passed ; and only at the end of sevent^^ years was the work 
 which he contemplated really begun. The Commissioners 
 were very fortunate in securing the services of Eugene 
 O^Curry and John O'Donovan, who combined, with original 
 knowledge of the Irish tongue, a sound training in Celtic 
 scholarship under Dr. Petrie, in the offices of the Ordnance 
 Survey. Their task was one of infinite labour and difficulty. 
 It was deemed almost impossible of performance by Charles 
 OTonor, of Belanagare, and other competent Irish linguists 
 of the last century. But they pursued it steadily; and had 
 brought it almost to completion, when they were taken from 
 us, in the prime of their rare faculties, leaving none behind 
 accomplished like themselves. They had transcribed all 
 the legal MSS. in Irish, existing within these kingdoms 
 in seventeen large volumes, and they had executed trans- 
 lations filling twenty-five — twelve by Dr. O'Donovan, 
 and thirteen by Professor 0' Curry. Since they died, we 
 
 F 
 
82 The Study of Jurisp7^udence — - 
 
 have received the first fruits of tlieir great labour in the 
 publication of the Senclms Mor, or '^ Great Law Compila- 
 tion," as O'Curry translates the title,* which deals with the 
 Irish procedure by Athgabhail or Distress. It is of equal 
 interest to the jurist and the historian. 
 
 The Brehon Code had prevailed in Ireland for ages before 
 the coming of St. Patrick. Like our Common Law, it was 
 not composed of written statutes, but of the decisions of 
 the Brehons — the judges of the land at that remote period ; 
 and when the people had been brought within the Christian 
 fold, we learn that the Apostle of Ireland did for them a 
 service like that which the Roman emperors effected for the 
 world, shortly before and after the same period. In the 
 middle of the fifth century, at his instance, with the aid of 
 native chiefs and learned persons, the ancient judgments 
 were reduced to order. Their Pagan character was taken 
 from them, and they were adapted to the uses of a Christian 
 nation. The introduction to the Senchusf tells us : — " What 
 did not clash with the Word of God in the written law and 
 the New Testament, and with the consciences of the be- 
 lievers, was confirmed in the laws of the Brehons by Patrick, 
 and by the ecclesiastics and chieftains of Erin ; for the law 
 of nature had been right, except as to the Faith and its 
 obligations and the harmony of the Church and People. 
 And this is the Senchus.'" It seems a little startling to 
 contemplate St. Patrick in the character of a Law Reformer 
 and the framer of a Code ; but the evidence that the 
 Senchus Mor was formed in his time and under his direc- 
 tion is very persuasive. It bore, through many ages, the 
 title of '^ Cain Patraic," or Patrick^s Law ; and Professor 
 O'Curry, whose opinion on such a point is of high authority, 
 declares his belief ^' that the recorded account of this great 
 
 * Lectures, 17. f Senchus Islow, 17. 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic. 83 
 
 revision of tlie body of the laws of Erin is as fully entitled 
 to confidence as any otlier well-autlienticated fact in ancient 
 history/^ * 
 
 For more than a thousand years this Brehon Code 
 settled the social relations and governed the conduct of 
 the Irish people. Not until the reign of James I., had 
 the English Law supremacy in Ireland. Not until 1619, 
 did the use of Irish cease in legal writings_, as we gather 
 from a most curious collection of deeds, agreements, awards, 
 bonds, and other specimens of conveyancing, in the native 
 language, published by the late Mr. Hardiman, in the 
 Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy. f The old Brehon 
 system, reaching back into remote antiquity, thus operated 
 as a living power down till comparatively recent times; 
 and it is worthy of our careful study, not only as exhibiting 
 much of the character and institutions of a nation whose his- 
 tory remains to be written, but, also, in its connexion with the 
 origin and peculiarities of the early Jurisprudence of Britain 
 and all the Celtic tribes. The volume which has appeared, 
 and the others which will, I trust, rapidly follow it, J con- 
 tain most minute and detailed provisions. They are full of 
 indications as to the arts and manufactures and commercial 
 transactions of ancient Ireland. They prescribe the duties 
 and the relations of the prince, the judge, the advocate, the 
 chieftain, the farmer, and all manner of persons. They 
 manifest the principles and peculiar notions which guided 
 the Irish in their dealings with the land, and which, to this 
 hour, have not ceased to operate, through dim tradition, on 
 our actual state. They answer conclusively, by their com- 
 plicated and precise arrangements for the prevention of 
 wrong and the doing of justice, the ignorant misrepresenta- 
 tions which have long been current in English historical 
 
 '^ O'Curry's Lectures, p. 17. t Aiiti-iuities, vol. xv., ^. i. 
 
 X Note C. 
 
84 TJie Study of Jiirisprtidence — 
 
 literature, representing the old Irisb. Celt as ^^ dwelling 
 in wattled hovels and turf-built sheeUngs;''* '^without 
 clerks, registries, or records/^ t They present a picture, 
 far more reliable than can be found in the meagre and 
 fable-clouded tales of ancient chronicles, of Celtic law 
 and life in the distant, — even the pre-historic, — times 
 from which we, certainly, derive these venerable Insti- 
 tutes. 
 
 My friend, Dr. Ferguson, J has published an admirable 
 paper, full of ingenuity and suggestiveness, " On the rudi- 
 ments of the Common Law, discoverable in the published 
 portions of the Senchus Mor ! ^^ § and I have no doubt that 
 speculations and researches such as his, in reference to the 
 entire body of the Brehon Code, w^ill be productive of very 
 rich results. 
 
 To the study of that ancient system which, for so many 
 ages, held sway in Ireland, some of us, children of the soil, 
 will be attracted, as by ^' ancestral voices ^^ from the buried 
 past. And for all the learned of Europe, who have interest 
 in the history of Jurisprudence and the archa3ology of Law, 
 it must be the subject of intelligent curiosity and careful 
 investigation. I can say no more of it here; but, having 
 said so much, I should be untrue to my own feelings and 
 convictions if I did not seize the occasion to add the ex- 
 pression of my great regret, that an end has been put to 
 the study of the Irish language in those hospitable halls 
 which are opening to receive us.|| You will find in them the 
 amplest appliances for scientific and literary teaching; but, 
 amongst their accomplished professors, there is not one 
 to give instruction in the ancient tongue, which is still 
 
 * Pal,L,'riive. t Cox. X Now Sir Samuel Forjjnson. 
 
 § Trans. R. I. Academy, xxiv. p. 83. 
 II The Queen's Colleoe, Belfast. 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic. 85 
 
 sounding, witli melodious sweetness and expressive power, 
 amongst tlie glens and mountains of the fair county in 
 which we are assembled. There is not one to help in 
 training future O'Currys and O'Donovans ; so that the 
 remnants of our old literature, scattered in mouldering 
 manuscripts through the libraries of Europe — from Copen- 
 hagen to the Vatican — may be saved from destruction, — as 
 these Brehon Laws have been, — and made available for the 
 honour of Ireland, and the benefit of the world. When 
 the Queen^s Colleges were established, each of them had a 
 small endowment for a professorship of Irish. In two of 
 them, that endowment has been diverted to other purposes, 
 and the professorships are abolished. As to the third, the 
 same course is contemplated. 
 
 The time was strangely chosen for this questionable act, 
 when Englishmen, such as Mr. Mathew Arnold and Pro- 
 fessor Morley, are labouring, with generous enthusiasm, to 
 assert the dignity, and celebrate the achievements, of the 
 Celtic race ; when Germany produces an unmatched Irish 
 grammar, and Continental scholars, recognising the wisdom 
 of the counsel of Leibnitz,* who urged the cultivation of 
 the Irish language — Lingiue Hiheriticce — for the general 
 purposes of European literature, find, in the pursuit of 
 Celtic studies, the necessary and efficient means of ad- 
 vancing ethnological and philological inquiry. 
 
 Irishmen have been too justly reproached as " Incuriosi 
 suoriim" ; but that reproach should not have found con- 
 firmation in a change so needless, so injurious, so little in 
 harmony with the spirit of a self-respecting people, and the 
 tendency of cultivated thought, throughout the world. I 
 trust that the publication of the Brehon Laws, and the 
 attention it must attract to Celtic Literature and Juris- 
 
 * Op. iv. 131. Note D. 
 
86 The Study of Ju7'isp7'udence — 
 
 prudence, may contribute to make plain, and undo quickly, 
 the mischief of this retrogressive step. 
 
 One necessary word before I close. I would not be mis- 
 conceived. I have stated my approval of the principle of 
 assimilation, when applied on certain conditions and within 
 certain hmits ; and I have sought to show that Ireland has 
 some special institutions, which should be held in view for 
 the purpose of its application in other portions of the United 
 Kingdom. But, by assimilation, I do not mean absorption. 
 I do not regard identity of laws as involving unity of ad- 
 ministration. I confess my intolerance of schemes which 
 have been advocated, even by Irishmen, for imperialising 
 our Irish tribunals; attracting our Bar to English Courts; 
 disposing of great Irish causes there ; leaving to us narrow 
 jurisdictions and a debased profession; and making the 
 capital of England the legal metropolis of Ireland also. If 
 results, like these, were to follow assimilation of the legal 
 systems of the two countries, I should lament it as a grave 
 calamity. Ireland and Scotland, too, have suffered enough 
 from the action of excessive centralisation. They both endure 
 many of the inevitable evils of a provincial state. They 
 both have plain interest in resisting the further progress of 
 those evils ; and they can best resist it, by maintaining such 
 local institutions as may counteract the tendency of the 
 elements of national life to withdraw themselves from the 
 extremities of an empire, and gather at the centre of power 
 and wealth, where success is worth the trouble of achieve- 
 ment and merit is sure to seek distinction and reward. 
 
 We should labour, in all proper cases, to assimilate the 
 laws of the three kingdoms, giving, for that purpose, from 
 every district, what light and help we can reciprocally fur- 
 nish ; but we must maintain, for all, the integrity of their 
 independent judicatures, in the assurance that they will 
 
Roman ^ English^ and Celtic. Z'j 
 
 not less enjoy the benefits of a common Code, if it do not 
 aim to subordinate any one to any other of them, or unduly 
 exalt a part, at the expense of exhaustion and depression to 
 the rest. On this matter I can speak freely, as I speak 
 without personal interest. In my position, men bid fare- 
 well, not always joyously, to hope and fortune ; and I am 
 not conscious of self-seeking or any indirectness when I 
 conclude with the warning counsel, that for Ireland, at 
 least, it is essential to maintain a high Judiciary and an 
 educated Bar, if she would preserve the informed opinion, 
 the productive energy, and the public spirit without which 
 a People stagnates and sinks into contempt. 
 
 NO TE S 
 
 Note A. — p. 58. 
 
 Perhaps the highest instance of skill and success, in this respect, which 
 modern times have produced is the Act for the Abolition of Fines and 
 Eecoveries, framed, as is well known, by the late Mr. Brodie. He had 
 to deal with a vast and complicated system originating in a judicial 
 device for disposing of entailed land, and based upon legal fictions and 
 obsolete modes of procedure : a system, which, for centuries, had afi"orded 
 the only means of unfettering settled estates, or conveying the property 
 of married women, and which had become so inveterately embedded in 
 the whole structure of our real property law, that some of the greatest 
 lawyers believed that the utmost which could be done was to strip it of 
 some useless forms and technicalities, leaving the principle of its working 
 nntouched. To abrogate it entirely they conceived to be impossible, and 
 dangerous, if possible. Yet this has been done by the Act to which I 
 refer, and a new method, simple, rational, and adapted to modern ideas 
 substituted ; not with the rashness of sloth, but with a perfect prevision 
 
SS The St2tdy of Jitrispriidence — 
 
 in detail of the objects to Idc effected and the difficulties to be overcome : 
 —and this, in such clear legal language and with such thoroughness and 
 completeness, as scarcely to have left a difficulty for litigation to resolve. 
 The Succession Duty Act prepared by Mr. King presents another con- 
 spicuous instance of skill in drafting. 
 
 Note B.— p. GG. 
 
 I would reproduce, as giving weight and authority to the suggestions 
 of my address, the following words spoken at a former meeting of the 
 Social Science Association, by one whose opinions must command the 
 respect which is due to the greatest judicial eminence, and the highest 
 and purest personal character: — "I wi^h to see an enlarged view of 
 jurisprudence existing in this country. I am told often, ' Look at Lord 
 Mansfield.' He was, no doubt, a man of large views ; but he came here 
 from that country where the Roman civil law is in force, and is the 
 principal basis of their judicial system, with which he was, no doubt, 
 thoroughly acquainted. Sir William Grant and Lord Brougham, and 
 many others, have also, doubtless, acquired for themselves a sound and 
 enlarged knowledge of the civil law. But look at the many who never 
 acquired anything of the kind. I take shame to myself in saying, that 
 almost up to the time that I was placed upon the bench— because the 
 moment you enter into Parliament or public life you have no leisure for 
 such studies— almost up to the time of my being on the bench, I was- 
 singularly behind hand in my knowledge of jurisprudence, compared 
 with what every sound lawyer should be. You want an accomplished 
 class of jurists such as exists on the Continent, not in order that we- 
 should adopt the laws which prevail in other countries, less free than our 
 own, but to enable us, at least, to take an enlarged view of our own law — 
 to see where general views are applicable to our own particular purpose, 
 and, in other words, never to attempt legislation, until we are convinced 
 and decided in our own minds of the general principles on which legisla- 
 tion should proceed." — Addrc&s on Jurisprudcuce, by Yice-Chancellor 
 Sir W. P. Wood, delivered before the Social Science Association at 
 Bradford. Transactions for 1859, p. 73. 
 
 Note C— p. 83. 
 
 The Commissioners, in their Third Report (16th January, 1861), p. 5>. 
 say that they have decided on completing the publication of the Senchus 
 ;Mor ; but, as to the residue of the ancient laws of Ireland, " the nature 
 
Roman, English, and Celtic. 89 
 
 of their ulterior proceedings has not been fully determined on." They 
 indicate two possible courses— to deposit the MSS. in some public 
 library, for the purposes of reference ; or to print them in the imperfect 
 state in which they have been left by O'Curry and O'Donovan. I trust 
 that the publication of the manuscripts and translations will be carried 
 out with all convenient speed, even though their condition be less satis- 
 factory than it would have been, if we had not prematurely lost the 
 eminent scholars by whom they were executed. The object of the Com- 
 mission would be substantially, to a large extent, defeated if they were 
 buried in any library. In my judgment, such an abortive result of so 
 large an expenditure of public money and intellectual labour should not 
 be permitted by Parliament or the countr3\ The MSS. should be put 
 into the best possible condition, attainable under the unfortunate circum- 
 stances, and committed for use and further correction, in a published 
 form, to the scholarship of the world. 
 
 Note D.— p. 85. 
 
 These are the words of Leibnitz : — 
 
 "Postremo, ad perficiendam vel certe valde promovendam Literaturam 
 Celticam diligentius Linguse Hibernicfe studium adjungendum censeo, ut 
 Lloydius egregie facere coepit. Nam uti alibi jam admonui, queraad- 
 modum Angli fuere colonia Saxonum, et Britanui emissio veterum 
 Celtorum, Gallorum, Cimbrorum ; ita Hiberni sunt propago antiquorum 
 Britannise habitatorum, colonis Celticis Cimbricisque nonnullis, et ut ita 
 dicam mediis, anteriorum. Itaque, ut ex Anglicis lingua) veterum 
 Saxonum, et ex Cambricis veterum Gallorum, ita ex Hibernicis vetustio- 
 rum adhuc Celtarum Germanorumque ; et ut generaliter dicam accolarum 
 Oceani Britannice cismarinorum antiquitates illustrantur. Et si ultra 
 Hiberniam esset aliqua insula Celtic! sermonis, ejus filo in multo adhuc 
 antiquiora duceremur." 
 
INTERNATIONAL LAW. 
 
International Lazv, — Conference at 
 Antwerp: 1877. 
 
 [The Annual Conference of the Association for the Reform and Codi- 
 iication of the Law of Nations, which was held at Antwerp, in 1877, 
 was opened by the following Address.] 
 
 IT has been my fortune, on several occasions^ in my own 
 country, according to the usage there, to make some- 
 what lengthened opening addresses at meetings like this. 
 A different custom has, so far, prevailed in the society over 
 which I have now the honour to be President ; and I have 
 no desire to depart from it. 
 
 The rules of our association are desig^ned to make its 
 
 CD 
 
 proceedings practical and business-like, by minimising the 
 length of speeches, and encouraging brevity and precision 
 in debate. It avoids local excitements and temporary 
 politics. It aims to deal with principles of universal 
 application, in a calm and judicial spirit ; and to you, who 
 have come from many and distant lands to assist at its 
 deliberations, and who can affoi'd too little time for the 
 discussion of the various subjects which press on your 
 attention, it would be idle to offer observations which 
 might be suitable to a popular assembly. I shall only 
 trouble you with such words as need to be spoken, at this 
 stage of its history, with reference to the origin and 
 progress of the Association. 
 
 It is a young societ3\ It had its origin in America. 
 Whilst the Washington Treaty and the Geneva Arbitration 
 suggested to many minds the possible advantages which 
 
94 International Law : 
 
 miglit accrue to mankind from the formation of an 
 International Code and International Tribunals,, it was 
 conceived that publicists, jurists, statesmen, and leading- 
 commercial men might be got to take friendly counsel 
 together, and endeavour, with the aid of varied learning 
 and large experience, to bring into harmony, at least to 
 some extent, the laws and usages which — as distinguished 
 from municipal arrangements — mutually affect the several 
 families of our race in their inevitable transactions with each 
 other : and might so diminish the occasions of contention 
 and promote relations of amity between them. Many of 
 the foremost men of the United States took cordial interest 
 in the project, and our late honoured general secretary. 
 Dr. Miles, came on a mission to Europe, to submit it for 
 consideration in the chief capitals of the Old AVorld. He 
 was everywhere received with respect and approval. 
 Persons of high distinction, in Germany, France, 
 Holland, England, and other countries, concurred that an 
 effort should be made in the direction to which he pointed. 
 So sustained, he returned to America and communicated 
 the results of his successful action; and, thereupon, the 
 Association was constituted by a number of American 
 gentlemen, some of whose names have won a wide celebrity 
 in Europe. 
 
 They desired that the first conference should be held in 
 New York ; but many, who had joined the xlssociation in 
 Europe, could not undertake the journey ; and it was 
 ultimately resolved that the meeting should he convened in 
 Brussels, where, accordingly, it took place, on the 10th of 
 October, 1873. It was signally successful. Kepresentative 
 men, of established reputation, as jurists and politicians, 
 attended from France, Germany, Italy, Holland, England, 
 and America. The rules of the Society were framed ; and 
 its discussions and resolutions gave fair promise of the 
 
Conference at Antzuerp : 1877. 95 
 
 practical capacity and tlie public usefulness, of which,, I 
 may now confidently say, its transactions have afforded 
 indisputable proofs. 
 
 In the succeeding years, it has assembled in Geneva, at 
 the Hague, and in the city of Bremen. In all, it has met 
 the most cordial reception. The interest in its proceedings 
 has steadily augmented, and the number of its associates 
 has proportionately increased. Its organisation, as I have 
 intimated, is not popular ; and its inquiries, although they 
 concern matters of high moment to humanity, are often dry 
 and difiicult, and cannot be expected to excite or amuse the 
 popular mind. But thinking men show a growing appre- 
 ciation of them ; and its members who, at the Hague, were 
 reported, in 1875, not to exceed ninety, now, as our secre- 
 tary informs me, number five hundred and thirty. 
 
 So much for its progress. Let me say something of the 
 character of its work. Its founders, in America, were 
 apparently at first moved to action by the desire to apply 
 and extend the principle asserted in the Geneva Arbitration, 
 and secure the peaceful settlement of disputes between 
 Sovereign States, so far as might be, by the creation of 
 International Tribunals, regulated and controlled by an 
 International Code. That was their dominant idea. The 
 time was propitious; the example was encouraging; and 
 the design to assist — as they said by their original resolu- 
 tion — ^^ in substituting the arbitrament of reason and justice 
 for the arbitrament of the sword,^-' was a noble one. But 
 the Association wisely resolved to deal with other pressing 
 questions of law and usage, affecting individual interests 
 throughout the world ; and the exigencies of the time, and 
 the greater possibility of discussing them with immediate 
 and practical advantage, have fixed its attention mainly on 
 those questions during its several Conferences. It has not 
 neo^lected the consideration of a public International Code, 
 
96 International Law : 
 
 for whicli one of its strongest committees lias been 
 appointed ; but I shall best indicate the value of its aims 
 and the nature of its proceedings, by pointing to its action 
 in some of the matters which, at present, greatly occupy 
 the attention and inspire the efforts of the members of 
 various communities, who desire to improve the condition 
 of commerce throughout the world. 
 
 For many years, there has been a growing conviction 
 among jurists and mercantile people of intelligence, that 
 there should be a common Code and a uniform usage with 
 reference to Bills of Exchange for the nations of Europe 
 and the states of America. The advantage of such a Code 
 and such a usage, if they could be established, does not 
 appear to me to need exposition in an assembly of reason- 
 able men. The complications, the difficulties, the errors, 
 and the losses, which arise from the want of them, are of 
 every day's experience in commercial affairs. 
 
 That the change is practicable seems nearly as plain as 
 that it would be of inestimable advantage. All nations, in 
 which such instruments are employed for the purposes of 
 commerce, have a common interest in making them, by a 
 simple, speedy, and universally intelligible procedure, 
 promptly negotiable, and easily convertible. A great 
 American jurist has truly said, that ^^ the Jurisprudence 
 which regulates Bills of Exchange can hardly be deemed 
 to consist of the mere municipal regulations of any one 
 country. It may, with far more propriety, be deemed to 
 be founded upon and to embody the usages of merchants in 
 various commercial countries, and the general principles, 
 ex aequo ei bono, as to the rights, duties, and obligations of 
 the parties derivable from those usages and from the prin- 
 ciples of natural law applicable thereto." Those principles 
 are not bounded, in their operation, by the limits of any 
 land. They arc equally applicable to all; and furnish 
 
Conference at Antwerp: 1877. 97 
 
 the means of a profitable concert in whicli all may find 
 unqualified benefit. 
 
 But, we are not left to speculate on possibilities. To 
 some extent, the work, which seems so desirable and so 
 useful, has been already done. The various states of 
 Germany had various laws affecting Bills of Exchange, and 
 the variety was found to be intolerably mischievous. Under 
 the auspices of the Prussian Government, a Conference was 
 assembled at Leipsic, and, after elaborate discussion, framed 
 a uniform project for all the states, whicli was adopted by 
 the confederate Assembly of 1849 ; has ever since been 
 successfully in action; and, at this moment, arranges, on 
 common principles, the commercial dealings of seventy- 
 nine millions of people. Austria and Hungary accepted it, 
 and were followed by Sweden, Finland, Switzerland, and 
 Servia. Through all these countries, so diverse in race, 
 customs, and habits, one law and one usage have been found 
 satisfactory and sufficient. 
 
 In like manner, the provisions of the French Code as to 
 Bills of Exchange have been adopted by Spain and some 
 of the South American states, and have worked success- 
 fully, in spite of the great social differences between those 
 countries. 
 
 A joint Commission has lately been nominated by the 
 Governments of Sweden, Norway, and Denmark, for the 
 purpose of preparing a common Code as to Bills of 
 Exchange for those kingdoms. The Presidents of its three 
 Sections are members of this Association : Judge Klein, of 
 the Supreme Court of Denmark ; M. Bergstrom, of Stock- 
 holm, late Minister of the Interior ; and Professor Aubert, 
 of Christiania, 
 
 With such encouragement to action in the nature of the 
 thing and the experience of nations, the Association 
 set itself earnestly to promote, through all commercial 
 
 G 
 
98 International Law : 
 
 countries, the assimilation of law which has been accom- 
 plished in so many. It formed a Committee, by which a 
 circular was prepared, embodying a series of queries, for 
 the purpose of obtaining information and eliciting opinion. 
 Of this, several thousand copies were distributed through 
 the cities of Europe and America to eminent jurists, 
 bankers, and merchants, and the more important Chambers 
 of Commerce. The circular stated the chief points of 
 conflict in the law and practice of the various communities, 
 and invited answers to the questions which were submitted, 
 paragraph by paragraph. Prompt and full replies were 
 largely returned. They were summarised in a Report which 
 was presented to the Conference at the Hague, and there- 
 upon a Commission was nominated, including represen- 
 tatives of Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, 
 Great Britain, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, 
 and the United States, to consider and report on the prin- 
 ciples on which an International Code should be based. 
 This Commission has zealously prosecuted its labours, 
 dealing with the mass of information which had been thus 
 accumulated ; and they have had a successful issue in a 
 statement of those principles, drafted originally by Dr. 
 Borchardt, of Berlin, and Dr. Jaques, of Vienna, considered 
 deliberately, at many meetings, by their colleagues of 
 various nationalities, and finally adopted by the Conference, 
 at Bremen, in 1876. Of the character and value of that 
 statement I do not need to speak. It is in the hands of 
 the members of the Association, along with an excellent 
 paper from our efiicient secretary, Mr. Jencken. Its 
 principles have been substantially accepted by the Swedish, 
 Norwegian and Danish Commission. 
 
 As your President, I invited the attention of the English 
 Foreign Office to that Report, and laid before Lord Derby 
 all the materials for judgment collected by the Association. 
 
Conference at Antwerp: 1877. 99 
 
 Those materials have also been submitted to the Ministry 
 of Justice at Berlin and the Prime Minister of Austria. I 
 have reason to believe that their importance has been fully 
 appreciated : and thus real progress has been made towards 
 a joint international action for the establishment of a 
 common system of law. In this matter, the work of the 
 Association has been fruitful, as it has been earnest and 
 persisting. It has aimed at nothing which is not, at once, 
 reasonably feasible and of manifest advantage. It will be, 
 I trust, continued until its objects shall have been accom- 
 plished, and a great advance secured in the formation of a 
 general commercial Code. 
 
 Scarcely, if at all, of less importance than the project 
 of assimilation to which I have been referring is that of a 
 like assimilation, in the matter of General Average. That 
 matter has necessarily been, from time immemorial, of 
 deep interest to maritime countries. Hundreds of years 
 before the coming of our Saviour, the Ehodian law regulated 
 it in the seas of Europe. The Roman Code dealt with it 
 — as with most other subjects of legislation — with a lucid 
 order and an exhaustive fulness, which furnish guidance to 
 thought and action in nearly all the controversies about it, 
 between trading communities even in our own time. The 
 provisions of that marvellous Code had force throughout the 
 Empire, and controlled the commerce of the world. They 
 were lost for centuries ; but when the Crusades had stimu- 
 lated the intercourse of nations, the necessities of society 
 produced inferior substitutes, with less completeness and 
 less authority, in the Rolls of Oleron, the laws of Wisby, 
 the Code of Pisa, the Consolado del Mare, and the Guidon 
 de la Mer. They dealt with Average ; as did the various 
 Ordonnances of Holland, France, and Spain. 
 
 In later times, the subject has occupied, more or less, 
 the attention of the jurists, merchants, shipowners, and 
 
 G 2 
 
lOO International Law : 
 
 insurers of all nations. The differences which prevail 
 between them have been felt to be most detrimental to the 
 interests of commerce. They involve grievous confusion 
 and frequent injustice. They induce^ continually, loss of 
 time and loss of money, and promote misunderstanding-s 
 and contentions of the most mischievous kind. The con- 
 tributions to General Average, being arranged according to 
 the systems established in the several places in which the 
 cargo may be separated from the ship, and those systems 
 being founded on diverse and inconsistent rules and prin- 
 ciples, the difficulties accruing to the assured and the under- 
 writer — to the master of the vessel and the owners of the 
 goods — to every one, in short, concerned in such trans- 
 actions, are annoying and injurious in a high degree. The 
 advantage which would arise from removing those difficulties 
 by an international agreement is, I believe, universally 
 recognised ; but the realisation of that advantage has been 
 delayed by many obstacles. The German and the English 
 law are in serious conflict. The Continental nations do not 
 adopt the rules of the Conference of York. The '^common 
 safety '^ principle is opposed to the ^^ common benefit " 
 principle. The traditions and customs of the maritime 
 states are not easily modified or abandoned. And yet, I 
 am sure that they all desire an assimilation and uniformity 
 which, to all of them, would result in most material benefit. 
 So strong has been this desire, that three several Con- 
 ferences have been held in Great Britain, and attended by 
 numerous delegates from many nations. The first occurred 
 at Glasgow, in the year 1860, and had for its presidents 
 Lord Brougham and Lord Neaves. The second took place 
 in 1862, under the presidency of Sir Travers Twiss ; and 
 the third in 1864, at York, the Lord Chief Baron of 
 England being the President. Of those meetings I have 
 only time to say, that they were very valuable in collecting 
 
Conference at Aiitwerp : 1877. lor 
 
 facts and formulating opinion ; but they failed to secure 
 that union of thought and effort which might have issued 
 in a uniformity of law. 
 
 The interest in the subject has in nowise abated : and I 
 am happy to say that it was taken up energetically at the 
 Bremen Conference. Able papers were read by Mr. Hach 
 and Mr. Schneider^ and a Committee was appointed to 
 report upon it, which they have done with great success. 
 Your Council have circulated their Report, with copies of 
 the York Rules of 1864, as offering a basis of discussion ; 
 and I am informed that anxiety has been manifested in the 
 various maritime countries to unite in reaching an agree- 
 ment, as to the principles on which an international law of 
 Oeneral Average may properly be framed. Why should they 
 not ? I know how difficult it is to break with old traditions 
 and abandon old usages. But moderation, forbearance, 
 and mutual concession accomplish great things ; and the 
 rule •'■ to give and take '^ may rightly govern, where all 
 have so plain an interest in reaching a unanimous conclusion. 
 
 I am glad to say, that, through my Right Hon. Friend, 
 Mr. Goschen, lately the First Lord of the Admiralty in 
 England, I was enabled to bring this subject and the action 
 of the Association upon it, under the consideration of the 
 Committee of Lloyd'' s, of which he is the Chairman ; and 
 that that most important body has delegated three of its 
 members to attend this Conference. Elaborate reports on 
 General Average have been received from Sweden, Germany, 
 and the United States ; and there has been much activity 
 in the movement amongst our members in Austria, France, 
 Holland, and throughout the world. I believe they are 
 generally represented here, and I repeat the expression of 
 my hope that your deliberations may be so conducted — 
 with mutual forbearance and consideration, and an honest 
 purpose to reach a fair agreement — as to produce a 
 
I02 International La 
 
 w : 
 
 practical result of real service to the great interests of 
 commercial nations. 
 
 Keeping in mind my promise to be brief^ and believing 
 tliat^ in tbe simple statement I have made^ I have suffi- 
 ciently accomplished my purpose of indicating the nature 
 of the objects of the Association and the methods it applies 
 to attain them^ I shall go into no further detail with refer- 
 ence to the other grave questions which have been dealt 
 with in its Conferences and Committees — I shall only say 
 a word as to two or three of them. 
 
 International Patent Law has received great attention 
 from a Committee, of which Mr. Hinde Palmer, Q.C., was 
 the first Chairman, and over w^hich Mr. Brown, member of 
 our Imperial Parliament, now presides. It has produced 
 two masterly Reports, and made its influence beneficially 
 felt in the improvement of a measure lately adopted by the 
 German Reichstag, as I hope it will do, during the progress 
 of a Bill, with the same objects, introduced in England by 
 the Attorney-General. Another Committee has been en- 
 gaged in inquiries as to the laws of Copyright of various 
 countries; and the possibility and means of introducing an 
 international Coinage have had much consideration. 
 
 As I have already said, whilst matters of immediate and 
 practical importance have mainly been discussed. Public 
 International Law has not been neglected by the Associa- 
 tion. It has not lost itself in the cloud-land of speculative 
 thought, or wandered far afield in search of a Utopia ; but 
 it has been busy with subjects of substantial interest, in 
 that department. 
 
 At the instance of Professor Sheldon Amos, the vexed 
 question of Maritime Capture has been raised and debated 
 with great ability; and the Report of a Committee upon it, 
 under his presidency, will, I believe, be submitted to the 
 Conference. 
 
Conference at A ntwerp ; 1 8 7 7 . 103 
 
 Tlie principles of Extradition and International Criminal 
 Law were largely investigated at tlie Hague : and have 
 received much elucidation from the reports of distinguished 
 Dutch jurists^ of whom, and others^ a Committee was 
 constituted there. 
 
 International arbitration^ as a means of settling Inter- 
 national disputes, has been the subject of deliberation s, 
 earnest and careful in proportion to its importance ; and the 
 Law of collisions at sea, originated by the Board of Trade 
 in England, and adopted by other maritime countries, 
 which has not been found, in some respects, satisfactory, 
 has been examined, with a view to its improvement, by a 
 Committee organised under the direction of an eminent 
 American Judge. 
 
 In these, and cognate questions, the work of the last 
 twelve months, conducted with sedulous attention, and 
 assisted by an extensive correspondence, has been effective, 
 and gives fair promise for the future. The Council reports 
 to us, that the year 1876-77 " has been one of greater and 
 more fruitful activity than any other in the annals of the 
 Association." 
 
 In these various ways, good service has been done, and 
 valuable knowledge accumulated for use hereafter. But if 
 the Association had produced no other advantage than that 
 derived from tbe assembling of men of various tongues and 
 nations, with a view to advance, by their united action, the 
 general well-being, it would have been entitled to the 
 approval of every friend of peace and progress in the 
 world. The veiy coming together, from distant places, 
 and often at much personal sacrifice, of so many persons, 
 largely engaged in professional and commercial pursuits, 
 is warrant, at once, of their real interest in its objects, and 
 of their capacity, in their several spheres, to promote those 
 objects with intelligence and efficiency. Heretofore, it 
 
I04 International Law : 
 
 would not have been possible tbat sucli meetings as that 
 which I address could have been convened, year after year, 
 in the various centres of culture and energy through 
 Europe. The conquests of science have offered no more 
 precious advantage to our race than may be found in 
 that personal communion of the inhabitants of far-divided 
 lands which may induce, amongst them, mutual trust, 
 mutual respect, and mutual helpfulness; which may de- 
 stroy national antipathies,— the noxious growth of ignorant 
 isolation ; — substitute in their stead cordial alh'ances for the 
 common benefit ; and so promote that ^' Federation of the 
 World ^' towards which, although the selfish instincts and 
 ungoverned passions of humanity may delay its progress, 
 and, possibly, prevent for ever its full accomplishment, 
 good men should strive with all their power. 
 
 ^^ Nobody,^' said the late lamented Prince Consort of 
 England, ^Svho has paid any attention to the peculiar 
 features of our present era will doubt, for a moment, that 
 we are living at a period of most wonderful transition, 
 which tends rapidly to accomplish that great end to which 
 all History points. — the realisation of the unity "of man- 
 kind; — not a unity which breaks down the limits and levels 
 the peculiar characteristics of the difi'erent nations of the 
 earth, but rather a unity the result and product of those 
 very national varieties and antagonistic qualities.^' 
 
 Freedom of Intercourse, Freedom of Trade, the Steam 
 Engine, and the Telegraph, are more and more promoting 
 ■that unity every year of our existence ; and if this Asso- 
 ciation can advance it, even a little, by harmonising the 
 relations of Commerce, increasing the uniformitj^ of Law, 
 and making nations understand the value of reciprocity 
 in kindly feeling and friendly ofiiccs, we shall not have 
 laboured altogether in vain. 
 
 Before I conclude, let me express* the pleasure we all 
 
Conference at A ntwei^p .-1877. 105 
 
 experience in accepting the hospitality of the Chief Magis- 
 trate and the people of this ancient and noble City — 
 renowned^ as it has been for ages_, in Commerce and Art, 
 and, when need was, in War. Holding a foremost place 
 amongst the trading communities of Europe, it has kept 
 itself well abreast with all economic and intellectual pro- 
 gress : and in the celebration which has just concluded — 
 in honour of a Painter who filled the earth with his labour 
 and his fame* — it has revived the memory of its artistic 
 greatness, by proclaiming, with generous ostentation, that 
 the city of the Scheldt, like the city of the Arno, has 
 boasted many an illustrious citizen on whose tomb may 
 worthily be written the famous epitaph : 
 
 Tanto noinini nullum par eulogium ! 
 
 Our assemblage, in this place, has a peculiar fitness. 
 The most important subject of our inquiries will probably 
 be the assimilation of the law of General Average ; and 
 nowhere could it be more appropriately discussed. His- 
 torians doubt whether the modern system of marine insur- 
 ance was organised in the Italian cities or in the ports of 
 the North Sea. But there is persuasive evidence that it 
 was established in Bruges, in 1310, under a charter of the 
 Count of Flanders. Although it may have been a graft on 
 the ancient Rhodian sea-laws, the customs of merchants, 
 with reference to it, were first reduced to legal order in the 
 North of Europe by Flemish traders at Bruges — at that 
 time the great entrejpot of an ample commerce — ^^ the 
 London of 500 years ago.^' Antwerp succeeded to the 
 maritime supremacy, and distinguished itself by codifying 
 its usages on questions of General Average, so far back as 
 1609. You will find them lately published in the ''Customs 
 
 * Rubens. 
 
lo6 International Law. 
 
 of tlie Ducliy of Brabant/^ by M. de Lenge_, tbe President 
 of the Cour de Cassation ; and those old customs should 
 not escape your attention when you are considering the 
 formation of a modern law. 
 
 Do not such historical recollections curiously connect the 
 present and the past and make our meeting of happy augury ? 
 And may we not hope that its successful issue, in promoting 
 an auspicious concord amongst commercial nations^ will 
 be recorded in an honourable page of the annals of 
 Antwerp, as having been fortunately accomplished here ? * 
 
 * The result of this Conference was of a memorable kind. It was 
 attended by representatives of nearly all the Maritime States of Europe ; 
 and, after lengthened consideration, they formulated their views as to 
 the principles on which an International Law and Practice of General 
 Average should be founded in " The York and Antwerp Rules,"' which 
 have had wide acceptance and application amongst mercantile com- 
 munities, and have largely assimilated their action in a matter of very 
 vital moment to the commerce of the world. 
 
ECONOMIC AND STATISTICAL INQUIRY. 
 
Economic and Statistical Inquiry. 
 
 [The British Association for the Advancement of Science met in Belfest 
 in 1874. The Statistical and Economic Section was opened by 
 this Address.] 
 
 I AM glad to liave the honour of presiding over such an 
 assembly in a town to which I am attached, not merely 
 as the place of my birth, but, far more, by life-long associa- 
 tions of interest, duty, and aflfection. I rejoice that it is 
 again distinguished by the presence of so many men illus- 
 trious in every walk of science, who come to take counsel 
 together as to the conquests of human thought and the 
 extension of the bounds of knowledge; and I may be 
 permitted to say, that Belfast, in its industrial eminence, its 
 honourable traditions, and its intellectual progress, is not 
 unworthy to receive them. 
 
 As to its varied industries, they may more fitly be con- 
 sidered by other sections of the Association, in their con- 
 nexion with those branches of Science, — such as Chemistry, 
 Natural Philosophy or Mechanics, — with which they have 
 more direct concern. But the Statistician and Economist, 
 without trespassing on the province of any of those 
 branches, has relations with them all, — aiming to test the 
 value of their results, and make them practically conducive 
 to the general well-being. Thus, when you note the 
 wonderful progress of this community — increasing in 
 population from 37,000 in 1821 to 174,000 in 1871, and 
 
no Economic and Statistical Inquiry, 
 
 possessing multitudes of palatial manufactories where, 
 within my own memory, there was exactly one, — you may 
 be led, legitimately, to consider its causes, its consequences 
 and the means of its extension. You may find food for 
 profitable speculation in examining the industrial efibrts 
 which continue that progress, without pause or faltering ; 
 and, perhaps, amongst them, not the least remarkable is 
 that which has established great iron foundries, winning for 
 their work the highest honours in the industrial competitions 
 which have occupied the capitals of Europe from time to 
 time, for a quarter of a century, and commanding orders 
 from the most distant regions of the globe. Or you may 
 examine, with equal interest, shipbuilding establishments 
 which employ skilled artisans in thousands, send out scores 
 of great vessels to traverse the Mediterranean, and bridge 
 over the Atlantic; and have cultivated the special manu- 
 facture of long iron-decked ocean steamers, from the year 
 1861, when it was first begun, until they have produced the 
 gigantic Britannic and Germanic, measured at 5,000 tons, — 
 not surpassed, if they have been equalled, in any country, — 
 and exhibiting improvements which are largely imitated 
 in all ocean-going ships throughout the world. But, apart 
 from its general industries, Belfast has peculiar claims on 
 the good-wdll of this branch of the British Association. 
 
 It is nearly a quarter of a century since, at a former 
 meeting of that Association, in this town, the place which 
 I now fill was more fitly occupied by the late Archbishop 
 Whately, whose services to Economic Science, as well in 
 his own masterly publications as in the liberal energy with 
 which he encouraged the study of it in Ireland, I need 
 not eulogise before this assembly. On that occasion, there 
 were not wanting able and instructed men to show that its 
 principles had found acceptance here. Such men had been, 
 already, active in the prosecution of those special inquiries. 
 
Economic and Statistical Inquiry. 1 1 1 
 
 which^ in tliis section, it will be our business to pursue. 
 In distant days, when Belfast was poor in material wealth 
 and very limited in population, they had formed a specula- 
 tive and literary society which did excellent work. They 
 had also societies for the culture of natural science, and 
 others which were useful in training young people for the 
 encounters of public and professional life. And these, 
 with great schools, which were the creation of the spirit 
 and enterprise of private persons, tended to the remarkable 
 advancement of individuals, and assisted in laying the 
 foundations of that great prosperity, — the unaided growth 
 of self-reliance and self-assertion, — which has so distin- 
 guished this community amongst the cities of the empire. 
 
 It was not strange that, with such antecedents, Belfast 
 should have early moved in the new path of statistical 
 inquiry; and, accordingly, long before the meeting to 
 which I have alluded, it had established a Social Inquiry 
 Society for the consideration of " Statistics, Political 
 Economy, and Jurisprudence," which, in some particulars, 
 remarkably anticipated the Social Science Association ; and 
 was, whilst it existed, very useful and efficient. And thus 
 it came to pass that not the least distinguished of those 
 who, in 1852, discussed the subjects peculiar to this sec- 
 tion, in able papers, were inhabitants of Belfast, some still 
 living, and some departed, who well maintained the intel- 
 lectual reputation of their town. Subsequently, the Social 
 Inquiry Society merged into the larger combination repre- 
 sented by the Statistical and Social Inquiry Society of 
 Ireland, which has laboured, and continues to labour, in 
 the metropolis, with great and increasing success. It has 
 dealt, in its published transactions, with almost every 
 important economic question of the time : and has acted 
 beneficially, by suggestion and argument, on the Irish 
 legislation of later days. 
 
1 1 2 Economic and Statistical Inquiry. 
 
 It lias operated^ also^ in spreading economic knowledge 
 throngli the organisation of the Barrington Lectureships 
 on Political Economy^ which were founded by the munifi- 
 cence of a citizen of Dublin ; and through which competent 
 teachers afford the opportunity of instruction in the prin- 
 ciples of the science, to the various towns of Ireland. 
 But, although the capital of the Ulster Province has thus 
 allowed its local society to be absorbed by one which is 
 national, the spirit which originated both continues to 
 prevail in Belfast ; and it will gratify the members of this 
 section to learn, that, in the month of January last, a 
 committee was formed in it, to establish classes for the 
 systematic teaching of Political Economy, — chiefly to young' 
 men engaged in mercantile pursuits. That committee is 
 composed of the Chief Magistrate of the town, — to whose 
 intelligence, energy, and affluent liberality, I am not sur- 
 prised to learn, the British Association is largely indebted, 
 — many of its leading merchants and professional men, and 
 several eminent professors of the Queen^s College. They 
 were fortunate in obtaining the services of a highly in- 
 formed economist ; and the experiment has, so far, proved 
 very satisfactory. The number of students on the roll has 
 been 55 : — 3 of them alumni of the Queen^s College; 7, 
 apprentices of solicitors; and 45, engaged in commercial 
 business. The average of attendance on the classes has 
 been from 40 to 50. The committee may well be congra- 
 tulated on the result of their novel and excellent effort, 
 and the probable influence, in other communities, of the 
 example they have given. Already, it has been imitated 
 in Dublin. A class of young mercantile men has been 
 formed in the metropolis for a similar purpose ; and there 
 is no reason why others should not pursue it there and in 
 the provincial towns. 
 
 In connexion with this matter, I may mention that, very 
 
Economic and Statistical Inqinry. 1 1 3 
 
 recently, a considerable portion of the Barrington fund has 
 been devoted to the instruction^ in Political Economy, of 
 schoolmasters, who are examined in its principles under 
 the direction of the Barrington .lecture committee of the 
 Statistical Society; and, already, at an examination held 
 on the 12th of May last, thirteen of them have obtained 
 distinctions and certificates. The importance of such a 
 movement, I need not dwell upon. It was anticipated by 
 Archbishop Whately in the preparation of his " Easy 
 Lessons on Money Matters '' and other books ; and, I find 
 that the Labour and Capital Committee of the Social 
 vScience Association have endeavoured to induce the Edu- 
 cational Committee of the Privy Council in England to 
 promote the teaching of economics in schools under its 
 inspection ; and have urged the importance of such teachiug 
 on the Lord President, for reasons, which, in the painful 
 circumstances existing around us, may, not unprofitably, 
 be repeated here. They declared their strong conviction, 
 '^that the hostility between Labour and Capital, arising 
 from an erroneous belief that the interests of work-people 
 and their employers, and of tenants and landlords, are 
 opposed to each other — a belief leading, in manufactures, to 
 attempts to impose harrowing restrictions regarding rates 
 of wages, hours of labour, piece work, number of appren- 
 tices, and the use of machinery : and, in agriculture, to 
 attempts to dictate the amount of rent to be exacted, and 
 the selection of tenants ; and leading, in its further stages, 
 to strikes, lock-outs, rattenings, and threats of personal 
 violence, and ultimately, in many cases, to murder itself — 
 might have been mitigated, and in great measure prevented, 
 had the people of this country, in their youth and before the 
 mind could be warped, been instructed in the elements of 
 Economic Science. •'' And, on this and on other grounds, 
 they prayed that no more time should be lost in taking 
 
 H 
 
114 Economic and Statistical Inquiry. 
 
 measures for gradually introduciug this knowledge, ^^ as a 
 regular branch of education/^ into all schools to which the 
 State gives pecuniary aid. Their demand was not fully con- 
 ceded j but a beginning has been made in England as in 
 Ireland^ and the study has been introduced in some large 
 schools, under efficient inspection. Individuals have made 
 the same experiment in London and Glasgow, — eminently, 
 Mr. Ellis and Mr. McClelland, — and with a success demon- 
 strating the feasibility of imparting economic knowledge to 
 young people, and making it full of attractive interest to 
 them. We must all sincerely trust that the same success 
 may attend the effort which has been so well begun in 
 Ireland. 
 
 I do not think that I need apologise for these references to 
 the connexion between economic and statistical science and 
 the intellectual traditions of Belfast, for, whilst they prove 
 that I am not unwarranted in asserting its worthiness to 
 receive this Association, they must gratify especiall}^ those 
 whom I address, as indicating a healthy interest in the 
 prosecution of that science, and a continuing effort to assist 
 its progress here. 
 
 It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of that 
 progress to the best interests of every class of our society. 
 The branch of knowledge with which we have to deal must 
 have had an existence coeval with all advanced civili- 
 sation, although its name is new. It could never have been 
 ignored by the historian, who properly marshalled facts and 
 drew inferences as to the characters and actions of indivi- 
 duals, and the causes of the rise and fall of nations. It was 
 necessarily cultivated by investigators of the working of 
 commercial communities, and the influences which affect 
 their prosperity or decay. It was implicitly recognised by 
 all careful and conscientious statesmanship, in considering 
 the events and circumstances which might require the main- 
 
Economic and Statistical Inqttiry. 1 1 5 
 
 tenance of institutions^ or warrant their abolition or reform. 
 Those who fulfilled such functions were^ consciously or un- 
 consciously, statisticians and economists; although the 
 recognition of statistics and economy, as distinct domains 
 of human knowledge, and the cultivation of them, with 
 exclusive attention, are comparatively of recent origin in 
 the world of thought. 
 
 It is not, perhaps, matter of surprise that such new- 
 comers have not always met a cordial reception ; that the 
 masters of exact science have sometimes looked askance on 
 their looser and more speculative methods ; and disputed 
 their right to rank with the older scientific sisterhood. 
 But the controversy was never of much practical account; 
 and it has well-nigh ended. 
 
 The statistician and economist do not demonstrate ; do 
 not claim for their propositions the certainty of mathematics; 
 are too much engaged with the shifting conditions of human 
 existence, and the infinitely varied shades of human thought 
 and feeling to pronounce, with rigid dogmatism, as to the 
 course to be adopted, in all the varying circumstances which 
 concern the wealth of nations and the social interests of 
 mankind. 
 
 But, nevertheless, they are entitled to call their labours 
 scientific, if science be needed to deal with subjects and 
 educe results of the last importance to our race; and to 
 accomplish this by drawing, from facts rightly ascertained, 
 lucidly classified and profoundly considered, conclusions of 
 permanent truth and wide application for the government 
 of human conduct and the increase of human happiness. 
 
 The reign of Law is not bounded by the physical universe. 
 Its vigilant power is not exhausted when the planets have 
 been kept in their courses and the earth is made bountiful 
 for the maintenance of man. As the material creation, 
 assuredly, did not owe its harmony and beauty to a for- 
 
 h2 
 
1 1 6 Ecorioniic and Statistical Inquiry. 
 
 tuitous concourse of atoms^ so tlie humanity^ to whose 
 needs it has such a marvellous adaptation^ has not been 
 left to be the sport of chance^ stumbling through the ages 
 in blind disorder and hopeless desertion by the Infinite 
 Power which called it into being. There is a moral govern- 
 ment which '^shapes our ends/^ pervading the apparent 
 chaos of motive and action^ and making the liberty which 
 belongs to us^ as individuals, subordinate itself, with a 
 felicity as admirable as it is incomprehensible, to the pro- 
 motion of the universal good. 
 
 Three millions of free and responsible beings constitute 
 the population of London, — each having his own idiosyn- 
 crasy and power to act in independent isolation, — but all 
 overruled and subdued by an overmastering, though an 
 unacknowledged, influence, to the working out of a com- 
 mon system by which, whilst they prosecute, for their 
 respective interests, their separate objects and pursuits, 
 they supply one another with all things useful for their 
 existence and enjoyment. 
 
 This is amongst the greatest of marvels ; and it is 
 achieved, as no human power could achieve it by any 
 governmental force or police strategy, because there is a 
 Law which dominates the movements of society and moulds 
 the earthly destinies of men. And, surely, the inquiries 
 which are bent to the comprehension of that Law, and strive 
 to ascertain the principles on which it acts, — from earnest 
 inquiry, laborious record, and just appreciation of the 
 facts which, more or less clearly, disclose its systematic 
 operation, in the various departments of human effort, — 
 are vital to our well-being and progress in the world. 
 They are fruitful in precise and enduring results. They 
 have, already, in many points, revolutionised the opinions 
 of communities, and shaped the policy of cabinets, and 
 they have furnished canons of public conduct which 
 
Econionic and Statistical Inquiry. 1 1 7 
 
 liave liad an ever-widening acceptance amongst civilised 
 men. 
 
 Statistical inquiry is, therefore, scientific inquiry, and 
 scientific inquiry of the highest value; and its successful 
 prosecution is important to every class, from the states- 
 men and the legislator, to the humblest operative. It 
 has relations with all matters of real human interest. It 
 touches the reciprocal rights of classes ; the claims of capital 
 and labour; the advancement of education; the repression 
 of crime ; the relief of distress ; the prevention of disease ; 
 the improvement of agriculture; the extension of commerce ; 
 and all the various cognate questions which afi'ect our social 
 and industrial state. 
 
 All men may profit by acquaintance with a department 
 of knowledcife which concerns all alike — the hio^h and the 
 low — the wealthy and the poor. If there be ascertainable 
 laws by which the relative rights and responsibilities of 
 human beings are regulated, and by the evasion or defiance 
 of which they must sufi'er inevitable injury, it is plainly 
 important that some knowledge of such laws, by all men^ 
 should promote the equitable and reasonable enforcement 
 of those rights and responsibilities. 
 
 There is, at present, a sad encounter of classes in this 
 great town, which has paralysed its most important in- 
 dustry.* As to the origin of the dispute, or the conflicting 
 views of the parties to it, I do not presume to oS'er an 
 opinion. But I may say, for myself, and, I am sure, for 
 those whose pleasant meeting here has been clouded by 
 that grievous calamity, that we lament its occurrence, and 
 trust it will find a speedy ending, — towards which we 
 should rejoice to oS'er any aid within our power, — for the 
 avoidance, not merely of privation on the one side and- 
 
 * A strike for wages, of a formidable character, existed at the traie.. 
 
1 1 8 EcoJtomic and Statistical Inquiry. 
 
 embarrassment on the other, ])ut of evil consequences 
 which, may bring permanent miscbief to every order of the 
 community, and damage vitally the commercial position of 
 Belfast. I refer to the subject, at present, only to indicate 
 how important it might have been if the educational effort 
 of which I have already spoken had so far advanced, as to 
 spread abroad a knowledge of the issues of like encounters, 
 in other places and at other times ; and of the teaching to 
 be derived in this, as in most things else, from that old 
 experience, which 
 
 Doth attain 
 To something of prophetic strain ! 
 
 But the statesman needs the knowledge which is accu- 
 mulated by statistics even more than the mass of men. To 
 legislate aright, — to guide a nation safely through calm 
 and stormy times — to take advantage of opportunities of 
 safe and wise reform, and avoid alike the evils of obstinate 
 adherence to abuse and reckless innovation, a member of 
 Parliament or a minister, holding political power, should 
 qualify himself by familiarity with that science of which 
 a most eminent professor of it (Dr. Farr) has said : — 
 ^^ Statistics underlie politics. It is, in fact, in its essence, 
 the Science of Politics without party colouring." And 
 yet, there are many members and some ministers who, 
 from time to time, undertake the discharge of their high 
 functions, without any such preparation as is deemed 
 essential in the aspirants to any ordinary profession ; — of 
 which, in their case, some little statistical and economic 
 knowledge might well form a necessary part. 
 
 Political action should not be altogether empirical; and 
 scientific instruction, specially aimed to qualify for the 
 higher undertaking of it, might be usefully supplied by 
 our schools and universities, in ftir larger proportion than 
 
Economic and Statistical Inquiry. 1 19 
 
 they now afford it. For they would so supply new 
 faculties o£ perception and persuasion to our public men, 
 whom they might train to elucidate economic questions, 
 and apply established principles in the novel emergencies 
 which perpetually test the quality o£ statesmanship. And 
 so, promoting an attempt to found legislation on a scientific 
 basis, or, at least, to have it conducted with informed and 
 forethoughtful intelligence, they might take away, in some 
 degree, the reproach of the famous Chancellor : 
 
 Quam parvula sapientia regitur mundus ! 
 
 There are, no doubt, subjects on which the law-maker 
 may decide, promptly and on the first impression ; but, on 
 most of those which are really important and permanently 
 afiect the general interest, he should seek the help, which 
 the statistician can afford, by casting light from the past 
 on the dim pathways of the future; if he would avoid 
 perfunctory and hap-hazard legislation, issuing often in 
 serious mischief, and necessitating attempts at unsatisfac- 
 tory amendment, which he need never have essayed, if he 
 had allowed that light to lead him to an appreciation of 
 the difficulties in his way, and the means to master them. 
 
 Still further, the statistical method may be employed, 
 beyond the bounds of municipal arrangements, and made 
 to operate for the benefit of the great community of 
 nations. It may assist the jurist in dealing with the vexed 
 questions of international law ; and preparing the way for a 
 progressive agreement, as to the reciprocal claims and 
 duties of civilised states. And this, though it cannot, 
 perhaps, whilst man is man, subdue the turbulence of 
 ambition or end the crimes and calamities of war, may 
 promote, at least, an approach to that universal harmony, 
 which, however it may be delayed or forbidden by human 
 
1 20 Economic and Statistical Inquiry. 
 
 pride and passion, is dictated by tlie liigliest interests, 
 of mankind. 
 
 But, furtlier still, tliere are collateral advantages wliicli 
 statistical inquiry affords, in bringing together, to such a 
 meeting as this, men of science, and men of the world, — 
 the professor, the actuary and the politician, — who find the 
 occasion of union and mutual benefit, in a pursuit which 
 exercises at once the student\s capacities of intelligent 
 research, and logical deduction, and assists, as I have 
 shown, to a happy issue, the best efforts of those who move 
 in the busiest and noblest spheres of active citizenship. 
 
 And, even more widely, it promotes the diffusion of 
 intelligence and the unity of intellectual effort throughout 
 the earth, as in the case of the International Statistical 
 Congress, which was originated at the London Exhibition 
 of 1851, and has assembled successively in Brussels, in 
 Paris, in Vienna, in London, in Florence, at The Hague_, 
 and, lastly, in St. Petersburg. At those meetings, various, 
 countries have been represented by delegates from their 
 Governments and by men of science, with the object of 
 discovering the best modes of statistical inquiry, of ascer- 
 taining the facts capable of numerical expression which can 
 bo collected in all civilised communities, of establishing a 
 w'orld-v/ide uniformity of statement, tabulation and pub- 
 lication of those facts, giving a more exact and scientific 
 character to results, and making them more available for 
 general usefulness. At the last Session, the eighth cf 
 the series, in St. Petersburg, — of which I should be glad, 
 if I had time, to give some account from an admirable 
 Report of Mr. Hammick, whose absence from this meeting 
 I sincerely regret — notwithstanding the distance from 
 which they came and the dangers they encountered from 
 cholera and otherwise, 128 foreign members attended, from 
 almost every country in Europe, and the United States of 
 
Economic and Statistical Inquiry, 1 2 1 
 
 Ameiica, from Brazil, Egypt, and Japan. There were 360 
 Russian members, including the first scientific men and 
 University professors from all parts of the Empire. The 
 Grand Duke Constantine presided, and opened the proceed- 
 ings in a forcible address. The Emperor gave his best 
 assistance, in every way, and the meeting was most har- 
 monious and successful. I cannot attempt even to indicate 
 the nature and the fruits of its important labours ; and I 
 refer to it, only that I may illustrate, by a late and con- 
 spicuous example, the mode in which the prosecution of 
 statistical studies may tend to promote the good under- 
 standing of Governments ; to dissipate the evil prejudices 
 which have so often held nations in unnatural and absurd 
 antagonism ; to diffuse the highest inteUigence of its most 
 instructed members amongst the whole family of states, 
 and bind them together by an identity of mental action 
 and an equal participation of discoveries and suggestions, 
 abounding in advantage to them all. 
 
 I fear I have already overpassed the proper limits of 
 sach an address as this; and I pursue no further the 
 general considerations on which I have partially and im- 
 perfectly entered. But it seems to me, that those who 
 are charged with the duty which I have assumed, may 
 fairly be expected to make some allusion to matters within 
 the sphere of their own special division of scientific know- 
 ledge, which may have peculiar relations with the localities 
 in which they act. The opportunity of concentrating 
 attention upon such matters may be judiciously and 
 largely used by the authors of papers in the several 
 sections ; but a very brief allusion to some of them should 
 be allowed to make the opening addresses ''racy of the 
 soil.-" I shall merely glance at two or three which will be 
 of interest as belonging to Ireland. 
 
 I believe that in no other department of statistical inquiry 
 
122 Econoi7iic and Statistical Inquiry, 
 
 lias such progress been made in these countries^ within 
 living memory^ as in that which comprehends ^^ Judicial 
 Statistics^^^ — dealing with crime^ its motives, its causes 
 and the means of its repression, and with all the various 
 questions of interest which arise in connexion with the 
 administration of civil and criminal justice. In this depart- 
 ment, men of high intelligence have long been labouring 
 throughout the world; and it was the subject of sedulous 
 attention at all the international congresses of which I have 
 spoken. The results have been satisfactory and full of 
 practical advantage, and they will become still more so, 
 when the inquiries which those congresses have organised 
 shall have submitted for comparison the judicial systems of 
 all lands, described by those who are best acquainted with 
 them. In this good work, Ireland has done more than her 
 part, under the supervision of Dr. Neilson Hancock ; and 
 I owe it to that very eminent statistician to quote from a 
 letter addressed to me by Mr. Hammick, of whom I have 
 spoken already, the remarkable statement, that " the Irish 
 Judicial Statistics are unequalled in Europe for skilful 
 arrangement and lucid exposition. ^^ 
 
 The changes in the social state of Ireland, and the legis- 
 lation of latter years, have fixed attention on our County 
 Courts, and made some reforms in their procedure and some 
 extension of their jurisdiction very desirable. The Land 
 Act creates new exigencies in connexion with our agricul- 
 tural and commercial life, and they must be satisfied by a 
 moderate and carefully-considered reform of institutions, 
 which have worked well and command the confidence of 
 the people. This is one of the most important matters 
 which can receive the attention of the Legislature ; and I 
 am glad to say that a beginning of improvement has been 
 made in the last session, by an Act which gives the Chair- 
 men of Counties power to adjudicate, in small cases, and 
 
Eco7ioinic and Statistical Inquiry. 123 
 
 within certain limits, although hona fide questions of title 
 may have arisen. The want of this power has often pro- 
 duced a denial of justice to suitors, whose poverty has 
 forbidden them to seek it in a superior court — with the 
 frequent consequences of lawless contentions, violent as- 
 saults, and, sometimes, lamentable homicides. The humble 
 man who is wronged, in fact or fancy, and has found all 
 available legal tribunals closed against him, takes the law 
 into his own hands and becomes his own avenger. I hope 
 this great mischief will now exist no more. But the exten- 
 sion of jurisdiction in title cases, and the further concession 
 of a limited right to deal with transactions of partnership 
 are only, I trust, the heralds of a more comprehensive 
 measure, giving to our local courts, with such modification 
 as may be necessary, the equitable jurisdiction already 
 possessed by the County Courts of England. 
 
 You will, I am pleased to learn, have the opportunity of 
 hearing a paper on Land Tenure, prepared by Sir George 
 Campbell, the late Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal, who is 
 eminently qualified to speak with authority on that momen- 
 tous subject ; and to whom the people of this country owe 
 serious obligations, for the counsel and assistance which his 
 great ability and large experience in another land enabled 
 him to aSbrd, during the discussions which preceded the 
 passing of the Irish Land Act. Of that Act, generally, I 
 have no purpose to speak here. It has been in operation 
 for too brief a time, and its provisions have yet been too 
 little interpreted by judicial exposition to warrant a con- 
 fident pronouncement on many points connected with it. 
 I believe that it has already been of signal advantage, 
 and will yield greater benefits hereafter. But I refer to it 
 now, only that I may say a word of its purchase clauses, 
 which, — and the best mode of giving them vitality and 
 effect, — are worthy of the attention of all who care for the 
 
124 Eco7iomic and Statistical Inqiuiy. 
 
 prosperity of Ireland. As to those clauses, there was no 
 controversy in Parliament : they passed^ with universal 
 approval,, through both the Houses. They recognised^ with 
 all the authority involved in so rare a unanimity of accept- 
 ance^ the value of diffused proprietorship of land amongst 
 our agricultural classes. It is impossible to over-estimate 
 their importance to the progress of this country in industry 
 and order. Yet^ they have had a very inadequate operation ; 
 and remain almost a dead letter on the Statute Book. I 
 learn, from a report of the Commissioners of Public Works, 
 that, since the passing of the Act, 338 tenant-farmers have 
 purchased their holdings, comprising an acreage of 22,116 
 acres, — of which the annual rent amounted to £13,141, — at 
 a gross cost of £319,522, including advances from the Com- 
 missioners of £192,066. The report informs us, further, 
 that the applications of tenant-farmers for loans under the 
 Statute have diminished instead of increasing, and that the 
 purchases of one year have been 206, whilst only 106 were 
 made, in that w^hich followed. These facts are disappointing 
 in a high degree; and I call attention to them, in this place, 
 that, if possible, the causes of the disappointment may be 
 investigated and done away, and free and fruitful action 
 given to legislative provisions, amongst the very best which 
 have ever been vouchsafed to us. Of course, I cannot here 
 discuss so large a question ; but I may indicate my own 
 opinion that, in order to the effective working of those pro- 
 visions, it will be necessary to facilitate, still further, the 
 transfer of land, divided in small proportions, by cheapening 
 conveyances and validating titles at a small expense ; and 
 that, for this purpose, it will be proper to extend the opera- 
 tions of the Record of Title Office beyond the narrow sphere 
 within which Parliamentary opinion confined it when it was 
 originally designed, and to make it effective, as it has never 
 been, though years have elapsed since it was opened, by the 
 
Economic and Statistical Inquiry. 125 
 
 application of tlie principle o£ compulsion, without the aid 
 of which, old habits, ignorant dislike of innovation, and 
 powerful class interests, will continue to nullify its influence. 
 The purpose of the Legislature to secure a complete and 
 permanent register of all dealings with property in the soil 
 is of high policy and plain necessity; and must not be 
 baulked by the supineness or the obstinacy of individuals, 
 whose own best interests will be promoted when they are 
 forced to aid in carrying out that purpose. In addition, it 
 will be necessary to reconsider the fiscal arrangements of 
 that Office as well as of the Landed Estates Court, to which 
 it is attached, and to localise their action by the establish- 
 ment of District Registries, of easy access, for small trans- 
 actions, and with fees too moderate to bar approach to 
 them. 
 
 These seem to me the outlines of a reform long desirable, 
 but, heretofore, difficult, — from the vis inertioe of some and 
 the active antagonism of others, — which should promptly 
 be undertaken by Parliament, and has already, in principle, 
 received its sanction, by its general approval of the Bills 
 introduced by Lord Cairns during the past session. It is 
 essential to Ireland, if we would have the action of a benefi- 
 cent law no longer paralysed, and the passionate eagerness 
 with which the Irish people covet the possession of the soil 
 indulged, legitimately and within the limits of the law ; so 
 that, instead of finding it often identified with agrarian 
 crime, we shall see it become subordinate and ancillary to 
 the equitable settlement of the country and the lasting 
 contentment of its people, by prompting them to obtain, 
 through honourable industry and manly effort, that position 
 of secure and independent proprietorship, which, according 
 to all our experience of human nature, will lead them to 
 identify their individual interests and objects with their duty 
 to the State^ and make them loyal and law-abiding citizens. 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 
 
Daniel O ConiielL 
 
 [The O'Connell Centenary Address : Dublin, 1875.] 
 
 THE commemoration which we make to-day is more than 
 an honour to a man. It celebrates the redemption of 
 a people. It should be a prophecy and a foretaste of that 
 future of union^ prosperity, and peace, in which Irishmen 
 will yet forget the misrule, and end the strife, of ages. 
 
 You assemble to testify your thankfulness for the noblest 
 service a single citizen ever rendered to a nation : your 
 pride in the equality he conquered for you by such gigantic 
 efforts and against such desperate odds : and your un- 
 changing devotion to that good old cause of civil and 
 religious liberty, of which, throughout his life, he was the 
 foremost champion in the world. 
 
 I feel, very deeply, my own inadequacy to fulfil the task 
 imposed upon me. But avoidance of it was impossible. 
 In my earlier years, I knew O'Connell well. He was to me, 
 also, as he was described by Richard Lalor Shell, during the 
 trial of 1844 — '^my great political benefactor, my deliverer, 
 and my friend ! ^' I have more than shared the public 
 advantages which his marvellous career purchased for his 
 country ; and from the hour when he signed my certificate 
 for admission to the Irish Bar, I was personally his debtor 
 for continual kindness. As his counsel, I acted for him in 
 the Queen's Bench and the House of Lords, and though. 
 
130 Daniel G Connell. 
 
 on some serious public questions^ I ventured to differ from 
 him in tlie zenith of his power, he never withdrew from 
 me his confidence and friendship. With such antecedents, 
 could I be silent when I was asked to speak — even though 
 friends whom I respect would have had it so ? Surely, I 
 could not. I am here to discharge, however weakly, what 
 seems to me, a sacred duty; and I hold it one of the 
 highest privileges and distinctions of my life to be, on a 
 day which you are making for ever memorable, the echo of 
 a fame which has filled the earth — the interpreter of the 
 feelings of grateful enthusiasm and loving pride with which 
 the remembrance of their Liberator is cherished by 
 millions of my race. 
 
 And not by them only, but also by men of other tongues 
 and nations. The voice of foreign countries, which speaks 
 the sense of a ^^contemporary posterity,^' acknowledged 
 his greatness whilst he lived. The spirit of O'Connell ani- 
 mated the eloquence of Lacordaire, when he strove for free 
 education and found, in the divine religion of the Cross, 
 the sternest condemnation of intolerance and the highest 
 sanction for ordered liberty. Admiration of his genius 
 and his virtue made Montalembert, — then preparing for a 
 troubled but brilliant and most noble life, — a pilgrim to his 
 home in the wilds of Kerry, and his eulogist, in pathetic 
 words, when, long years after, he passed through France, 
 a bowed and broken man, to die in Genoa. Gustavo de 
 Beaumont, De Tocqueville's friend, described him in phrases 
 combining fervent admiration and critical analysis. 
 
 And these witnesses to a reputation which, as has lately 
 been said with authority, continues to this hour more 
 diffused than that of any English-speaking public man of 
 the present century, had their praises widely repeated in 
 Germany and Italy and beyond the Atlantic. 
 
 There was no European state in which O'ConnelFs action 
 
Daniel GConnell. 131 
 
 was not watched with interest,, — the interest of apprehen- 
 sion in the upholders of dominant injustice, the interest of 
 hope and joy in multitudes pining to be free. His speeches 
 were translated into all languages. They were read in 
 Poland and Hungary, and not unknown to the slaves of 
 America, whose friend he was, when they had no hope; or 
 to those of our colonies, for whom he toiled until they were 
 set free, as earnestly as if his own Celtic blood had bounded 
 in their veins. 
 
 So it was during his life ; and now that he has rested in 
 Glasnevin, under the shadow of the Irish round tower, for 
 nine-and-twenty years, we have, to-day, decisive evidence 
 that time has dealt kindly with his memory and accumu- 
 lated honours round his tomb. The accordant testimony 
 of many distinguished men, of various and distant lands, 
 — some of whom are with you after weary journeys, and 
 others have spoken from afar with no uncertain sound, — 
 proves that the world has not forgotten O^ConnelPs 
 triumphs for his church and people ; and that their history 
 furnishes, and will furnish long, guidance and impulse to 
 those who, now or hereafter, may be called to maintain the 
 rights of conscience, and strive, as he strove, at once for 
 faith and freedom. 
 
 Europe has been prompt to respond, on this occasion, to 
 the call of Ireland : and we have greetings from the 
 American Republics and from the young nations which are 
 rearing themselves in the Australasian seas — instinct 
 with Irish spirit and Irish blood — demonstrating that the 
 memory of O'Connell is still reverecl, wherever civilised 
 men have known 
 
 The name and the fame 
 Of the sea-divided Gael. 
 
 The celebration of his Centenary, in such a way, will 
 
 I 2 
 
132 Daniel O' Council, 
 
 affirm his right to take a place amongst the rare beings 
 whose lives are but the beginnings of their earthly immor- 
 tality^ — whose work endures through ages^ and affects the 
 fate of untold generations. He has passed beyond the 
 sphere of contemporary hatreds. The mists and heats of 
 party are ceasing to envelope him. AVhat was accidental 
 and fleeting in his life fades gradually away. But the great 
 events of which he was the author^ the high qualities which 
 fitted him to achieve them^ come prominently forth, and the 
 figure of the man looms out before us in its true proportions 
 and its real grandeur. AYe are not far enough removed to 
 miss the vision of blots upon its surface : for blots there 
 were, as upon all things human. But time, which mellows 
 tints and rounds angularities, is telling even upon these ; 
 and men are coming to honour O'Connell as the great Irish 
 Celt, who conducted a fearful struggle to a happy issue, 
 with unexampled patience, skill, and mastery, not escaping 
 soil in the dust of the arena and the shock of the combat, 
 but emerging from them to a resplendent victory, which 
 will remain for ever the glory of his nation and a warning 
 and example to the world. 
 
 Of the general incidents of his life, I shall not think of 
 speaking in detail. The generation which saw his majestic 
 form, and heard his voice of music, is fast departing. Not 
 many exist who took part in the fight for Emancipation ; and 
 even the excitements of 1843 and its monster assemblies 
 are becoming traditions of the past. But the uncrowned 
 monarch, who then held over millions a more than kingly 
 sway, needs here no annalist. To you his life and labours 
 are as household words; and the occasion onl}- requires that 
 I should rapidly point to some of the principles which were 
 dear to him, some of the methods of his action, and some 
 of the results which he attained. 
 
 When Daniel O'Connell first saw the light, a hundred 
 
Daniel GConnelL 133 
 
 years ago, the race from which he sprang and the religion 
 of his forefathers seemed hopelessly sunk beneath the 
 weight of an oppression^ as degrading and complete as 
 ever overwhelmed a people. The Irish Catholic was w^orse 
 than a serf in his own land. In his person, all human rights 
 were trampled down, all human feelings outraged. He 
 was denied the common privilege of self-defence. He was 
 incapable of holding property like other men. He w^as 
 forbidden to instruct his ow^n children ; and a wicked and 
 immoral law tempted his brother to defraud him, and 
 robbed him that it might reward the apostacy of his un- 
 grateful son. Since time began, a system more atrocious 
 was never devised to crush the human conscience. And 
 this horrible machinery of persecution was worked with fit 
 results. It was mitigated in its action by the kindly feel- 
 ings of those whose supremacy it was invented to sustain ; 
 but it brought the country to the deepest depression, and 
 left it, spiritless and impotent, at the mercy of its task- 
 masters. 
 
 I look back from the happier present to the intolerable 
 past, in no spirit of bitterness, and with no desire to per- 
 petuate the memory of wrong. But, if we would judge 
 fairly of O'Conneirs character and history, w^e must know 
 what obstacles he had to encounter; what enemies to con- 
 front ; from wdiat a depth he w^as called to lift his people ; 
 and what faculties he needed to compass his success. 
 
 Ireland lay, as I have described her, without hope or 
 help, — the outcast of the nations ! But the hour of her de- 
 liverance came, — the hour, and the man created to deliver 
 her. O'Connell was born into a world which was soon to 
 see convulsions, disturbing its ancient order and shaping 
 its destinies anew; and, in the scheme of Providence, these 
 were to give occasion for the use of his singular endow- 
 ments, which, but for them, might have rusted in inac- 
 
134 Daniel O Connell. 
 
 tivity. The year of his birth witnessed the outbreak of 
 the American war of independence ; and the battle of 
 Lexington was the herald of events^ the memory of which 
 gives our Transatlantic brethren occasion for a centenary 
 festival as happy as our own. The spirit of the insurgents 
 passed across the seas_, and poured new life into the out- 
 worn nationalities of Europe. Their success animated the 
 efforts oi men struggling for freedom, and compelled atten- 
 tion to demands which had been flouted with contempt. 
 Thus it came to pass that the penal laws were partially 
 relaxed; and then the revolution of France broke forth, 
 and the privileges of the Irish Catholics received still 
 greater enlargement. The vital right of voting was be- 
 stowed; and, in 1793, when O^Connell was just of an age 
 to take advantage of the boon, he found himself permitted 
 to become a barrister. 
 
 The preparation was complete. If he had lived earlier, 
 he would not have had a chance of developing his genius 
 and marshalling his countrymen for their political deliver- 
 ance. But the concessions of the Irish Parliament gave 
 him instruments of action. His admission to the Bar en^ 
 abled him to use them ; and, after a moral struggle without 
 precedent in history, he employed the franchise of 1793 to 
 master the cabinet of Peel and Wellington, and found, in 
 the freeholders of Clare, the irresistible pioneers of emanci- 
 pation. 
 
 O'Connell came to the Bar in 1 798, and, almost from the 
 opening of his career, devoted himself to the public service. 
 He had no force to aid him in the gigantic task he under- 
 took. Physical or moral help was equally denied him! He 
 led no army. There was no trained and organised opinion 
 to stimulate his efforts or reward them by applause. His 
 lot was cast with an utterly prostrate community, — wanting 
 all strength of self-assertion, almost without the courage to 
 
Daniel O'ConnelL 135 
 
 complain. Indeed, they had fallen so low as to declare 
 whilst they grovelled before the Throne, that they " re- 
 spected from the bottom of their hearts ^^ the infamous 
 laws under which they suffered. 
 
 But, in himself, O^Connell had limitless resources, — a 
 buoyant nature, perpetual vigilance, untiring energy, pa- 
 tience inexhaustible, invention without bounds, faith in his 
 cause which never faltered, and resolution which no reverse 
 could daunt and no discouragement subdue. 
 
 And, so accoutred, he prepared to play the part of the 
 mighty Jew of old : — 
 
 The dread of Israel's foes, who, single combatant, 
 Duelled their armies ranked in proud array, 
 Himself an army ! 
 
 His brain and tongue were, at first, his only weapons ; 
 but the brain was massive and fertile, and the tongue, in 
 many ways, has scarcely had an equal. His powers as an 
 orator were all his own. He had, perhaps, greater variety 
 and completeness of control over his auditory than any 
 speaker of ancient or modern times. Others have been 
 pre-eminent in special gifts; but he had singular command 
 of the widest range of persuasive eloquence. He had 
 humour, and pathos, and invective, and argument, and he 
 could pass from one to another, sweeping across the 
 human heart-strings with an astonishing facility and a sure 
 response. 
 
 He was not an artist in oratory. He regarded his faculty 
 of speech as an instrument, and not as an end; and had 
 little pride in it, save for the means it gave him of working 
 out his purposes. He was indifferent to his reputation as 
 a speaker, and took no pains to correct or preserve his 
 addresses ; and perhaps the only one really representing what 
 he was is his defence of John Magee, which — as he told me 
 
136 Daniel OCoimelL 
 
 during tlie state trial — lie himself wrote out, whilst he 
 was waiting to start for his circuit on the morning after the 
 delivery of it. 
 
 He impressed himself upon his hearers, not by nice 
 attention to the form of his sentences or the selection of 
 his words, but by vigorous repetition of the views he de- 
 sired to inculcate, in such language as was most suited to 
 those whom he addressed. Thus, he dealt habitually with 
 juries ; and it was this repetition, in every variety of phrase 
 and with every aid of illustration, which enabled him to fill 
 the popular mind with his own conceptions, and mould it 
 according to his will. 
 
 He had the rare endowments of a stately presence, and a 
 voice almost unequalled in melody and compass ; and these, 
 with his skill in reasoning and affluence of wit and fancy, 
 commended him to all sorts of people, wherever he ap- 
 peared. Once, he came down as special counsel to a northern 
 county, and he was regarded as the very incarnation of evil 
 by jurors who had known in him only their irreconcileable 
 political antagonist. They looked askance at him, and 
 would scarcely hear him ; but, before he had concluded his 
 speech to evidence, he had won their admiration and their 
 verdict, and established kindly relations with them, which 
 were long maintained. 
 
 I saw him in Edinburgh speaking to a multitudinous 
 assembly of Scotchmen, who had small love for the Irish 
 agitator, and no sympathy with his religion or his race; 
 but when his voice rung out like a trumpet round the 
 Calton Hill, he moved them to a frenzy of enthusiasm such 
 as I have rarely seen excited in any Irish crowd. 
 
 Listen to Lord Lytton^s description of O'Connell at a 
 monster meeting : — 
 
 Once to my sight the giant thus was given, 
 Walled by -wide air and roofed by boundless heaven, 
 
Daniel O'Comiell. 137 
 
 Beneath his feet the human ocean lay, 
 
 And wave on wave flowed into space away. 
 
 Methought no clarion could have sent its sound 
 
 E'en to the centre of the hosts around ; 
 
 And, as I thought, rose the sonorous swell, 
 
 As from some church-tower swings the silvery bell. 
 
 Aloft and clear from airy tide to tide 
 
 It glided easy, as a bird may glide — 
 
 To' the last verge of that vast audience sent ; 
 
 It played with each wild passion as it went ; 
 
 Now stirred the uproar — now the murmurs stilled. 
 
 And sobs or laughter answered as it willed. 
 
 Then did I know what spells of infinite choice 
 
 To rouse or lull has the sweet human voice. 
 
 Then did I learn to seize the sudden clue 
 
 To the grand, troublous life antique — to view. 
 
 Under the rock-stand of Demosthenes, 
 
 Unstable Athens heave her noisy seas ! 
 
 Pitt was unable to fulfil his promises to Ireland; aban- 
 doned^ at the King^s bidding-, the scheme which might have 
 given her a happier future ; and ultimately renounced all 
 effort to remove her religious disabilities. The period which 
 followed was very dreary for her. It gave no prospect of 
 relief. But, for five-and-twenty years, hoping against hope, 
 she still pressed onwards, maintaining her bootless struggle, 
 — now in associations, again in committees, often in popular 
 assemblies, sometimes in the law courts; — her modes of 
 action always varying, her objects always the same. 
 
 It was not a time of progress, but of preparation. There 
 was continual movement, but little advance. The multitude 
 were made familiar with the story of their wrongs, and 
 encouraged to seek redress by hopes which were often 
 baffled, but always revived. O^Connell had not yet attained 
 that leadership which was unquestioned in after days. But 
 he was mounting towards it. He was building up his legal 
 reputation, and commanding more and more the public 
 confiidence. Wherever work was to be done, or counsel 
 
138 Daniel 0'Con7iell. 
 
 given, or opposition overborne^ in assertion of the Catholic 
 claims, there was he, ready to speak or act, — eager to sus- 
 tain their friends, audacious, a outrancej in defiance of their 
 adversaries. Associated with able and trusted men, he was 
 already the animating spirit of the movement. But for 
 him, also, it was only a time of preparation. He was 
 nerving his strength and training his energies for the 
 supreme efifort which was to win for him the name of 
 Liberator. 
 
 Time went on ; but the cause of the Catholics did not 
 prosper much. It had, in the Imperial Parliament, the 
 advocacy of Plunket and Grattan — the first astonishing 
 the House of Commons by his masculine vigour and a 
 trenchant logic ; and the second displaying, in his latest 
 years, the unbroken power of that electric eloquence which, 
 in his youth, had stirred a nation's heart to passionate 
 excitement and high endeavour, and given him a claim to 
 Byron's eulogy : — 
 
 With all that Demosthenes wanted endued, 
 And his rival or victor in all he possessed ! 
 
 The advocacy of such men was a providential agency, 
 informing the mind of England, and dissipating the preju- 
 dices on which sectarian ascendency was based. And they 
 were sustained by a great party, of which I may now say, 
 without offence to any one, that, to its immortal honour, it 
 refused to succumb to the intolerance of royalty, or pur- 
 chase office at the expense of principle. For many a long 
 year, the place of the friends of the Catholics was in 
 opposition, and they held that place with a self- abnegating 
 faithfulness beyond all praise. In our own island, the 
 liberal Protestant was ostracised by the Government, and 
 systematically denied emolument or distinction. Yet men 
 like Robert Holmes, and Louis Perrin, and Maziere Brady, 
 
Daniel G ConnelL 139 
 
 — dear friends of mine, whose memory I hold in reverence, 
 — were always found mindful of their duty, and careless of 
 themselves. They held aloft the banner of religious liberty, 
 — round which we all profess to rally now, — in evil days, 
 when to be its bearer was to defy authority and court ex- 
 clusion; and Catholic Ireland will be, indeed, disgraced, 
 if the time shall ever come, when she shall cease to be 
 deeply grateful for the services and sacrifices of those who 
 did not share her faith or bow before her altars, but stood 
 by her in her weakness, to their own grievous injury, 
 because they believed in the justice of her claims. 
 
 Much had been accomplished by speech in Parliament 
 and writing in the press, and much by the example of 
 steadfastness displayed by honest men in the face of all 
 discouragement. Its opponents were led, at least, to con- 
 sider the reasonableness of the Catholic demand. But its 
 concession seemed indefinitely postponed : and the people, 
 tantalised and disgusted by the alternation of fair hopes 
 and bitter disappointments, sank into a miserable apathy. 
 Although the visit of George the Fourth, — an event of evil 
 memory, — galvanised them into feverish expectation for a 
 time, they soon learned that the King, before whom they 
 had humbled themselves so slavishly, loved them as little 
 as his royal father; and they fell into the abject condition 
 described by one of the best and most accomplished of them 
 all. Sir Thomas Wyse : — "■ The Catholic spirit had totally 
 passed away. The dead body only was left behind. ■'' But 
 
 'Tis always the darkest hour nearest the dawn ; 
 
 and O^Connell seized the moment of her worst despair to 
 recal the spirit of his country, and sound the trumpet of 
 her resurrection. 
 
 Whilst the moral prostration described by Sir Thomas 
 
140 Daniel GConnell. 
 
 Wyse was most complete, he formed tlie Catholic Associa- 
 tion of 1824. You need not be told its history, — how hard 
 it was to procure the attendance of ten persons at its early 
 meetings^ and how it grew in numbers and in power, whilst, 
 day by day, OX'OnnelFs voice resounded through the land, 
 rousing the '^hereditary bondsmen'^ from their despairing 
 inaction, and teachiug them reliance on themselves. You 
 need not be told how Ireland ralUed to the Association, — 
 how the Catholic aristocracy came around its leader, — how 
 the Catholic clergy answered to his call, — until despondency 
 was banished, apathy passed away, and the Catholic millions 
 were banded to do the work of men, in the last struggle 
 for their freedom. The organisation was made perfect from 
 the centre of the island to the sea ; and its unbought and 
 unforced obedience to its chief was more absolute than 
 was ever given, by trembling serfs, to Eoman emperor or 
 Eastern caliph. 
 
 And the one essential figure in this great drama, which 
 soon grew to absorb the attention of mankind, was the 
 figure of Daniel O'Connell. Ho towered above his com- 
 peers. He acted in the open day : within the limits of the 
 law and by methods known to the constitution. He was 
 intensely loyal ; combining the personal devotion of a 
 cavalier to his sovereign with devotion, as earnest, to 
 popular rights. He taught the masses to honour the Crown 
 and be obedient to authority, not for fear only but for 
 conscience' sake : and he proclaimed that by moral force, 
 and moral force alone, all they could legitimately wish 
 might be accomplished. 
 
 He had seen the horrors of the French revolution. Ho 
 had mourned over the miseries of the rebellion of 1 798. 
 He had learned to hate anarchy, and shrink from civil strife ; 
 and his perpetual teaching was, that civil liberty is made 
 worthless by the defilement of a bloody purchase. It was 
 
Daniel GConnell. 141 
 
 a new gospel^ preached witli strong faith and endless itera- 
 tion_, and, in the might of it, the Catholic people triumphed ! 
 
 They triumphed with the weapon which the legislation of 
 1793 had put into their hands. They learned to use, for their 
 religion and their country, the franchise which they had, 
 theretofore, prostituted to their own debasement, at the 
 bidding of their masters. They refused to be any longer 
 " dumb driven cattle,^^ lashed to the poll to vote as they 
 were ordered. The serfs, as was said by a great minister 
 of the time, ^^ assumed the attitude of freemen ''^; stormed, 
 at all hazards, in Louth and Waterford, the citadels of the 
 Ascendency; and gave the first assurance of its downfal. 
 
 It tottered. The Clare election struck the cou^ de 
 grace, and the conqueror of Waterloo succumbed to 
 O'Connell. That famous election is unique in history. It 
 was said to have been the prophecy of John Keogh, that 
 emancipation would be carried when a Catholic should 
 be sent to Parliament ; and the leader of the Catholics 
 attempted its fulfilment. The great encounter came be- 
 tween the lords of the soil and the people who had been so 
 subservient, that they felt amazed at the audacity of their 
 own opposition. The issue was known to be momentous 
 and decisive : and all possible efforts were made to insure 
 the victory of the government. But they were vain. The 
 prestige of dominion had departed. The fetters of interest 
 and custom had been wrenched away. The voters listened 
 to their priests and defied their landlords; and, demon- 
 strating their fitness for liberty by a majestic order and a 
 universal temperance, which proved at once the depth of 
 their resolution and their power of self-reliance and self- 
 restraint, they elected O'Connell and won Emancipation. 
 
 Bitterly confessing 
 
 The sharp, convulsed pangs of agonising pride, — 
 Sir Robert Peel and the Duke of Wellington accepted 
 
142 Daniel O' ConnelL 
 
 the inevitable, and gave us the justice they could no more 
 withhold. The great heart of Ireland throbbed with exul- 
 tation. The incense of a people^s thanksgiving went up 
 to the throne of the Almighty Being who had permitted 
 them to be raised from their low estate, and led to a pure 
 and bloodless victory. Countries which had strained from 
 afar, with eager eyes, to watch the shifting scenes of the 
 unequal contest, noted its result with wonder and rejoic- 
 ing. The triumph was complete j and the nation bowed in 
 homage to the author of its great deliverance. 
 
 That triumph was not for the Catholics alone. They had 
 especial reason to value it, for it most nearly affected them, 
 and they had gained it in a manly struggle without any 
 compromise. They had been saved by O'Connell, and 
 those who thought with him, fi-om purchasing it by an 
 enslavement of their Church, which no man now deems 
 possible ; and although, to soothe the irritation of their 
 baffled adversaries, some ungenerous and unwise restric- 
 tions were put upon them, they had really obtained — what 
 their fathers longed for, but did not dare to hope — Un- 
 conditional Emancipation ! But the triumph, although 
 otherwise regarded by the Irish Protestant, ought, if 
 rightly understood, to have been considered, and will 
 yet be considered, as his triumph also. It relieved him 
 from the reproach of foul wrong to his fellow men. 
 It removed him from the demoralising influences of an 
 unjust ascendency. It cast him free to wage honestly 
 the battle of life on equal terms with those around him; 
 and forbade him any longer to hold the place of a 
 pampered monopolist, debauched and emasculated by ex- 
 clusive privilege. It set the seal of condemnation on 
 religious strife : and took away the inducements which had 
 encouraged rulers to divide that they might govern, and 
 misled the people 'Ho hate each other for the love of God.^' 
 
Daniel GConnelL 143 
 
 By all — Protestants and Catholics alike — it should have 
 been hailed as the common victory of truth and reason ; 
 and although it needed many supplements to make it 
 perfect^ which have been painfully and slowly gained^ and 
 although^ even now^ its results have not reached their full 
 development, it has changed the character of our social 
 life, — harmonised our relations with each other, — abated 
 the violence of our hereditary feuds, — and assisted Ireland 
 to advance, in the way of material and moral progress, 
 more rapidly, considering her antecedent state, — I say it 
 with confidence and pride, in spite of all our shortcomings, — 
 than any other country of the old world. 
 
 It is not needful, here and now, to justify the career of 
 O^Connell or to vindicate him from the aspersions which 
 pursued him to the grave. He had faults, for he was 
 mortal ; and, looking back from the calmer period in which 
 we live to the tempestuous days of agitation^ we inevitably 
 note acts and words which we might wish to have been 
 unspoken and undone. We may dislike the rudeness of 
 the strife, — the bitterness of language,- — the vehemence of 
 assaultj — the bandying of ugly epithets, — the looseness of 
 passionate assertion and sanguine promises lightly made 
 and quickly falsified. These things, and things such as 
 these, which existed in the movements of times gone by, — 
 not in Ireland only but equally in England, as any one may 
 see who turns to the political records of the earlier part of 
 the present century, — may seem to us to have discredited 
 the popular cause, even though they did it temporary 
 service. But whilst, in the peaceful enjoyment of our con- 
 summate liberty, we use the privilege of criticism on the 
 acts of those who won it for us, — who bore the burthen and 
 heat of the day, and spent themselves in labour and devo- 
 tion to the cause, — we must remember the work O'Connell 
 had to do, and his materials for the doing of it. 
 
144 Daniel G Connell. 
 
 It was his task to lift up a people^ prostrate — apparently 
 for ever — before an invulnerable power. The spirit of 
 manhood had been crushed from their hearts^ and it was 
 the first need of their deliverer to 
 
 Create a soul under the ribs of death, 
 
 and rouse them to self-respect and self-dependence. As I 
 have said, his brain and tongue were his only instruments, 
 and if he sometimes spoke in harsh language, and paid 
 back hate and scorn with interest, his violation of social 
 amenities and fastidious tastes may have a claim for pardon, 
 if it gave courage to a trampled race and emboldened them 
 to confront their hereditary lords. Revolutions of opinion 
 are as little wrought by abject meekness as revolutions 
 of force; and when Shakespeare tells us, — "if a man will 
 make courtesy to say nothing, he is virtuous'^; the great 
 painter of human nature points to the virtue of a slave. 
 0' Connell exacted from the Irish Catholics submission to 
 authority, as at once a moral duty and the condition of 
 success ; but whilst they were still sufi'erers from injustice, 
 that submission could only be what Burke had described as 
 '^ a litigious and dissatisfied obedience "; and this he could 
 not well maintain by honeyed words, or the exchange of 
 compliments with those whom it was his life's business to 
 encounter and overthrow. 
 
 Again, he has been attacked for his autocratic temper 
 and intolerance of rivalry ; and, in ordinary circumstances, 
 good feeling would condemn these things, so far as they 
 existed. But, again, we must consider O'CounelPs position. 
 To succeed, he required concentration of authority. He 
 had to deal with ignorant and undisciplined masses, — with- 
 out reliable leaders or intelligent opinion; — and to draw 
 forth and utilise their latent strength, a firm hand and a 
 vigorous will, defying opposition, were essential. 
 
Daniel O ConnelL 145 
 
 His sclieme of peaceful agitation required for its working 
 apparent impossibilities. He aimed to keep Ireland pro- 
 foundly submissive to tlie laws, yet morally ungovernable : 
 — to stir to its depths the passion of the people, yet make 
 them shrink from violence and outrage : — to be himself, at 
 once, vehement and fierce and cool of judgment ; stanch 
 to principle, but pliant and supple in adaptation to the 
 expediencies of the hour : steady of purpose, but seeking 
 his end by an infinite variety of means, — of means, pos- 
 sibly, not always wise or always warrantable, but always 
 faithfully employed, and with unerring precision, to carry 
 forward the mission of his life. Considering these things, 
 we shall probably conclude, that, if O^Connell had not 
 grown to be an autocrat, the Irish Catholics might never 
 have been welded together in an unbroken and resistless 
 phalanx — might never have been got to shape a policy 
 capable of carrying them to their difficult end — might 
 have remained, for many a dreary year, a 
 
 Heap of un cementing sand — 
 
 torn by small divisions, committed to hostile courses, and 
 powerless to overbear the tremendous combination of royal 
 enmity and aristocratic influence and class interest and 
 popular hatred, which threatened to hold them in per- 
 petual bondage. 
 
 O'Connell was very much an impersonation of his 
 country, in its strength and its weakness, its virtues and 
 its faults. If he had been more perfect, he would have 
 been less successful. If he had been other than he was, 
 in his peculiar time and sphere of action, Emancipation 
 might have been indefinitely postponed or unworthily 
 eff'ected. Men say it would have come, if he had never 
 lived. And so it might ; for Ireland sought only justice ; 
 and there is a God in Heaven ! But when would it have 
 
146 Daniel G Council. 
 
 come ? Or how ? Would tlie Irish Catholics have still 
 been quiet slaves ? Or would the intolerable pressure of 
 hopeless wrong have had its issue in social anarchy ? If 
 O^Connell had not been here, to force them to self-assertion_, 
 they might have continued to submit: — if he had not been 
 here, to moderate passions inflamed by tyranny, they might 
 have burst all bounds and desolated Ireland or broken up the 
 Empire. Who can tell what might have been ? But we know 
 what is; and we have reason for deep thankfulness to Heaven 
 and its appointed instrument, that doubt is ended and specu- 
 lation done away, and that w^e rest, through his endeavours, 
 in the enjoyment of the priceless blessings of a free consti- 
 tution, — securing to us the fair administration of equal laws. 
 There has been talk of O'ConnelFs extravagance of 
 pretension and unreasonableness of demand. The charge 
 is not historically just. Rightly or Avrongly, he sometimes 
 acted on the notion that excess of claim was needful to 
 enforce concession. But he was practically reasonable. 
 He had strong common sense, and he always strove to 
 obtain the best available terms for his country. He stirred 
 the multitude almost beyond restraint, but he never let 
 them overpass the limits of legality ; and when he could 
 secure a measure of substantial benefit, he did not throw it 
 by to clutch at an abstraction. When Lord Mulgrave 
 came to afford its first real effect to the Relief Bill, he 
 abandoned the Repeal agitation which had secured for him 
 unbounded popularity and a princely revenue, — the free- 
 will gift of a nation to its advocate w^hose services it held 
 beyond all price, doing signal honour to them both. He 
 struggled then to realise advantages many of which we 
 have since obtained. And at various stages of his after- 
 career, any one who will study his speeches, which a recent 
 publication makes accessible to all, will find him claiming 
 as justice to Ireland those reforms in the corporations, the 
 
Daniel O'Connell. 147 
 
 churcli, tlie land laws, and the jury system, wliicli have 
 been conceded — although too often imperfectly, — beyond 
 the measure of his hopes, and other political and social 
 changes within the easy reach of an enfranchised people, 
 pursuing, in unity and earnestness, a common end. 
 
 I have said that here he needs no defence ; but it has 
 seemed to me becoming that a little word should be 
 spoken, on an occasion of such solemnity and general 
 interest, — extenuating nothing of charges really sustain- 
 able, but repelling some of those with which the virulence 
 of faction strove, through all his days, to blacken his 
 reputation. At various times, he grappled angrily with the 
 Press and the Parliament. The great interests he assaulted 
 and the keen susceptibilities he was obliged to wound 
 made him hosts of enemies. He was not spared whilst he 
 lived. Even now, the trail of slander slimes his memory : 
 and those to whom it is dear are driven to defend it. But 
 every day is lessening the necessity, and lifting him, more 
 and more, above the foulness of partisan abuse. 
 
 After 1829, O^Connell enjoyed a reputation — 
 
 With which all Europe rang from side to side. 
 
 His name was a familiar word in foreign lands. He had 
 done an act for which there was no precedent. He had 
 used a method previously unknown. He was a victorious 
 revolutionist, who had changed a people^s destiny without 
 blood or crime ; leading them safely through the unspeak- 
 able perils of the stormiest civil agitation the world had 
 seen. He was the apostle of liberty and the enemy of licence. 
 He had reconciled order and progress ; and identified 
 religion with the advancement of human right. This was 
 his high position in the palmiest epoch of his life. He did 
 other great and memorable things, but the unique achieve- 
 ment by which he will be for ever distinguished from other 
 
 K 2 
 
148 Daniel GConnell, 
 
 leaders of mankind, was the liberation of Catholic Ireland 
 by purely moral means. 
 
 I have lingered fondly on that achievement ; because I 
 feel that an Irish Catholic, speaking of 0' Conn ell in the 
 metropolis of Ireland, is bound chiefly to regard him as the 
 author of our religious freedom. But I must tell you 
 briefly how, in a wider theatre, after he had won it, and 
 when his influence was enlarged, he acted in the interest of 
 progress and for the benefit of the human race. 
 
 Do not fear that I approach this latter period of 
 O^ConnelPs life with any purpose of stirring past or 
 present controversies, or touching on any question capable 
 of disuniting honest Irishmen. If I were so disposed, I 
 should be precluded from dealing with such topics by the 
 programme of your celebration, proclaiming to the world 
 that it repudiates exclusiveness, that it is meant to trans- 
 cend the bounds of sect and party, and that it invites all 
 men to combine in honouring one whose opinions they may 
 not all adopt, whose actions they may not all approve, but 
 whose greatness is their common property, and ought to 
 be their common pride. Your Committee have said of 
 their organisation, that '^ within it is reserved a place for 
 ev^ery man, of every hue and shade and party, who feels a 
 pride in being the countryman of O'Connell, and desires to 
 honour his memory.^^* That pledge is binding. I accepted it 
 when I wrote, in answer to the invitation of the chief magis- 
 trate of DubUn, that, on this occasion, we should ignore '^the 
 divisions of the past and the controversies of the present.^' 
 It was accepted by such men as the Duke of Norfolk, Lord 
 Greville, Lord Portarhngton, Lord Emly, Mr. Langdale, 
 Mr. Fullarton, and many others of the most various 
 political opinions, who, on the faith of it, gave to your 
 
 * Address of the Centenary Committee. See note at p. 101. 
 
Daniel OConnelL 149 
 
 movement the aid of their money and the authority of 
 their names. It should have strict observance throughout 
 your festal days ; and no man — Conservative or Liberal, 
 Catholic or Protestant, Unionist or Anti-Unionist, for all 
 these have answered to your call — should be forced to 
 complain that his generous confidence has been abused, by 
 word or act, compromising his opinions or offending his 
 susceptibilities, religious or political. Our solemnity is 
 national, or it is worse than nothing; and if O'Connell be 
 permitted to look down from that Heaven in which we 
 humbly trust he is now enjoying his eternal rest, he will 
 recognise — as the most grateful homage of the people 
 whom he freed — their striking of a truce of God, in which 
 they may celebrate his Centenary by forgetfulness of 
 dissensions and unity of hearts. 
 
 Avoiding, therefore, as far as possible, all unclosed con- 
 troversies and matters in dispute, political or religious^ and 
 looking only to accomplished and accepted facts, I shall 
 advert to O^ConnelFs course after he had attained the 
 vantage-ground of Emancipation. Unhappily, a perverse 
 policy and antipathies, meanly indulged by those he had 
 overcome, made his victory too long unfruitful of results^ 
 and exposed him to neglect and contumely. But this, 
 although it pained him, did not lead him to betray his 
 principles or neglect his duty. He set himself earnestly 
 to do the work of Parliament: and wherever effort was 
 possible, for the promotion of public interest or the expan- 
 sion of public liberty, he was sure to be found, '^ faithful 
 amongst the faithless and foremost of the fearless.^' 
 
 He claimed the great movement for Reform as a conse- 
 quence of Emancipation ; and, beyond doubt, it was largely 
 stimulated and shaped by the methods and the success of 
 the Irish struggle. Again, associations were formed, and 
 leaguers rallied the masses, and moneys were gathered, and 
 
150 Daniel GConnell. 
 
 ''^ muster ings of men in myriads/^ to use Lord Brougham^s 
 words^ made their tramp heard in Parhament, sounding the 
 death-note of electoral abuse. The strife was bitter and its 
 fortunes various_, but^ through it all^ O^Connell was in the 
 van; and at a time when very able men were roused to the 
 utmost exertion of their highest powers, his speeches yielded 
 in excellence to no others, and were pronounced by many 
 the best in the debates. And when the battle ended, and 
 England was saved from that risk of revolution which 
 comes of the hopelessness of necessary change, and allowed 
 to enter on the course of gradual and safe improvement 
 which has kept her undisturbed amidst the fall of dynasties 
 and the wreck of empires, she ought to have been grateful 
 to the Irish leader who did not help her less, because he 
 failed to get for his own people their full measure of Parlia- 
 mentary reform. 
 
 And so, when the dispute about the abolition of slavery 
 was coming to a close, and the Legislature prepared to make 
 the enormous pecuniary sacrifice by which it was nobly pur- 
 chased, 0^ Conn ell, though he resisted a compensation which 
 he thought unrighteous, was foremost in commending the 
 act of liberation to the acceptance of the country. 
 
 He was entitled to speak on the subject with authority, 
 for, as I have said, he had always been the negro's friend, 
 even when to be so seemed inconsistent with the political 
 interests of Ireland. In its great extremity the Catholic 
 Association needed help — the help of sympathy and money 
 — from foreign countries ; and one of the likeliest and 
 readiest to give such help was America. But O'Counell 
 refused to gain it by any compromise with slavery. He 
 denounced that evil institution in the Southern States as in 
 the British colonies. lie fought against it with fearless 
 resolution : and the contributions, which would otherwise 
 have been ample, were withheld. It was one of the many 
 
Daniel G Comic 11. 151 
 
 occasions on wlilcli he proved liimself to possess liigL. moral 
 courage and devotedness to duty. Another was^ when he 
 was led — I think, and the event has proved, mistakenly — 
 to oppose the introduction of poor laws into Ireland, al- 
 though the popular sentiment, interpreted by the illustrious 
 Bishop of Kildare, was very strong against him. And there 
 was another occasion more striking still — when he resisted 
 a pernicious combination of the Trades of Dublin, and saved 
 them from themselves, at the peril of his popularity and 
 even of his life. These things are worthy of remembrance 
 when we come to estimate the nature of the man; and 
 therefore I note them, although they may not be strictly in 
 order here. 
 
 It is fitting also to observe that the Liberator of the Irish 
 Catholic equally desired the liberation of the Dissenter and 
 the Jew. He drafted the petition which — backed by 100,000 
 Catholic signatures — precipitated the repeal of the Test and 
 Corporation Acts, and he was not deterred from advancing 
 that salutary measure, because the people he aided to en- 
 franchise had strong sectarian antipathies and gave little 
 help to the Catholic claims. At that time, too many of them 
 inherited the spirit of their Puritan ancestors, and would 
 almost have refused their own deliverance, if it had in- 
 volved the concession of liberty to their fellow- Christians. 
 O^Connell rebuked their bigotry by forcing his aid upon 
 them and helping to make them free. 
 
 And when the Jews needed support in their Parliamentary 
 struggle, he gave it, earnestly and freely. He had a special 
 interest in that ancient people ; for Ireland, like them, had 
 '^ sat by the waters of Babylon, and hung her harp upon the 
 willows ^^; — had suffered persecution and learned mercy; and 
 was eager to welcome the outcasts of Jerusalem to the 
 enjoyment of the privileges she had conquered for herself. 
 In spite of obstinate resistance, they also were emancipated : 
 
152 Daniel O Connell. 
 
 and we are not witlioufc reason for believing tliat O^Conneirs 
 efforts for them find grateful recognition in many Jewish 
 hearts. 
 
 The great battle of the Corn Laws was fought; and 
 0^ Connell contended for freedom of commerce as stoutly 
 as he had striven for freedom of religion. He was not, 
 perhaps, a profound economist; but he had the instincts of 
 genius, — informed and stimulated by a large humanity. 
 For many a year, before the cause grew popular or hopeful, 
 he was its unflinching advocate. He anticipated the un- 
 adorned eloquence of Cobden, and urged the absolute 
 repeal of the food-tax, whilst the Legislature was playing 
 with shifts and palliatives. And this he did, although his 
 doing of it offended, to a large extent, the local feeling, 
 and seemed to antagonise the local interests, of Ireland, 
 and was disapproved by many of his most important 
 political allies. Notwithstanding, he was strong enough 
 and brave enough to assert his own convictions. He 
 believed that the demands of the working people were 
 just, and might be conceded with advantage to all classes. 
 He looked to the removal of trade monopolies for the 
 creation of reciprocity of benefit and service amongst 
 nations, making them happily dependent on each other 
 for mutual aid, — and giving the world the truest guaran- 
 tees for peace and progress. If he had taken another 
 course, — and he could easily have made another more 
 popular in Ireland, — the issue of the struggle, in which 
 we now rejoice, might have been far less fortunate, or, at 
 the least, far less rapidly attained. 
 
 I can dwell no more on O^ConnelPs Parliamentary course ; 
 but I fear not to say that it was such as to make Britain 
 largely his debtor. She did not, and she could not, at once 
 appreciate the worth of his labours for religious liberty. 
 He had succeeded, by subduing her pride and compelling 
 
Daniel OConnelL 153 
 
 her sabmission ; although her intelligence was not con- 
 vinced or her prejudice removed. If her people had been 
 polled in 1829, a majority of every class would, probably, 
 have refused Emancipation. The matter, of course, is pro- 
 blematical ; but so have thought men most competent to 
 judge, and their opinion is sadly sustained by the almost 
 incredible exclusion of every Roman CathoHc from the 
 representation of England and Scotland which prevails 
 even at this hour — although amongst those who would 
 willingly seek it are Catholics of the oldest blood, and 
 the largest possessions, and the best intelligence, and the 
 most various political sentiments, on all the public ques- 
 tions of the time. Surely the exclusion is a shame and a 
 reproach ; and not the less because it is rebuked by the 
 conduct of other nations. We have seen Cathohc Austria 
 ruled, in our day, by a Protestant Prime Minister ; Catholic 
 France submitting cheerfully, for long years, to Guizot ; 
 and Catholic communities, everywhere, — and eminently 
 here in Ireland, — admitting to their legislatures, freely and 
 confidingly, Protestants of every confession and of every 
 class. 
 
 But although, under such circumstances, O^Connell may 
 not receive from Britain the full honour due to his greatest 
 public act, which she will yet assuredly award him, he has 
 other claims upon her which a just and generous people 
 should not be slow to allow. For years, he was the most 
 powerful subject of the realm. He had a band of followers 
 in the House of Commons, exulting in his leadership, and 
 obedient to his will ; who held the balance bet\veen con- 
 flicting parties, and had strength enough to make and 
 unmake ministries. It was a dangerous position, tempting 
 the man who held it to transact unworthily for his own 
 benefit, or indulge his own ambition without regard to the 
 general interest. His influence was odious to many who 
 
154 Daniel O' Comiell. 
 
 bowed before it^ and many wlio made profit by it ; and the 
 feelings of irritation which it roused have scarcely passed 
 away. But history will tell that O'Connell used his power 
 for pure and generous purposes^ in no spirit of poor self- 
 seeking or of insular narrowness, or of exclusive sectarian- 
 ism — but with a true and liberal sense of his public duty 
 and a firm resolution to discharge it. The records of 
 Parliament demonstrate that his labours were unsparingly 
 devoted to the advancement of every measure which had 
 for its aim the destruction of monopoly and the enlarge- 
 ment of public right. Not one of the statutes passed 
 during his representative career, which constitute the 
 modern charters of British liberty — commercial, political, 
 and religious — failed to find in him a willing supporter; 
 and if those great measures have laid, as I believe they 
 have, the broad and strong foundations of a prosperous 
 commonwealth, which, but for them, in a period of strange 
 transition, might have been subject to perilous disturbance 
 and possible decay, I claim for him the praise of having 
 been — in spite of scant encouragement from those who 
 owed him most and large inducements to other courses — 
 the unselfish, devoted, and efficient promoter at once of 
 the real interests and lasting greatness of the Empire, and 
 of the advancement of sound political and economic prin- 
 ciples throughout the globe. 
 
 I must hurry to a conclusion. Loyally observiug your 
 engagement of neutrality on still debated questions, I 
 cannot discuss the objects of O'ConnelPs latest struggle for 
 the Repeal of the Union, as to which opinions vary so 
 much and conflict so strongly. But no one will blame me 
 if I say, that it was conducted with an indomitable energy 
 and an amplitude of intellectual power, such as the aged 
 leader had scarcely demonstrated in his early prime. He 
 roused again the popular enthusiasm to a marvellous in- 
 
Daniel GConneU. 155 
 
 tensity. At his will, lie again restrained it from dangerous 
 excess ; and his dominion over the masses was never, 
 perhaps, so absolute before. Let men differ as they may 
 on the policy of the movement, its magnitude and grandeur 
 will make it conspicuous in history for ever. 
 
 Then came the monster trial, in which I was myself a 
 young and humble actor. O^Connell stood before a jury 
 wholly alien from him in politics and faith, — empannelled as, 
 I rejoice to believe, no jury can hereafter be empannelled in 
 this country, — whose verdict of conviction was invalidated, 
 as you know, by the House of Lords. 
 
 I well remember the day of the reversal. I was stand- 
 ing at the Bar, beside the Attorney -Greneral for Ireland, 
 when it grew evident that the judgment would be for the 
 traversers, and an Irish peer rushed down and said openly, 
 ^' We can^t stand this ! We must vote and prevent the 
 mischief ! ^' But better counsels prevailed. Lord Wharncliffe 
 reminded the House of its usages, and the becomingness of 
 abiding by them ; and to their honour, the Peers, who owed 
 O'Connell little courtesy or favour, for he had often dealt 
 with them very hardly, abstained from avenging themselves 
 by the exercise of their undoubted privilege. 
 
 The judgment was reversed, and the Liberator was free ! 
 It was a success for which he and his friends had scarcely 
 dared to hope; and the effect was magical. A wild delight 
 thrilled through the island. No triumph of old Rome could 
 have been more imposing than that which presented their 
 idol to the myriads who thronged the metropolis on the day 
 of his release. His incarceration had been felt by each of 
 them as almost a personal wrong and suffering. It had 
 taken from his prestige, for it impeached his legal invul- 
 nerability, in which the popular belief had been undoubting. 
 The success of his appeal was more than a mere deliverance 
 from prison. It was a restoration of credit and of power. 
 
156 Daniel O'ConnelL 
 
 The rejoicing was universal, and there were glad anticipa- 
 tions of the coming time. 
 
 But they were doomed to disappointment. Disputes 
 arose between O'Connell and some of the most gifted of 
 his followers; and of them, also, I cannot speak, on an 
 occasion which excludes all controversy. They were un- 
 happy, and of ill result ; and after them came the calamity 
 which soon cast its deadly shadow over Ireland, and filled 
 her homes with desolation. 
 
 O'Connell^s strength gave way. I believe that fatal 
 disease was upon him during the great state trial. His 
 brain had possibly been affected by the unexampled excite- 
 ment he had undergone. When he spoke, on his own 
 behalf, the old fervour had departed, the old mastery was 
 no more; — and he read to the jury an argument, not void 
 of high ability, but wholly different from the appeal with 
 which, in other days, he would have subdued them under 
 the spell of his matchless advocacy. His illness advanced 
 to its sad ending. He made, in the House of Commons, a 
 last appeal for Ireland — then slowly perishing in famine 
 and pestilence — and began the pilgrimage to Rome which 
 he was not destined to accomplish. He died in Italy, a 
 penitent and humble Christian; true to the faith of his 
 fathers ; trusting in the mercy of his God ; and leaving a 
 name which will live as long as grass grows and water runs 
 in the land he liberated. 
 
 His heart is in the Eternal City.' His body lies amongst 
 his own in Ireland ; and for his soul's repose, the prayers 
 of a grateful people ascend, to-day, to Heaven. 
 
 Of the events which followed his removal, I have no time 
 to speak, even if it were fit to speak of them on a day 
 exclusively devoted to his honour. But I may say, at least, 
 that they cast reflected credit on his life. 
 
 If we have seen the principle of Religious Equality, 
 
Daniel GConnell. 157 
 
 whicli lie unceasingly proclaimed, and never compromised, 
 carried out in full compreliensiveness and efficiency ; — if we 
 have seen tlie people endowed with an interest and a 
 security in their homesteads for which, in his day, he 
 pleaded, apparently without the most shadowy prospect of 
 success ; — and if we are thankful, as we ought to be, to the 
 living authors of those great blessings; — we cannot fail to 
 recollect how O'Connell strove for them, in less happy times, 
 anticipating, as he did, and urging forward, the advent of 
 changes, — the necessary conditions of all healthy progress, 
 — which, if we be true to ourselves and carefal of our 
 opportunities, will deliver us from sectarian divisions, as 
 they have destroyed the remnant of sectarian ascendency, 
 and plant at last on the soil of Ireland a prosperous and 
 happy people. 
 
 And now, before I conclude, let me, in a few words, 
 present to you what I deem to be some of the main prin- 
 ciples of the teaching of O'Connell, which he enforced in his 
 speeches and illustrated by his life. They should be 
 cherished as a precious legacy of truth and wisdom. 
 
 First, and above all things, he was the assertor — the 
 earnest, consistent, uncompromising assertor — of the right 
 of all men to freedom — civil and religious. His doctrine 
 was expounded by his true disciple. Count Montalembert, 
 in words which, once before, I was proud to adopt as 
 mine : — " I desire to serve the cause of liberty as dis- 
 tinguished from revolution, and the cause of Catholicism, 
 as distinguished from despotism and intolerance — religious 
 liberty, sincere and equal for all, without privileges either 
 for or against Catholicism — political liberty, defended 
 against the encroachments of government, but also defended 
 against the immoral violence and abject servility of corrupt 
 democracy, — liberty and authority both kept within the 
 bounds of justice and truth — the faith which respects 
 
N 
 
 158 Daniel GConnell. 
 
 honesty of belief and inviolability of conscience/^ And 
 there are other words— of O'Connell himself — which should 
 not pass from human memory: — ''^ \, as a Catholic," he said_, 
 '' abhor and repudiate persecution. Insisting on my own 
 right, at my own awful responsibility, to my Creator and 
 my Lord, and to Him alone, to worship Him in the full 
 sincerity of conscientious belief, I assert, for every Christian 
 man, precisely the same right at the same awful responsi- 
 bility/^ Through good report and ill report, this was the 
 doctrine he promulgated. This was the faith in which he 
 lived and died. He taught his countrymen that the re- 
 covery of that hberty, ^''to know, to utter, and to argue 
 freely, according to conscience," which is " above all 
 liberties," and which they were forbidden to enjoy, was 
 worth any expenditure of toil and sacrifice. And he 
 taught them also, in the spirit of the Saviour, that, doing 
 by others as they would be done by, they should equally 
 claim that liberty for all mankind. 
 
 That was one lesson of O'Connell : and another was, that, 
 as civil liberty does not necessarily associate itself with 
 revolution, religious liberty is not to be identified with 
 indifference to the truth of God. He found the weapons 
 of political action more potent when they were wielded 
 under the sanction of the law, and in sustainment of the 
 order of society ; and the firmness of his Catholic faith 
 animated and nerved him for the battle of freedom. That 
 is a lesson worthy of all acceptance now. Men are swing- 
 inoc loose from the moorings of religion, and assail, as it 
 was never assailed before, the system of belief which has 
 founded and built up the institutions of the modern world 
 — as effete and obsolete and endurable no longer. For us, 
 at least, in Ireland, it will be good to remember that the 
 most fearless champion of our liberty was also the most 
 docile child of the church, and the most resolute defender 
 
Dafiiel GConnell. 159 
 
 of her integrity and independence. I pray you to lay to 
 heart this lesson also^ in an age when the secular seeks to 
 dissociate itself too much from the spiritual, and we are 
 confidently told that man^s well-being will be advanced by 
 the denial and dethronement of his Maker. 
 
 A third great lesson was taught by O'Connell in thou- 
 sands of speeches, accepted with unquestioning sub- 
 mission by millions of brave men, and stamped with 
 authority by the results it wrought for those who learned it. 
 It was, — that moral force should always be preferred to 
 physical ; that peaceful agitation may be adequate to the 
 removal of every grievance ; and that the man who casts 
 away the aid of legal action and trusts to violence, — under 
 a constitution adequate to the needs, and, if they only 
 will it, protective of the rights, of all, — is mad or criminal. 
 This was the characteristic teaching of his life, to which he 
 clung in the face of all opposition and discouragement, and 
 which he equally maintained in the darkest and the brightest 
 days of his weary struggle. 
 
 To one other lesson, and only one, shall I detain you by 
 adverting. The union of Irishmen was always amongst 
 the dearest aims of O'Connell. He laboured to induce them 
 to work together for their common good. He longed to 
 see established that brotherhood of affection, which, for 
 any wise purpose and in any worthy cause, would make 
 their combination irresistible. For this, he hoped and 
 prayed; but the time for it had not arrived, and he failed 
 to join in love those whom a wayward fate had put asunder. 
 We have fallen on happier days. The motives and the 
 means of social union are greatly multiplied. Old lines of 
 demarcation are blotted out. Old influences, which held us 
 in antagonism, to a large extent exist no longer. The lav/ 
 does not tolerate the semblance of ascendency, or place a 
 premium on civil strife. We enjoy equality of rights, 
 
i6o Daniel G Connell. 
 
 wliicli should involve identity of duties and of interests ; 
 and althougli the divisions of centuries may not bo ended 
 in an hour, the way is open for their reconcilement. It has 
 begun. This celebration should speed it onward. There 
 is no reason why we should not soon look back upon our 
 gloorny history, without seeking incitements to hatred or 
 subjects for recrimination, — regarding what is good in it 
 with common pride, and deriving from it common guidance 
 for our futm-e conduct. There is no reason why we should 
 not reciprocally recognise great qualities and heroic deeds, 
 displayed by our forefathers in internecine feuds gone by 
 for ever. There is no reason why the North and the South 
 should not emulate each other in doing homage to the 
 magnanimous endurance of Limerick and Derry, and 
 associate in honour the gallant clergyman who held the 
 Maiden City against all comers, and the noble exile who 
 caught up the life-blood welling from his heart, in a foreign 
 quarrel on a foreign field, and murmured, with his latest 
 breath, " Would that this were for Ireland.'''' 
 
 God speed the coming of the better time when these 
 things shall be, and sound opinion, informed by reason and 
 guided by the spirit of mutual charity and trust, shall lead 
 us to wise courses and free us from our miserable broils ! 
 Ireland ! 
 
 model to thy inward greatness, 
 
 Like little body witli a mighty heart, — 
 
 What mightst thou do, that honour would thee do, 
 
 Were all thy children kind and natural I 
 
 Such aspirations went up often from the heart of 
 O'Connellj and with them I may fitly conclude an imper- 
 fect effort, — attempted in circumstances of pain and 
 difficulty, — to represent him as he was in life, and indicate 
 some of his titles to the endurino: admiration of his 
 country and mankind. 
 
Daniel O'Connell. i6i 
 
 Note to page 148. 
 
 Extract from the Ciecular of the Centenary Committee 
 of the 23rd February, 1875. 
 
 City Maxsiox House, Dublin, 
 23?-(:? Fchyuary, 1875. 
 
 It is the earnest wish of every friend of O'Connell to conduct the 
 grand ceremonial thoroughly free from sectarian or political bias ; to 
 render it, in fact, a reflexion of the breadth and the liberality of our 
 illustrious countryman's life and labours, which aimed at the civil and 
 religious emancipation of mankind without distinction of creed, race, or 
 colour. 
 
 By order of the Provisional Committee, 
 
 James W. Kavaxagh, j jj-„,. .^..^..^^^es. 
 John Keegan, 
 
THOMAS MOOEE. 
 
TJwmas Moore, 
 
 [The Moore Centenary Address : Dublin, 1878.] 
 
 FOR many reasons, I should have wished to cast on 
 another the duty I have been asked to discharge 
 to-day. On a memorable occasion, to which I shall allude 
 hereafter, I strove to estimate the character of Thomas 
 Moore, as a Poet and a Man. I cannot hope, after the 
 lapse of many years, to speak of him more worthily ; and 
 I should have rejoiced to listen to his eulogy from some 
 more eloquent tongue, new to the grateful task and unvexed 
 by the tediousness of repetition. But, in my judgment, 
 Ireland owes him a large return for the love he bore her 
 and the gifts he lavished on her ; and when I was invited 
 to assist in making it, and told that some, more competent 
 than myself, who should have been foremost in the effort, 
 declined to join in it, and that whisperings derogatory to 
 his honour and injurious to his fame had been used to 
 discredit the celebration of his Centenary, I felt that I 
 could not refuse the call or shrink from lending help, how- 
 ever humbly, to a movement in which I, at least, am proud 
 and happy to participate. 
 
 For I felt that what, to-day, is largely done throughout the 
 world, the Metropolis of Ireland — the birthplace of Moore, 
 which must ever hold him in loving remembrance — is pre- 
 eminently bound to do. There is no great town in Britain, 
 where his countrymen have cast their lot, which will not 
 
1 66 Thomas Moore. 
 
 testify by festive gatherings^ — witli speecli and song, — 
 their reverence for his memory. In the East and in the 
 West;, in India and Australia and Canada and the United 
 States — wherever our teeming race has spread its exiled 
 myriads, — true Irish hearts are doing homage to the poet 
 whose melodies have thrilled them with passionate emotions 
 of joy and sadness, and kept alive the love of their old 
 land, and pride in it and hope for it, though it is far 
 away. I have, myself, had letters from distant countries, 
 expressing the deepest interest in our celebration, and 
 promising to repeat it in local assemblies, to which men of 
 great position, high intellect, and brilliant speech will 
 dedicate a willing service. It would not be worthy of this 
 good old City to be silent, whilst a diapason chorus of 
 applause from many nations proclaims the esteem in which 
 they hold one of her noblest children, and justifies largely 
 the aspiration and the prophecy which burst from him in 
 one of his rarest lyrics, whilst he heard his own sweet 
 music on the Killarney waters : — 
 
 He listen'd — while, high o'er the eaf^le's rude nest, 
 The lingering sounds on their way loved to rest : 
 And the echoes sung buck from their full mountain quire 
 As if loath to let song so enchanting expire. 
 
 It seem'd as if every sweet note that died here 
 Was again brought to life in some airier sphere, 
 Some heaven in those hills, where the soul of the strain 
 That had ceased upon earth was awaking again ! 
 
 Oh ! forgive, if while listening to music, whose breath 
 Seem'd to circle his fame with a charm against death. 
 He should feel a proud spirit within him proclaim : — 
 " Even so, shalt thou live in the echoes of fame ! 
 
 ^' Even so, though thj- memory should now die away, 
 
 " 'Twill be caught up again, in some happier day, 
 
 " And the hearts and the voices of Erin prolong, 
 
 " Through the answering Future, thy name and thy song ! " 
 
Thomas Moore, 167 
 
 We are Kere, to some extent_, fulfilling the prophecy and 
 realising the aspiration, and in a fashion which, though it 
 has not been without assault from sneer and sarcasm, has 
 been approved by the practice of mankind. A little time 
 ago, Stratford-on-Avon witnessed a great function in 
 honour of the foremost poet of the world. The country- 
 men of Burns have had endless celebrations, to prove their 
 admiring love for 
 
 Him who walk'd in glory and in joy, 
 Beside his plough upon the mountain side ! 
 
 Lately, the sunny fields of Avignon resounded with the 
 name of Petrarch, though centuries have gone since he 
 associated with them, for ever, his labours and his fame. 
 With similar acclaim, Florence and Ferrara have testified 
 their recollection of Michael Angelo and Ariosto. So, 
 Germany has proved her admiration of Schiller ; and, at 
 this moment, Paris is preparing to inaugurate, with signal 
 honour, the statue of Beranger, another true songster of 
 the people, who stirred to its depths the spirit of his 
 country, and bore, not without many shortcomings, in some 
 of the best qualities of his intellect and some of the most 
 striking incidents of his life, a curious resemblance to 
 Thomas Moore. 
 
 And thus it has been, always, from age to age, that men 
 have been moved, on stated and fit occasions, to display a 
 grateful appreciation of those who have been eminent by 
 intellectual achievement or social service — in literature, or 
 art, or industry, or arms, — and they have expressed it not 
 merely from thankfulness for benefits received, or pride in 
 distinction reflected on themselves, but from a sense of the 
 importance of perpetuating memories, which may awaken 
 generous emulation and prompt to worthy deeds. 
 
 Our hiofhest interests dictate that we should not allow 
 
1 68 Thomas Moore. 
 
 sucli memories to perish; but strive^ with earnest sym- 
 pathy^ and sometimes even with generous ostentation, to 
 prove that we value them, as amongst the best possessions 
 which a civihsed people can guard for themselves and 
 transmit to their posterity. 
 
 You will ask no proof from me that Thomas Moore may 
 justly claim, from Irishmen, the recognition w^hich has thus 
 been accorded, by their compatriots, to the gifted of other 
 lands. Your presence here demonstrates that, to you, 
 such proof is needless. But you know the adage: 
 Tem'piLS edax rernm — Years bring forgetfulness. You 
 whom I address are, most of you, of a different generation 
 from that which delighted in his living genius and watched 
 by his mournful death-bed. It has been noted, oftentimes.^ 
 that those who come soon after the departure of great men 
 are apt to undervalue them. The excitement attendant on 
 their loss abates, and suffers a reaction. New themes of 
 interest and new objects of respect present themselves. 
 The place of the departed, in the roll of enduring fame, 
 has not yet been fixed by an unquestioned ascertainment : 
 and many will be found to challenge his pretensions, and 
 deny him the praise of which he is assured from the judg- 
 ment of the future. I believe that something of this 
 temporary obscuration has, for the time, affected the fame 
 of Moore; and some of the circumstances attendant on the 
 festival w^e are making, lead me to think that it is needful 
 to remind you, as briefly as I can, of the estimation in which 
 he was held by those who knew him, in life and death, and 
 the qualities by which that estimation was established. 
 
 The judgment of contemporary opinion may not be 
 decisive ; but it is, at least, often of great authority. 
 
 More than twenty years ago, it was my fortune to play a 
 leading part in the solemnity, with which his native citv 
 accompanied the unveihng of the statue of Thomas Moore. 
 
Thomas Afoorc, 169 
 
 The occasion was remarkable. It was graced by sucb a 
 representation of her intelh'gence and worth and rank, as 
 has rarely been seen in Ireland. For once, men of every 
 party combined in an act of homage to one of their own 
 nation, of whom they all were proud, and, with unwonted 
 harmony, proclaimed their reverence for his genius, their 
 value for his services and their interest in his fame. The 
 genial and accomplished Viceroy identified himself with 
 Irish feeling by eloquent praise of the Irish poet. The 
 chair was occupied by the son of Charlemont — 
 
 The glorious man 
 
 Who led the van 
 
 Of the Irish Volunteers ! 
 
 The Chancellor, the Chief Justice, the Attorney-General, 
 the Surgeon- General, and other representative men, were 
 surrounded by a gathering of all that was notable and 
 brilliant in the society of the time, and sustained by the 
 leading merchants and the kindly people of Dublin. 
 
 It was a worthy commemoration of an illustrious man,. 
 I look back upon it at once with pride and sadness. 
 Every one, I believe, of the distinguished persons I have 
 mentioned, — some of them Moore^s life-long friends, — has 
 gone to his account, and the lapse of years has dimmed the 
 recollection of the tribute they bestowed. But the influence 
 of that festal day survives, and should be gratefully recog- 
 nised by this Metropolis. I had the privilege of making 
 the presentation to the Municipality, and you will forgive 
 me for recalling the words in which I told them that then, 
 for the first time, the memorial of an Irishman was seen in the 
 streets of the Irish capital, and that, then, we first relieved 
 ourselves from the disgrace of neglecting the great of our 
 own blood and lineage, and making, to the stranger who 
 passed through our city, the false confession that we had 
 
I70 
 
 Thomas Moore. 
 
 no men of Irish birth, worthy of pubHc reverence. I 
 presented ir, expressing the hope and prayer that the 
 feeling which pervaded the assembly might outlive the 
 passing hour, and originate other celebrations of other 
 men, whose names we ought not to allow to be forgotten. 
 
 Has not the prayer been answered and the hope fulfilled ? 
 Has not the feeling of that day been perpetuated in the 
 statues which now populate and adorn our thoroughfares, — 
 noble and enduring works of which, alike in their subjects 
 and their execution, any capital in Europe might be proud ? 
 That of Moore lias disappointed expectation and needs to 
 be replaced : although, I am bound to say of one who was 
 my friend, that it was executed by a sculptor of rare and 
 admirable faculty in other departments of his profession. 
 But the spirit and the purpose with which it was erected 
 have animated us to more fortunate enterprises, and we 
 should rejoice that the effort to honour the Irish poet, if it 
 was not as artistically successful as it was earnest and 
 sincere, has taken from us the reproach of indifference to 
 those who have done credit to their country. 
 
 The function of 1857 had been often forerun by the 
 rapturous reception which awaited Moore, whenever he 
 appeared in Ireland. The necessities of his struggling life 
 kept him habitually away ; but his return was always the 
 signal for a burst of popular enthusiasm. 
 
 In 1818, a crowd of the best and noblest of the land, — • 
 including Charlemont and Cloncurry, and O'Connell and 
 Shiel, and hundreds of others — entertained him. The 
 occasion was one of signal triumph, and was so described 
 by Byron in a letter to Isaac D'Israeli, the father of the 
 present Prime Minister : — ^^It was not less to the man than 
 to the poet ; to the tempted but unshaken patriot ; to the 
 not opulent but incorruptible fellow-citizen, that the warm- 
 hearted Irisb paid the proudest of tributes." 
 
Thomas Moore, 171 
 
 And that tribute was often repeated. The best men in 
 the country were always anxious to crowd around him^ and, 
 in 1835, he was hailed in the Dublin theatre with unex- 
 ampled enthusiasm by a great audience, which his own 
 melodies had enraptured, as ^^ The Poet of the People of 
 Ireland/^ Some of those whom I address may have been 
 witnesses of that singular scene, and may remember the 
 wild emotion to which his speech excited his hearers, when 
 he accepted the title and told them of the fulfilment of his 
 own anticipation — 
 
 The stranger shall hear thy lament o'er his plains, 
 The sigh of thy harp shall be heard o'er the deep ! 
 
 In Scotland, he had a similar reception at the Edinburgh 
 theatre. He went to it in company with Sir Walter Scott ; 
 and found himself hailed with plaudits as warm and loud as 
 ever rung from an Irish audience. ^^ The house,^^ said the 
 great Scotchman, '^received him with rapture. I could 
 have hugged them for it." And, on the few occasions on 
 which he appeared at public assemblies in England, un- 
 equivocal proof was given of the wide popularity he had 
 established there. 
 
 I have said more than enough to show that, for the 
 demonstration which we make to-day, we have full warrant, 
 if any were wanting, in the distinctions already showered 
 upon Moore. They should be remembered by any, if any 
 there be, who take exception to the labour of love and 
 gratitude in which we are engaged. The honour he en- 
 joyed whilst he was amongst us ought not to be denied 
 him, now that he has passed away. The gratitude of a 
 people to their benefactor should not end with his capacity 
 to serve them. Their admiration for the intellect which 
 has enriched their language and adorned their country 
 must not depart when its presence is no more. We are not 
 
172 TJwmas Moore, 
 
 asliamed to echo the praise which was given to Moore^ so 
 lavishly, by the men with whom he lived. 
 
 And now I proceed to tell you, as shortly as I can, how 
 he earned that praise, and was most worthy of it, not 
 merely as a Poet, but also as a Man. And I will dwell, in 
 the first place and chiefly, on his qualities in the latter 
 aspect, because I know that, whilst few are bold enough to 
 deny his genius, his conduct in his moral and social rela- 
 tions has been, even recently, the subject of a criticism 
 which I believe to have been ungenerous and unjust ; and 
 because, with all their delight in his poetry and all their 
 pride in his fame, I am not sure that his countrymen even 
 yet sufficiently understand how loveable he was, how 
 generous, how manly, and how true ! 
 
 It is not easy to approach the story of his life and 
 labours with the hope of saying much that can be of any 
 novel interest. 
 
 The melodies which, above all things else, will perpetuate 
 his memory, are known in every household, and have been 
 sung more widely than any other lyrics in the world ; and 
 the incidents of his career, — which, laborious and fruitful 
 as it was, had not the excitement or variety of a career of 
 action, — have been narrated with brevity and clearness in 
 works within the reach of all. 
 
 I can only ask you to bear with me if I seem to repeat a 
 thrice-told tale, whilst I give you my own impressions of 
 the attributes of character and conduct which, in my judg- 
 ment, distinguished him as nobly as his mental gifts. 
 
 He was born, as you all know, not very far from the 
 place in which I speak to you. He had none of the 
 advantages of rank or fortune ; and entered on the course 
 which he made so brilliant, without a friend who had power 
 to help him. The circumstances of the time were not 
 favourable to his advancement. He belonged to a people 
 
Thofnas Moore, 173 
 
 who had been but recently admitted to the enjoyment of 
 the most ordinary civil rights : and, falling on days which 
 tried men's souls, his sympathy was given to a ruined cause 
 and a despairing country. He passed to England, where he 
 made for himself acquaintances of high position and great 
 influence. He married early a lady as penniless as himself, 
 and, giving '^^ hostages to fortune/' he set himself manfully 
 to fight the battle of life. He succeeded, and attained all 
 the enjoyments which domestic happiness and wide-spread 
 fame could give; but his existence was one of toil and 
 struggle, burthened with the pressure of many cares, and 
 never free from the anxiety which comes of narrow pecu- 
 niary means and heavy claims upon them. He lived in 
 comparative poverty, relieved, at the last, by the trifling 
 bounty which the State honoured itself by bestowing; but 
 always, in his modest cottage, dependent on his daily 
 labour for his daily bread. 
 
 His memoirs were edited by Lord Russell, not in the 
 best fashion, or with the result most favourable to his 
 reputation. The work was undertaken from kindly motives, 
 but executed without sufficient care. The arrangement of 
 the matter was not satisfactory, and much of it might have 
 been omitted with advantage. It was seized upon by 
 enemies of Moore, and he was assailed with savage viru- 
 lence. Even lately, as I have said, there has been a 
 renewal of insolent imputation against him, as one who 
 was selfish and sensual, — who afiected the society of the 
 great unduly, and lowered himself to the position of a 
 tuft-hunting parasite. Nothing, in my judgment, can be 
 more entirely false. 
 
 He rejoiced in intercourse with his fellow-men, and not 
 the less if they were of high breeding and liberal culture, 
 and capable, from their circumstances, of aS*ording grati- 
 fication to delicate and discriminatino^ tastes. But, in such 
 
174 Thomas Moore, 
 
 society^ lie was tlie sought and not the seeker. His com- 
 pany was prizedj as bestowing the truest pleasure on those 
 who could obtain it. ^^ Moore," said Lord Byron^ " is the 
 epitome of all that is exquisite in personal or poetical 
 accomplishments." His conversation sparkled with quaint 
 allusion and lively repartee. His singing was described by 
 Scott as *^the sweetest warbling he ever heard": and by 
 Sydney Smith, as ^^ poetry floating in fine music." His 
 unfailing cheerfulness and buoyancy of spirit diffused their 
 bright influence wherever he appeared ; and when he was 
 called " the poet of all circles and the idol of his own/^ 
 there was little of exaggeration in the flattering descrip- 
 tion. No wonder that he enjoyed the homage which was 
 paid him. No wonder that he was attracted to assemblies 
 which were emulous in courting the exhibition of his 
 social powers : and found in them grateful enjoj'ment and 
 relief. But, I repeat, he was the sought, and not the 
 seeker. He never abased himself to gain admission to 
 lordly tables, and never sat at them without perfect dignity 
 and self-respect. When the Prince Eegent, at Carlton 
 House, assuming that his connexions were opulent and 
 high, inquired about them, he did not hesitate to answer 
 that he was ^^ the son of one of the honestest tradesmen 
 in all Dublin." And so he ever asserted himself, with 
 courageous simplicity and modest firmness. 
 
 To me, who read Lord Russeirs book, when it appeared, 
 —from end to end, — it presented, on the whole, the picture 
 of a man resolute to maintain his independence under all 
 circumstances and at all hazards, — true to his principles and 
 faithful to his country, — unspoiled by the blandishments of 
 social life, — inaccessible to corruption and incapable of base- 
 ness, — in his dealings with his family and fi'iends, full of 
 gentleness and loving-kindness, and acting, always, without 
 a taint of selfishness, and often in the spirit of heroic self- 
 
Thomas Moor 
 
 175 
 
 sacrifice. That is the picture whicli lias ever since dwelt 
 in my memory : and you will scarcely wonder that, on this 
 occasion, I prefer to press it on your attention^ rather than 
 to occupy the little time at my disposal, by praise of works 
 on which the world has set the broad seal of its approval, 
 or by a re-hash of criticisms which have long grown stale. 
 A word or two, to show that the picture has been drawn 
 according to the truth. 
 
 In 1818, at the great Dublin banquet to which I have 
 alluded. Lord Charlemont said of Thomas Moore : " His 
 character may be expressed in three words. Patriotism, 
 Independence, Consistency.''^ For many years after that 
 eulogy was spoken, he lived through the vicissitudes of a 
 troubled life ; but he never ceased to merit it, until his race 
 was run. 
 
 He had early occasion to demonstrate the manliness of 
 his nature. He entered Trinity College and read for a 
 scholarship. But, when he had proved his right to it, and 
 could only obtain it by compromise of conscience and 
 abandonment of faith, he scouted the dishonouring con- 
 ditions and lost the fruit of his labour. And again, when 
 he was required to give evidence before the collegiate 
 authorities as to the conduct of students involved in the 
 rebellious movement of that terrible time, — with which he 
 was not connected, — he risked expulsion from the Uni- 
 versity and exclusion from the professions, rather than 
 give utterance to a word which might injure his young- 
 associates. 
 
 Many of those who are around me, to-day, have no 
 favour for his political opinions. But they will not the 
 less on that account allow his claim to the name of patriot. 
 He clung to Ireland with an intense and unchanging 
 affection, which is testified by every act of liis life and 
 every page of his writings : and all who, now or hereafter. 
 
176 Tho77ias Moore. 
 
 may clierisli trae attachment to liei";, whatever may be 
 their honest varieties of sentiment,, will find in him, — 
 when they have eliminated all they can disapprove in his 
 dealings with temporary struggles and the passions they 
 arousedj — an Irishman with whose love for Ireland and con- 
 stant desire to promote her welfare they can have cordial 
 sympathy. According to his conception of her interests and 
 his own duty^ he was stanch to her^ in periods of the 
 worst discouragement as in those of the highest hope ; and 
 he refused^ for her sake^ to falsify his convictions when he 
 might have gained place and power, by giving even silent 
 countenance to public action of which he disapproved. 
 
 For these things, he should command the respect of men 
 of every creed and party. But, by the majority of Irish- 
 men, he is entitled to be regarded with a far warmer feel- 
 ing; and that feeling, even in this mixed assembly, one 
 who cherishes it deeply will not be forbidden to express. I 
 speak of it as referring to an event long past, — as an 
 Englishman might speak of Eunnymede or a Scotchman 
 of Bannockburn. During the long struggle for Eman- 
 cipation, he never failed or faltered, for an hour, in urging 
 the claims of the Catholics of Ireland. By playful wit, by 
 pungent sarcasm, by vehement invective, — with all the 
 energy of his soul and all the resources of his genius, — he 
 pressed them on a reluctant Legislature and a hostile people. 
 And the influence he exerted was incalculable. Circles into 
 which political agitation could never break opened freely 
 to the pleadings of the poet. The same melodious voice, 
 which roused the Irish millions to remember they had a 
 country, and rely on themselves for their own political 
 salvation, resounded in the halls and salons of the British 
 aristocracy, dispelling prejudice and denouncing wrong, 
 with a power and sweetness which touched many a heart 
 and awakened many a conscience, theretofore hardened 
 
Thomas Moore. 177 
 
 against tlie cold appeals of justice. The strife is over and 
 the victory achieved. We are fast forgetting the en- 
 venomed hatreds and cruel struggles of other days. We 
 will yet learn, with God^s blessing, to trust each other and 
 love each other, as if they had never been. But, in the 
 prosperous harmony of a better time, the enfranchised 
 masses of the Irish people can never be such ingraces as to 
 forget the noble service they owed, in their hour of trial, to 
 the courage and the faithfulness of Thomas Moore. 
 
 And if his patriotism be undeniable, can any one doubt 
 of the independence and consistency which, in the view of 
 Lord Charlemont, made his character complete ? I venture 
 to say that no man, of whom we have authentic record, was 
 more distinguished by those high qualities. He was placed 
 in circumstances most adverse to the cultivation of them. 
 He was poor. He had to procure, by continuous effort, the 
 ordinary comforts of existence. He moved amongst the 
 wealthy and the great, many of whom had strong attach- 
 ment to him and would have been happy to supply his 
 wants. He had faculties of brain and pen^ invaluable to 
 any party which could have procured the use of them. He 
 loved his relatives with a devoted affection, which might 
 have prompted any sacrifice to elevate them and advance 
 their interests. Briefly, he had the amplest opportunities 
 of commanding a profitable dependence, and the strongest 
 temptations to employ them. And he could have done so, 
 without any flagrant impropriety or any forfeiture of the 
 world's esteem. But he refused. He endured his poverty 
 and preserved his honour. He lived and died a self- 
 relying, self-abnegating, self-respecting man, and left to 
 posterity an example of independence — seldom more needed 
 than at the present hour — which, so far as I know, has not 
 had many parallels. 
 
 By instinct or reflection, Moore seems to have appre- 
 
 M 
 
1 73 Thomas Moore. 
 
 liended, from the first,, tlie deadly miscliiefs of those 
 monetary embarrassments which have debased so many 
 generous natures and wrecked so many fair reputations^ — 
 which subject men to others and forbid them to be masters 
 of themselves, — which weaken the moral sense and, some- 
 times, lamentably extinguish at once the sentiment of honour 
 and the reverence for truth. 
 
 Jove fix'd it certain, that whatever day 
 Makes man a slave takes half his worth away ! 
 
 All this, and the evil chance of it, Moore avoided by de- 
 clining the acceptance of favours from his friends. Lady 
 Moira described him as "a proud little thing that no one 
 would dare to confer a favour on/' He was always, as I 
 have said, a struggling man. The res angusta domi was 
 always present to him. Over and over again, he had the 
 most liberal ofi*ers of assistance. He might have filled 
 blank cheques at his discretion. He was pressed to accept 
 gifts and loans by friends who knew his needs, and could 
 have supplied them, without the slightest inconvenience or 
 care for repayment or return. But he steadfastly resisted. 
 He continued independent, by habitually avoiding super- 
 fluities, and carefully adapting his modest expenditure to 
 the capacity of his hard-earned income. He sustained his 
 family by his own unaided efforts, and, at his death, owed 
 no man anything. 
 
 When his father died, he had not the means of paying 
 the expenses of the funeral and giving needful help to his 
 poor mother, without anticipating from his publishers the 
 proceeds of unfinished work. Yet he refused to allow his 
 sister to accept a pension, and took upon himself the 
 burthen of his family. 
 
 When he was involved in serious difficulties by the de- 
 falcations of his representative in Bermuda — to such an 
 
Thomas Moore. 179 
 
 extent that he was obliged to fly from England, crushed 
 by a loss he had small prospect of retrieving — ^Lord Moira 
 offered him patronage which might have freed him from all 
 anxiety about the future, and his answer was : — '^ I would 
 rather struggle on as I am, than take anything that would 
 have the effect of tying up my tongue under such a system 
 as the present/' Yet, at the time when he made that mag- 
 nanimous reply, he was obliged to ask his publisher. Power, 
 for an advance of two or three pounds, as he had not. Lord 
 Hussell says, " a single sixpence in the house/' 
 
 I could multiply the cases in which he proved his resolu- 
 tion to enjoy, at any sacrifice. 
 
 The glorious privilege 
 Of being independent. 
 
 But, surely, no more are needful to justify the praise of 
 Lord Charlemont, and commend to all of us, in this aspect 
 of it, the inspiring lesson of his life. " Although,'' says Lord 
 Kussell, '^the wolf of poverty often prowled round his 
 door, he never abandoned his humble dwelling for the 
 safety of the city or the protection of the palace ! " 
 
 And the independence which was thus dear to him, in 
 private life, he as thoroughly exhibited in his public con- 
 duct. He called no man master. He asserted his freedom 
 of judgment, without respect of persons. He declined, as 
 I have said, the tempting patronage of a party to which he 
 was opposed, not because he was asked to be guilty of 
 political apostacy, but lest he should be obliged to abstain 
 from active opposition to it. 
 
 To the Whigs, he was attached by many ties. His 
 principles were mainly theirs. He, had received great 
 kindness from their leaders. He delighted in their society, 
 and lived amongst them on the most familiar terms. But 
 when they were raised to power, and dealt with Ireland in 
 
 M 2 
 
i8o Thomas Moore. 
 
 a mode lie disapproved, lie uttered his indignation in scath- 
 ing words, at the risk of sacrificing friendships which were 
 dear to him and connexions of which he was justly proud. 
 He speaks of the verses in which he expressed his feelings 
 as ^^ extorted ^^ from him by ^^ that lamentable measure, 
 the Irish Coercion Act ^^; and I shall only cite one of them, 
 from the ^' Moral '^ to '' Paddy^s Metamorphosis,^' as indi- 
 cating the boldness and bitterness of his assault : — 
 
 'Tis thus— but alas ! by a marvel more true 
 Than is told in this rival of Ovid's best stories, 
 Your Whigs when in office a short year or two, 
 By a ZitsMs iiaturK all turn into Tories. 
 
 And again, when — after that Emancipation he had done so 
 much to win — events occurred in Ireland which disap- 
 pointed his hopes and irritated his feelings, he did not 
 hesitate to speak harshly of a people whom he loved. He 
 was proud of their admiration, and delighted in their attach- 
 ment ; but, to the peril of both, again he asserted his 
 freedom, and spoke his sad thoughts in these passionate 
 words : — > 
 
 The dream of those days when first I sung thee is o'er ; 
 Thy triumph hath stain'"d the charms thy sorrows then wore : 
 And ev'n of the light which Hope once shed o'er thy chains, 
 Alas ! not a gleam to grace thy freedom remains. 
 
 Say, is it that slavery sunk so deep in thy heart, 
 That still the dark brand is there, though chainless thou art ; 
 And Freedom's sweet fruit, for which thy spirit long burn'd, 
 Now reaching, at last, thy lip, to ashes hath turn'd ? 
 
 Up Liberty's steep by Truth and Eloquence led, 
 "With eyes on her temple fix'd, how proud was thy tread ! 
 Ah, better thou ne'er hadst lived that summit to gain, 
 Or died in the porch, than thus dishonour the fane ! 
 
 This is no political assembly, and it does not concern 
 us to say whether, in writing thus of his friends and his 
 
Thomas Moore. i8i 
 
 country, Moore was right or wrong ; but the stinging 
 passages I htive cited prove, beyond doubt, that he held 
 himself free to utter, under all circumstances, his true 
 convictions, and was equally undeterred from speaking 
 them by the trammels of party and the fear of popular 
 disapproval. 
 
 The verses I have last quoted offended O'Connell; but 
 he was soon reconciled with Moore, and pressed him 
 strongly to come into the House of Commons. The people 
 of Limerick offered to buy a qualifying estate. He de- 
 clined the gift, as embarrassing his political action. It is 
 singular enough that Beranger also refused a seat in the 
 Legislature of his country, and preferred to die, as he had 
 lived, almost in penury, rather than subject himself to 
 restraining obligations towards those who had the power 
 and the will to make him rich. 
 
 I have spoken more than enough to justify the triple 
 eulogy of Lord Charlemont; and you, at least, will not 
 deny to Thomas Moore the praise of consistency, patriotism, 
 and independence. But I should fail in my duty if I did 
 not, for a moment, dwell on another aspect of his life, in 
 which he seems to me specially worthy of affectionate re- 
 membrance. I speak of his relations with his family — his 
 parents and his wife. His conduct towards them all was full 
 of gracious tenderness and practical devotion. From the 
 hour when he quitted his Irish home to make his way in 
 England, he was always, as I have said, in straitened cir- 
 cumstances, and often hardly pressed by the necessities of 
 the current hour; but he never failed to help those he had 
 left behind. He never spared himself when he could give 
 them comfort ; and his liberality was bounded only by the 
 means of its indulgence. 
 
 He treated his father with a reverence which could not 
 have been more profound if the good old man had boasted 
 
1 82 Ihomas Moore. 
 
 the proudest ancestry and the amplest fortune. When, in 
 1818^ he sat, in his full ''noon of fame/' amongst the chiefs 
 of his people, that father was beside him and shared his 
 honours. To his mother — plain and simple woman as she 
 was — his attachment was intense as it was enduring. In 
 the midst of his labours, his trials, and his triumphs, he 
 never failed to write to her twice in every week. She had 
 no capacity for maintaining a correspondence of interest to 
 him on any general topics ; but, until she died, he persisted 
 in lavishing his words of affection, and proving to her con- 
 tinually how well she was remembered and how fondly she 
 was loved. Forgive me if I am tempted to read to you the 
 sweet verses he once addressed to her : — 
 
 They tell us of an Indian tree, 
 
 Which — howsoe'er the sun and sky 
 May tempt its boughs to wander free 
 
 And shoot and blossom wide and high — 
 Far better loves to bend its arms 
 
 Downward again to that dear earth 
 From which the life that fills and wanus 
 
 Its grateful being first had birth. 
 'Tis thus, though woo'd by flattering friends, 
 
 And fed with fame, if fame it be. 
 This heart, my own dear mother, bends 
 
 With love's true instinct back to thee ! 
 
 With his beautiful and gentle wife he enjo^^ed, in his own 
 words, '' perfect happiness. ■'* The story of their lives reads 
 like a charming idyl. In their early union, they gave little 
 heed to considerations of worldly prudence. Throughout 
 their lives, they had often gloomy days and hard struggles, 
 and, at the last, bereavements which brought desolation to 
 their childless home. But they clung to each other with 
 an unfailing fondness, which gave them strength and 
 courage through all vicissitudes. Of the husband, Lord 
 Russell testifies that his most engaging as well as his most 
 
Thomas Moore. i8 
 
 o 
 
 powerful passions were " liis domestic affections ^' -, and of 
 the wife, Mrs. Hall has told us, in the recollections with 
 which she has enriched Mr. HalFs generous and sympathetic 
 '^ Memory of Moore,'^ for which we and Ireland are in- 
 debted to one of our fastest friends, — that her reverence 
 for him was unbounded, and that she watched over him 
 as a mother watches over a tender child, — " with the most 
 wonderful blending of admiration, duty, and lovingness.^^ 
 
 It is a beautiful picture — a singular realisation of the 
 ideal of a united and happy household, and not unworthy 
 to be associated with that which I have endeavoured to 
 present of the public life of Moore. Taken in the concrete 
 and altogether, his personal character, so displayed, appears 
 to me as worthy of respect as any yet revealed to us in the 
 biographies of illustrious men. 
 
 I say this boldly, but not forgetting his acts and words 
 which challenge disapproval. He had his share of human 
 weaknesses and errors. In his youth, he published poems 
 which were indefensible, and some of his earlier letters 
 speak of matters, political and religious, in terms which I, 
 at least, feel bound strongly to reprobate. But when we 
 remember the misleading influences to which he was ex- 
 posed in the commencement of his life, and the confessions 
 and regrets of his maturer years, we may pity the weak- 
 nesses and deplore the errors, without refusal of the praise 
 which is his due. 
 
 As to '^ Little^s Poems,^' nothing need be said, but that 
 he lamented bitterly that unhappy publication. Eogers saw 
 him " shed tears, tears of deep contrition,'^ when he was 
 talking of it; and Jeffrey, who had assailed it sternly, 
 afterwards declared that he had long redeemed himself, 
 and appeared as " the eloquent champion of purity, fidelity, 
 and delicacy, not less than of justice, liberty, and honour.'^ 
 The conduct of his life, in his private relations, was a con* 
 
184 Thomas Moore. 
 
 tinual protest against the prurient folly of his boyhood; 
 and we should do ourselves little credit, as Christians or as 
 men, if we refused to condone it and yield him the justice 
 he anticipated, in words you will all remember : — 
 
 The bard to purer fame may soar, 
 
 When wild youth's past : 
 And win the wise, who frown'd before, 
 
 To smile at last ! 
 
 As to the imputations against him on religious grounds, 
 of which, in a mixed assembly, it is difficult to speak, I 
 shall only say that the society in which his youth was passed 
 was largely imbued with the infidel spirit of the French 
 Revolution, and that its influence upon him was not encoun- 
 tered by any corrective force, in that to which he was 
 afterwards attracted in England. Those who think with 
 me must deeply lament that, in after years, he did not give 
 practical effect to his early training, and make his conduct 
 accord with his consistent profession of belief. 
 
 And they will not wonder that some of his keenest griefs 
 may have come from that want of the inculcation of definite 
 religious principles upon his children, which is too often the 
 evil consequence of marriage between persons of different 
 creeds. 
 
 Lord Eussell, a very unimpeachable witness on such a 
 matter, tells us that ^^ he always adhered to the Roman 
 Catholic Church ^^ — and, when he was asked to abandon it, 
 his answer was : " I was born and bred in the faith of my 
 fathers, and in that faith I intend to die/^ 
 
 Unhappily, long before his death, it pleased God to visit 
 him with that affliction which has befallen so many men of 
 genius. His fine intellect was darkened. His powers of 
 judgment and will were gone. And those who are most 
 true to that Church, in which he had declared his resolve 
 
Thomas Moore. 185 
 
 to die, will be slow in condemning harshly one who so 
 laboured, as I have striven to tell you, to raise her from the 
 civil thraldom in which she had lain, — 
 
 Down in the dust and a shame to be seen ; 
 
 who has dealt with her so nobly in his lyrics, — and so 
 vindicated her principles and asserted her authority, in one 
 of the latest and ablest of his works. 
 
 Moore rebuked Byron, in the zenith of his fame, for the 
 blasphemous licence of his language; told him that Faith 
 was a treasure not lightly to be parted with, and strove to 
 guard him against the evil influence of Shelley^s infidel 
 opinions. 
 
 Will you forgive me for repeating to you the verses in 
 which he addressed his ancient Church in her day of perse- 
 cution, under the guise of an Irish Girl ; and the perfect 
 lines, believed by himself, it has been said, to have been 
 the finest of all his compositions, as to the blessedness of 
 that Heaven to which we all aspire ? 
 
 Thus mystically sings the Irish Peasant to his Mistress : — 
 
 Thy rival was honour'd, whilst thou wert wrong'd and scorn'd ; 
 Thy crown was of briers, whilst gold her brows adorn'd. 
 She woo'd me to temples, whilst thou lay'st hid in caves ; 
 Her friends were all masters, whilst thine, alas ! were slaves ; 
 Yet cold in the earth at thy feet I would rather be, 
 Than wed what I loved not, or turn one thought from thee. 
 
 They slander thee sorely who say thy vows are frail, » 
 Hadst thou been a false one thy cheek had look'd less pale. 
 They say, too, so long thou hast worn those lingering chains, 
 That deep in thy heart they have printed their servile stains. 
 Oh ! foul is the slander — no chain could that soul subdue — 
 Where shineth fliy spirit, there liberty shineth too. 
 
 To some of us, these words will always be peculiarly and 
 deeply touching. By every one, their pathos must be 
 admired, and not less the grace and sweetness of the 
 
1 86 Thomas Moore, 
 
 others to whicli I have referred_, and which I proceed to 
 recal to your recollection : — 
 
 This world is all a fleeting show, 
 
 For man's illusion given ; 
 The smiles of Joy, the tears of Woe, 
 Deceitful shine, deceitful flow, — 
 
 There's nothing true, but Heaven ! 
 
 And false the light on Glory's plume 
 
 As fading hues of even ; 
 And Love and Hope and Beauty's bloom 
 Are blossoms gather'd for the tomb ; — 
 
 There's nothing bright, but Heaven ! 
 
 Poor wanderers of a stormy day ! 
 
 From wave to wave we're driven ; 
 And Fancy's flash and Reason's ray 
 Serve but to light the troubled way — 
 
 There's nothing calm, but Heaven ! 
 
 I think it right to repeat what I have already said^ that 
 I have deliberately devoted so large a portion of my address 
 to a consideration of the personal, as distinguished from 
 the literary, character of Moore, because I have reason to 
 believe that, whilst the latter will always assert itself and 
 command appreciation, the prejudices which assailed the 
 former, — when he was living and after he was dead, — still 
 haunt some honest minds, and persuade them to deny him 
 justice. The foulness of detraction has not ceased to defile 
 his memory ; and I have thought it fitting that, at least on 
 Irish soil, he should find an Irish vindicator, and that Irish- 
 men should be taught, in spite of his human failings, to 
 respect his virtue as they admire his genius. 
 
 Of that genius and the multiform treasures it has be- 
 queathed to us, I have left myself no time to speak becom- 
 ingly. Nor is it needful that I should attempt to do so. 
 You are acquainted with his labours even better than with 
 his life. For very many of us, his unforgotten words have 
 
Thomas Moore, 187 
 
 precious associations with memorable epochs of our lives^ — 
 with scenes of beauty, and nights of enjoyment, and events 
 of interest, and dear ones who are gone. You come to 
 honour, and not to criticise, the poet of your country. You 
 treat him as a friend, who has long been familiar to your 
 homes. 
 
 Perhaps, however, I should not fail to note that, in rich- 
 ness of intellectual accomplishment, — in capacity of mental 
 toil, — in variety of curious learning, — in brilliancy of wit 
 and power of sarcasm, — he will bear comparison with the 
 best of his contemporaries. 
 
 Of his prose writings, I am content to say, that they 
 were worthy of the remarkable popularity and approval 
 with which they all were welcomed. The "Life of Sheri- 
 dan,'^ disfigured though it was by some faults of taste, was 
 an important contribution to our political history. "The 
 Epicurean^' is the most charming of poems in prose, — 
 enriched by a recondite scholarship. " Captain Rock,^^ no 
 longer, as at first, the subject of passionate attack, con- 
 tinues to delight us by its abounding humour, although it 
 describes times which are happily departed, and aimed at 
 results which have been substantially achieved. The 
 pathetic beauty and simple truthfulness of the "Life of 
 Lord Edward Fitzgerald '^ will always move the heart : and 
 the lucid narrative of the " Life of Byron,'^ — " deserving,^^ 
 as the competent criticism of Macaulay pronounced it, " to 
 be classed amongst the best specimens of English prose 
 which any age has produced,^' — remains a model for the 
 biographers of the future. His satirical and humorous 
 poems are, in one sense, the most remarkable of the pro- 
 ductions of Moore. They are characteristic and unique 
 They forced from Hazlitt a reluctant eulogy — describing 
 them as " essences,^^ and " nests of spicery,^' — even 
 whilst he lampooned the Melodies, perhaps under the 
 
i88 Thomas Moore. 
 
 influence of the irritation he endured, when Moore strove to 
 rescue Byron from the clique of '^ The Liberal/' I do not 
 believe that the political literature of Europe can mafccli 
 those pasquinades. 
 
 Of his ^^ Travels of an Irish Gentleman/' men, of course, 
 will judge according to their several views of a great con- 
 troversy : but, whatever we may think of the conclusions 
 to which the book would lead us, there can be no question 
 as to the learning- and the logic with which it abounds. 
 
 In his ^^ History of Ireland '' he made a laborious and 
 conscientious effort to accomplish a very necessary work, 
 with such knowledge and materials as were within his 
 reach. They were often used effectively; and it con- 
 tains frequent passages of felicity and power. But the 
 knowledge was not profound, and the materials were in- 
 adequate; and Moore would have better consulted for his 
 reputation if he had abstained from an undertaking to 
 which, in many respects, his training and position made him 
 unequal. It was not his fault that he had not access to 
 the original sources of information, which still, in spite of 
 the labours of O'Curry, O'Donovan, and many others, have 
 been insufficiently approached. We should be grateful for 
 the spirit in which he addressed himself to his task, and 
 his earnest endeavour to achieve it ; although hie inevitably 
 left it incomplete and was painfully conscious of his failure. 
 
 Of bis great Oriental poem, I shall only observe, that 
 w^hilst its brilliancy may be sometimes too continuous, and 
 its exuberance of fancy too unrestrained, it has passages of 
 wonderful power over which, as was said by Lord Jeffrey, 
 ^^ the very genius of poetry seems to have breathed his 
 richest enchantment.'' He exhausted upon it the labour of 
 years ; acquired, in connexion with it, a rare acquaintance 
 with Oriental history and life and scenery and manners ; 
 and was rewarded by the grent success which it achieved. 
 
Tho7nas Moore, 189 
 
 at home and abroad. And it is not yet forgotten in other 
 lands, for we have very lately seen the Chancellor of the 
 German Empire, '^ the man of blood and iron,^^ seeking, in 
 the Veiled Prophet of the Irish minstrel, illustration of his 
 argument before the Reichstag. 
 
 I pass from any attempt at a further estimate of works 
 which, with the National and Sacred Melodies, would of 
 themselves give ample justification for Moore's title to high 
 literary eminence. But on his lyrics, more than all things 
 else, his fame will permanently rest. If any of the poetry 
 of the century survives, they will not be forgotten. They 
 have gone home to the heart of Ireland, and they will live 
 in it, whilst it is capable of generous or grateful emotion. 
 They have taken their rank in the literature of Europe, and 
 that rank is high and sure. As in the Heaven of faith there 
 are many mansions, in the world of song there are various 
 gifts; and we should be slow to make invidious distinc- 
 tions or suggest conflicting claims, between some of the 
 noblest benefactors of our species, — 
 
 The gentle poets who have made us heirs 
 Of truth and pure delight in deathless lays ! 
 
 Moore has his own place and his own glory; ^' unrivalled,'^ 
 as was said by a great critic, " in one exquisite department 
 of his art, delightful in many."" He has been as little 
 spared assaults on his literary reputation as on the conduct 
 of his life. But they need not trouble us. Time has done 
 him justice. Whilst he lived, he had, probably, a wider 
 popularity than any man of his day ; and, since his death, 
 that popularity has been indefinitely diffused, with the ever- 
 widening expansion of the races which speak the tongue of 
 England. 
 
 I visited the British Museum lately, and, looking through 
 its great folio catalogue, I found sixty-four pages devoted 
 
iQO ThoDias Moore, 
 
 exclusively to various editions^ in various languages^ of the 
 works of Moore^ — surely an impressive proof of his large 
 iipproval by the world. 
 
 On such an occasion, I should be rebuked by voices from 
 the past if I dishonoured him, by troubling you with notice 
 of futile attempts to lower unduly the literary position of 
 a man to whom Shelley avowed himself '^ proud to acknow- 
 ledge his inferiority/^ and of whose melodies Byron declared 
 that, to him, they were worth " all the epics that ever were 
 composed/' 
 
 Amongst the lyrists of European lands, Burns, Beranger, 
 and Moore are confessedly the first. Of Burns and Moore, 
 Professor Wilson, — himself a poet, a Scot of the Scots, an 
 idolater of his great countryman, — speaks thus, in words 
 worthy of remembrance on a day like this : — ^^ Of all the 
 song-writers that ever warbled, or chaunted, or sung, the 
 best, in our estimation, is verily no other than Thomas 
 
 Moore In richness, in variety, in grace, and in the 
 
 power of art, he is superior to the Ploughman.^' And 
 Augustine Thierry, one of the most eminent of modern 
 Frenchmen, — the contemporary of Beranger and Moore, — 
 describes him as, at once, like the bards of old, a poet and 
 musician, — adding to tbe inspiration of ruder times all the 
 graces of an advanced civilisation, and invoking the ancient 
 airs of Ireland to aid the cause of liberty and justice. 
 
 Moore and Beranger were born within a year of each 
 other. They were both in the prime of their lives and the 
 fulness of their powers when Thierry wrote thus in 1820 ; 
 yet he concludes with an earnest aspiration that a poet 
 might arise to do for France what Moore had done for 
 Ireland ! 
 
 I do not ask you to concur Avith the enthusiastic esti- 
 mates of Shelley, and Byron, and Wilson, and Thierry, to 
 which others, of high authority, might easily be added. 
 
Thomas Moore. 191 
 
 Opinions may differ about their accuracy — and I am not 
 disposed to deny tliat some of them exaggerate his 
 merits; but I present them to you as dispensing me from 
 any necessity of argumentative assertion of those merits ; 
 and as suggesting, when such men have so spoken, a modest 
 distrust of their own superior judgment to some who, in 
 recent times, have ventured to assail him. 
 
 His literary claims have found wide and generous 
 acknowledgment ; but for us, in Ireland, Moore has a 
 fame which rests on even more impregnable foundations, 
 and which we are bound to cherish as more peculiarly 
 our own. To him, above all others, we owe the pre- 
 servation of our ancient music, its redemption from base 
 and vulgar uses, and its cordial reception by the world. 
 And for this great service we shall be, in my judgment, 
 always his debtors. That music had been, from pre-historic 
 times, one of the most prized endowments of the Irish people. 
 The bardic system was characteristic of the Celtic tribes ; 
 and, in Ireland, it was knit up with the national polity, 
 and was an influence of power on the national life. The 
 bard was held in honour. The airs which he inherited or 
 produced were handed down, from generation to generation, 
 with reverential care; and, accordingly, when the meeting 
 of the harpers, to which I shall immediately refer, took 
 place at the end of the eighteenth century, it was found 
 that, coming from the most distant places, they played the 
 same tunes, in the same key, and with the same expression. 
 In the twelfth century, Giraldus Cambrensis, a Welsh eccle- 
 siastic, who showed no special favour to the Irish race, 
 testified that their instruction in musical instruments was 
 incomparably superior to that of any nation he had known. 
 ^^ In musicis instrumentis commendabilem invenio istius 
 gentis diligentiam, in quibus prse omni natione quam vidi- 
 mus incomparabilitcr est instracta.^' 
 
192 Thomas Moore, 
 
 The music of Ireland has been described as " the truest 
 of all comments on our history'^ — by turns turbulent and 
 soft, — defiant and despondent, — alternating between levity 
 and sadness. Its airs were perishing when Moore was born. 
 A barbarous legislation had aimed to extinguish the min- 
 strelsy of Ireland. The bards fell wifch the great houses 
 which had cherished them; and when the gloom of the 
 penal days was beginning to be dissipated, the music which 
 had resounded in ancestral halls was heard only in the hut 
 or by the wayside, — at the pattern or the wake ; and the 
 harpers, who had once been maintained in competence and 
 dignity, became homeless wanderers, and were fast ceasing 
 to exist, with the melodious deposit of which they were 
 the guardians. Happily, before it had been lost, an 
 assembly of those who remained, — I think they were seven 
 in number, — was convened in 1792, at Belfast, by men who 
 loved their country, — the chief of whom, I am proud to 
 remember, was the beneficent physician, James McDonnell, 
 who, in his green old age, was the kindest friend of 
 my own early days. The tunes they had preserved 
 were collected by Edward Bunting, and published, in 1796 
 and afterwards, and so rescued from the oblivion which had 
 seemed inevitable. The achievement, for our nation and 
 the world, was beyond price or praise. 
 
 But much more was wanting for the safety and the 
 honour of our dear old music. It needed some one who 
 could clothe it in fitting words and commend it to popular 
 acceptance. It needed a gifted man to interpret the spirit 
 and character of Ireland, — her fancy and her feeling, — her 
 sorrows and her hopes. It needed that the "inarticulate 
 poetry'^ of sound should find verbal expression, and that 
 the strains which had floated down through the ages, — so 
 sweet, so various, so marvellously expressing, in their 
 pathos and their mirthfulness, the changeful phases of the 
 
Tho7nas Moore. 193 
 
 Irisli nature — should, at last, be ^^ married to immortal 
 verse. ■'^ 
 
 As I have said, in 1792, the harpers met, and Bunting 
 was preparing his collections, whilst Moore was practising 
 on a broken harpsichord, which his father had taken in 
 discharge of a trifling debt. Opportunity and capacity 
 to use it are the conditions of success in human affairs. 
 He discovered his faculty for music and his vocation as a 
 poet ; and the melodies he learned to love induced him to 
 exercise the one and to pursue the other, until he became, 
 for Ireland, in Shelley^s words, — 
 
 The sweetest lyrist of her saddest wrong. 
 
 In the earliest advertisement of the melodies, Moore 
 said that, if Burns had been an Irishman, ^^ his heart 
 would have been proud of such music and he would have 
 made it immortal." He had not then tested his own 
 powers, and could scarcely have anticipated that he himself 
 was destined to give it immortality. But we may fairly 
 apply his words to his accomplished work. Petrie recog- 
 nised the fact, that the finest of our airs obtained their 
 just appreciation in later days, less from a sense of their 
 intrinsic merit than from their union with lyrics which 
 seized on the popular attention ; and thus it was that 
 Mooi-e saved them from degradation, and made them a 
 present service, and a possession for all time, to his country 
 and his race. 
 
 Yery long ago, in words too old to be now remembered, 
 I said that he did for us what we wanted, and no one had 
 done before him. Exquisitely organised in soul and sense, 
 he gathered up the fragments of our melodies, and asso- 
 ciated them with songs such as had not been heard in 
 latter days. Those songs have resounded wherever the 
 English tongue — destined, as it seems, to become the 
 
194 Tho7nas Moore, 
 
 dominant language of mankind — is borne by tlie millions 
 who utter it throughout the earth. They are resounding 
 still beneath Eastern suns and amidst Canadian snows, — 
 in the forests of the West, and at the Antipodes, where 
 young empires begin their conquering progress. The same 
 sweet words, coupled with the same old music, have been 
 heard throughout Christendom, and far beyond it, — have 
 been sung by the Frenchman and the Russian, the Persian 
 and the Pole, — and thus have the name, and the history, 
 and the genius of our land been made familiar to distant 
 nations, and we have all been exalted by claiming, as our 
 own, one of the greatest lyrists of the world. 
 
 I have striven to put before you some of the grounds on 
 which Ireland, to-day, does honour to her Poet. Much 
 more I might wish to say about him ; but I cannot detain 
 you longer from the great enjoyment which is provided for 
 you. If, within the space at my command, I have not been 
 able to speak of him fitly, I have spoken, at least, with 
 earnest feeling and hearty purpose ; and, in the concert 
 which is coming, he will speak far better for himself. He 
 said that his songs, to be appreciated, should be sung, 
 not read, and your ears are still ringing with his own 
 apostrophe : — 
 
 Music ! Oh how fiiint, how weak, 
 
 Language fades before thj^ spell, 
 Why should Feeling ever speak, 
 
 When thou canst breathe her soul so well ? 
 
 In his own exquisite melodies, he will best vindicate, for 
 himself, his claim upon his country ; and the sentiments of 
 national pride and national thankfulness with which we 
 acknowledge it will be more aptly expressed, than by any 
 dull prose of mine, in the brilliant Ode, inspired by kindred 
 
Thomas Moore. 195 
 
 genius, wliich will be commended to you by all tbe graces 
 of a consummate elocution.* 
 
 I thank you for the kindness with which you have heard 
 me; and I congratulate you on your complete success, 
 despite untoward circumstances^ in a generous endeavour 
 to make worthy of Thomas Moore a tribute to his memory^ 
 to which all who have taken a part in offering it may look 
 back hereafter with proud and satisfied remembrance. 
 
 "*^ The address was followed by the recital of an ode of singular 
 power and beauty, composed by the lamented Denis Florence MacCarthy, 
 and deUvered, with masterly effect, by the Eev. Dr. Tisdall, Chancellor of 
 Christ Church. 
 
 N 2 
 
SAMUEL TAYLOE COLEEIDGE, 
 
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 
 
 [This Paper was one of a Series of " Afternoon Readings on Literature 
 and Art," at the Museum, Stephen's Green, Dublin, in 1866.] 
 
 WHEN I proposed to myself to speak to you of 
 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, I was prompted by 
 pleasant memories of earlier days, when I was somewhat 
 familiar with his writings, and filled with admiration 
 of his genius. I had not very recently recurred to the 
 fragments of Philosophy and Song bequeathed by him, — 
 poorly representing his own manifold and marvellous 
 endowments, but still sufficient, in their beauty and their 
 power, to fix his impress on the intelligence of every 
 English-speaking people. Preparing to address you, I 
 have glanced through them again, after a long lapse of 
 years, with a renewal of all my old delight and reverence ; 
 — but they have afi*ected me with an almost painful sense 
 of the temerity of my endeavour to present, in a lecture 
 such as this, any adequate delineation of the intellectual 
 life and action of one who, more perhaps than any other of 
 his time, might claim the epithet which he made current in 
 our language, and be fitly called a ^^ myriad-minded ^^ man. 
 I can only touch, lightly and imperfectly, under such cir- 
 cumstances, so large a theme ; but I may, at least, hope to 
 awaken some useful recollection of the scholar, the thinker, 
 and the poet, whose spirit had long high mastery over the 
 young mind of England, and greatly shaped the current of 
 
200 SamiLcl Tayloi^ Coleridge. 
 
 speculation and the character of literary effort^ amongst 
 her foremost men. With the rank and file of the reading- 
 public^ his history and his works have never been popular, 
 and, even to an audience such as I address, some reference 
 to them, now that more than thirty years have come and 
 gone since his departure, may not be altogether without 
 novelty and interest. 
 
 Coleridge was born in 1772. His father, the vicar and 
 schoolmaster of a parish in Devonshire, seems to have been 
 a simple man, with much classical and scientific reading. 
 He had a large family, and he allowed the youngest of 
 them, of whom I speak, to have very much his own way, 
 and to follow his own fancy. He was, according to his 
 own account, from his earliest boyhood, " a playless day- 
 dreamer, a lieluo libi'omm.'^ He read all the books he 
 could procure, and they and his musings on them con- 
 stituted his enjoyment. He never herded with other 
 children, — never, as he says, " thought as a child or had 
 the language of a child ''; — and so much the worse for him 
 it was, in all his after years. But, he was happy in his 
 dreamland. He speaks of his keen delight in the ^ ^Arabian 
 Nights ^'; and putting the question, " Ought children to 
 be allowed to read romances, and stories of giants, 
 magicians, and genii ?" — he answers : ''I have formed my 
 faith in the affirmative. 1 know no other way of giving 
 the mind a love for the great and the whole.'''' 
 
 Judge BuUer, who was educated by his father, procured 
 for him a presentation to Christ^s Hospital ; and thither 
 he went, and entered on the pursuits, in which his life was 
 to spend itself, at a very early period. Before his fifteenth 
 year, he had plunged into all the mysteries of Metaphysics, 
 and, having a library at his command, he ran through every 
 book, treating of that subject or of theological controversy, 
 on which he could lay his hands. At Christ's Hospital he 
 
Sanmel Taylor Coleridge. 201 
 
 formed the friendship with Charles Lamb, ^'his dearest, 
 best-loved, and earliest associatOj^^ which never ceased 
 during their existence. Long after, Lamb celebrated the 
 events of that early period in one of his most charming 
 essays — '^ Christ^s Hospital, Five-and-Thirty Years ago ^^; 
 — and thus he describes the " marvellous boy,^^ in terms 
 which might not inaptly picture him in his maturity : 
 ^' Come back into memory,^^ Lamb says, " like as thou 
 wert in the day-spring of thy fancies, with hope like a fiery 
 column before thee — the dark pillar not turned — Samuel 
 Taylor Coleridge, — Logician, Metaphysician, Bard ! How 
 have I seen the casual passer through the cloister stand 
 still, entranced with admiration (while he weighed the 
 disproportion between the speech and the garb of the 
 young Mirandula), to hear thee unfold, in thy deep 
 and sweet intonations, the mysteries of lamblichus or 
 Plotinus (for, even at those years, thou waxedst not pale 
 at such philosophic draughts), or reciting Homer in his 
 G-reek, or Pindar, whilst the walls of the old Grey Friars 
 re-echoed to the accents of the inspired charity-boy ! ^' 
 
 In after days, Coleridge spoke bitterly of his " prepos- 
 terous pursuit ^' of abstruse speculation, at such an age, as 
 having been injurious to his natural powers and the progress 
 of his education. And the lesson of his life, in this regard, is 
 not without its worth ; for there is grievous danger, alike 
 to the faith and the intelligence of the youth who, with 
 untrained faculties and imperfect knowledge, sets himself 
 to consider the great problems which in all ages have 
 puzzled the wisest of mankind, and need to be approached, 
 not with a light audacity or a flippant sciolism, but in the 
 ripeness of thought, and with a solemn sense of respon- 
 sibility, if we would not run the risk of unsettling con- 
 viction, and substituting, in its place, indifference to the 
 eternal distinctions between truth and falsehood. 
 
202 Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 
 
 Coleridge attributes his escape from destructive conse- 
 quences, such as these,, mainly to the genial influence of 
 poetry^ which led him to cultivate ^' his fancy and the love 
 of nature, and the sense of beauty in forms and sounds." 
 He became a student of poetry ; and he never ceased to 
 express the admiration with which he regarded the sonnets 
 of Mr. Bowles, and his gratitude for their useful influence 
 on his mind. They appeared in his seventeenth year, and 
 stirred him to such enthusiasm, that he made forty tran- 
 scriptions of the entire book, in order to present them to 
 his friends, for whom he could not afford to purchase 
 copies. And, till his latest hour, he cherished the senti- 
 ment which he has embodied in one of his sweetest 
 sonnets : — 
 
 My heart has thank'd thee, Bowles, for those soft strains 
 Whose sadness soothes me, like the murmuring 
 Of wild bees in the sunny showers of spring. 
 
 For hence, not callous to the mourner's pains, 
 
 Through youth's gay prime and thornless paths I went ; 
 And when the mightier throes of mind began. 
 And drove me forth, a thought-bewilder'd man, 
 
 Their mild and manliest melancholy lent 
 
 A mingled charm, such as the pang consign'd 
 To slumber, though the big tear it renew'd ; 
 Bidding a strange, mysterious pleasure brood 
 
 Over the wavy and tumultuous mind : 
 
 As the Great Spirit erst, with plastic sweep, 
 Moved on the darkness of the unfonn'd deep. 
 
 He entered Cambridge in 1791. He read largely, but 
 irregularly, and gained few collegiate honours; and in 
 1793, pressed by some pecuniary difficulties, and in a fit of 
 despondency, he enlisted as a private in a regiment of 
 Light Dragoons. He took the name of Comberbacke, and 
 his true [character was discovered by one of the officers, 
 who found inscribed by him on a stable-door : '^ Eheu ! 
 
Sainuel Taylor Coleridge. 203 
 
 quam infortunii miserrimum est fuisse felicem ! " Which 
 I may render in the lines of Tennyson : — 
 
 For a sorrow's crown of sorrow 
 Is remembering happier days ! 
 
 Coleridofe ceased to be a soldier after a service of four 
 months ; but he never completed his academic course_, and 
 soon passed to another field of action. 
 
 In 1794^ he became acquainted with Robert Southey, and 
 formed relations with that eminent man which affected 
 very much the fortunes of his life. They married sisters, 
 became identified for a time in their views and aspirations, 
 and contemplated the establishment of a new community 
 beyond the Atlantic, in accordance with notions which were 
 then very prevalent in the world, and which we should now 
 call '^ socialistic.''^ It was the time when the French Revolu- 
 tion had shattered down old systems, and brought into ques- 
 tion old opinions, and startled the nations by many a fantastic 
 theory, and many an inspiring hope. Men dreamed of an 
 impossible equality and a perfect reign of justice; of the re- 
 storation of the ^''golden time^' which knew no poverty or sin ; 
 of a material Paradise and a mundane immortality. Godwin 
 gravely prophesied, in his ^' Political Justice,^' that the life 
 of human beings would, at last, be made perennial upon 
 earth ; and Coleridge and Southey proposed to prove, 
 experimentally, on the banks of the Susquehannah, that, 
 in the meantime, and before that consummation, they 
 might dispense with the obsolete institution of individual 
 property, and hold all things in common. However, the 
 project had no issue in fact. And although there were 
 joyous evenings, in which, as Charles Lamb said, he sat 
 with his friend at the "Cat and Salutation,^' reading poetry 
 and speculating on Pantisocracy, " drinking egg-hot and 
 smoking Oronooko,'' the enthusiasts never realised their 
 
204 Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 
 
 scheme^ but remained in England to help^ it may be 
 over-much^ when the glitter of the vision faded and the 
 reaction came^ the foes of all political and social innova- 
 tion. 
 
 Coleridge then began to lecture ; and those who desire 
 to appreciate his early efforts in that way will find speci- 
 mens of his manner of speech in his " Conciones ad 
 Populum/' and " The Plot Discovered.'^ But on these I 
 do not linger^ nor on his abortive attempt to establish the 
 Watchman, a journal which endured only for a few weeks. 
 He seems to me to have been unfortunate in attempting, 
 from time to time, to connect himself with periodical 
 literature. His range of vision was too wide, his imagina- 
 tion too teemingly suggestive, his " large discourse of 
 reason'-' too much conversant with the abstract and the 
 permanent in speculation, to permit easily of the concen- 
 tration, the point and the completeness, in narrow space, 
 which must be achieved by the prosperous journalist. Add 
 to this, that his habits were very desultory ; that procrasti- 
 nation cursed him through all his life ; and w^e shall not 
 wonder that his Watchmaji failed ; that his contributions to 
 the Mornvig Post and Courier, — though they were some- 
 times redolent of the high faculty of wliich it was, indeed, 
 true to say, nihil tetlgit quod non ornavit, and though they 
 were much praised by the proprietor of the papers, Mr. 
 Stuart, and gained for those papers increased circulation 
 and popularity, — were yet not very worthy of him ; and that 
 the Friend itself, abounding in deep thought and noble lan- 
 guage, had a brief career, and remains an indigested mass 
 of admirable papers, individually of the highest value, but 
 wanting in continuity and integral effect. Since his day, 
 our periodicals have largely multiplied, and, in the general, 
 greatly improved, and the weekly and daily press now 
 habitually displays a lavish expenditure of intellect and 
 
Sanmel Taylo?"- ColeiHdge. 205 
 
 knowledge which,, heretofore^ would have built up many a 
 lofty reputation. But I do not think that, at any time, he 
 could have achieved high distinction in such a field ; and 
 we may rejoice that it failed to absorb his energies, and 
 lure them from work to which they were more properly 
 applied. 
 
 Two events early tended to draw him towards that 
 work and keep him to it, — his acquaintance with Words- 
 worth, and the opportunity afforded to him, by the 
 liberality of the Wedgwoods, of becoming well acquainted 
 with the literature, especially the philosophical literature, 
 of Germany. 
 
 He first knew Wordsworth in 1794, and they became 
 neighbours in 1797. They formed fit estimates of each 
 other^s powers, and soon resolved to unite in a literary 
 venture. They projected the '^Lyrical Ballads,'^ — a work 
 which was destined to mark a momentous epoch in the 
 history of English Poetry. 
 
 When the first volume of that book appeared, in 1798, 
 there was need of the change of which it was the pre- 
 snge. The Poetry which had sprung into being, finding 
 almost at once its birth and its perfection, in the age of 
 Spenser and Shakespeare, had passed through many phases 
 and assumed many forms. It maintained itself with austere 
 dignity during the civil war, and until the overthrow of the 
 Commonwealth, producing minor verses, full of melodious 
 sweetness, and solemn tenderness, and philosophic musing, 
 and making England illustrious as the creator of one of the 
 great epics of the world. But, when the Restoration came, 
 it lost, together, its national character and its power and 
 purity. It subserved the base uses of a licentious Court, 
 and spread a moral pestilence throughout the countr}-. 
 Even the masculine genius of Dryden, destined to exercise 
 much influence for good, and incapable of utter obscuration 
 
2o6 Saimiel Taylo7^ Coleridge, 
 
 and debasement^ was made its evil minister. He describes 
 Ms age in the '^ Secular Masque ^^ as — 
 
 A very merry, dancing, drinking, 
 Laughing, quaffing, and unthinking time. 
 
 And its verse-makers and playwrights^ permeated by its 
 spirit, mocked at tlie true passion and high purpose of the 
 elder days of England. French models were the favourite 
 subjects of imitation, and the form and tendency of intel- 
 lectual effort were long too largely shaped by them. Even 
 when that effort ceased to be corrupt and morally corrupt- 
 ing; when Addison reached the perfection of grace and 
 ease in prose, and Pope's faultless couplets enshrined the 
 keenest satire, the soundest observation, and the astutest 
 thought ; the character of English Poetry was not emanci- 
 pated from the influences of the seventeenth century. 
 There were wisdom and wit in it abundantly, and, 
 sometimes, great descriptive power ; there were artistic 
 endeavour and artistic progress ; and there was not 
 wanting appreciation of natural beauty and the working of 
 the human heart, in the environments of an advanced 
 society. All these things there were in the age which 
 produced Thomson, and Young, and Gray, and Collins, and 
 our own Goldsmith, so admirable in many things. But the 
 verse which had these qualities of excellence lacked the 
 large sympathies, the deep emotion, the fresh and loving 
 enthusiasm for the good and the beautiful, the gorgeous 
 imagination, the subtle fancy, and the rich and various 
 melody, which had belonged to the poets of the past. It 
 has been described as not so much poetic thought as 
 thought '^translated into the language of poetr}^,"" or as 
 ^^a translation of prose thoughts into poetic language''; 
 and, though much exception must be made in behalf 
 especially of Gray, and Collins, and Goldsmith, the descrip- 
 
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 207 
 
 tion does not appear to misrepresent the general cliaracter 
 of the rhythmical compositions of the age. 
 
 Cowper was near his end before the opening of the 
 career of Coleridge, who associates him and Bowles in 
 the eulogy, that, of living poets, they were the first '^ who 
 combined natural thoughts with natural diction — the first 
 who reconciled the heart with the head.^^ In Cowper, and 
 in the greater Scotchman, 
 
 Who walk'd in glory and in joy, 
 
 Behind his plough upon the mountain side, 
 
 and approved himself, before his early death, fitted to 
 become a master in every province of the poeVs art, that 
 art, in the eighteenth century, fortunately culminated. 
 
 The comparative dulness of the time, when Whitehead 
 was Laureate and Hay ley had fame, was broken cheerily by 
 the publication of Percy^s ^'Reliques of Ancient English 
 Poetry.^' The collection appeared in 1765, and their 
 venerable editor, himself of no mean lyrical capacity, saw a 
 great intellectual revolution wrought before his death, at 
 Dromore, in 1811. The ^^Reliques^' gave an impulse and aid 
 of the most material kind to those who heralded a new poetic 
 era. ^^ I do not think,''^ said Wordsworth, ^' that there is 
 an able writer in verse in the present day who would not 
 be proud to acknowledge his obligations to the ^ Reliques ^; 
 — I know that it is so with my friends : for myself, I am 
 happy to make a public avowal of my own.^^ They were n 
 fit prelude to the ^'^ Lyrical Ballads ^^; and they stimulated 
 the early activity of Sir Walter Scott. For, in truth, the 
 '^ old rude songs,^^ which had been well-nigh forgotten^ 
 stirred men^s hearts through all the crust of a polished 
 conventionalism, and made them thrill again to the touch 
 of Nature, applied in its simplicity and strength. 
 
 This was one instrument of change : and there were 
 
2o8 Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 
 
 others : but they might all have been impotent to work it, 
 without the aid of the awakening power of that great 
 movement, which, at the close of the century, ran through 
 Europe with electric force, disturbing all that was stagnant, 
 and quickening all that was slow, and evoking to unknown 
 excitement, for evil or for good, the hidden emotions and 
 the slumbering faculties of mankind. That movement was 
 often black with crime, and fruitful in suffering and 
 sorrow. It defied Heaven, and spread war and desolation 
 through the earth; but, under Grod's overruling Providence, 
 it had its ^' sweet uses,^^ and its happy issues, too. 
 
 In the preparation of the ^' Lyrical Ballads,'' Coleridge 
 undertook the special romance of the work, and the 
 blending of supernatural machinery with human interest ; 
 whilst Wordsworth dealt with the common objects of 
 physical nature and the ordinary courses of man's life and 
 feeling, developing their deeper meanings, their unappre- 
 ciated beauty, and their hidden relations with truth and 
 goodness. 
 
 Coleridge produced the " Ancient Mariner," and a few 
 other poems, and all the rest of the published pieces be- 
 longed to Wordsworth, whose genius never despised tne 
 wholesome sustainment of systematic industry, and bore 
 far ampler fruit than that of his co-mate, though the latter 
 may have been more rich in natural gifts, as it was certain!}^ 
 more various, and endowed with a riper scholarship and a 
 wider intellectual vision. 
 
 Then came that assault upon the "Lyrical Ballads," 
 which was kept up against their authors, with savage 
 ferocity, for more than twenty years, and will ever be one 
 of the worst reproaches to the critical literature of Britain. 
 The Edinhurgh Review^ in its palmiest state, and maintain- 
 ing a mastery of opinion in the world of letters, set itself 
 to run down Wordsworth, and Coleridge, and Southcy, 
 
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 209 
 
 whom it was pleased to class together as forming a 
 single and peculiar school ; although not one of those 
 writers was identified with, or like to, any other, in the 
 conception, the purpose or the mode of execution of his 
 literary enterprises. It is impossible now to read the 
 scandalous diatribes in which they were traduced, and note 
 the utterly unscrupulous partisanship which assailed them, 
 without some disgust, and much astonishment, that persons 
 of undoubted ability could so have prostituted their powers, 
 in an efi'ort to cloud the fame, and obstruct the usefulness, 
 of the great men whom, for a generation, they made the 
 subjects of sneering ridicule to the misled multitude. 
 
 The " Ancient Mariner '^ of Coleridge was described as 
 " a mixture of raving and drivelling ^^; his " Christabel ^^ 
 was merely laughed at. And neither the wonderful rhyth- 
 mical effects, nor the more wonderful power of affluent 
 illustration, nor the deep and suggestive thoughtfulness, of 
 his other poems, could extort, for many a day, a word of 
 commendation from the critical dictators. South ey was 
 equally attacked : and the comparatively few verses in 
 which Wordsworth carried to vicious excess a theory, in 
 many respects, just and defensible, were seized upon, and 
 too long successfully, to make the world forgetful of his 
 transcendent merits. The observation of Coleridge, that 
 the omission of less than a hundred lines from Words- 
 worth^s contributions to the '^ Lyrical Ballads ^^ would have 
 precluded nine-tenths of the criticism upon them, is un- 
 questionably true. Yet, criticism of the same kind, and 
 having the same small foundation, was sustained, persist- 
 ingly, for a score of years. The calumniated writers were 
 robbed of the substantial rewards of their high mental 
 efforts, and scouted insolently when they should have been 
 clothed with honour. 
 
 But time went on : a wiser intelligence was diffused ; and 
 
 
 
2IO Samuel Taylo7^ Cole7'idge. 
 
 truth and beauty could not be hidden for ever. TKe revo- 
 lution in poetic taste wbicb. began with the century made its 
 way^ slowly but surely. Southey^s position became clear 
 and assured ; Coleridge^ at last, had respect and influence ; 
 and Wordsworth survived to see himself the object of 
 universal reverence,, and note the proof of his acknowledged 
 influence on the literature of his country, which has adopted, 
 and will long cherish, amongst its treasures, to be con- 
 tinually applied in apt quotation for current use, a greater 
 number of his lines than of most other poets since the time 
 of Shakespeare. Coleridge was in his five-and-twentieth 
 year when he produced the ^^ Ancient Mariner,^^ and others 
 of his finest compositions. It was his annus mirahilis. 
 He had written much and well before, and he wrote nobly 
 afterwards ; but the work of that year he never excelled. 
 I have no time to go through his poems in detail ; but I am 
 sure many of you are acquainted with them all ; and to a 
 few selections from some of them I shall, by-and-by, ask 
 your attention. Those which succeeded the efi'orts of his 
 youth are graver and more full of thought and often of 
 thoughtful melanchol}^ ; and though their excellence makes 
 us lament the smallness of their number, they represent, 
 remarkably, the conditions of his mind, at various periods ; 
 and, in the absence of any record of stirring events or 
 practical activity, — for his life was exhausted in abstract 
 inquiry and intellectual acquisition, — they are suflBcient to 
 compel our homage to the rare genius which produced 
 them. 
 
 But, Coleridge was not merely a poet, nor was the cultiva- 
 tion of poetry the main business of his life. His verse is, 
 indeed, instinct with a true philosophy, looking kindly and 
 wisely into nature and life and the heart of man. But he 
 had a double intellectual being ; and his speculative faculty, 
 whilst it aided, and was interfused with, his imagination. 
 
Sarmtel Taylo7'' Coleridge. 211 
 
 far transcended it, in his own esteem, and commanded more 
 of his culture and attention. 
 
 As I have said, one of the great determining occasions 
 of his hfe was the visit he was early enabled to make to 
 Germany, and his acquaintance with its metaphysical 
 systems, which followed thereupon. He had been an 
 enthusiastic advocate of the Hartleian theory; but he 
 abandoned it, and, after becoming famihar with Locke, 
 Leibnitz, and Des Cartes, he became as familiar with Kant, 
 Fichte, and Schelling. He had few relations with the 
 work-day world around him. Circumstances sadly detached 
 him, even from the domestic obligations which happily 
 control the freedom of the man who governs his family ; 
 and so, from month to month, and year to year, he dwelt 
 in his own peculiar atmosphere of thought and fancy, 
 brooding over the cardinal questions of metaphysics and 
 morals, and believing that he had found for them a wise 
 solution ; — *''' spinning/^ as De Quincy said, " from his 
 magical brain theories more gorgeous by far, and sup- 
 ported by a pomp and luxury of images, such as no German 
 that ever breathed could have emulated in his dreams ;'^ — 
 and promising continually the completion of an 0])vs 
 Magnum which should make a new reconcilement of Reason 
 and Revelation, and " justify the ways of God to man.-'^ 
 
 And he sought help in these high pursuits from every 
 department of human knowledge; from Natural Science 
 and Universal Literature, from the Fathers of the Christian 
 Church, and the later Platonists, and the Schoolmen of 
 the Middle Age, and the mystic Theosophists, and the 
 workers in the wide field of modern speculation. To him- 
 self his own lines may well apply, more, perhaps, than to 
 any other of his time : — 
 
 For not a hidden path that to the shades 
 Of the beloved Parnassian forest leads, 
 
 2 
 
212 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 
 
 Lurk'd undiscover'd by him ; not a rill 
 
 There issues from the fount of Hippocrene, 
 
 But he had traced it upward to its source, 
 
 Through open glade, dark glen, and secret dell ; 
 
 Knew the gay wild flowers on its banks, and cuU'd 
 
 Its med'cinable herbs ! Yea, oft alone 
 
 Piercing the long-neglected holy cave, 
 
 The haunt obscure of old Philosophy, 
 
 He bade, with lifted torch, the starry Avails 
 
 Sparkle, as erst they sparkled, to the flame 
 
 Of odorous lamps tended by saint or sage ! 
 
 His knowledge was encyclopedic, and liis power of 
 speech had in it, according to contemporary report, some- 
 thing superhuman. He poured out, day by day, the 
 wealth of his imagination and his memory to wondering 
 listeners, who bore it away and often made it fruitful, to 
 themselves in fame, and to the world in profit. 
 
 William Hazlitt hated him, as a politician, and was one 
 of his most virulent assailants in the Edinhurgh Review; 
 but, notwithstanding, this was the testimony of that keen- 
 sighted and brilliant, though unhappy man : — '' He is the 
 only person I ever knew who answered to the idea of a man 
 of genius. He is the only person from whom I ever learned 
 
 anything He talked on for ever, and you wished 
 
 him to talk on for ever. His thoughts did not seem to 
 come with labour and effort, but as if borne on the gusts of 
 genius, and as if the wings of his imagination lifted him 
 from his feet. His voice rolled on the ear like the pealing 
 organ, and its sound alone was the music of thought. His 
 mind was clothed with wings, and, lifted on them, he raised 
 Philosophy to Heaven.^' And such w^as the testimony of 
 all the men of note who came, from time to time, to submit 
 to the witchery of his unmatched eloquence. Professor 
 Wilson wrote : — ^' If there be any man of great and original 
 geniuB alive at this moment in Europe, it is Coleridge.''^ 
 
Saimiel Taylor Coleridge, 213 
 
 ^^ I think," said Dr. Arnold, '*" with all his faults, old Sam 
 was more of a great man than any one who has lived within 
 the four seas in this generation/^ And Wordsworth, who 
 was not given to praise, declared that " he had seen many 
 men do wonderful things, but Coleridge was the only 
 wonderful man he had ever met/' 
 
 And so he sat in his room at Highgate, 
 
 The rapt one, of the godlike forehead, 
 
 exercising, in some sort, the intellectual domination which 
 had belonged to Dr. Johnson, or rather, perhaps, to be 
 likened to the sages of the Porch and the Grove, in the great 
 days of Athens, whose disciples hung upon their lips, and 
 garnered up the wisdom which enriched their utterance. 
 He was lavish of his gifts, and indifferent to the profit and 
 the fame he might have won from them. Sometimes, regret 
 for his self-forgetfulness seems to have crossed his mind. 
 He says, sadly, in his ^^ Literary Life '^ : — '^ I have laid too 
 many eggs in the hot sands of this wilderness, the world, 
 with ostrich carelessness and ostrich oblivion. The greater 
 part, indeed, have been trodden under foot and are for- 
 gotten. But yet, no small number have crept forth into life, 
 some to furnish feathers for the caps of others, and still 
 more to plume the shafts in the quiver of my enemies, 
 of them that, unprovoked, have lain in wait against my 
 soul — 
 
 Sic vos, non vobis, mellificatis, apes ! " 
 
 But, withal, he exercised a greater individual influence 
 than any man of his time ; and that influence has penetrated, 
 widely and deeply, the literature of the English tongue, in 
 the Old World and the New. 
 
 As 1 have said, his printed prose works are fragmentary 
 
214 Samuel Taylor Coleindge. 
 
 and imperfect, and poorly represent the great intelligence 
 wMcli produced them. The chief of them may be briefly 
 named: "The Friend/' the ''Lay Sermons/' the '' Bio- 
 graphia Literaria/' the '' Aids to Reflection/' and the essay 
 '' On the Constitution in Church and State '' ; to which I 
 may add two posthumous publications, the '' Confessions of 
 an Inquiring Spirit/' and the " Literary Remains." These 
 compositions are, in many ways^ of rare excellence ; but., 
 taken altogether, they leave upon the mind a painful 
 sense of their insuflBciency to fulfil the hope which their 
 author cherished, and the world was warranted to share, 
 of some complete achievement worthy of his reputation. 
 With him, unhappily, to project gave no sure promise 
 of fulfilment ; as was curiously indicated by his state- 
 ment to De Quincy, that his title-pages alone (titles 
 of works devised, but not executed,) would fill a large 
 volume. 
 
 The System of Philosophy, to which he had dedicated 
 his best years, and to which he repeatedly referred as the 
 crowning labour of his life, he never completed ; but, after 
 his death, a devoted follower undertook to give it to the 
 world. Mr. Green was a surgeon of high professional rank 
 in London ; a Professor in King's College ; and a man who 
 had gained great distinction by his Hunterian Lectures and 
 his speculations on subjects connected with mental science. 
 He was conversant with the modern philosophy of Germany, 
 and this, perhaps, led him to seek the society of Coleridge, 
 to whom he became attached, as a pupil to his master. 
 Every week, for many a year, in spite of his absorbing 
 occupations, he spent long hours at Highgate, learning the 
 views of Coleridge from himself; and when their great 
 expounder was no more, he determined, in the words of his 
 biographer, Mr. Simons, to devote "the whole remaining 
 strength and earnestness of his life to the one task of 
 
Smnuel Taylo7^ Coleridge. 215 
 
 systematising, developing_, and establishing tlie doctrines 
 of the Coleridgian Philosophy.''^ He soon retired from 
 practice^ and^ for eight-and-twenty years which remained to 
 him^ he chiefly devoted his time and his faculties to the 
 task he had taken on himself. Coleridge had made no full 
 or intelligible demonstration of his system. He left only 
 fragmentary suggestions and notes on margins and in scrap- 
 books j and these_, with the memory of the conversations at 
 HighgatCj supplied to Mr. Green the materials for his work. 
 In connexion with it, we are told that he strove to 
 familiarise himself with every branch of human knowledge, 
 physical and psychological ; that he made a new study of 
 the Greek language ; began, when he was sixty years old, 
 to read Hebrew; and, when he was older still, tried to 
 make some acquaintance with Sanscrit. He believed, Avith 
 Coleridge, that a full philosophic system should include 
 '^ the laws and explanation of all being, conscious and un- 
 conscious ^' j and, with such a conception of it, his labour 
 of construction was, apparently, immense. He died, in 
 1863, in his seventy-second year, having conscientiously 
 prosecuted that labour to the end; and, only in 1865, was 
 the result of his faithful and affectionate endeavours given 
 to the public, under the title, '^ Spiritual Philosophy, 
 founded on the Teaching of the late Samuel Taylor 
 Coleridge.^^ The work was edited by his able friend, 
 Mr. Simons, whose preliminary memoir has enabled me 
 to make this statement, as to the origin and progress of 
 the book. 
 
 I have made it, not because this is the time or the place 
 to analyse or to judge that remarkable publication ; but 
 because I think it must be of interest to an intellectual 
 audience to learn that, in this busy century, with all its 
 utilitarian proclivities, and all its proneness to absorb itself 
 in the moiling and toiling of mere material progress, such 
 
2i6 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 
 
 an exemplar should have been given of reverence and 
 docility and renunciation of selfish ends^ by a scholar of 
 high capacity and great acquirements, who, from mere love 
 of what he deemed a sound philosophy, and of its best 
 expositor, spent himself in earnest and humble setting 
 forth of the thought of another man. I institute no foolish 
 parallelism between the cases, but the conduct of this 
 London surgeon reminds us somewhat of the relation which 
 subsisted between the philosopher whose sublime previsions 
 seemed to anticipate the great doctrines of Kevelation, and 
 his master, Socrates. For eight years, before an unjust 
 judgment took from Athens her sagest citizen, he had filled 
 with his wisdom a disciple worthy of him, — from whose 
 mind, we are told, his image never passed, — who occupied 
 a luminous career, in perpetuating his influence and illus- 
 trating his principles. The dialogues of Plato have made 
 the name of Socrates, who bequeathed no written memorial 
 of himself, famous and venerable for all mankind : and it is 
 pleasant to see, in our own day, something of the old Greek 
 devotedness show itself again. To me, at least, there is 
 inspiring nobleness in the spectacle of such strength of 
 purpose and such pure and persistent self-abnegation, as 
 have been rare in any age, and not least in our own. 
 
 I have digressed slightly, but, I trust, not unprofitably. 
 And I scarcely regret, that the digression leaves me no 
 time to talk of some circumstances in the life of Coleridge 
 which ask from us ^^ the charity of silence.'' Of his 
 slavery, for a time, to the dominion of opium, which 
 poisoned the very springs of his life, and deranged his 
 relations with those who were nearest and dearest to him, 
 and drew from him agonising cries of self-condemnation, it 
 were not profitable here to speak. Nor is it needful, that I 
 should further dwell upon his want of the prudence, the con- 
 centration and the care by which ordinary men utilise, to 
 
Saymiel Taylor Coleridge. 2 1 7 
 
 the uttermost^ their meaner faculties. Often^ he pined in 
 his solitary musings^ when 
 
 Fruitless late Eemorse would trace, 
 Like Hebrew lore, a backward pace, 
 Its irrecoverable race ! 
 
 And in his own rich verse he lamented — 
 
 Sense of past youth and manhood come in vain, 
 And genius given, and knowledge won in vain ; 
 And all which he had cull'd in wood-walks wild, 
 And all which patient toil had rear'd -^ * * but flowers, 
 Strew'd on his corpse and borne upon his bier. 
 In the same coflBn, to the self-same grave ! 
 
 Yetj when he was assailed by critics and in literary circles, 
 as an incorrigible idler, who had wasted his talents and 
 opportunities, he defended himself with natural vehemence, 
 insistiug that he had done great work for his generation : — 
 '^By what I Imve effected,^^ he said proudly, ^*'am I to be 
 judged by my fellow-men : what I could have done^ is a 
 question for my own conscience/^ And then again would 
 come his hours of despondency, as when, in later years^ he 
 wrote thus, in a strain of exquisite sadness : — 
 
 All nature seems at work : slugs leave their lair, 
 
 The bees are stirring, birds are on the wing. 
 
 And winter, slumbering in the open air. 
 
 Wears on his smiling face a dream of Spring ! 
 
 And I, the while, the sole unbusy thing, 
 
 Nor honey make, nor pair, nor build, nor sing. 
 
 Yet, well I ken the banks where amaranths blow, 
 
 Have traced the fount whence streams of nectar flow ; — 
 
 Bloom, ye amaranths ! bloom for whom ye may, 
 
 For me ye bloom not ! Glide, rich streams, away ! 
 
 With lips unmoisten'd, wreathless brow, I stroll. 
 
 And would you learn the spells that drowse my soul ? 
 
 ^York without hope draws nectar in a sieve, 
 
 And hope without an object cannot live. 
 
2i8 Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 
 
 Of his uneventful life^ I liave no more to say. He passed 
 it in oscillation between the cloudland of his gorgeous fancy 
 and the high, rare atmosphere of speculative thought ; and 
 he was not without the comfort of that deep afiection_, 
 approved by years of tenderness and care, from those who 
 were bound to him by no ties of flesh and blood, for which 
 his yearning found utterance when he said — 
 
 To be beloved is all I need, 
 And whom I love, I love indeed ! 
 
 He suffered from the want of a definite pursuit or profession 
 to steady his course, and keep his mind from unprofitable 
 wandering. He knew, by sad experience, the truth of 
 Scott's wise saying — ^' Literature is a good staff, but an evil 
 crutch^'; and he has done his best, by eloquent and earnest 
 warning, to prevent young men from pursuing authorship, 
 as the business of their lives. I observe that Mr. Carlyle, 
 in his recent Inaugural Address at Edinburgh, repeats the 
 counsel with energy and unction. But I need not dwell 
 upon the causes, in connexion with that to which I have 
 last adverted, which produced the mental shortcomings and 
 the bodily afflictions of Coleridge. 
 
 At last he sank, at the age of sixty-two, broken with pain 
 and many infirmities, but in the unclouded clearness of his 
 majestic intellect, and with the full control of his abounding- 
 acquisitions. And, at the end of all, he wrote to his godson, 
 from his dying bed, these words: — " I, too, your godfather, 
 have known what the advantages and enjoyments of this life 
 are, and what the more refined pleasures which learning and 
 intellectual power can bestow ; and, with all the experience 
 which three-score years can give, I now^, on the eve of 
 my departure, declare to you (and earnestly pray that you 
 may hereafter live and act on the conviction), that health 
 is a great blessing; competence, obtained by honourable 
 
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 219 
 
 industry, is a great blessing ; and a great blessing it is to 
 have kind_, faithful, and loving friends and relatives ; but 
 that the greatest of blessings, as it is the most ennobling 
 of all privileges, is to be, indeed, a Christian ! ^' 
 
 And with this final utterance the greatest thinker of his 
 time went to his account, leaving a memory ^^ which the 
 world will not willingly allow to perish ! ^' 
 
 I borrow, as a conclusion to my unworthy outline of an 
 illustrious life, a few of the words which a true poet of our 
 own, Aubrey de Yere, has dedicated to Coleridge : — 
 
 No loftier, purer soul than liis hath ever 
 With awe revolved the planetary page 
 
 (From infancy to age) 
 Of knowledge, sedulous and proud to give her 
 The whole of his great heart for her own sake, 
 For what she is, not what she does, or 
 
 What can make. 
 
 It remains that I should briefly speak of the character of 
 Coleridge, as a philosopher and a poet. 
 
 I shall not expound to you his doctrine of Ideas, or the 
 distinction which it was the labour of all his maturer years 
 to establish between the Reason and the Understanding, as 
 the main foundation of his system, and the key to the truths 
 of Intellectual Philosophy, in its connexion with Theology 
 and the grounds of certainty as to spiritual things. Such 
 an exposition of such theories and their consequences, 
 involving the discussion of many a vexed and tangled 
 question, would be impossible in a lecture like this ; even if 
 it were not, as it seems to me, beside and beyond the pur- 
 poses for which we are assembled. I therefore avoid it : 
 but I shall say a word of the influence on the general 
 character and current of opinion, in his time, which 
 Coleridge so remarkably exerted. 
 
 Some of my own views, as to the gravest subjects which 
 
2 20 Samuel Taylor Cole^ndge, 
 
 can occupy tlie intellect of man, are wliolly opposed to 
 those wliicli lie energetically advocated, and I deem him 
 often a dangerous guide and counsellor ; but that does not 
 prevent me from recognising in him a sincere lover of the 
 truth, who pursued it, if not always with success, always, 
 at least, in simplicity and single-heartedness. 
 
 And, being so distiuguished by mental integrity and 
 purity of purpose, he seems to me, without reference 
 to the minute details of his peculiar teaching, to have 
 been specially a benefactor to his country, in this, that he 
 sought to lift the speculation of his contemporaries from the 
 dull level on which it had been running, and to inform 
 it with a higher spiritual life. He was no friend to some 
 of the doctrines of mental science, which, taking their 
 origin in England, had a fatal development in the godless 
 materialism of France, and, with various modifications, pre- 
 vailed, more or less, in the schools of Scotland. He became 
 their adversary, when he escaped the fascination of the 
 Hartleian scheme; and the new types of thought, and even 
 of technical expression, which he introduced, were very 
 useful in making men exert their understandings, freely and 
 freshly, and question the necessity of submission to the 
 dominion of the prevailing theories of " sense and selfish- 
 ness.'^ In all his writings and in all his oral intercourse, 
 he asserted views of man's nature and relations to the 
 universe antagonistic to those theories, and his logic and his 
 eloquence encountered them, unceasingly. The thoughtful 
 students of the great English universities, for many a 
 day, looked reverentially to his judgment; and its guidance 
 led very many of them to cherish a high conception of 
 the moral constitution, the freedom and responsibiHty, 
 and the immortal destiny, of the human race. For the 
 difi'usion of such conceptions, at such a time, they and 
 the world were deeply his debtors. 
 
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 221 
 
 Further, his intellectual action always aimed to propagate 
 generous impulses and suggest lofty aims, the disinterested 
 love of truth and virtue, and a large-hearted spirit of love 
 and charity towards all mankind. And, whatever were his 
 own faults and failings, those who followed his counsels 
 were sure to learn the worth and the happiness of con- 
 scientious labour, the necessity of method, in the regulation 
 of the intellect and the discharge of social duty, and the 
 sacred obligation, incumbent on every one of us, of acting 
 throughout the details of life, private or public, trivial or 
 momentous — 
 
 As ever in his great Task-master's eye. 
 
 In another way, the influence of Coleridge on opinion 
 was of much importance. Before the language of Germany 
 had become familiar, as it now is, to multitudes in these 
 islands, and whilst many of the most learned of their 
 people were still ignorant of the new intellectual develop- 
 ment of that country, Coleridge applied himself to the 
 study of the German philosophy, mastered its principles, 
 and measured an intellect, of no unequal power, with those 
 of its chief creators. If he had become its subservient 
 expositor in the English tongue, he would have sapped the 
 foundations of the most cherished beliefs and traditions of 
 his countrymen ; or, if he had succeeded such an expositor, 
 he might have found it very difficult to countervail the 
 mischief of a first impression on the national sentiment. 
 But, whilst he made much of the teaching of Kant and 
 Schelling and their compeers familiar in the language of 
 England, he put upon it the impress of his own spirit, and 
 subdued it to the uses of his own deep convictions. He 
 laboured to demonstrate that its doctrines, so far as they 
 were worthy of acceptance, were entirely reconcilable 
 with the dogmas of Christianity — with God's personality 
 
222 Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 
 
 and man's redemption ; and lie anticipated and prevented, 
 to a large extent,, the danger of an identification of tlie 
 new phase of mental science with unbelief, and the sub- 
 stitution of a pantheistic mysticism for the faith of 
 Eevelation. 
 
 These were some of the modes in which Coleridge 
 wielded a power, unrecognised and unproclaimed, but not 
 the less real and widely operative, on intellects which were 
 to head the march of thought, and mould opinion by their 
 persuasion and example. In one of his early books, a 
 writer, who has since gained high reputation from a history 
 — distinguished by original research and perverse theory, 
 by a racy and vigorous style and many a delusive repre- 
 sentation of events and persons — makes a striking state- 
 ment as to his own condition of mind, when he looked out 
 into the world from the cloisters of Oxford, and debated 
 with himself, whether he should follow the path traced for 
 him by John Henry Newman, or that to which he was 
 attracted by Thomas Carlyle ? These, it has often seemed 
 to me, with that of Coleridge, are the names representing 
 the exercise of the widest influence, in the most diverse 
 ways, which has acted on individual minds, amongst us, 
 within this century. And it is curious to observe, as may be 
 noted by any one who makes a study of the matter, how 
 far the subtle and many-sided intellect of the eldest of the 
 three, in one way, promoted the movement which was led 
 by Dr. Newman with such surpassing power, and, in 
 another, lent to Carlyle much of the energising force and 
 awakening earnestness which give effect to his peculiar 
 modes of thouglit. But this is a subject which I cannot 
 pursue, and I refer to it, only because I think it suppHes 
 an illustration of the sort of connexion which Coleridge has 
 had, with very various phases of the mind of his country. 
 
 I must hasten on to make brief reference to the poetry of 
 
Sanmel Taylor Cole7^tdge. 223 
 
 Coleridge. But before I do so, permit me to offer to you 
 two short specimens of his prose, with which, perhaps, you 
 may be less familiar. They are, in my judgment, two of 
 the noblest passages which enrich the English tongue. 
 
 The first I take from his essay "On Method, in the Will 
 and the Understanding,^' one of the most precious of the 
 fragments he has left behind : — 
 
 " Our discussion, however, is confined to method as 
 employed in the formation of the understanding, and in the 
 constructions of science and literature. It would, indeed, 
 be superfluous to attempt a proof of its importance in the 
 business and economy of active or domestic lite. From the 
 cottier's hearth or the workshop of the artisan to the palace 
 or the arsenal, the first merit, that which admits neither 
 substitute nor equivalent, is, that every thing is in its place. 
 Where this charm is wanting, every other merit either loses 
 its name, or becomes an additional ground of accusation 
 and regret. Of one by whom it is eminently possessed, we 
 say, proverbially, he is like clock-work. The resemblance 
 extends beyond the point of regularity, and yet falls short 
 of the truth. Both do, indeed, at once divide and announce 
 the silent and otherwise indistinguishable lapse of time. 
 But the man of methodical industry and honourable pur- 
 suits does more ; he realises its ideal divisions, and gives a 
 character and individuality to its moments. If the idle are 
 described as killing time, he may be justly said to call it 
 into life and moral being, while he makes it the distinct 
 object not only of the consciousness but of the conscience. 
 He organises the hours, and gives them a soul ; and that, 
 the very essence of which is to fleet away, and ever more 
 to have been, he takes up into his own permanence, and 
 communicates to it the imperishableness of a spiritual 
 nature. Of the good and faithful servant whose energies, 
 thus directed, are thus methodised, it is less truly affirmed 
 
2 24 Sa77tuel Taylor Coleridge. 
 
 that he lives in time, than that time hves in him. His 
 days, months, and years, as the stops and punctual marks 
 in the record of duties performed, will survive the wreck of 
 worlds, and remain extant when time itself shall be no 
 more." 
 
 That is the first passage ; and the second will be found 
 in his essay ^' On the Principles of Political Knowledge.^' 
 It has reference to the nature and the force of law, and it 
 is introduced in connexion with a eulogy of Sir Alexander 
 Ball, for whom Coleridge had great reverence, on the 
 occasion of his subjection of a mutinous crew by the 
 controlling power of discipline. He says : — 
 
 " An invisible power it was that quelled them, a power 
 which was therefore irresistible, because it took away the 
 very will of resisting ! It was the awful power of law 
 acting on natures pre-configured to its influences. A 
 faculty was appealed to in the offender's own being ; a 
 faculty and a presence, of which he had not been previously 
 made aware — but it answered to the appeal. Its real exist- 
 ence, therefore, could not be doubted, or its reply rendered 
 inaudible ; and the very struggle of the wilder passions 
 to keep uppermost counteracted their own purpose, by 
 wasting in internal contest that energy which before had 
 acted in its entireuess on external resistance or provocation. 
 Strength may be met with strength ; the power of inflict- 
 ing pain may be baffled by the pride «^ endurance ; the 
 eye of rage may be answered by the stare of defiance, or 
 the downcast look of dark and revengeful resolve ; and 
 with all this there is an outward and determined object to 
 wliich the mind can attach its passions and purposes, and 
 bury its own disquietudes in the full occupation of the 
 senses. But who dare struggle with an invisible com- 
 batant — with an enemy which exists and makes us know 
 its existeucc — but where it is, we ask in vain ? No space 
 
Samttcl Taylor Coleridge. 225 
 
 contains it; time promises no control over it; it has no 
 ear for my threats; it has no substance that my hands can 
 grasp, or my weapons find vulnerable ; it commands and 
 cannot be commanded ; it acts and is insusceptible of 
 reaction ; the more I strive to subdue it, the more am I 
 compelled to think of it, and the more I think of it, the 
 more do I find it to possess a reality out of myself, and not 
 to be a phantom of my own imagination ; that all, but the 
 most abandoned men, acknowledge its authority, and thai; 
 the whole strength and majesty of my country are pledged 
 to support it ; and yet that for me its power is the same 
 with that of my own permanent self, and that all the choice, 
 which is permitted to me consists in having it: for my 
 
 guardian angel or my avenging fiend ! This 
 
 is the true necessity, which compels man into the social 
 state, now and always, by a still-beginning, nev^er-ceasiug 
 force of moral cohesion." 
 
 That is the second passage; and I repeat, as to both, that 
 the language contains few which surpass them in solidity 
 of thought and felicity of expression. The first clothes 
 with the freshness and impressiveness of an original 
 conception, one of the old truths, which have striven 
 in every household for practical recognition, since human 
 society was formed. What would not Coleridge have 
 accomplished, if his life had illustrated that noble teach- 
 ing ! Of the second, I shall only say, that it is worthy to 
 hold a place, in English literature, side by side with 
 Hooker's famous proclamation of the origin and dignity of 
 Jaw, at the close of the first book of the " Ecclesiastical 
 Polity." 
 
 And now, I come to speak of the poetry of Coleridge. 
 Much I shall not say of it, for I have already tran- 
 scended the proper limits of a lecture, and I must em- 
 ploy some of the moments which remain to me, in recalling 
 
 r 
 
2 26 Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 
 
 to your recollection a few illustrations of tlie various 
 forms of beauty which pervade it. In comparison witli 
 others of his time^ he wrote very little; and the reason 
 is painfully expressed in his note to the unfinished frag- 
 ment of ^'The Three Graves ^^ : ^'Carmen reliquum in 
 futiirum temjyus relegatiim.'' ^' To-morrow ! and To- 
 morrow ! and To-morrow ! '' The want of that hus- 
 banding of time of which he so well knew the value^ of 
 that fruitful method of which he proclaimed the triumphs, 
 made his genius, in verse as in prose, too barren of result ; 
 but he did enough to demonstrate its rare quality, and 
 affirm his claim to a high place amongst the singers of 
 the world. 
 
 I cannot pause to criticise his drama — ^^ Remorse^' — • 
 which was successful, and deserved success ; or his masterly 
 version of the '' Wallenstein " of Schiller, which has taken 
 the very highest rank amongst translations, but was long 
 neglected and profitless to its author; and, as he complains, 
 with some natural bitterness, useful only in supplying 
 '^ waste paper to the trunk-maker." 
 
 Of his verse, in general, it may be truly said, that it 
 exhibited a sweetness, a freedom, and a power of melody, 
 which had been scarcely known to the later poetry of 
 England. His ear was exquisite ; he had studied pro- 
 foundly the laws of rhythm ; and when he produced the 
 '^ Ancient Mariner," and the first part of " Christabel," 
 their music came upon the senses of men like a revelation 
 of the spheres. 
 
 The life and passion which were to distinguish the new 
 poetry of the time needed a new expression, and it was 
 supplied primarily by Coleridge, of whom it has been, 
 I think, truly said, that, whatever may be doubted as to 
 his poetic rank amongst the writers of his age, in other 
 respects, ^^in vers]fik:ation, at least, he was supreme." And 
 
Saniitel Taylor Coleridge, 227 
 
 lie became so, partly from his own fine faculties of ^^ soul 
 and sense/^ and partly, perhaps, from his loving familiarity 
 with the exquisite modulation of the verse of the Eliza- 
 bethan poets, and the bold and various measures of the 
 young literature of the German people. Be this as it may, 
 the five-and-twentieth year of Coleridge produced com- 
 positions of rhythmical excellence, which appear to me 
 perfectly unsurpassed in our language ; and to justify this 
 opinion of mine, and, at the same time to indicate some- 
 thing of ^^ the vision and the faculty divine ^^ which 
 possessed him as a poet of the imagination — for the 
 purposes may be well combined — I shall, even at the risk 
 of wearying you with the cramhe repetita of things long 
 familiar, read to you a few lines from the ^^ Ancient 
 Mariner," and two or three of his other poems. 
 
 I need not tell you the story of the man " who shot the 
 albatross,'' the bird of good omen, with terrible results to 
 himself and his mess-mates ; and how, after a shuddering 
 ■confession of his sin, he goes on to describe its conse- 
 quences, in the becalming of the vessel, and the rotting of 
 the deep, and the coming of the Spectre Ship and the 
 Nightmare, Life in Death, and the perishiug of the doomed 
 sailors : — 
 
 With heavy thump, a Ufeless lump, 
 They dropt down one by one. 
 
 But thus the mariner describes his horrid solitude, and the 
 dissolution of the spell : — 
 
 Alone, alone, all, all, alone, 
 Alone on a wide wide sea ! 
 
 And never a saint took pity on 
 My soul in agony. 
 p 2 
 
2 28 Samuel Tayloj^ Coleridge. 
 
 The many men so beautiful ! 
 
 And they all dead did lie : 
 And a thousand, thousand slimy things 
 
 Lived on ; and so did I. 
 •^ * * * -Ji^ 
 
 The moving moon went up the sky, 
 
 And nowhere did abide ; 
 Softly she was going up, 
 
 And a star or two beside 
 
 Her beams bemock'd the sultry main, 
 
 Like April hoar-frost spread ; 
 But where the ship's huge shadow lay, 
 The charmed water burnt ahvay, 
 
 A still and awful red. 
 
 Beyond the shadow of the ship, 
 
 I watch'd the water-snakes ; 
 They moved in tracks of shining white. 
 And when they rt-ar'd, the elfish light 
 
 Fell off in hoary flakes. 
 * *• * -:t * 
 
 hapi^y living things ! no tongue 
 
 Their beauty might declare ; 
 A spring of love gush'd from my heart, 
 And I bless'd them unaware ; 
 Sure my kind saint took pity on me. 
 
 And I bless'd them unaware. 
 
 The self-same moment I could pray ; 
 
 And from my neck so free 
 The albatross fell off, and sank 
 
 Like lead int j the sea. 
 
 And tlien he tells how the rain came, and how the ship 
 moved on, without a breath of wind, and how his dead 
 comrades rose up, and how their bodies were inhabited by 
 *' a troop of spirits bless'd '^ : — 
 
 For when it dawn'd— they dropp'd their arms, 
 
 And cluster'd round the mast ; 
 Sweet sounds rose slowly through their mouths, 
 
 And from their bodies pass'd. 
 
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 229 
 
 Around, around, flew each sweet sound, 
 
 Then darted to the sun ; 
 Slowly the sounds came back again, 
 
 Now mix'd, now one by one, 
 
 Somethnes a-droppin;:' from the sky 
 
 I heard the sky-lark sino- ; 
 Sometimes all little birds that are, 
 How they seem'd to fill the sea and air 
 
 With their sweet jargoning ! 
 
 And now 'twas like all instruments, 
 
 Now like a lonely flute ; 
 And now it is an angel's song. 
 
 That makes the heavens be mute. 
 
 It ceased ; yet still the sails made on 
 
 A pleasant noise till noon, 
 A noise like of a hidden brook 
 
 In the leafy month of June, 
 That to the sleeping woods all ni-ht 
 
 Singeth a quiet tune. 
 
 Aiid^ as lie couclucles Lis tale^, he thus instructs the wedding 
 guest to whom it has been tcld : — 
 
 Farewell, farewell ! but this I tell 
 
 To thee, thou Wedding Guest : 
 He prayeth well, who loveth well 
 
 Both man and bird and beast. 
 
 He prayeth best, who loveth best 
 
 All things both great and small ; 
 For the dear God who loveth us, 
 
 He made and loveth all. 
 
 I have read so much of a poem which^ to me, for many a 
 year^ was an ever new delight, because, in its integrity, as 
 I have said, it comes equally in aid of my conception of 
 Coleridge's mastery of rhythm, and in proof of the creative 
 energy of his weird imagination. 
 
 '''The Ancient Mariner '^ was one of his early poems; 
 
230 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 
 
 take one, less known, of his later life — take '' Youth and 
 Age-:- 
 
 Verse, a breeze 'mid blossoms straying, 
 Where Hope clung feeding, like a bee — 
 Both were mine ! Life went a-maying 
 With Nature, Hope, and Poesy, 
 When I was young ! 
 When T was young ? Ah, woful when ! 
 Ah ! for the change 'twixt Now and Then ! 
 This breathing house not built with hands. 
 This body that does me grievous wrong, 
 O'er aery cliffs and glittering sands, 
 How lightly then it flash'd along ; 
 Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore, 
 On winding lakes and rivers wide. 
 That ask no aid of sail or oar. 
 That fear no spite of wind or tide ! 
 Nought cared this body for wind or weatlier 
 When Youth and I lived in't together. 
 
 Flowers are lovely ; Love is flower-like ; 
 Friendship is a sheltering tree ; 
 Oh ! the joys, that came down shower-like. 
 Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty, 
 
 Ere I was old. 
 Ere I was old ? Ah woful ere. 
 Which tells me, Youth's no longer here \ 
 
 Youth ! for years so many and sweet, 
 'Tis known, that thou and I were one ; 
 I'll think it but a fond conceit- 
 It cannot be that thou art gone ! 
 
 Thy vesper bell hath not yet toll'd ; 
 And thou wert aye a masker bold ! 
 What strange disguise hast now put on, 
 To make believe, that thou art gone ? 
 
 1 see these locks in silvery slips. 
 This drooping gait, this alter'd size : 
 But springtide blossoms on thy lips. 
 And tears take sunshine from thine eyes ! 
 Life is but thought ; so think I will 
 That Youth and I are house- mates still. 
 
Saimtel Taylor Coleridge, 231 
 
 Dew-drops are the gems of morning, 
 But the tears of mournful eve ! 
 Where no hope is, life's a warning 
 That only serves to make us grieve, 
 "When we are old : 
 That only serves to make us grieve 
 With oft and tedious taking-leave. 
 Like some poor night- belated guest, 
 That may not rudely be dismist. 
 Yet hath out-stay'd his welcome while, 
 And tells the jest without the smile. 
 
 And now I shall ask your attention to his *^ Vision in a 
 Dream/^ of wliicb. lie says, that, having fallen asleep in his 
 chair, after the perusal of some words about Kubla Khan, 
 in Purchases ^^ Pilgrimage," he was conscious of composing 
 two or three hundred lines ; and that, on awaking, he dis- 
 tinctly recollected the whole, and instantly and eagerly 
 wrote down what I shall read to you. He was then called 
 away by business, and, on his return, after the lapse of an 
 hour, he had forgotten all the rest of the composition of his 
 slumber : — 
 
 In Xanadu did Kubla Khan 
 A stately pleasure-dome decree : 
 Where Alph, the sacred river ran 
 Through caverns measureless to man 
 
 Down to a sunless sea. 
 So twice five miles of fertile ground 
 AVith walls and towers were girdled round : 
 And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills 
 Where blossom'd many an incense-bearing tree ; 
 And there were forests ancient as the hiUs, 
 Enfolding sunny spots of greenery. 
 
 But oh ! that deep romantic chasm which slanted 
 Down the green hill athwart a cedarn cover ! 
 A savage place ! as holy and enchanted 
 As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted 
 - By woman wailing for her demon-lover ! 
 
Sarmicl Taylor Coleridge. 
 
 ^nd from this cha?:ni, with ceaseless turmoil seething, 
 As if the earth in fast thick pants were breathing, 
 A mighty fountain momently was forced ; 
 Amid whose swift half intermitted burst 
 Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail, 
 Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail ; 
 And 'mid these dancing rocks at once and ever 
 It flung up momently the sacred river. 
 Five miles meandering with a mazy motion 
 1'hrough wood and dale the sacred river ran, 
 Then reach'd the caverns measureless to man, 
 And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean : 
 And 'mid this tumult Kubla heard from far 
 Ancestral voices prophesying war ! 
 
 The shadow of the dome of pleasure 
 
 Floated midway on the waves ; 
 
 "Where was heard the mingled measure 
 
 From the fountain and the caves, 
 It was a miracle of rare device, 
 A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice ! 
 
 A damsel with a dulcimer 
 
 In a vision once I saw ; 
 
 It was an Abvssinian maid, 
 
 And on her dulcimer she play'd, 
 
 Singing of Mount Abora. 
 
 Could I revive within me 
 
 Her symphony and song, 
 
 To such a deep delight 'twould win me 
 That with music loud and long, 
 I would build that dome in air, 
 That sunny dome ! those caves of ice ! 
 
 And all who heard should see them ther?, 
 
 A nd all should cry, Beware ! Beware ! 
 
 His flashing eyes, his floating hair ! 
 
 Weave a circle round him thrice, 
 
 And close your eyes with holy dread, 
 
 For he on honey-dew hath fed, 
 
 And drunk the milk of Paradise. 
 
 Uudoubteclly, such lines, so composed^ are^ as tliey have 
 been called, a ^^ psychological curiosity ^^ : and the brain 
 
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 233 
 
 must have been '^magical'' indeed, from wliicli sprang 
 spontaneously, in its passive state, a strain so beautifully 
 wild, so strangely sweet as this. 
 
 If I had time, I should remind you of the passages of 
 *^ Christabel,^^ which charraingl}^ demonstrate the same 
 combination of rich fancy and melodious verse. But I 
 must hurry on. I spoke of Coleridge as a poet of reflection, 
 and I have myself, perhaps, higher admiration for him in 
 that character than in any other. Sir James Mackintosh 
 has somewhere said, that nothing is so easy as to put 
 philosophy into verse, and nothing so difficult as to write 
 philosophical poetry. Any one who will refer to Akenside 
 and Darwin and compare their — in their own way — able 
 and ingenious compositions, with poems such as those 
 of Coleridge, will have no difficulty in understanding the 
 distinction. 
 
 Thus he wrote, when he was four-and-twenty, ^' On 
 leaving a place of Eetirement ^^ : — 
 
 All ! quiet dell ! dear cot, and mount sublime ! 
 I was constrain'd to quit you. Was it right, 
 While my unnumber'd brethren toil'd and bled, 
 That I should dream away the entrusted hours 
 On rose-leaf beds, pampering the coward heart 
 With feelings all too delicate for use ? 
 Sweet is the tear that from some Howard's eye 
 Drops on the cheek of one he lifts from earth : 
 And he that works me good with unmoved face, 
 Does it but half : he chills me while he aids, 
 My benefactor, not my brother man ! 
 Yet even this, this cold beneficence. 
 Praise, praise it, my soul ! ofc as thou scann'st 
 The sluggard Pity's vision-weaving tribe ! 
 Who sigh for wretchedness, yet shun the wretched, 
 Xursing in some delicious solitude 
 Their slothfid loves and dainty sympathies ! 
 
2 34 Samttel Taylor Coleridge. 
 
 In the " Frost at Midnight/^ written two years later, 
 there is this address to his little son : — 
 
 Dear babe, that sleepest cradled by my side, 
 "Whose gentle breathings, heard in this deep calm, 
 Fill np the interspersed vacancies 
 And momentary pauses of the thought ! 
 My babe so beautiful ! it thrills my heart 
 Witli tender gladness, thus to look at thee, 
 And think that thou shalt learn far other lore 
 And in far other scenes ! For I was rear'd 
 In the great city, pent 'mid cloisters dim. 
 And saw nought lovely but the sky and stars. 
 But thou, my babe ! shalt wander like a breeze 
 By lakes and sandy shores, beneath the crags 
 Of ancient mountains, and beneath the clouds, 
 Which image in their bulk both lakes and shores 
 And mountain crags : so shalt thou see and hear 
 The lovely shapes and sounds intelligible 
 Of that eternal language, which thy God 
 Utters, who from eternity doth teach 
 Himself in all, and all things in himself. 
 Great universal Teacher ! he shall mould 
 Thy spirit, and by giving make it ask. 
 
 Therefore all seasons shall be sweet to thee, 
 Whether the summer clothe the general earth 
 With greenness, or the redbreast sit and sing 
 Betwixt the tufts of snow on the bare branch 
 Of mossy apple-tree, while the nigh thatch 
 Smokes in the sun-thaw ; whether the eve-drops fall 
 Heard only in the trances of the blast, 
 Or if the secret ministry of frost 
 Shall hang them up in silent icicles, 
 Quietly shining to the c[uiet Moon. 
 
 And how beautiful and wise is this reference^ in '^ The 
 Nightingale/' to the same dear child : — 
 
 My dear babe, 
 Who, capable of no articulate sound, 
 Mars all things with his imitative lisp, 
 
Samttel Tayloj"" ColeiHdge. 235 
 
 How he would place his hand beside his ear, 
 
 His little hand, the small forefinger up, 
 
 And bid us listen ! And I deem it wise 
 
 To make him Nature's playmate. He knows well 
 
 The evening-star ; and once, when he awoke 
 
 In most distressful mood (some inward pain 
 
 Had made up that strange thing, an infant's dream) 
 
 I hurried with him to our orchard-plot. 
 
 And he beheld the moon, and, hush'd at once, 
 
 Suspends his sobs, and laughs most silently. 
 
 While his fair eyes, that swam with undropp'd tears, 
 
 Did glitter in the yellow moon-beam ! Well ! — 
 
 It is a father's tale : But if that Heaven 
 
 Should give me life, his childhood shall grow up 
 
 Familiar with these songs, that with the night 
 
 He may associate joy. — Once more, farewell. 
 
 Sweet Nightingale ! Once more, my friends ! farewell. 
 
 I sliall give you but one more extract from these- 
 " Meditative Poems.^^ It seems to me delicious in its 
 painting of Nature,, and the spirit of calm and purity whick 
 breathes throughout it : — 
 
 This Sycamore, oft musical with bees, — 
 
 Such tents the Patriarchs loved ! long unharm'd 
 
 May all its aged boughs o'er-canopy 
 
 The small round basin, which this jutting stone 
 
 Keeps pure from falling leaves ! Long may the Spring, 
 
 Quietly as a sleeping infant's breath, 
 
 Send up cold waters to the traveller 
 
 With soft and even pulse ! Nor ever cease 
 
 Yon tiny cone of sand its soundless dance. 
 
 Which at the bottom, like a Fairy's page, 
 
 As merry and no taller, dances still. 
 
 Nor wrinkles the smooth surface of the Fount. 
 
 Here twilight is and coolness : here is moss, 
 
 A soft seat, and a deep and ample shade. 
 
 Thou mayst toil far and find no second tree. 
 
 Drink, Pilgrim, here ; Here rest ! and if thy heart 
 
 Be innocent, here too shalt thou refresh 
 
 Thy Spirit, listening to some gentle sound. 
 
 Or passing gale or hum of murmuring bees ! 
 
236 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 
 
 The pliilosopliy witli whicli Coleridge interfuses liis 
 sweet or solemu verse is not a thing of dogma or defini- 
 tion ; a descriptive catalogue of physical phenomena ; or 
 an astute discussion of scholastic theories. It is the de- 
 velopment of a deeply thoughtful mind and a heart filled 
 with tender and noble feeling, holding close relations with 
 external nature and sensitive to all influences of beauty 
 and grandeur, which are derivable from the physical crea- 
 tion and the deeds and aspirings of mankind. Coleridge 
 is eminently a subjective poet. He looks within ; and 
 seeks 
 
 The harvest of a quiet eye, 
 
 Which broods and sleeps on his own heart. 
 
 But his poetry is warm with the life of human emotion, and 
 rich in the reflection of the forms and sounds which brighten 
 and glorify the earth around us. It has the luxurious 
 sensuousness of Keats and Tennyson ; but with more of 
 insight, and a truer echo of 
 
 The still, sad music of humanity. 
 
 It has the wisdom of the verse of Wordsworth. It is 
 sometimes as stately, but never as cold. It rolls with a 
 more melodious fulness, and is instinct with more genial 
 sympathies. It is, indeed, philosophical poetry, and not 
 philosophy forced into rhythm, and we may well lament, 
 that, being what it is, there should be so very little of it. 
 
 Fain would I delight you with portions of Coleridge's 
 ^^ Religious Musings/^ his ^^ Dejection,^' his '' Fears in 
 Solitude,^' and of that ode to " France,^' which Shelley 
 pronounced ^'the finest of modern times." But it is 
 impossible ; and I must despatch most briefly the last 
 section of my subject. 
 
1/1,^^ it . . .-, j 
 
 Sarmiel Taylor Coleridge, 237 
 
 To many, tlie poems of Coleridge wliicli deal with Love ^ 
 are the mosfc charming and characteristic of his writings. 
 They carry us back from monotonous dulness and loath- 
 some impurity, to the good days, when with all their 
 superficial coarseness, the old drama^tists of England, 
 and eminently their mighty master — the dramatist of 
 the world and all humanity — dealt with woman^s nature 
 in a spirit of high appreciation and reverential tender- 
 ness, and penetrated the mystery of her gentle life, 
 strong in its ^^ magnanimous weakness,^' and rich in the 
 boundless sacrifices of its unselfish affection. He took his 
 place with them and with their elder brothers of Italian 
 song, who recognised, as one of the highest victories 
 of the Christian civilisation, her uprising from her low 
 estate, and helped to make it lasting and spread its holy 
 influence, by exalting her worthiness and adopting, into 
 immortal verse, the chivalric spirit which bowed rude 
 force in proud humility before its own ideal of grace and 
 loveliness. 
 
 ^^ I do not think,^^ said Professor Wilson, ^^ there is any 
 poet in the world who ever touched the mystery of the 
 passion as he has done.^' And I challenge your approval 
 of that judgment of a gifted critic, whilst I remind you of 
 some verses of the exquisite composition, so familiar to you 
 all, which is, undoubtedly, the chief adornment and the 
 consummate flower of the love-poetry of Coleridge : — 
 
 All impulses of soul and sense 
 Had thrill 'd my guileless Genevieve,— 
 The music and the doleful tale, 
 The rich and balmy eve ; 
 
 And hopes, and fears that kindle hope, 
 An undistinguishable throng, 
 And gentle wishes long subdued, 
 
 Subdued and cherish'd long ! 
 
238 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 
 
 She wept with pity and delight, 
 
 She bkish'd with love and virgin shame ; 
 
 And, like the murmur of a dream, 
 
 I heard her breathe my name. 
 
 Her bosom heaved — she stepp'd aside. 
 As conscious of my look she stept — 
 Then suddenly, with timorous eye. 
 She fled to me and wept. 
 
 She half enclosed me with her arms, 
 She press'd me with a meek embrace, 
 And bending back her head, looked up 
 And gazed upon my fiice. 
 
 'Twas partly love, and partlj'- fear, 
 And partly 'twas a bashful art. 
 That I might rather feel, than see 
 The swelling of her heart. 
 
 I calmVl her fears, and she was calm. 
 And told her love with virgin pride ; 
 And so I won my Genevieve, 
 
 jMy bright and beauteous Bride. 
 
 I could give you passages not unworthy to be classed Tvitli 
 this, from other poems, but it is the choicest of them all ; 
 and I cannot venture to detain you further_, by the repeti- 
 tion of any more of them. I shall only ask you, before I 
 ■conclude, to listen to some lines which I should properly 
 have cited when I spoke of meditative verse, but I have 
 advisedly reserved them, because they have, to me, a 
 peculiar charm, that they may sound latest in your ears, 
 and cling longest to your memories : — 
 
 How seldom. Friend I a good, great man inherits 
 Honour or wealth, with all his worth and pains ! 
 It sounds like stories from the land of spirits, 
 "If any man obtain that which he merits. 
 Or any merit tliut which he obtains. 
 
 Por shame, dear Friend I renounce this canting strain ;— 
 What wouldst thou have a good, great man obtain ? 
 
Saumel Tayloi' Cole7'idge. 239 
 
 Place — titles — salary — a gilded chain — 
 
 Or throne of corses which his sword hath slain ? 
 
 Greatness and goodness are not means, but ends ! 
 
 Hath he not always treasures, always friends. 
 
 The good great man ? Three treasures, love and light, 
 
 And calm thoughts, regular as infant's breath ; 
 
 And three firm friends, more sure than day and night, — 
 
 Himself, his Maker, and the angel Death, 
 
 The man v/lio could write these things has said of himself — 
 ^^ I have feltv, and deeply, that the poet's high functions 
 were not mj proper assignment, that many may be worthy 
 to listen to the strains of Apollo, neighbours of the sacred 
 choir, and able to discriminate and feel and love its genuine 
 harmonies, yet not, therefore, called to receive the harp in 
 their own hands, and join in the concert. I am content 
 and gratified that Spenser, Shakspeare, Milton, have not 
 been born in vain ; and I feel it as a blessing-^ that even 
 among my contemporaries I know one at least who has 
 been deemed worthy of the gift,'' — he spoke, of course, of 
 Wordsworth, — ^^ who has received the harp with reverence 
 and struck it with the hand of power." The self-abase- 
 ment is strange, and, believing it genuine, we must hold it 
 to be beautiful. It is to me more full of interest than the 
 bold self-admiration and uncompromising self-assertion, 
 which have distinguished son^e of the greatest poets from 
 the days of Horace to those of Milton and of Wordsworth, 
 and the humility of Coleridge will not make us slower to 
 recognise his genius. " The temple of Fame stands upon 
 the grave — the lights which burn upon its altars are kindled 
 from the ashes of the great ; " — and the opinion of his 
 country and the world has redressed the wrong with which 
 evil tongues and perverse judgments too long pursued him, 
 recognising his full possession of the '^ high functions '^ 
 which his own modesty disclaimed. 
 
 We may mourn for the opportunities which escaped him 
 
240 Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 
 
 without improvement^, and the moral imperfections which 
 marred his usefuhiess and darkened his life, and the dis- 
 proportion of his actual performance to his power and 
 promise. We may refuse to take aspiration for achieve^ 
 ment, or confound possibility with fact. But, contemplating* 
 all the things of beauty which he has bequeathed, to be 
 "a joy for ever" to us and to our children; and all 
 the traditions of his incomparable speech, which had its 
 mission and did its work, though it was spent upon the air, 
 and has been lost to us; and all the wisdom which may 
 still be gathered from the imperfect books he has left be- 
 hind him ; and all his good and worthy service in purifying 
 and spiritualising the intelligence of his race ; we shall 
 cherish with gratitude and reverence the memory of a man 
 whom his own words may most fitly picture, — 
 
 The studious poet, eloquent for truth, 
 Philosopher, contemning wealth and death, 
 Yet docile, child-like, full of life and love ! 
 
CAEDINAL NEWMAN, 
 
Cardinal Newman. 
 
 [In 1880, the following Address was presented to Cardinal Newman, at 
 Edgbaston, Birmingham, on behalf of a deputation from the 
 Catholics of Ireland.] 
 
 ON behalf of the Catholics of Ireland, we approach 
 your Eminence, to congratulate you on your eleva- 
 tion to the sacred Purple, and to express the sentiments 
 of reverence and affection -with which you have inspired 
 them, by the greatness of your genius and the nobleness 
 of your life- 
 
 Have we need to speak of the gifts which God has 
 bestowed upon you, and the priceless services you have 
 rendered to His Church ? They have, long ago, received 
 a world-wide acknowledgment, and won you an illustrious 
 name. 
 
 You have triumphed in every field of mental effort — as 
 a philosopher, an historian, a theologian, an orator, and a 
 poet. You have wielded the most varied powers with 
 equal mastery. Your writings have given light and joy 
 to millions of your fellow-men. You have exercised an 
 influence almost without parallel on individual minds. You 
 liave impressed your age by the energy of your convictions, 
 the depth and clearness of your insight, the affluence of 
 your learning, the power and subtlety of your reasonings 
 and the magic of your style. 
 
 You have contended for the Truth with heroic courage 
 and self-sacrificing devotion, and commended it to accept- 
 
 Q 2 
 
244 Cardinal Newman, 
 
 ance in the gracious spirit of an all-embracing charity ; — 
 whilst you have been ready^ on many a fit occasion, with 
 trenchant logic, or exquisite humour, or stern invective, to 
 confound the sophist and calumniator. 
 
 To your high qualities and memorable acts eloquent 
 testimony has been borne in the addresses lately presented 
 to your Eminence, and we are conscious that no words of 
 ours can iocrease the universal estimation which they have 
 commanded. But we remember with honest pride that 
 our country has had peculiar relations with you ; and, as 
 Catholic Irishmen, we cannot refrain from the special 
 utterance of our feelings towards one who has been so 
 signally our friend and benefactor. 
 
 In the prime of your years and the fulness of your fame, 
 you came to do us service. You left your home, and those 
 who were most dear to you, and the engagements and avo- 
 cations in which you had found your happiness, to labour 
 for our intellectual and moral well-being. You dedicated 
 yourself to the improvement of the higher education of 
 our people — a work as noble in conception as it was difficult 
 in execution : and whatever success that work has achieved, 
 or may achieve hereafter, must be largely attributed to your 
 Eminence. 
 
 Of the wisdom of your administration as Rector of the 
 Catholic University of Ireland, the untiring toil you gave 
 to all its details, and the enthusiastic attachment which 
 bound to you its professors, its students, and all who came 
 within the sphere of your influence, the memory has sur- 
 vived your departure, and is still fresh amongst us. 
 
 When you returned to England, you left behind precious 
 and enduring memorials of your presence in the beautiful 
 Collegiate Church which we owe to your personal munifi- 
 cence ; — the discourses you delivered within its walls, unsur- 
 passed even amongst your own incomparable sermons; — the 
 
Cardinal Neivman. 245 
 
 excellent periodicals, the Atlantis and Gazette j which, you 
 brought into existence and enriched by some of the finest 
 of your compositions; and, above all, those Lectures and 
 Essays on University education, abounding in ripe erudi- 
 tion, suggestive thought, perfect language, and sage 
 counsel on matters affecting the highest human interests, 
 which are a possession of incalculable worth to Ireland and 
 the world. 
 
 We cannot forget the words of cordial kindness in which 
 you have proved, so often, your sympathy with the Irish 
 race; and encouraged them to find, in the remembrance of 
 their faithfulness to their old Religion, the promise of a 
 happier future. 
 
 For these reasons, we, who have watched your career 
 with constant admiration and unwavering confidence, desire 
 to offer you our homage, in union with that which has been 
 tendered to you, so abundantly, on every side. You have 
 not been altogether spared the dishonouring misconceptions 
 which have been the portion of the besfc and greatest of 
 mankind. But they have ceased to trouble you. Your 
 endowments of heart and intellect have compelled a recog- 
 nition quite unexampled in its unanimity and earnestness ; 
 and we come, to-day, on the part of the Catholic People of 
 Ireland, to join in the applause with which the nations of 
 Christendom have hailed your enrolment among the Princes 
 of the Church, and to proclaim their reverential gratitude 
 to the Sovereign Pontiff, for the gracious act by which he 
 has marked his appreciation of your labours and crowned 
 them with the highest earthly sanction. 
 
CHAELES WILLIAM EUSSELL, D.D. 
 
Charles William Rtissell, D,D, 
 
 [This paper appeared in "The Irish Ecclesiastical Eecord," of July, 1880.] 
 
 I HAVE been asked to write briefly of the life and 
 character of one who was very dear to me. I have 
 hesitated to "jomply with the request,, because I feel that 
 it is impossible to describe him worthily within the limits 
 prescribed in a periodical, like this, and because, so soon 
 after his removal, the materials for a fit record would not 
 be available, even if there were ample space to use 
 them. Those materials exist, and will, I trust, be em- 
 ployed, hereafter, in a work doing some justice to the 
 nobility of his nature, the power of his intellect, the range 
 of his accomplishments, and his great services to his 
 Church and to his Country. 
 
 The career of a scholar and a saint does not commonly 
 abound in incidents such as enrich the biographies of men 
 of action. It may be fruitful of great results ; whilst its 
 silent labours and its spiritual achievements furnish scant 
 occasion for elaborate description or stimulating detail. 
 Still, it seems to me that, in the correspondence and the 
 writings of the late President of Maynooth— of whom 
 scholarship and sanctity were special characteristics — in 
 his wide relations with many of the most eminent men of 
 his time, of various faiths and various positions in society, 
 and in the work he did for the College, which was his 
 constant home from youth to age — commanding the de- 
 votion of his best faculties and the earnest attachment of 
 
250 Chaides William Russell, D.D, 
 
 his warm and generous heart — there may yet be found the 
 groundwork of a memoir of the highest interest and 
 value. 
 
 I am painfully conscious, how incapable I am of at- 
 tempting even a shadowy outline of such a memoir ; and 
 I shrink from degrading a noble subject by poor and 
 inadequate treatment of it. But, on the other hand, I 
 feel that I have some capacity to speak of the impression 
 which he made on those who knew him best, and of the 
 rare qualities by which that impression was produced. 
 
 He was my friend for nearly half a century, and, during 
 that long period, our intercourse was continual and our 
 attachment unfailing. We followed very diverse paths in 
 life; but, through all its chances and changes, we main- 
 tained an intimacy most close and trustful. I had no 
 sorrow in which he did not share, and I had no success 
 w^hich did not give him joy. He was my kindly counsellor 
 in troubles and perplexities. His bright and genial presence 
 was familiar in my home : and by all its inmates he was 
 much beloved. In many a sad bereavement, he was their 
 stay and comfort. He watched and prayed by the death- 
 beds of the dear ones whom it pleased God to take from 
 me ; and he was the best consoler of those who were left. 
 The remembrance of him is, more or less, associated with 
 all that has been pleasant and all that has been mournful in 
 my existence : and his loss has left a blank in it which I 
 can never hope to fill. Therefore, my knowledge of him 
 was peculiar as it was ample. It, at least, enables me to 
 indicate some of the mental and moral gifts which secured 
 for him so much esteem and admiration: and I shall attempt 
 to do so in brief and simple words. 
 
 Charles William Russell was the son of Charles Russell 
 and Anne M'Evoy. The families represented by his father 
 and his mother were of respectability and influence. He 
 
Charles Williain Russell, D,D, 251 
 
 was born on tlie 14tli of May, 1812, at Killough, a seaport 
 in tlie county of Down. He was sent to Drogheda to be 
 educated, and attended, successively, tbe schools of Mr. 
 Hamilton and Dr. Needbam. In his early years, he gave 
 evidence of great industry and intellectual promise, which 
 continued and increased when he was transferred to the 
 care of the Eev. Dr. Nelson, of Downpatrick, then at the 
 head of a seminary of a high class, in which very many dis- 
 tinguished priests of the diocese of Down and Connor 
 received the preliminary instruction which fitted them for 
 entrance into Maynooth. From his boyhood, he had mani- 
 fested a fixed inclination for the ecclesiastical state, and his 
 mental development was so rapid that, when only fourteen 
 years of age, he was judged fit to enter college, bringing 
 with him a knowledge of classics and English literature 
 rarely attained at such a period of life. 
 
 His course at Maynooth was uniformly successful and 
 distinguished. He never relaxed in his efforts to master 
 the special subjects with which he was required to deal ; 
 whilst he erave laborious attention to the cultivation of 
 general letters, and the formation of that refined and 
 accurate taste which was one of the remarkable endow- 
 ments of his maturer manhood. He is described as utilising 
 every hour and minute of his time. He rapidly attained 
 a high position in the esteem of the collegiate authorities 
 and his fellow-students, to whom he was endeared by the 
 unceasing kindliness and self-abnegation which continued 
 always to beautify his life. He took a foremost place in 
 all his classes, and found his favourite recreation in the 
 study of modern languages and the literature of the modern 
 world. High hopes were formed of his future eminence. 
 He was elected to the Dunboyne Establishment in 1832; 
 and when the Khetoric chair became vacant in 1834, he 
 proposed to compete for it ; but he was induced to waive 
 
252 Charles William Rttssell, D.D, 
 
 liis claim, and to give way to tlie Rev. Thomas Furlong, 
 afterwards the pious Bishop of Ferns, who was there- 
 upon promoted from the chair of Humanity. Charles 
 Russell was still too young to receive ordination as a 
 priest, when he went through a public concursus for the 
 latter chair and succeeded to it with universal approba- 
 tion. 
 
 For ten years, he continued to discharge the duties of 
 his professorship, with complete mastery of its business, 
 and a conscientious devotedness and untirins: zeal which 
 bore admirable fruit in their influence on the young aspirants 
 to Holy Orders, to whom the training they receive at the 
 outset of their ecclesiastical career must always be of extreme 
 importance. There are numbers of priests in Ireland, who 
 look back witb deep gratitude to the services he rendered 
 them as their first professor. 
 
 In 181-5, the chair of Ecclesiastical History was 
 established in Maynooth, and no one doubted that he 
 was incomparably the best qualified to fill it. No Irish 
 ecclesiastic had any pretension to compete with him. 
 His knowledge of general history, of the history of the 
 Church, and of cognate subjects — his acquaintance with 
 the Fathers — his familiarity with the researches of Con- 
 tinental critics, and his wide and varied literary acquire- 
 ments — qualified him exceptionally for the task imposed 
 upon him ; and, without competition, he was established 
 in the chair. How he discharged its obligations, I need 
 not say. With what clearness of exposition, with what 
 affluence of information, with what keenness of insight, 
 with what appreciation of character, with what accuracy 
 of detail, with what candour and integrity he traced 
 the fortunes of the Church for her future ministers, those 
 who attended his prelections will rejoice to testify ; and 
 their testimony will be corroborated by all who have 
 
Charles Williant Russell, D,D. 253 
 
 read the many critical and historical disquisitions which 
 were some of the fruits of his studies, contributed chiefly 
 to the Duhlin Review. 
 
 He continued to hold the chair of Ecclesiastical History 
 until the death of the President, Dr. Renehan, in 1857, 
 when he became the ruler of the College in which he had 
 spent most of the days of his life. There was wide-spread 
 satisfaction at the choice. It was felt that he would 
 admirably maintain the dignity, and worthily wield the 
 influence, of his high office; and that his temperate wisdom 
 and strict justice gave assurance of an exercise of his 
 authority, which would satisfy every reasonable require- 
 ment, and promote the happiness of all submitted to it. 
 
 I adopt the words of one who, having known him well, 
 has written of him becomingly : — " The prudence and zeal 
 with which he discharged all the duties of his most respon- 
 sible office amply justified the choice that had been made. 
 In his exalted position the great virtues by which he was 
 distinguished shone conspicuously. While he won the 
 respect of the students by the dignity of his character, he 
 won their love and affection still more by the paternal soli- 
 citude he manifested in their welfare.^' 
 
 There are men from whom there goes forth an effluence 
 either repellent or attractive — either exalting or abasing — 
 to those whom it aff'ects; and the very demeanour of the 
 new President — the mode in which he bore himself in his 
 place of honour — the dignified cordiality of his manner — 
 the serene self-reliance which gave ease and grace to all his 
 actions — were to the mass of students an example and a 
 model of inappreciable worth. 
 
 Whilst he laboured in the chair of Ecclesiastical History, 
 and afterwards discharged his onerous presidential duties, 
 he contributed largely to the current literature of the time, 
 and produced many works of permanent interest and im- 
 
2 54 Charles William Russell, D.D, 
 
 portance. On the establishment of the Dublin Review, he 
 was associated with Cardinal Wiseman as one of the chief 
 directors of the work ; and, for many years, he enriched 
 its pages, in every number, with articles which commanded 
 the attention of scholars and the general public, in a re- 
 markable degree. Indeed, he continued unremittingly to 
 sustain it by such articles, after he had ceased to have 
 special responsibility in connexion with it, and until he was 
 stricken down by the unhappy accident which caused his 
 untimely death. His latest contributions were two charming 
 papers on the English Sonnet, abounding in critical acumen 
 and exhaustive knowledge. His biography of Cardinal 
 Mezzofanti is a book of permanent authority in England 
 and on the Continent, to whose men of letters competent 
 translations have made it familiar. It is full of rare and 
 curious information, presented with artistic completeness, 
 and in a style of equal simplicity and force. He published 
 Leibnitz's '^ Systema Theologicum,'' with a lucid intro- 
 duction and learned notes. He translated from the German 
 the tales of Canon Yon Schmid, in three ample volumes, 
 which have had a large circulation. He prepared, — in con- 
 junction with Mr. Prendergast, the historian of the Crom- 
 welhan Settlement, — a report of the highest value on the 
 Carte MSS. in the Bodleian Library; and with that accom- 
 plished gentleman he prosecuted, laboriously and successfully, 
 the task imposed upon him as a member of the Historical 
 Manuscript Commission. He wrote many papers in the 
 Edinhurgh Review, the first of them, in 1854, having been the 
 Mezzofanti article, which preceded the elaborate biography 
 I have mentioned, and the latest, a very ingenious and 
 erudite paper on the ^' Pseudo- Sibylline Poems," which 
 appeared in July, 1877. The North British Review j the 
 Encyclopccdia Britannica, the English EncyclopcGdia, the 
 Academy, and several other literary journals, from time to 
 
Charles TVilliam Rtissell, D.D. 255 
 
 time, sought and received the aid of his ripe scholarship 
 and facile pen. I cannot pretend to exhaust the list of his 
 publications in this perfunctory sketch; but I have said 
 enough to show how full of earnest effort' was his life, and 
 how well he employed all the moments he could snatch 
 from official toils, which were very anxious and absorbing. 
 A collection of his occasional writings will, I doubt not;, 
 be made, which the world will appreciate as an acceptable 
 
 gift. 
 
 His relations with the best men of the day were wide and 
 varied. Amongst Catholics, of every class, his name was 
 held in high respect; and there were numbers of Protestants 
 of distinction, intellectually and socially, who were much 
 attached to him. He had the confidence and regard of 
 successive Pontiffs. He was cherished by that venerable 
 Hierarchy into which he declined to enter. He was the 
 bosom friend of Cardinal Wiseman. He was, also, the 
 friend of the present Prime Minister, who admired his high 
 qualities and sought familiar intercourse with him, when he 
 came to London. The Fellows of Oxford were always 
 happy to receive and entertain him, on his frequent visits 
 to the Bodleian, with full recognition of his intellectual 
 gifts. I do not mention very many others, whose 
 friendship was valuable, and who deemed themselves 
 honoured in possessing his. But I cannot pass unnoticed 
 the remarkable incident which links his name for ever with 
 that of the great Oratorian, to whom he did noble service 
 in the supreme crisis of an illustrious life. Thus, Cardinal 
 Newman speaks of him in the famous " Apologia " : — 
 
 " The letter -which I have last inserted is addressed to ray dear friend, 
 Dr. Kussell, the present President of Maynooth. He had, perhaps, more 
 to do with my conversion than any one else. He called upon me in 
 passing through Oxford in the summer of 1841, and I think I took him 
 over some of the buildings of the University. He called again another 
 
256 Cha74es William Russell, D,D, 
 
 summer on his way from Dublin to London. I do not recollect that he 
 said a word on the subject of religion on either occasion. He sent me at 
 different times several letters ; he was always gentle, mild, unobtrusive, 
 uncontroversial. He let me alone." 
 
 And, again^ in the dedication of " Loss and Gain/' tliese 
 are tlie terms in wliich he was addressed by one of the 
 greatest of living men : — 
 
 " Now that at length I take the step of printing my name in 
 the title-page of this volume, I trust I shall not be encroaching on the 
 kindness you have so long shown to me if I venture to follow it up by 
 placing yours in the page which comes next to it, thus associating myself 
 wdth you and recommending myself to my readers by the association. 
 
 " Not that I am dreaming of bringing down upon you, in whole or part, 
 the criticisms, just or unjust, which lie against a literary attempt which 
 has in some quarters been thought out of keeping with my antecedents 
 and my position ; but the warm and sympathetic interest which you took 
 in Oxford matters thirty years ago, and the benefits which I derived from 
 that interest personally, are reasons why I am desirous of prefixing your 
 name to a tale which, whatever its faults, at least is a more intelligible 
 and exact representation of the thoughts, sentiments, and aspirations 
 then and there prevailing, than was to be found in the pamphlets, charges, 
 sermons, reviews, and story-books of the day. 
 
 " These reasons too must be my apology, should I seem to be asking 
 
 your acceptaiice of a volume which over and above its intrinsic defects is, 
 
 in its very subject and style, hardly commensurate with the theological 
 
 reputation and ecclesiastical station of the person to whom it is presented. 
 
 '' I am, my dear Dr. Lussell, 
 
 " Your affectionate friend, 
 
 "JOHN H. NEWMAN, 
 
 " Of the Oratory." 
 
 AVhilst he thus led a life of unceasing activity and various 
 usefulness ; — whilst he^ at once, elevated his own scholastic 
 reputation and that of his College, and maintained its dis- 
 cipline with a firm but kindly rule ; — whilst his labours in the 
 Press enriched the domains of History and Theology, and 
 his personal influence and acceptance amongst the best 
 
Cha7'les Willia7?z Rtcssell, D.D, 257 
 
 of his contemporaries dissipated outworn prejudices against 
 the religion to which he clung with his whole heart, and 
 rebuked the bigotry which assails it, as inconsistent with 
 manly independence and mental progress ; he effected 
 material changes which make the great seminary he 
 governed very deeply his debtor. Of these, I can only 
 pause to mention the cemetery which he beautified, and the 
 collegiate church which will be his enduring monument. 
 
 Amongst his many accomplishments were numbered his 
 knowledge of the principles of ecclesiastical architecture, 
 and his study of the matchless masterpieces which the 
 genius and piety of the children of the Church, in other 
 generations, dedicated to her honour and the glory of the 
 Almighty. He mourned over the venerable ruins which 
 testify to the Irish people how much their fathers loved the 
 beauty of God's house, and how cruel was the iconoclastic 
 fury which dared to profane and destroy the temples of His 
 worship. He earnestly desired that for the rude and 
 formless chapels which had been raised in their stead, with 
 difficult and painful effort, when Catholic Ireland emerged 
 from the gloom of the penal days, buildings should be 
 substituted more worthy of the Faith for w^iicli she had 
 struggled with desperate fidelity, and of the happier 
 fortunes which, at last, permitted its freedom and full 
 development. As President of the Ecclesiological kT-ociety, 
 he did his best to advance this purpose; and in Maynooth, 
 which from its foundation had possessed a chapel inadequate, 
 in extent, to the needs of its great community, and unfit, in 
 construction, to be associated with Piigin's imposing w^ork, 
 he resolved that another should be erected, of which 
 Ireland and the Alma Mater of her Priesthood need not be 
 ashamed. 
 
 It was an undertaking of extreme difiiculty, and the 
 want of money to accomplish it delayed its commencement 
 
 E 
 
258 Charles William Rttsscll, D,D. 
 
 for a long time. But, at last, lie made tlie bold endeavour, 
 single-handed. He sent circulars everywhere. He laboured 
 incessantly to make them effective. His pressing and 
 continuous appeals were liberally answered. His personal 
 popularity gave them wide effect ; and from all parts of 
 the country, as well as from the Continent and America, 
 contributions poured in so freely that he was enabled to 
 commence his enterprise^ with the aid of the constructive 
 genius and the large experience of Mr. J. J. MacCarthy, 
 to whom the architectural renaissance of the Church in 
 Ireland is so larofelv indebted for labours which have won 
 him a high reputation and a strong claim to public grati- 
 tude. The building went on successfully ; and approached 
 completion, when its author ceased to have power to help 
 it further, and left it, with deep regret, to the care of others, 
 who will prosecute it to the end, reverently regardful of 
 his wishes, stimulated by his example and eager to per- 
 petuate his memory. 
 
 It has been asked, in a journal of high standing, why 
 was not a man gifted with such rare endowments and 
 capacities raised to the Episcopate or to the Purple ? 
 And the answer supplied by the propounder of the 
 question has been so misleading, that even in this 
 brief notice I am bound to repudiate it. The state- 
 ment that he was not promoted because of a divergence 
 of sentiment between him and the authorities of the 
 Church, or its Supreme Head, is wholly without foundation. 
 To him, and to them, his loyalty was given, at every 
 period of his life, with absolute devotion. He was not 
 a Bishop, because of his own free choice and persistent 
 determination. I do not desire to pry into the motives by 
 which he was actuated. His books were dear to him. He 
 delighted in the quiet exercise of his high faculties, in the 
 accumulation of knowledo^e and the culture of taste. He 
 
Charles William Ritsscll, D.D. 259 
 
 had real humility, and no ambition ; and when he said, over 
 and over again, ^' Nolo episcojpari/^ the negative expressed 
 the true and unchanging purpose of his souL He was 
 appointed to the Bishopric of Ceylon, when he was barely 
 thirty years of age. He declined the nomination, and 
 had great difficulty in escaping it. The Pope, Gregory 
 XVI., desired to force the high responsibility upon him^ 
 and he was obliged to go to Rome and struggle for a 
 twelvemonth before he was allowed to reject the mitre and 
 return to his professorship. Afterwards, when a vacancy 
 occurred in his native Diocese of Down and Connor, on 
 the death of ray dear and honoured friend. Dr. Denvir, he 
 was placed first in the list presented by the clergy to the 
 Bishops and chosen for the succession by the Holy See. 
 But again he declined the proffered elevation, and again he 
 found the gravest opposition to his earnest desire of avoid- 
 ing it. Under Pius IX., as under Gregory XYI., his worth 
 was appreciated and his service sought; and he remained 
 in his humbleness because he chose to do so. 
 
 At a subsequent period, he might certainly, in my opinion, 
 have ascended the Primatial Chair of St. Patrick, if he had 
 only allowed it to be understood that he would not again 
 render the recommendation of the clergy ineffectual ; and 
 there is no ground for doubt that he might have been 
 enrolled amongst the princes of the Church, if he had 
 not been resolved to shrink from a position which might 
 have naturally led to his entrance into the Sacred 
 College. I remember, at that time, urging him, with all 
 the force I could command, to forego his resolution. But 
 my reasoning and persuasion were vain. He would not 
 be taken from his obscurity, and burthened with dignity 
 and power. And so he rested in the collegiate home he 
 had chosen in his boyhood, and in which he desired to close 
 his tranquil life. 
 
 E 2 
 
2 6o Charles William Rttssell, D.D, 
 
 Bat tliat life was to be abruptly and prematurely ended. 
 His health was excellent. It was maintained by his 
 buoyancy of spirit and wise regard to sanitary conditions. 
 For the sake of example, he had taken the pledge from 
 Father Mathew, and he kept it inviolate for more than 
 thirty years. His friends feared the effect of his abstinence, 
 and often urged him to relax its strictness ; but he was firm, 
 and steadfastly abided by his promise. He was an accom- 
 plished horseman, and had great enjoyment in his daily 
 rides, which he continued, in full health and vigour, until, 
 on the 16th of May, 1877, the fatal accident occurred which 
 resulted in his death. He was thrown from his saddle in 
 the street of Maynooth, and suffered concussion of the 
 brain. Although he lived for a considerable period, he 
 never recovered from the shock, or regained his former 
 energy. He bore his long sufferings with constant cheer- 
 fulness and uncomplaining patience, and the Master, whom 
 he had served so well, took him to his reward on the 26th 
 day of February, 1880. 
 
 I have outrun the little space allotted to me ; but I can- 
 not conclude without saying a word of the moral qualities 
 which, more than his mental power, or his ample erudition, 
 or his intellectual industry, or his finely-balanced judgment, 
 or his exquisite literary taste, won for him so widely attach- 
 ment and respect. 
 
 His fife was gentle, and the elements 
 
 So mix'd in him, that Nature might stand up 
 
 And say to all the world, this was a Man ! 
 
 He was a gentleman in the truest and highest sense of 
 that noble epithet — regardful of others, forgetful of him- 
 self, — exhibiting, on all occasions, a stately but kindly cour- 
 tesy — full of unselfish interest in the pursuits and aspirations 
 
Charles William Russell, D,D. 261 
 
 of tliose around him, — with a heart alive to every high 
 emotion, and a hand 
 
 Open as day to melting charity ! 
 
 If I may specify the attributes which seemed to me most 
 to illustrate and adorn his character, I would say they were 
 his truthfulness, his tolerance, and his consideration for all 
 of whom he spoke or with whom he acted. 
 
 He was utterly incapable of doubleness or indirectness 
 in word or deed. No one could approach him, under any 
 circumstances, without feeling the assurance that he spoke 
 his thoughts with fearless freedom, and that he was entitled 
 to absolute reliance. His pure spirit was never tainted by 
 the semblance of deceit or subterfuge. 
 
 And it is literally true to say, that he was never heard to 
 utter an uncharitable word of any one. He was always 
 prompt to put the best construction on human conduct, and 
 when he could not honestly approve, his custom was to be 
 silent, unless duty required him, in his official capacity, to 
 rebuke or punish. I have never met a man who so nearly 
 realised, in his whole life and conversation, the perfection of 
 that virtue which the Apostle of the Gentiles describes, in 
 the most marvellous passage of his inspired eloquence, as 
 greater than any other. Sometimes, his toleration seemed 
 to verge on weakness. But it was the outcome of a mental 
 discipline which enabled him to exercise the ^^ energy of 
 silence,^' when it was possible that his words might, in any 
 degree, be injurious to a fellow-creature. He had learned 
 to put that bridle on his tongue, without which the highest 
 authority has declared the religion of a Christian to be vain. 
 And although he had a clear insight into human character, 
 and a prompt perception of faults and shortccmiugs, he was 
 chary of blaming any one, and full of all allowances ibr error. 
 
262 Cha7des William Russell, D.D, 
 
 He liad habitually and completely submitted himself to the 
 great law of Charity. 
 
 It was by these and kindred virtues that he mastered so 
 many hearts, and established, without efibrt, a wonderful 
 influence which he did not seek to acquire, and of which 
 his modest and humble nature scarcely permitted him to 
 be conscious. His manners reflected the tenderness and 
 serenity of his soul, and made him dear wherever he was 
 known. A monk of the Mediaeval time, depicting a brother 
 who had exchanged the camp for the cloister, has fittingly 
 described the graciousness and the holiness of Charles 
 William Ecssell: — • 
 
 Ultra modum placiuus, dulcis et benicrniis, 
 Ob aetatis senium candidns ut cygnus, 
 Blandus et afFabilis et amari dignus, 
 In se Sancti Spiritus possidebat pignus. 
 
EEXEY GRATTAN. 
 
Henry Grattan. 
 
 [This letter was written to the Earl of Charlemont on the commencement, 
 in 1869, of a subscription for the erection of a statue of Henry 
 Grattan.] 
 
 EuTLAND Square West, 
 
 January 9thy 1869. 
 
 MY DEAR Lord Charlemont, — I enclose a cheque in 
 aid of the fund for the erection of a statue of 
 Henry Grattan, as I learn that you fitly take a leading- 
 part in the movement for that good purpose, which has 
 been so generously and hopefully begun. 
 
 I tender you my humble co-operation, because that 
 movement is not of a party or a sect^ but of a nation, 
 offering its grateful reverence to one of its worthiest sons. 
 
 I remember the feeling with which, long years ago, I 
 stood in Westminster Abbey, beside a shattered slab, bear- 
 ing the name of Henry Grattan, and thought it a symbol 
 of the broken fortunes of the land for which he lived and 
 died. It seemed to me a reproach to Ireland that his dust 
 should have been left in English earth, with no better 
 monument, by the people to whom he rendered such loving 
 service. And now I rejoice that we are, at last, uniting, 
 in a time of hope and progress, to put away that reproach 
 for ever. 
 
 We may hold various opinions with reference to Grattan^s 
 policy and conduct ; but we can have no dissension as to 
 his pure and earnest life, his public virtue, his indomitable 
 courage, his true and unchanging devotion to his country. 
 
266 Henry Grattan, 
 
 the achievements by which he lighted up the fairest page 
 of our dismal story, the genius which ranked him amongst 
 the foremost of the orators of the modern world ! 
 
 The Irish Protestant will not hold unworthy of his 
 homage the chief of the great men of his own faith, whose 
 labours and sacrifices for Ireland have given lustre to their 
 race. The Irish Catholic will be emulous to honour him 
 who, in evil days, — untainted by corruption and unawed 
 by power, — was the dauntless champion of Eeligious 
 Liberty. 
 
 The fame of Henry Grattan is the common and the proud 
 inheritance of all good Irishmen. It is no longer clouded 
 by popular prejudice or the malignity of faction. It suffers 
 no more from the insolence of authority or the fickleness 
 of the crowd. It lifts him high on the roll of the bene- 
 factors of his country; and we should all rejoice to 
 demonstrate, according to our power, how dear it is to the 
 memory and the heart of Ireland. 
 
 Believe me. 
 
 Dear Loed Chaelemont, 
 
 Yours faithfully, 
 
 THOMAS O'HAGAN, C. 
 
SIR ALEXANDER MACDONNELL, BAET. 
 
Sir Alexander Maedo7tnell, Bart, 
 
 [This Letter was written to Sir Patrick J. Keenan, the Resident Com- 
 missioner of National Education in Ireland, on the occasion of 
 unveiling a Statue of Sir Alexander Macdonnell, in 1878.] 
 
 YZih August, 1878. 
 
 MY DEAR Keenan, — Will you oblige me by expressing 
 to tlie Duke of Leinster and tlie Committee my 
 great regret that I cannot be present at tlie unveiling of 
 tlie statue ? I owe tliem a special apology, as they kindly 
 postponed ib for my convenience. 
 
 I am obliged to move the second reading of the Sunday 
 Closing Bill, of which I have charge in the House of Lords, 
 and I must endeavour to carry that much-contested measure 
 successfully through its remaining stages. On this account, 
 I shall be unable to leave London before Thursday evening. 
 
 I am deeply grieved that I must be absent on an occasion 
 in which I take the truest interest ; and I cannot refrain 
 from saying that I trust the statue of Sir Alexander 
 Macdonnell may prove a fit memorial of one whom, from 
 a, life-long intimacy, I am bold to describe as amongst the 
 noblest men who have done honour to the Irish race. 
 
 He had every claim to such a distinction. He was very 
 rich in intellectual gifts. His scholarship was of the rarest 
 and ripest kind. He wrote and spoke with singular grace 
 and eloquence. He was at home in every department of 
 
270 Sir Alexaitder Macdonnell^ Bart, 
 
 literature, and familiar witli every brancli of political know- 
 ledge. He was wise in counsel as lie was earnest in action ; 
 and his fidelity in friendship was matched by the consist- 
 ency with which he asserted, unchangingly, the great prin- 
 ciples of liberty and progress. 
 
 His public career did not altogether fulfil the high 
 promise of his youth. At this moment, the memory of his 
 almost unexampled successes, as a student, preserves for 
 him a lofty reputation in Oxford, of which few in Ireland 
 have ever heard. His proud modesty held him too much 
 apart from the rude trials of professional a%d political con- 
 tention ; but many of his contemporaries, who won distinc- 
 tion in Parliament and rose to ministerial rank, would have 
 readily admitted his superiority to themselves. 
 
 Probably, however, in the course it was given him to 
 pursue, he did more real good to the country which he 
 loved, than he could have accomplished in a position of more 
 apparent importance, and more fruitful in influence and 
 fame. The Irish people will never know how much they 
 and their children are indebted to him for the anxious 
 labours of those thirty years which he dedicated to their 
 improvement, with a devotion as constant and effective as 
 it was unostentatious. 
 
 I was bound to him, almost from my childhood, by close 
 affection. I hold his memory in loving reverence ; and I 
 am glad that the ceremonial of to-day will make a lasting 
 recognition of his high worth and great public services. 
 
 I am, 
 
 My dear Keenan, 
 
 Ever yours, 
 
 O^HAGAN. 
 
lEELAND IN 1853. 
 
Ireland in 1853 : Hopes of Progress, 
 
 [A Lecture delivered in aid of the Library of the Working Classes' 
 Association of Belfast, in 1853.] 
 
 SOME years have elapsed since I was honoured with a 
 request that I should deliver a lecture on behalf of the 
 Belfast Working Classes' Association. I felt it a pleasure 
 to comply with that request, for I have not ceased to regard 
 with true interest and natural pride the prosperity of the 
 town in which I was born ; I believe that institutions wisely- 
 established for the diffusion of sound intelligence amongst 
 its people must greatly assist in advancing that prosperity ; 
 and I should rejoice to promote it, even in the humblest 
 way. 
 
 The pressure of many engagements has delayed the 
 fulfilment of my undertaking, from time to time, but it has 
 never been abandoned ; and I am glad, to-night, that I am 
 enabled to meet, once more, many with whom I have long 
 been happily associated, in a place so rich to me in memories 
 of pleasant days gone by and good men who have departed 
 — of the keen enjoyments and the light troubles of early life 
 — of the aspirations of youth and the endeavours of man- 
 hood — of friendships which have outlived vicissitude, and 
 dear affections which change no more can weaken or time 
 destroy, for they are made immortal in the consecration 
 of the grave. 
 
 Forgive me these words of reference to the past. Forgive 
 me, also, if I say another and a sadder word of one whose 
 
 s 
 
2/4 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 name;, unhappily belonging to it now, onglit not to be 
 forgotten in this Hall. When I was last urged to fulfil my 
 promise to your association, I was told that the lamented 
 nobleman, who had so deep an interest in its welfare, would 
 occupy the place which is held to-night by my friend. Dr. 
 Henry. A few short months are gone ; and foreign earth, 
 holds all that was mortal of the good and gentle Lord Belfast. 
 He has been stricken down in the very bloom and pride of 
 bis existence — in the full possession of high ability and rare 
 accomplishments, and the true graces of character and 
 manners whicli are yielded by a genial nature and an 
 unselfish heart. His life was briglit with promise, and rich 
 in usefulness. He would have spent himself, and all his 
 endowments of capacity and acquisition, for the welfare of 
 his fellow-men. He would have adorned his order and 
 served his country. But it was otherwise designed — 
 
 Oh, sir, the good die first, 
 
 And they, whose hearts are dry as summer dust, 
 
 Burn evea to the socket ! 
 
 God has been pleased to take him in his youth, dis- 
 appointing the hope and love which hung around him, and 
 teaching us humbly to remember, in the bereavement, 
 "■^ what shadows we are, and what shadows we pursue ! ^^ 
 By the members of your society, to whom he was ever a 
 considerate and faithful friend, his memory should be held 
 in especial honour. They will perpetuate it fitly, in con- 
 nexion with the great institution which he laboured to 
 establish for the benefit of your town, and in whicb he will 
 find his noblest monument. And they will not blame me if 
 I have thought it becoming, for them and for myself, to say 
 how greatly he was valued, and how truly he is mourned. 
 
 It has been suggested to me, that I may properly fulfil 
 my task, by speaking to you of the social and industrial 
 prospects which are opening before us ; and I have thought 
 
Hopes of Progress, 275 
 
 the suggestion good, and the topic suitable to the time, the 
 occasion, and the auditory — for the time is one of great 
 and unexampled change in the condition of our people; 
 the occasion is that of an appeal for the benefit of working 
 men bent to exalt themselves by moral culture, and so to 
 exalt their country ; and the auditory comprises very many of 
 those who have already fought and won the battle of self- 
 reliant industry which Ireland is beginning. From such an 
 auditory, on such an occasion, and at such a time, I may 
 venture to solicit some attention to such a subject. 
 
 And, having determined to direct your thoughts briefly 
 to the probable future of Ireland, I have some reason to 
 congratulate myself that I could not sooner comply with 
 your invitation; for I do not now address you, as I must 
 heretofore have done, at a period of national calamity. The 
 country begins to be filled with unwonted energy, and stirs 
 with the buoyancy of renovated life. There is bustle on 
 our old highways, and our new ways of iron. There is 
 thronging in the marts of commerce, and affluence in the 
 farmer^s homestead. A new career invites the nation to 
 brace itself for hopeful progress ; and he who speculates 
 on the coming time may utter words of congratulation, and 
 mingle lessons of warning with prophecies of good. 
 
 The divisions which have made us weak and miserable 
 have been numerous as they have been fatal, penetrating 
 every region of speculation and every field of action, in 
 which harmonious working was most clearly necessary to 
 our common good ; but, difiering as we may in other 
 things, we must all entertain the sad conviction that 
 Ireland has not fulfilled her destiny; for we all know 
 that she has capacities which have never been developed, 
 and means of wealth and happiness which have been 
 useless for ages to her wretched people. Why has 
 this been so ? Nature does nothing vainly ; Providence 
 
 s 2 
 
276 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 does not offer occasions of advancement to mankind witli- 
 out a benign purpose that they shall be profitable in its own 
 appointed time. Is there anything in the frame, or the 
 heart, or the intellect of the Irishman which must render 
 him a perpetual anomaly amongst his race, and nullify for 
 ever, in his regard, the general laws of Providence and 
 Nature ? It behoves us, in order to think wisely of what 
 may be hereafter, to understand, if we can, some of the 
 reasons of the things that have been. 
 
 What has been mainly wanting to our social well-being ? 
 In many of the best attributes of a nation — in many of the 
 highest achievements of a nation's mind — we have no cause 
 to blush for our inferiority to any region of the earth, 
 Ireland has been almost equally injured by flattery and 
 abuse — by self-praise, glozing over real faults and follies, 
 and unjust exaggeration of her errors and denial of the 
 worth that is truly hers. It is an injurious weakness to 
 shrink from encountering the truth when it is painful, and 
 conceal from ourselves the evils which deform our nationa) 
 condition. But '^ he is a mean man who thinks meanly of 
 his country ; '^ and there is less of weakness than of crimi- 
 nality in those who delight to undervalue their own land, and 
 make unnatural ostentation of the defects of its people, 
 instead of dwelling with honest pride on its nobler qualities, 
 and recognising its errors with a reluctant sorrow, or seek- 
 ing to amend them in the spirit of filial love and reverence. 
 We should strive to avoid either extreme ; and, avoiding 
 both, we may confidently say, that the undeniable depres- 
 sion and backwardness of Ireland are not attributable, in 
 any fairness, to want of physical endowment, or natural 
 goodness, or intellectual power. 
 
 Physical endowment she has not wanted; for God has 
 given her a teeming soil and untold riches in her plains and 
 waters ; and, in their strength and stature and capacity of 
 
Hopes of Progress, 277 
 
 sustained and vigorous eflfort, it is well established that 
 her children, when fairly fed and cared for, can stand in 
 successful competition with the most prosperous and pro- 
 gressive of the races of the world. 
 
 Natural goodness has not been the want of Ireland, 
 for we have ever had a people — often indulging in ex- 
 -cesses, and often stained with crime — but, as a people, 
 full of kindliness, susceptible to all the tender charities 
 which beautify the human soul, capable of great acts of 
 self-sacrifice and self-devotion, and, in their domestic rela- 
 tions and their daily lives, exhibiting a purity of morals to 
 which the earth can scarcely afford a parallel. 
 
 Has Ireland been deficient in intellectual power ? Surely, 
 she has not. The masses of her inhabitants, through all 
 their poverty and sufi'ering, have been astute, and quick of 
 apprehension, and eager to be informed, and, in the face of 
 the most disheartening difficulties, in the most evil days, 
 have struggled for knowledge bravely. And in what field 
 of art or literature have Irishmen failed to win distinction ? 
 Have we not had amongst us scholars, and statesmen, and 
 soldiers, some of them of that imperial order of mankind 
 whose names endure through ages, growing always more 
 renowned as time destroys occasional celebrities, and clears 
 away the mists of temporary passion and local prejudice 
 which confound true greatness with its many counterfeits ? 
 Have we not had painters and sculptors of enduring 
 reputation ; and orators who need not fear rivalry with thv. 
 foremost of the modern world, so long as there is memory 
 of Burke and Grattan, and Plunket and O'Connell, and 
 Eobert Holmes, whose name your Northern Circuit, — which 
 he adorned for fifty years, — cannot let perish, whilst it lias 
 reverence for genius and virtue ? Have we not well main- 
 tained, in our poetry, the ancient reputation of a race with 
 which its bards had always peculiar favour, especially by 
 
278 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 those lyrics wMcli stir many hearts wherever^ tlirougliout 
 the world^ the English tongue is spoken ? And might I 
 not call in aid of the argument for the intellect of Ireland, 
 that music of our fathers^ which so symbolises, in its 
 mingled gaiety and sadness, the mixture of sparkling* 
 joyousness and depth of feeling which is peculiar to our 
 people ? Fragments of that sweet music have been pre- 
 served by the pious care of men who are eutitled to 
 Ireland^s lasting gratitude, and amongst whom towns- 
 men of your own— the great and good physician^ James 
 McDonnell, one of the most accomplished and unselfisb 
 of human beings, to whom, more than to all others of his 
 time, Belfast owes its intellectual reputation, and Edward 
 Bunting, whom he stimulated and encouraged in the 
 labour of love, which ended only with existence — deserve 
 to be held always in your kind and proud remembrance. 
 To these precious fragments we might point, if it were- 
 needful to draw from the past confirmation of the evidences 
 of the present; and we might point also to the rare relics 
 of extinguished art, which survive so many centuries of 
 strife and suffering, and prove that, in times almost beyond 
 the range of authentic history. Irishmen had learned to- 
 fashion metals and precious stones to forms of beauty, and 
 rear temples to God^s honour, which, even in their ruins,, 
 are majestic and full of venerable grace. But I must pass 
 on from a theme which tempts me, and leave unnoticed the 
 successes of our countrymen in the drama, in fiction, in 
 exact science, in speculative inquiry and in the practical 
 arts. I have said enough to prove that we have not been 
 wanting in intellectual power. 
 
 Yet, whilst thus amply blessed with physical, and moral, 
 and mental capacity for good, Ireland has been ^^ steeped 
 in poverty to the very lips.''^ She has failed to advance 
 with the advancing world. Her natural beauty has been 
 
Hopes of Progress. 279 
 
 marred by a universal wretcliedness, almost unparalleled in 
 civilised or savage states. She lias seen millions of lier 
 people housed and fed more miserably than the beasts that 
 perish — her cities sinking to decay — her noble harbours 
 empty and desolate — 'her trade and manufactures almost 
 extinct — her agriculture unskilled and unproductive — the 
 whole framework of her social system hopelessly diseased. 
 Into all the causes of this unhappiness^ stretching, as they 
 doj far into the ages that are passed^ and connected_, as they 
 are, with events of our dark history about which men 
 may form very diverse opinions, I do not mean to enter 
 here. We may seek for those causes in evil legislation or 
 administrative mismanagement, in intestine divisions or 
 international jealousies, in our wilfal errors or our malignant 
 fortune. We differ widely on these and other matters, poli- 
 tical and social; and my own judgment forbids me, as 
 imperatively as the wise law of your association_, to raise any 
 vexed questions in this place. 
 
 But as to one great want of Ireland — the want of indus- 
 trial opportunity and industrial training — there can be no 
 sort of controversy ; and, in this single want, in its con- 
 tinuing causes and its deadening influences, there was 
 enough of evil to perpetuate, for long generations, the 
 misery of our people. They had strength, but they were 
 net taught to use it ; they had knowledge, but it was not 
 applied to purposes of practical advantage; they had a 
 healthier morality and a more widely-diffused intelligence 
 than communities richer in physical comfort and suc- 
 cessful labour ; but they were deficient in that education 
 of habit,, without which no individual or nation can hope 
 to prosper. And, if the life of a country be thus 
 baulked of a prosperous issue; if it be denied the means of 
 wholesome and fruitful activity ; if its children remain, from 
 year to year, vegetating at one low level of squalid want, 
 
28o Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 without hope of change or ability to improve their heredi- 
 tary state ; it sounds like mockery to boast of their literature 
 or to blazon their art, or to glory in their poetry and elo- 
 quence. In the misery of their condition, these things seem 
 only as the wreath upon the grave, the sculptured pomp of 
 the sepulchre which hides corruption. 
 
 But the time has come, I fondly hope and confidently 
 believe, when this cardinal want will be supplied to Ireland; 
 and, because I so believe and hope, I look with glad antici- 
 pation to her future. We have seen the commencement 
 and the partial progress of a social and industrial revolution, 
 originating in events unforeseen by human prescience and 
 independent of man's control ; and we are bound reverently 
 to co-operate, according to our power, w^ith the purposes 
 of an Almighty Providence, w^hich draws from evil its 
 *' soul of goodness,^' and makes of our very suffering the 
 chastening instrument of our redemption. 
 
 To give free scope to the awakening energy of Ireland — 
 to remove the obstacles by which law and custom still oppose 
 her progress — to guide the intelHgence of her people in wise 
 and useful courses — and, whilst we earnestly promote her 
 industry in agriculture and manufactures and the arts of 
 life, to hold that industry in its true relation to the other 
 agencies of our national advancement, and save our country 
 from the moral mischiefs which have been wrought else- 
 where, by the gathering of multitudes into great cities and 
 crowded factories, and the sordid lust of gain, and the low 
 materialism of mere wealth-worship — these seem to me 
 amongst the main duties which the time casts upon those 
 who are fitted to discharge them. 
 
 Are we encouraged by the circumstances of our condition 
 to address ourselves to such duties with hopeful energy ? 
 Before I proceed to answer the question, by adverting to 
 the events which have altered our prospects for the better. 
 
Hopes of Progress, 281 
 
 and given us ground to trust tliat our national wretched- 
 ness is soon to pass away, I feel that I should speak of one 
 remarkable occurrence which has been the herald of the 
 revival of our country, and has made the current year 
 memorable amongst the rare epochs which relieve, by their 
 better fortune, the general gloom of our unhappy history. 
 As if it were the fate of Ireland ever to exhibit strange 
 anomalies and startling contrasts, the world has seen in this, 
 one of its poorest communities, after a wasting famine and 
 a series of terrible distresses which have moved the pity 
 and horror of Christendom, a gorgeous receptacle for the 
 industries of all lands, raised by the single effort of one 
 great-hearted Irishman.* The nations have been invited to 
 generous rivalry on Irish soil, in a humanising strife from 
 which there is no suffering, in which the victor and the 
 vanquished are alike rewarded, which binds together in 
 mutual dependence and mutual respect the combatants of 
 many lands, and impels them forward in the march of civi- 
 lisation. And the call has been answered, and the richest 
 products of man^s invention in every art, which clothes our 
 life with comfort or adorns it with beauty, have been 
 poured into our metropolis ; and we are proudly conscious 
 that our own people have given indications of high capa- 
 bility and diligent endeavour, which forbid them to blush 
 for their present inferiority, and promise well for their 
 future success. 
 
 Let us not be disheartened, because we have been forced 
 to admit that we have hitherto failed in industrial achieve- 
 ment. Let us not listen to the insolent suggestion, which 
 has been too current in latter time's, that the Irish race is 
 unfit for progress, and doomed to perpetual indolence, and 
 thrifblessness, and degradation. Such theories are dis- 
 honouring to the Creator, and falsified by the whole history 
 * William Dargan. 
 
282 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 of man. They preach a gospel of despair to prostrate 
 nations. They are invented to sanctify the iniquities of 
 conquest, and perpetuate the oppression of the weak. The 
 African is told by those who traffic in his blood that he was 
 born for bondage. The Irishman is forbidden to hope and 
 strive^ because the seal of inferiority is set upon his nature. 
 But sound ethnological inquiry sustains the averment of 
 Holy Writ, that of one blood God formed all the nations, and 
 when we would account for their manifold diversities, we 
 must consider their circumstances and training. And he 
 who will dispassionately examine what have long been the 
 circumstances and the training of Irishmen, will surely 
 reach the conclusion, that these things have produced any 
 peculiar evils which belong to us, and that what of good 
 we have has continued to exist in spite of their injurious 
 influences. 
 
 They are not incapable of progress, of whom we know 
 that, as in the grey dawn of European civilisation, they 
 sent forth saints and sages to scatter knowledge and 
 religion broadcast through the earth, so in our own day 
 they are to be found, in the old world and the new, wherever 
 they can get leave to toil with any profit, doing the hardest 
 work of hand and head, and doing it with skill and energy. 
 They are not to be branded as incapable of continued and 
 successful action, of whom he who knows them best, as he 
 belongs to them, and has employed more of them than any 
 score of living men, has testified that, after comparing them 
 with the workmen of various countries, he can pronounce 
 them " second to no others in generous, honest feeling, in 
 genius, and in untiring zeal.^^ 
 
 We need not fear for the future from any inherent and 
 ineradicable defects in the character of our countrymen; 
 more especially when we remember — putting out of account 
 all the circumstances, political and social, tending to their 
 
Hopes of Progress, 283 
 
 injury _, about which there may be difference of sentiment — 
 that, if they have not become great in commerce and ia 
 manufactures, they were forbidden, one and all, of every 
 class and creed, until a comparatively recent period, to 
 prosecute the commerce they had begun, or to maintain the 
 manufactures they had established. Mischievous and partial 
 laws forbade their merchants freely to import the produce 
 of foreign countries, and their agriculturists to export the 
 produce of their own. Their greatest and most profitable 
 trade, which maintained 32,000 families, and for which they 
 were famous throughout Europe, was annihilated by one 
 stroke of imperial power. I might advert to abundant facts 
 like these, about which no doubt exists, as rendering it 
 utterly unnecessary to seek in any natural deficiencies of 
 the Irish people — in any want of the common impulses 
 which prompt men to better their condition — in any un- 
 conquerable indolence or stolid indifference to their own 
 well-being, the causes of their industrial shortcomings. 
 
 It was not that the aid of intermeddling laws and the 
 active influence of Governments were wanting to advance 
 us. We did not fairly share the legitimate assistance which 
 was given from the public funds to great public under- 
 takings in other districts of the empire ; and, on this score, 
 the State is still our debtor. But, though we had not the 
 help which was given to distant colonies and rich com- 
 munities in the neighbour island, and to which we had a 
 right at least as good as theirs, we could have done without 
 it. For — may I not say so, with assurance of ready assent 
 to the proposition in this great town? — human energy,, 
 prompted by human interest, will certainly accomplish 
 human progress, if it have only full scope for its activity 
 and freedom from legislative obstruction. So it would have 
 been in Ireland, but she was paralysed by that obstruction, 
 and she had not power to master it. 
 
284 Ireland in 185 
 
 o • 
 
 Better times have come, and wiser counsels have pre- 
 vailed; and we should look back upon the errors and 
 injustices of the past, only that we may be checked in our 
 onward course by no disheartening consciousness of national 
 incapacity — that we may be roused to needful effort by the 
 certainty of our own ability to work our own deliverance 
 from the mischiefs which hang about us still, and impressed 
 with the conviction that they can continue only through our 
 own default. 
 
 The Irishman is not a sluggard or a slave by any law of 
 destiny. Give him liberty of action — give him the fair 
 reward of toil, the motive to exertion, the opportunity of 
 improvement, a progressive future, and an inspiring hope — 
 and he will play a man^s part in the battle of life. Because 
 these things have not been his, in his own land, he has 
 sometimes been indolent and reckless, and, under such 
 circumstances, he would not have been human if he had 
 been otherwise. 
 
 The course of modern statesmanship and the progress of 
 a sound economy relieve us from any fear lest our industry 
 should hereafter be fettered by ignorant or jealous legisla- 
 tion. Special protection for it we cannot hope ; but we 
 may expect fair play, and security from interference to its 
 injury. All things tend to the establishment of perfect 
 commercial freedom, and freedom, also, and facility in the 
 transfer of landed property. But, though this great ad- 
 vantage had been achieved, and though we had obtained 
 the further advantage of those improvements in machinery 
 and the arts, in the rapidity with which thought can be 
 communicated and business transacted, and in the means 
 of universal education, which characterise our stirring age, 
 and fill it with material and moral wonders, we should have 
 found the difficulties inherited from the past almost insur- 
 mountable, had not the Wisdom which guides the universe 
 
Hopes of Progress, 285 
 
 brougtt agencies into operation whicH we could not create,, 
 or even imagine, for ourselves. 
 
 Ireland has always been chiefly dependent on her agri- 
 culture, and whilst a large proportion of her proprietary 
 were insolvent, and her people were not valued as men 
 ought to be, it was impossible that she could rise to a 
 prosperous state. She could not adva,nce, as long as the 
 nominal owners of the soil were forbidden, by their neces- 
 sities, to discharge the duties of their position, with wise 
 consideration and merciful regard for its unhappy occu- 
 pants — as long as the masses of her peasantry were sunk 
 in penury, often trembling on the perilous edge of famine, 
 and always without the chance of attaining, by any effort, 
 the common decencies and comforts of civilised life. In 
 the face of these hopeless circumstances, politicians de- 
 claimed, economists theorised, and Christians were benevo^ 
 lent, in vain. A chronic disease consumed the vitals of our 
 society. It was intermittent — sometimes breaking out in 
 starvation and pestilence — sometimes exhibited in the hor- 
 rors of agrarian crime — habitually subduing a community 
 which subsisted on the smallest quantity of the poorest 
 food that could maintain existence, with shelter and clothing 
 of the meanest kind, to a condition of sickly languor and 
 listless inaction. 
 
 A great affliction came upon us — one of the strangest and 
 most fearful which ever visited a nation. The food of the 
 people failed. They were swept, in thousands and tens of 
 thousands, from the earth. In thousands and tens of thou- 
 sands, the survivors fled away. The maintenance of the 
 paupers who did not perish, and could not depart, became 
 a burthen too heavy to be borne by those who had been 
 deeply embarrassed before it fell upon them; and when the 
 day of destruction passed, and men were able to breathe 
 and look around them, they saw a population shrunk far 
 
286 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 witMn its old proportions, and a proprietary weeded of 
 hundreds of its members, whose broken fortunes failed in 
 a trial, from which the soundest and the proudest did not 
 escape unscathed. 
 
 It was a fearful time ; and we cannot look back upon it 
 without natural anguish. But our business in this world is 
 not to brood upon the past. We must gather from it what 
 help and light we may, and press onward to the work that 
 is before us. When, in the natural body, an evil humour 
 has grown and festered, until it can no longer consist with 
 the endurance of animal life, it struggles painfully to the 
 •surface — perhaps in a deforming blotch, or an unsightly 
 sore — but the patient is saved and he is grateful. And so, 
 in communities, when disorders have accumulated, and 
 social corruptions infect the life of the State, it is rarely 
 purified and restored, but through inflictions which at once 
 avenge its old misdoings, and sweep away the obstacles to 
 its healthy progress. Even in this world, it should be plain 
 to the apprehension of a child, that 
 
 Sorrow tracketli wrong, 
 As echo follows song, 
 Ever, for ever ! 
 
 And although, as it was with ourselves, the sorrow reaches 
 •often the victims, as well as the authors of the wrong, it is 
 mercifully ordered, that our endurance shall rarely be with- 
 out its compensating advantage. 
 
 The effect of the famine has been, that nearly eleven 
 hundred embarrassed landlords have transferred estates to 
 other hands; that one-twelfth of the area of Ireland has 
 •changed its owners ; that more than ten millions of capital 
 have been invested in the purchase of property from the 
 Incumbered Estates Court ; and that new proprietors, four- 
 fold the number of the old, have taken their places.* 
 * See Note A.— Paire 313. 
 
Hopes of Progress. 287 
 
 These are facts of a great significance. They indicate, 
 undonbtedly_, a lamentable change in the condition of many 
 individuals, some of them answerable for their own destruc- 
 tion^ through their own improvidence, but very many the 
 victims of the improvidence of others. There is no pleasure 
 in the spectacle of ruin ; and it would be a vulgar baseness 
 to rejoice in the overthrow of old names and honourable 
 titles : — 
 
 Men are we, and must grieve, when even the shade 
 Of that which once was great has pass'd away. 
 
 Neither let us imagine that, in all cases, tlie new pro- 
 prietors are better than the old ; for the owner of a moderate 
 estate is not necessarily more kind to liis dependents 
 than the lord of a great principality, and the tenant is, by 
 no means, assured of more liberal treatment from the com- 
 mercial speculator in land, than from the representative of 
 an ancient race. But, taking all this into account, and re- 
 membering, also, that crowds of persons who had charges 
 on the incumbered properties, have been subjected to serious 
 loss, and some of them reduced to beggary, we shall yet be 
 justified in believing, that the substitution of a solvent for 
 an insolvent proprietary will, probably, be of great advantage 
 to Ireland. 
 
 The landlord who was insolvent could not do his duty. 
 He might be kindly, but his necessities made him cruel. 
 He might be eager to improve, but he had not the power. 
 He might desire the welfare of his tenantry, but his cre- 
 ditors were his masters and theirs ; and the money-lender 
 cared only for his interest, though it should be wrung from 
 the blood and marrow of the peasant. For this man, thus 
 devoid of capacity for good, another has often been sub- 
 stituted, who possesses enterprise and energy, is free to act 
 according to his impulses, has intelligence to understand his 
 position, and capital to make it better, and, if he have no old 
 
288 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 associations uniting him with, the people, is not forced by his 
 poverty to press hard upon them, and may be expected ta 
 comprehend the plain truth, that their interests are really 
 identified with his own. Besides, we are to consider, that 
 the unhappy relations of classes in Ireland have not per- 
 mitted, in very many cases, the existence of those feelings of 
 mutual trust, issuing in the reciprocity of good oflSces, 
 between the owners and the occupiers of the soil, which, in 
 some other countries, are still an inheritance from the feudal 
 times; and that, therefore, any injury resulting from the 
 change, in this regard, would be of less consequence, even 
 if we could forget that, before the famine, more than one 
 thousand estates were under the control of the Court of 
 Chancery, and that its receivers had no sympathy with any 
 such feelings, whilst their management was the very worst 
 to which a tenantry could be subjected.* 
 
 Another very cheering consideration is suggested by the 
 facts which I have stated. Whilst so many insolvent land- 
 lords have given place to so many independent purchasers, 
 who have found an opportunity of investing that dormant 
 capital of which much has long existed uselessly amongst 
 us, more than two-thirds of them appear to be persons of 
 comparatively moderate means. The total number of the 
 new purchasers on the 81st March, 1853, was 3,428; and 
 of these, 1,595 had bought small properties costing less 
 than £1,000; G30 had bought properties costing less than 
 £2,000 ; and 709 had bought properties costing less thaa 
 £5,000. 
 
 Hitherto, one of our worst evils has arisen from the 
 
 * Unhappily, the experience of a quarter of a century has too much 
 disappointed the anticipation, once so widely entertained, of benefit from 
 purchases in the Landed Estates Court by men of moderate means, and 
 too fully justified the apprehension that " commercial speculators " might 
 often prove the most exacting and relentless of landlords. 
 
Hopes of Progress, 289 
 
 division of the country between tlie very great and the very 
 humble. We have had no graduated ascent of classes, 
 giving stability and grace to our society. That middle 
 order which connects the aristocracy and the masses of a 
 population, which is free from the peculiar temptations 
 and unaffected by the sometimes hostile feelings of the 
 extremely rich and the extremely poor, which should have 
 the deepest interest in the maintenance of peace, the 
 supremacy of law, and the growth of industry _, that great 
 middle order had not existence throughout a large part 
 of the island. Three of our provinces had scarcely any 
 manufactures; and such a class could not rise up in an 
 agricultural country, where none but those of ample fortune, 
 equal to the acquisition of great estates, had the oppor- 
 tunity of acquiring the proprietorship of land ; and the 
 operation of family settlements, and the costs of conveyanc- 
 ing and making title, prevented any free disposition of it, 
 in moderate proportions. It is a great advantage that so 
 many men^ having a substantial interest in the public 
 welfare — neither too wealthy to be indifferent to profitable 
 exertion^ nor too poor to find such exertion impossible — 
 have been enabled to plant themselves on their own small 
 domains, with a title as indefeasible as Parliament can afford 
 them, increasing the riches of the nation whilst they increase 
 their own^ and rousing their countrymen to improve by 
 their example and emulate their success. May we not hope 
 that this good work will advance still further, and that we 
 shall see very many more of our people enabled to acquire 
 a permanent abiding- place in their own country — a position 
 of perfect security and perfect independence, in homesteads 
 purchased by the frait of their honourable toil ? We should 
 hail every movement in this direction^ and aid it cordially ; 
 for by no other can the material prosperity, and the moral 
 elevation, and the loyal citizenship of Irishmen be so 
 effectually secured. 
 
290 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 Mucli, therefore^ liave tlie events of these latter years 
 contributed to remove the obstacles to our industrial pro- 
 gress, which the existence of embarrassed landlords and the 
 want of a middle class made so very formidable. But they 
 have done more. Through the terrible processes of de- 
 struction and exile, it has come to pass, that, in Ireland, 
 the poor man begins to be found of value, and to enjoy the 
 privilege which even the primal curse reserved to him — 
 the privilege of eating the bread he has earned in the 
 sweat of his brow. It was hard to get this privilege con- 
 ceded, and we have paid dearly for the concession of it, in 
 the loss of thousands of human beings, perishing by the 
 most horrible of deaths, or borne away by an emigration so 
 vast, and continuous, and prolonged, that the world never 
 saw its like before. But, again, we who survive and remain 
 must look to the consequences; and of these the very 
 plainest is, that the Irishman has a chance, at last, of getting 
 the treatment of a man in return for his labour. Whilst 
 this small justice was denied him; whilst, in agricultural 
 districts, he could gain only tenpence, or eightpence, or 
 fourpence a-day, for a few months in the year, sustaining a 
 death-in-life existence, as best he might, during the re- 
 mainder, he could not be careful or energetic. His labour 
 was a worthless drug, and his life an idle superfluity. For 
 him, industrial civilisation was impossible. 
 
 It was an essential condition of our improvement that all 
 this should be changed, and the change is coming fast. 
 There can scarcely be desperate competition for land or for 
 employment, when the demand for labour begins to exceed 
 the supply, and the tillers of the soil are too few for its cul- 
 tivation. What the schemes of economists and the devices 
 of legislation had failed to achieve, may be attained through 
 the suffering of some dreadful years. Man begins to be 
 of worth in the labour market ; and, hereafter, those who 
 
Hopes of Progress, 291 
 
 clioose to be industrious will not be forced to stand " all 
 the day idle/'' 
 
 The emigration proceeds ; and, if it should continue long 
 at the same rate of progress, the country might be left with- 
 out a living inhabitant, for the annual decrease of the popu- 
 lation has not been nearly supplied. Irishmen have ceased, 
 to a large extent, to cherish their old attachment to the 
 soil, and learned to look to the Western world, as the home, 
 at once, of their hopes and their affections. Their friends 
 are there before them, and prove, in the most practical 
 way, that they are lovingly remembered. The emigration 
 numbers amongst its compensating circumstances the 
 evidence which it has so wonderfully afforded, of the truth 
 and strength of domestic affection amongst our poorest 
 people. Distance does not make them forget their duty to 
 those they leave behind. They think of it when their toil 
 is most severe, and are excited to new effort ; and the first 
 fruits of their prosperity are dedicated to the help of their 
 absent kindred, who cannot help themselves. The remit- 
 tances of the emigrants have done honour, not to our 
 country only, but to human nature ; and, in their magni- 
 tude and continuance, have beautifully testified to the 
 generous faithfulness and self-denying liberality of the 
 Irish heart. 
 
 It is ascertained that, in the last year alone, more than 
 £1,404,000 was thus remitted; and, just in proportion to 
 the number of those who depart, has been the steady in- 
 crease of their annual contributions for the assistance or 
 removal of their relatives. There is ground for reasonable 
 apprehension that the tide of emigration may run too far ; 
 and it is not strange that the peasantry, having such induce- 
 ments — in addition to every other — to unite themselves 
 with those w^ho give signal proofs at once of their own 
 success in their adopted land and of their attachment to 
 
 T 2 
 
Ireland in 185 
 
 o • 
 
 tlie partners of their former sufferings sliould be still in- 
 duced to throng away in multitudes. 
 
 But there is not much cause for fear. This people — this 
 Irish race — will not be extinguished. This island will not 
 become a wilderness. In proportion as its state improves 
 the inhabitants will cease to desire to leave it. When they 
 can thrive in the homes of their fathers^ they will not be 
 tempted to a foreign soil. This is not mere speculation 
 although we might rely upon it, even as such, from a con- 
 sideration of the common motives and feelings which govern 
 human action. The emigration is actually decreasing, as 
 Ireland rises to a better state. In the first quarter of 1851, 
 45,132 left our seaports; in the first quarter of 1852, 
 42,289; and in the first quarter of 1853, 36,232. And 
 this diminution has occurred, although the ascertained 
 amount of remittances, with proportional facilities for 
 removal, w^as, in 1851, £999,000 ; and, in 1852, had in- 
 creased to £1,404,000. The first quarter of 1854 will, 
 probably, exhibit a still greater decrease ; and the drain 
 will ultimately stop, when the workman^s family can enjoy 
 comfort and competence at home. Sooner it will not have 
 an end, and it ought not. The Irishman has found that 
 there is room for him in the world ; and he will not pine 
 and starve in voluntary wretchedness, whilst he can enter 
 on the road to prosperity. Unhappily, he is not always 
 prosperous in his exile ; but the necessity of the case ought 
 soon to secure to him, everywhere, fair compensation for 
 his labour, and thus will be fulfilled another indispensable 
 condition of our progress. 
 
 Have we not further ground for cheerful expectation of 
 the future ? A lamentable w^ant of Ireland has been her 
 deficiency in the means of internal communication, though 
 she has natural facilities for its enjoyment which few other 
 lands possess. Many of her districts have been literally 
 
Hopes of Progress. 293 
 
 cut ofF from the world, and masses of lier population have 
 never acquired the advantages of that free intercourse with 
 our fellow-beings, which is so full of civilising influence. 
 No country can prosper industrially without that inter- 
 course ; and, happily, we may hope for it at last. Hereafter 
 great bridges will span our waters. Viaducts, of which 
 Eome's imperial art might have been proud in its palmy 
 days, will yet traverse our valleys. Broad and level roads 
 will penetrate districts which could have been reached, 
 within living memory, only by the sheep-track or the 
 bridle-path. Railways will bring the remote hamlet into 
 close neighbourhood with busy cities ; and our vast lakes 
 and abounding streams, from 
 
 The silver Senan, spreading like a sea, 
 
 to the smallest river which is capable of navigation, will be 
 made available for the purposes of commerce. The peasant, 
 whose fathers, dwelling on the richest soil, cultivated rudely 
 a mere patch of earth for the stinted maintenance of their 
 families, because they could gain nothing from crops for 
 which there was no purchaser, will be encouraged to exertion, 
 when he finds the markets of the metropolis and the world 
 open to his industry. The trader will see the riches of many 
 producers brought cheaply to his door, and extend the field 
 of his prosperous speculation j and the traveller will run 
 through the island to its remotest boundaries, with ease and 
 comfort, delighting in the loveliness which circles its shores 
 as with a girdle, and ridding himself of many an evil pre- 
 possession against a people, whom he did not esteem because 
 he did not know them. 
 
 This great change is only in its commencement. Every 
 day, new projects are conceived; in every direction, new 
 works are undertaken, for the enlargement of our oppor- 
 tunities of intercourse. Districts, which heretofore have 
 
2 94 Trelaud in 1853 : 
 
 known eacli other almost as little as if they had been 
 placed in separate hemispheres, have become acquainted. 
 Mutual appreciation will produce mutual trust as well as 
 mutual profit. What is wanting to one will be supplied by 
 another,, and reciprocity of service will induce harmony of 
 feeling. The North and the far West are rapidly approach- 
 ing, and the whole country will soon enjoy, in. all its parts, a 
 fruitful interchange of effort and intelligence. Inequalities 
 will be removed and discords reconciled ; and, in the 
 struggles of an honest emulation, the best and the worst will 
 be brought more nearly to a level, not by the sinking of 
 any from the position they have reached, but by the rise of 
 all to the rank of the highest. 
 
 The natural state of man is not a state of savao^e isola- 
 tion. It is that in which he cultivates the charities and 
 fulfils the duties of social life, and attains the fullest de- 
 velopment of heart and intellect of which his being is 
 capable in this lower world. To this, the largest, freest, 
 kindhest communication with his fellow-men is necessary : 
 and all things w^hich promote it tend at once to his moral 
 and industrial advancement. And thus it must be in 
 Ireland. The increase of the means of intercourse, whilst 
 it will augment our material prosperity, will enable us to 
 conquer old prejudices and learn the folly of old con- 
 tentions. We shall forget the unreal phantasms about 
 which we have been striving, in the vigorous and healthy 
 exercise of our awakened energies, and become, as we 
 understand one another and love one another, more and 
 more, a happy and a powerful, because a united people. 
 
 To another advance in our national j^rogress, this new 
 facility of intercourse, thus incalculably beneficial in itself, is 
 directly tending. Ireland should become the highway of 
 communication for Europe and the West. Her right to be 
 so is not derived from the favour of any human power, and 
 
Hopes of Pi'ogress. 295 
 
 cannot be withheld at the will of any. It belongs to the 
 position assigned to her by the Creator, and the common 
 interest of mankind will work out the purposes of His 
 providence. No jealous rivalry of trade, no old monopoly 
 of commercial advantage, can avail to take it from her. 
 Man cannot prescribe against a claim which is asserted in 
 the very constitution of the globe ; and the time is coming 
 when we shall see the surface of our country swept by the 
 traffic of two worlds. Of the benefits with which that 
 traffic must enrich us, — how it will employ labour, and 
 awaken activity, and sharpen intelligence, and increase 
 industrial opportunities of every kind — the simplest may 
 understand. But beyond this, of the possible issues of 
 such a change, the most thoughtful must hesitate to form a 
 judgment. 
 
 So far, I have spoken chiefly of the general agencies to 
 which we may trust for our improvement. It is right that 
 I should advert, very briefly, to some special departments 
 of industry in which we have seen, or may hope to see, a 
 great revival. 
 
 Our mines, so rich and so neglected, are worked, at 
 present, more prosperously than at any former period. Of 
 their existence and their value there is no question, but 
 abortive attempts to make them productive, failing, from 
 time to time, through want of knowledge, or care, or 
 capital, have been disheartening enough. Now, however, 
 money and skill are abundantly employed upon them ; the 
 increased facilities for carriage and export increase the 
 number of speculators, and the returns which are yielded 
 in Wicklow, and Wexford, and Cork, and Tipperary, and 
 your own province, will induce similar efforts in other 
 districts with similar results. 
 
 Again, our fisheries, which were largely productive, 
 centuries ago — which would avail for the profitable employ- 
 
296 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 ment of multitudes of our population, and add mucH to our 
 national wealth — and which, in latter times, have been so 
 sadly neglected, are compelling the attention of men of 
 enterprise. Who has not observed upon our coasts, with 
 mingled feelings of regret and shame, the fleets of well- 
 appointed vessels which annually throng from Cornwall 
 and other places, to carry off the riches with which our 
 seas are filled ? The owners of those vessels are not to be 
 grudged the profit of their industry. But that our own 
 people, to whom nature sends so amply the means of com- 
 fort, should refuse to stretch out their hands and accept the 
 gift, is very lamentable. Certainly, no more painful spectacle 
 could be witnessed than that which many of our villages 
 exhibited during the years of famine — men perishing for 
 lack of food on the borders of a sea, [from which they 
 might have drawn far more than sustenance, if they had 
 only possessed the little knowledge and the simple imple- 
 ments necessary for the collection of its treasures. This 
 great neglect should not continue; and we must endeavour to 
 prevent its continuance, not only by our own active efforts, 
 but by requiring an amendment of many statutes which 
 have materially contributed to create it. We have never 
 received the assistance which has been afforded to this 
 branch of industry in Scotland and elsewhere; but we 
 may, at least, require that the State, which does not aid, 
 shall not injure it by mischievous legislation. The opening 
 up of the country by so many new means of transport, will 
 serve us much, also, in this regard. The turbot and the 
 lobster, which might have rotted on the coast of Galway a 
 few years ago, because the fisherman could get no buyers 
 in his poor neighbourhood, and had no opportunity of 
 export, are now systematically carried to markets in which 
 they are always welcome, and always command a remuner- 
 ating price. And so it will be in other j)laces : the laws 
 
Hopes of Progress. 297 
 
 will be amended ; the people will be roused to exert them- 
 selves iu a course so plainly profitable ; and we shall not 
 hereafter have reason to lament the general indifference to 
 so rich a means of national advantage. 
 
 I cannot deny myself the pleasure of speaking to you 
 of the benefits which Ireland is deriving, and should 
 continue to derive, from the employment of her female 
 population. In the old times of the linen trade, it was our 
 boast that all the members of the family could be health- 
 fully and profitably engaged — the grandmother at the 
 spinning-wheel, the father at the bleach-green, and the 
 boys and girls in the processes connected with the prepa- 
 ration of the flax. Often and justly, have we lamented the 
 loss of occupation so remunerative, so wholesome, and so 
 consistent with pure morals and good domestic habits. We 
 have not so much reason to lament it any longer. The trade 
 which has sprung up within a very recent period, employing 
 thousands and tens of thousands of young women, in work 
 most suitable to their age and sex, furnishes an admirable 
 substitute. In the North, the profits of the sewed muslin- 
 workers are counted by millions, and in the South, 
 and partially in the West, a new creation of female 
 industry is one of the most hopeful of the signs of the 
 times. Here and there, it had begun before the famine j 
 but, like other blessings to which I have adverted, it grew 
 and strengthened in the shadow of that great calamity. 
 Religious ladies and ladies of the world vied with each 
 other in a magnanimous effort to help the poor, not by 
 corrupting them with the pittance of the mendicant, but 
 by giving them the means of maintenance from their own 
 labour. The wrangling of factions was stilled at the 
 bidding of humanity. Small passions and outworn pre- 
 judices were shamed into extinction, for a time, in the 
 dread presence of a nation^s agony. The pressure of 
 
298 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 universal suffering forced into common effort the good 
 of every class and creed_, and the blessing of Heaven was 
 on their novel union. Industrial schools multiplied and 
 flourished ; and whilst^ by the instruction they afforded, 
 little children were enabled to save whole families from 
 ruin, they created a new branch of commerce, and gave a 
 permanent addition to the resources of the country. How 
 admirably our peasantry have profited of their rare oppor- 
 tunity, no one need be tcld who has seen specimens of the 
 lace, and satin-stitch, and crochet, and work in gold and 
 silver, which are produced in the poorest cabins, and com- 
 mand a ready and extending market, from the delicacy 
 and grace of execution, and the fertility of invention in 
 design, which distinguish many of the humble work- 
 women. It is impossible to over-estimate the importance of 
 the employment which is thus afforded, not merely from its 
 pecuniary returns, and its manifest capability of indefinite 
 increase, but also from the habits of cleanliness, and order, 
 and regularity, which it should necessarily [produce. May 
 we not be proud of this new evidence of the intelligence 
 and taste of our people, when we know that their beautiful 
 fabrics are already valued highly and purchased freely in 
 the capitals of the world ? Six centuries ago, the woollens 
 of Ireland were prized by the nobility of Rome and the 
 merchant princes of Florence, and, from what has been ac- 
 complished in so brief a period, may we not fairly anti- 
 cipate, that the manufacture of our poor Irish girls will yet 
 attain a wide celebrity, and rival the lace of Flanders and 
 the embroidery of France ?* 
 
 It is almost as strange as it is gratifying, that, in the 
 
 * See the account of " The Female Industrial Movement " in " The 
 Industrial INIovement in Ireland," by J. F. Maguire, M.P. ; a work 
 abounding in information of the greatest interest and value. See, also, 
 an admirable paper in The Irish Quarterly Review for September, 1852. 
 
Hopes of Progress, 299 
 
 establislimeiit of industrial scliools and tlie actual creation 
 of novel manufactures^ tlie energetic benevolence of in- 
 dividuals in Ireland has anticipated and surpassed^ in its 
 successful results,, the efforts of the Governments of other 
 countries in the same direction. But it may be well worth 
 inquiry, whether the work of that benevolence may not be 
 extended and perpetuated, by a sound organisation in 
 connexion with the public teaching of the people, which is 
 promoted by the State ? Something has already been done 
 in this direction, and we may do much more. Skilled 
 labour is not to be had amongst us in sufficient plenty, and 
 our manufacturers have applied, in many instances, to the 
 managers of workhouses to qualify young paupers for the 
 weaving trade, which offers ample employment to thousands 
 of them. We must look carefully to these and other indica- 
 tions of the necessities of our peculiar and somewhat 
 anomalous position, and judge if we cannot improve it, by 
 wisely stimulating and systematising the industrial training 
 of the poor, without risk to the free working of sound 
 economic principles. 
 
 Touching, as I am forced to touch, merely the summa 
 fastigia rerum, I cannot go into any details as to 
 various branches of our growing industry, many of which 
 are more important and more familiar to you than those to 
 which I have referred. The true statement of the progress 
 of your Northern manufactures wears almost the appear- 
 ance of a fable. Your first spinning-factory was built 
 within a quarter of a century. In 1839, 15,000 spindles 
 only were at work; in 1850, they had increased to 
 326,000 ; and in the commencement of 1853 they numbered 
 506,000, 100,000 having been added in 1852 alone. In 
 1829, you had one mill; in 1853, you have nearly one 
 hundred. Our Irish spindles are more numerous than 
 those of England or Scotland, or of any Continental State, 
 
300 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 and they multiply in a continually increasing ratio. Again^ 
 the growth of flax is extending through the whole kingdom, 
 promoted by the successful efforts of enterprising men_, 
 assisted by the invention of new processes and encouraged 
 by a consumption which craves an unlimited supply. In 
 1848, we had 53,868 acres under this crop; in 1849, 
 00,314; in 1850, 91,040; and in 1851, 140,536. It is im- 
 possible to put any bounds to the advantages which flax 
 cultivation, rightly pursued, may create in such a climate 
 and with such a soil as ours, and Ireland should be roused 
 to improve it by the cheering fact, that already the linen 
 and yarn exports of Belfast alone are equal to those of all 
 France and Belgium, and the half of Germany besides. 
 Shall I tell you of the great prosperity which plainly awaits 
 your rising cotton trade ? Or shall I speak of the iron 
 foundries of your town, wdiich have their customers in all 
 the nations of the globe, — in Denmark and Spain, in 
 England and California, — and send out, in triumphant evi- 
 dence of Irish skill and energy, machines which water the 
 plains of Egypt, and press the olives of the South ? Need 
 I remind you of the improvements by which the man of 
 science and the machinist are increasing the productiveness 
 of our agriculture ; or dw^ell upon the new industry, in the 
 extraction of sugar from beet, which has been so successful 
 on the Continent, and promises, from many circumstances, 
 if prosecuted w^isely, to be so valuable here ? 
 
 Of these, and many topics of like interest, the discussion 
 of any one would demand a longer time than this lecture 
 could reasonably occupy. Others, far better qualified for 
 the task, by experience and information, may observe upon 
 them hereafter in this place ; but I have attained my object, 
 if I have said enough to indicate the changes in our national 
 circumstances, which give us the promise of improve- 
 ment, and the development of a wholesome industry 
 by which that promise already begins to be fulfilled. 
 
Hopes of Progress, 301 
 
 For its entire fulfilment, we must look mainly to indi- 
 vidual energy, without neglect of any necessary amend- 
 ment in the laws which especially affect our productive 
 classes. The evils of centuries are not extinguished in an 
 hour ; and there is no royal road by which we can move 
 smoothly to prosperity. Hard work and steady perseverance 
 are to us, as to every people, the conditions of success, and 
 no power will help us, if we do not help ourselves. But 
 we need, also, that the legislation of the time should be 
 suited to its wants. There is truth in the often-quoted 
 
 lines, — ■ 
 
 How small, of all that human hearts endure. 
 That part which kings or laws can cause or cure ! 
 
 And we are sometimes tempted, by the freaks of bungling 
 legislators, to wish that Parliament might go to sleep for 
 half a dozen years, and let the country try, whether it 
 would be much the worse, if its people should merely mind 
 their business and say their prayers. But the ignorant or mis- 
 chievous government of States has undoubtedly been a great 
 producer of human misery. The true province of authority 
 is to give full freedom to a nation's spontaneous industry, 
 and much meddling with it, though from a good design, 
 tends generally to an ill result. And when authority sets 
 itself to meddle injuriously, and puts obstacles in the way 
 of improvement, the mischiefs it has caused must be re- 
 moved, before that improvement can be satisfactorily ac- 
 complished. 
 
 Thus, in Ireland, there has been positive legal inter- 
 ference in many ways with the freedom of our industrial 
 action, paralysing effort, disheartening enterprise, and pro- 
 ducing poverty, with a long train of evils. We require 
 that this interference shall be put an end to. We should 
 not have our efforts cramped by the lingering operation of 
 old systems, the growth of obsolete circumstances and 
 social exigencies which have disappeared. Labour should 
 
302 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 be emancipated from restraints wliicli were put upon it^ 
 when it was without encouragement or honour. The re- 
 strictions on the free and simple transfer of landed pro- 
 perty_, which have been bequeathed to us by feudal ages^ 
 should be done away ; and capital should have the widest 
 field for the exercise of its powers^ and the completest 
 warrant for the security of its productions. The relations 
 of the proprietor and the tenant should be arranged, so that 
 antiquated legal theories shall not be permitted to deny the 
 requirements of natural justice — that each shall possess the 
 property which is truly his, and that the tiller of the soil shall 
 be protected in the enjoyment of the fruit of his industry, 
 and encouraged to improve by the assurance that the wealth 
 he may create shall be fairly secured to him. Already, 
 much has been effected to make our legislation what it 
 ought to be ; and what remains to be done cannot be long 
 delayed. The intelligence of the country has accepted 
 right principles, and will enforce their practical application; 
 and our law will cease to be disgraced by the reproach, 
 that, clinging to the traditions of the past, it refuses to 
 harmonise with reason or is the enemy of progress. 
 
 And, when these things shall be, may we not anticipate 
 that our agriculture and manufactures, overcoming all legal 
 difficulties, by the aid of wise and able men, and relieved 
 from social embarrassments, with which human laws had 
 scarcely power to deal, by the dispensation of Omnipotence, 
 will spring forward in a career of happy and prosperous 
 activity? If I have spoken truly of the material ad- 
 vantages which nature has bestowed upon Ireland, of her 
 virtue, which has been tried through suffering, and her in- 
 telligence, which has been bright and clear in her worst ex- 
 tremity, can we despair of her industry, w^hich must enjoy 
 at last a perfect liberty of action, and continually enlarging 
 opportunities of increase ? Can we despair of it, whilst 
 
Hopes of Progress, 303 
 
 we see around us tlie living evidences of its capabilities and 
 results ? Long years ago^ a ford of the river near to wliose 
 borders we are assembled won a small^ dim place in history, 
 as the scene of a hostile encounter of men and horses. The 
 names of the combatants, and the object of the strife, 
 passed away from human memory ; but the ford gave its 
 old name of Bela Fearsat to the neighbourhood ; and, from 
 time to time, in our meagre annals, we have rare and 
 doubtful glimpses of its fortunes. We see the chieftains 
 and the Norman knights contending for its mastery ; and we 
 read of the castle, which is built to command that ancient 
 ford, gathering around it the dwellings of those who need 
 protection — purveyors to its men-at-arms, perhaps, or 
 humble fishermen ; — and making its precincts busy with the 
 rude forerunners of a vigorous race. The castle sinks to 
 ruin — the military strength with which it awed wide districts 
 melts away — the very position of the ford becomes the sub- 
 ject of legal controversy. But the straggling huts grow 
 into a village, and the village into a town. The natural 
 difficulties of the situation are overcome by persevering- 
 effort. Houses and quays appear where the Irish boatman 
 guided his little currach, and the unwholesome slob was left 
 green and slimy by the receding tide. Commerce rears its 
 marts, and sends out its sails upon the waters. Intelligence 
 and public spirit rise with the rising fortunes of the place ; 
 and, in many a time of national difficulty and trial, it is 
 found to take an honourable part. And, now, we stand 
 upon the spot where the castle and the huts once stood, in 
 the midst of a population, mighty in numbers, and in- 
 creasing by tens of thousands, abounding in hard-won 
 wealth, flinging up its giant factories and its palaces of 
 trade with magical celerity, showing forests of masts in 
 its harbour and the riches of all lands upon its wharfs, offer- 
 ing full employment to every soul within its limits, and 
 
304 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 secure in the attainment of tliat point of progress at which, 
 according to all experience and analogy, it cannot be 
 stationary, but must advance to an indefinitely augmenting 
 prosperity. Is it a vain boast to say, that Belfast has out- 
 run, in the race of progress, many of the proudest cities 
 of the Empire, and exhibited to the world the spectacle of 
 an Irish community, aided by no physical advantages, 
 trusting to no adventitious support, fostered by no patron- 
 age of Cabinets or Parliaments, pampered by no doles from 
 the treasury of the State, by its own inherent energy and 
 determined purpose exalting itself to industrial eminence 
 and social importance, with a speed almost unparalleled, and 
 a success beyond expectation or belief ? What has been 
 done once may well be done again. What one town has 
 achieved cannot be impossible to others more favoured in 
 position and opportunities, and, as you have made your 
 own future clear before you, why should we not anticipate 
 that our awakened people, stirred by the energising in- 
 fluences which begin to thrill through its invigorated frame, 
 will use its great endowments, and grasp the happiness 
 which is within its reach ?* 
 
 I have detained you far too long, but I should leave m}' 
 task unfinished if I failed to say a word of the dangers 
 against w^hich we should be vigilant, whilst we look thus 
 hopefully to the coming time. AYe have seen, in other 
 countries, the growth of manufacturing greatness attended 
 by the worst mischiefs; and it behoves us, if we can, to 
 learn, from their example, the necessity and the means of 
 warding off those mischiefs from ourselves. Great traders, 
 with unbounded capacities for social usefulness, have de- 
 graded themselves, sometimes, to the position of mere 
 money-seekers, without a thought beyond the balance- 
 sheet and the ledger ; and, often, multitudes of men and 
 
 * See Note B.— Patre 315. 
 
Hopes of Progress, 305 
 
 women liave been crowded together, without moral re- 
 straint or intellectual culture, existing only for tlie pro- 
 duction of wealth, and valued and cared for as the spindles 
 and the looms which aid them to produce it. We know 
 that there have been such multitudes — barbarous in their 
 unlettered ignorance, but without the freedom or dignity of 
 savage life, at the very centre of a vainglorious civilisation 
 — seeking their happiness in the base enjoyments of sensual 
 appetite — indifferent to the obligations of religion, its ex- 
 alting influences and its consoling hopes — and passing to 
 their graves, without knowledge of the God who made them 
 or the immortal destiny for which they were created. That 
 such things have been and are, elsewhere, is but too well 
 attested; and, if they must exist in Ireland, as the con- 
 ditions of her material improvement, let us pray earnestly 
 that she may live on in her poverty for ever ! We should 
 purchase that improvement at too dear a price, if it cost us 
 the extinction of the moral life of our people. 
 
 But, there is no necessary connexion between successful 
 industry and ignorance or vice. Labour, rightly governed, 
 is the minister of intelligence, and the guardian of the holi- 
 ness and purity of the soul of man. It was well said in the 
 old time, " Laborare est orareJ' To toil is to pray ! The 
 willing worker, doing his duty with all his strength, offers 
 an acceptable homage to the Maker of the universe, and the 
 blessing of well-ordered thoughts, and regulated morals, 
 and peaceful happiness descends upon him, which is denied 
 to the man who, having work to do — and who in this world 
 has it not, according to his position ? — refuses to do it, or 
 to do it with an earnest heart. And, as it is thus with all 
 honest labour, we have no reason to suppose that the manu- 
 facturing system, which is so wrought up with the very 
 being of our modern society, and will act amongst us_, 
 whether we choose or no, cannot be managed, in its most 
 
 u 
 
3o6 hxland in 1853 : 
 
 successful exercise, whatever may be its dangers, consis- 
 tently with the health and virtue of a nation. 
 
 To capitalists and workmen universally, the pursuit o£ 
 wealth in a commercial state brings peculiar evils to be 
 avoided as well as peculiar advantages to be desired. The 
 position of a man dealing with large transactions, com- 
 municating with distant countries, able to affect for good 
 or ill the fate of crowds of his fellow-beings, may be the 
 noblest in the world, if he will always remember that 
 money-getting is not the single purpose which should 
 absorb his soul, and act accordingly. There is no nobler 
 man when he keeps his hand open, and his mind in- 
 formed, and his heart enlarged by a wise benevolence; 
 when he cultivates the amenities and graces, as he consci- 
 entiously performs the business of life, and makes his own 
 prosperity doubly delightful to him, by generous and cordial 
 care for those whose toil is necessary to its creation. But 
 there is danger to the character of those who are engaged 
 in business, especially in a country in which commerce is 
 new, and quick in its development, and exacting in its 
 claims on time and energy, if they will not cultivate them- 
 selves, and resist, in the strength of knowledge and the 
 spirit of love, the hardening and contracting operation of 
 the appetite for gain. 
 
 And the working man, also, must be aware of perils inci- 
 dent to his own condition. He must not let himself forget 
 that he has in him something greater than his capacity to 
 cast a shuttle or plane a tree — something '^ which was 
 before the elements, and owes no homage to the sun." He 
 must regard himself as gifted with faculties, which cannot 
 be , allowed to slumber, if he w^ould fulfil the purpose 
 of his being, and be entitled to the pure enjoyments of the 
 intellect and the affections, of which Providence has given 
 a monopoly to no c''ass of men. He must be trained habitu- 
 
Hopes of Progress, 307 
 
 ally to exercise tliose faculties^ and possess himself of tliose 
 enjoyments. His danger is_, lest the needful drudgery of 
 the day should make all effort distasteful to him in the hours 
 that remain when it is over; lest he should waste those 
 precious hours in idleness, which is never far from mischief, 
 and prefer injurious excitements to that cultivation of his 
 higher nature which would ennoble his position, and give 
 him a happy home, and endow his children with intelli- 
 gence and virtue. 
 
 Thus, for the capitalist and workman, there are dangers 
 in the walks of industry, as there are dangers, dogging the 
 footsteps of us all, in every path of life. But, although 
 
 Our nature is subdued 
 To what it works in, Hke the dyer's hand, 
 
 each must blame himself, if he succumb to the evil principle 
 in the strife which it is the lot of humanity to wage, from 
 the cradle to the grave. The employer may accumulate 
 wealth, and refuse to be the slave of Mammon, and the 
 operative's faithful service need not make him an unrea- 
 soning machine or a godless reprobate. 
 
 So far, our Irish experience has not taught us that the 
 difficulty of reconciling successful manufacturing effort with 
 physical comfort and purity of manners is insurmountable. 
 In this northern district, where that effort has been most 
 remarkable, and in other districts also, employers have been 
 found who have understood and recognised their grave re- 
 sponsibilities. They have felt, that the human beings whom 
 they collect for the advancement of their fortunes have a 
 claim to their regard which is not fully discharged by the 
 payment of wages from week to week; and they have 
 striven to provide the means of cleanliness, and health, and 
 moral progress for their working people. There are many 
 men in Ireland, as there are in England, too, who deal with 
 
 u 2 
 
3o8 ' Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 the multitudes subjected to their influence^ not with mere 
 monetary justice, but with watchful solicitude and con- 
 siderate kindness ; and find themselves abundantly re- 
 warded,, not only in the confidence and attachment of the 
 objects of their unstipulated bounty, and in the prospect 
 of the happiness they have been enabled to bestow, but in 
 the actual increase of their prosperity, which is secured by 
 the co-operation of grateful and willing hearts. And why 
 should we suppose that men like these, acting with the 
 truest wisdom in their practical beneficence, may not be 
 multiplied as our manufactures grow ? 
 
 So far, also, the working-classes amongst us have not 
 been infected, in any peculiar way, by the twin plagues of 
 ignorance and vice. They have not ceased to value such 
 information as is within their reach. They have other 
 pleasures than those of brutalising intemperance and low 
 debauchery. Your mills, which are thronged by thousands 
 of every age and sex, are not cursed with the impurities 
 which challenge God's vengeance in richer lands ; and it is 
 certain that, in your own town and neighbourhood, there is 
 a singular integrity of morals amongst the people in those 
 mills, and that multitudes of them sanctify their toil by 
 habitual piety. 
 
 Why should not this happy state of things continue ? 
 Many of the industries, which are springing up through 
 Ireland, are perfectly consistent with the moral and physical 
 well-being of the people they employ. And for those who 
 must engage in more dangerous occupations, we may fairly 
 have reliance on the religious spirit which has never aban- 
 doned the hearts of Irishmen, on the intelhgence they are 
 acquiring, and on their innocence of life, which will find its 
 best preservers in the maintenance of that spirit and the 
 advancement of that intelligence. The supply of our great 
 industrial deficiency ought not to involve the loss of any ad- 
 
Hopes of Progress. 309 
 
 vantages which we already enjoy. We enter on our future 
 career^ with reasonable preparation in our actual condition 
 of morals and intellect ; and, though its difficulties must 
 increase as we advance in it, we may trust much, for our- 
 selves and those who may come after us, to the opportunities 
 of national instruction, which are diffused amongst us more 
 widely and more richly than at any former time. The 
 children of the poorest can now command an education 
 more various, more enlarged, and of greater practical 
 utility, than could have been easily purchased by any class 
 within the memory of us all. That education is brought to 
 their doors, and almost forced on their acceptance ; and all 
 our experience of the past forbids us to imagine, that they 
 will refuse to profit, to the very utmost, of its humanising 
 and purifying influences. It is extending and improving 
 year after year, and is capable of indefinite expansion. 
 Already, it accompanies the young toiler to his workshop, 
 and oSers him sound information and effectual training in 
 its schools of design. He is enabled to pursue his daily 
 task, not as a cunningly- devised automaton, but with an 
 intelligent apprehension of the principles of art, and an 
 instructed aptitude in their practical development. He is 
 taught to read and to reflect. He may become familiar with 
 the beautiful in nature and the works of God, and appreciate 
 the noblest creations of human genius and the most fruitful 
 victories of human thought. Those who possess such great 
 advantages, and must possess them, more and more, will be 
 guarded against the evils of their state by the sense of self- 
 respect which grows from intellectual culture, and the moral 
 strength which lifts the educated man above the mean 
 indulgences of appetite and passion. And thus, for the 
 present and the future, we may not unreasonably trust, that 
 Ireland's advancement in prosperity will not materialise or 
 deprave her working people. 
 
3IO Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 But it behoves us^ though we indulge these grateful 
 hopes^ to understand the perils which certainly beset manu- 
 facturing industry_, and encounter them as best we may. 
 We cannot prevent the growth of that industry amongst us. 
 We cannot if we would, and we should not if we could. 
 But whilst we accept the advantages it affords, and rely on 
 the influences of religion as our prime and essential safe- 
 guard in receiving them, we must endeavour, by virtuous 
 example and kindly counsel — by promoting the spread of 
 a wholesome literature, and encouraging habits of manly 
 thought — by securing all fit appliances for the health and 
 comfort of the general community — by sustaining and en- 
 larging the means of popular instruction, and endeavour- 
 ing, so far as may be possible, at once to elevate its cha- 
 racter and connect it with the business of life — and by 
 providing opportunities of healthful recreation and innocent 
 enjoyment, which may avail the working man in his rare 
 hours of repose, and train him to the love of simple pleasures, 
 — thus, and by ways like these, we must endeavour, 
 whilst wo attain the blessings of that necessary industry, 
 to avert the mischiefs which have sprung from it in other 
 countries. '^ Forewarned, forearmed ! '^ It is our business 
 to profit by their sad experience ; and it will be our folly 
 and our shame, if we do not better their example. 
 
 I have run lightly over a large subject, and indicated some 
 of the circumstances which seem to me to warrant better hope 
 for Ireland than we could have reasonably indulged, at any 
 former time. I would not deceive you with false expecta- 
 tions or vain promises. We have been long too prone to 
 indulge in enthusiasm of feeling and extravagance of phrase ; 
 and, once and again, we have allowed ourselves to be de- 
 luded by prospects of improvement, as unsubstantial as the 
 phantom islands which show their fairy beauty on our 
 Northern waters, in the stillness of the summer evening. 
 
Hopes of Progress, 311 
 
 and vanisli like a dream. Our expectations may be 
 disappointed, but, judging with, the calmest reason, 
 we may believe tliat our darkest hour is overpast, and 
 feel ourselves stimulated to advance by the assurance 
 that, at last, the course is fairly open before us. Dynasties 
 have been exalted and destroyed — empires have risen and 
 decayed — power and riches have passed from land to land, 
 in continual alternations of victory and defeat, during the 
 centuries which have seen Ireland always distracted, always 
 weak, always miserable. For her only there was no redemp- 
 tion. To her only hope came not, that came to all. She had 
 no place in the march of nations — no profit from the revolu- 
 tions of the world. But, even for her, the day-spring has 
 arisen, and she touches the opening of a great career. 
 " All estates," says Sir Thomas Browne, " arise to their 
 zenith and vertical points according to their predestinated 
 periods; for the lives not only of men but of common- 
 wealths, and the whole world, run not upon a helix which still 
 enlargeth, but on a circle where, arriving to their meridian, 
 they decline in obscurity, and fall under the horizon again/^ 
 So far, this, the common lot, has not been ours in later 
 ages. Our rising remains to be accomplished. The shadow 
 of our obscurity has not passed away. But, looking around 
 us and before us, we may rejoice in the hope, that we, too, 
 approach the beginning of our ^^ predestinated period.''^ 
 And, as we learn that there is more of equality in the con- 
 ditions of individuals and communities than is at first apparent, 
 when we consider the dealings of Providence with the entire 
 life of the individual, and the many generations which make 
 up the life of the community, we may have humble trust 
 that, in its eternal counsels, there are reserved for Ireland 
 a happiness which may counterbalance her heavy suSering, 
 and a dignity proportionate to her deep humiliation. 
 
 The principle of compensation pervades the universe. 
 
312 Ireland /;^ 1853 : 
 
 Pleasure finds its cHastener in the pain which, waits upon 
 excess, and the luxuriance of prosperity is near akin to the 
 rankness of decay. The dream of our poet may be a pro- 
 phec3^ The Pariah of the nations may take her place 
 above those who for ages have held her in contempt ; and 
 countries, which are swollen with the pride of dominion 
 and the exuberance of wealth, may be broken in the dust, 
 when ours shall mount to greatness, and become, in her 
 riches, as in her beauty and her virtue, what your own 
 Drennan, who loved her well, proclaimed her, long- 
 ago,— 
 
 The Arch of the Ocean, the Queen of the "West ! 
 
 She has the natural freshness, and the unexhausted vigour, 
 and the salient life of a young people, whilst she is per- 
 mitted to enjoy the benefits of a matured civilisation, and 
 boast herself *^ the heir of all the ages,^^ the heir of their 
 old experience and their hoarded wisdom. Of a country so 
 gifted, and with such a future, let us think worthily, and 
 act up to the measure of our thoughts. Let us refuse to 
 despair of Ireland any longer; let us have faith in her 
 rising fortune, and advance it with all our strength ; let us 
 acknowledge the wickedness of our mad dissensions; let us 
 cherish the spirit of mutual love and trust; and appreciat- 
 ing the power of honest effort, and the nobleness of self- 
 dependence, let us strive together — each in his own sphere, 
 by work or word — to lift her from her low condition, and 
 build on a solid foundation her new prosperity, in our 
 successful industry, our pure morals, and our enlarged in- 
 telHgence. 
 
Hopes of Progress. 
 
 313 
 
 Note A.— Page 286. 
 
 The following summary of proceedings in the Encumbered Estate*' 
 Court, to the month of July, 1851, is of great general interest. I am 
 indebted for it to Mr. Locke's very valuable work, "Ireland's Re- 
 covery '' : — 
 
 Gross amount of rentals of estates sold 
 in Court by public action 
 
 By provincial auction, confirmed by 
 the Commissioners ... 
 
 By proposal accepted by the Commis- 
 sioners (about) 
 
 £535,614 12 6 Gross rental. 
 98,659 8 3 
 95,000 
 
 Total 
 
 Number of Acres sold by public 
 auction in Court 
 
 By provincial auction, confirmed by 
 The Commissioners... 
 
 By proposal accepted by the Commis- 
 sioners (about) 
 
 Total 
 
 £729,274 9 
 
 A. R. P. 
 
 1,036,137 2 37 Acreage. 
 
 205,564 2 8 
 
 450,000 
 
 1,691,702 1 5 
 
 Summary of the amounts of the purchase-money realised by sales in 
 the several provinces : — 
 
 Province of Leinster £2,767,640 5 2 
 
 „ Ulster 2,173,202 9 8 
 
 „ Munster 3,270,287 19 11 
 
 „ Connaught 2,218,762 10 4 
 
 Total 
 
 £10,429,893 5 1 
 
 Classification of sales according to the amount of the purchase-money 
 in individual cases : — 
 
 £L000 
 
 and 
 under. 
 
 £1.000 
 to 
 
 £2,000 
 
 £2,000 
 to 
 
 £5,000 
 
 £5,000, 
 
 to 
 £10,000 
 
 £10,000 
 
 to 
 £20,000 
 
 £20,000 
 
 and 
 upwards. 
 
 Total num- 
 ber of 
 Purchasers. 
 
 1,789 
 
 929 
 
 868 
 
 463 
 
 134 
 
 30 
 
 4,213 
 
 1 
 
H 
 
 Ireland in 1853 : 
 
 No. of Proper- 
 ties purchased 
 by English and 
 Scotch' 
 Purchasers, 
 
 N'umber 
 
 of 
 
 Purchasers. 
 
 Provinces. 
 
 Acreage. 
 
 Purchase-money. 
 
 32 
 
 24 
 71 
 46 
 
 35 
 15 
 75 
 
 56 
 
 Leinster, 
 Ulster, 
 Munster, 
 Connaught, 
 
 A. R. P. 
 
 43,484 3 10 
 
 51,866 36 
 
 68,862 2 2 
 
 332,723 21 
 
 £ s. d. 
 330,165 
 324,517 
 504,161 12 6 
 620,765 
 
 173 
 
 181 
 
 Total 
 
 496,936 2 29 
 
 1779,608 12 6 
 
 Classification of English and Scotch Purchasers according to the 
 amount of the purchase-money in individual cases : — 
 
 £1,000 
 
 and 
 under. 
 
 £1,000 
 
 to 
 £2,000 
 
 £2,000 
 
 to 
 £5,000 
 
 £5,000 
 
 to 
 £10,000 
 
 £10,000 
 
 to 
 £20,000 
 
 £20,000 
 
 and 
 upwards. 
 
 Total numb'r 
 of English 
 and Scotch 
 Purchasers. 
 
 31 
 
 38 
 
 45 
 
 30 
 
 17 
 
 20 
 
 181 
 
 Chancery estates sold, and how long 
 
 Chancery :— 
 
 
 Over 3 and under 5 years 
 
 . 
 
 » 5 „ 10 
 
 ... 
 
 „ 10 „ 15 
 
 
 „ 15 „ 20 
 
 
 „ 20 „ 25 
 
 
 „ 25 „ 30 
 
 
 „ 30 ., 35 
 
 
 » 35 „ 40 
 
 
 „ 40 „ 45 
 
 
 „ 45 „ 50 
 
 
 „ 50 years 
 
 
 they were severally in 
 
 219 
 
 364 
 
 167 
 
 89 
 
 46 
 
 31 
 
 22 
 
 17 
 
 6 
 
 4 
 
 9 
 
 Total 
 
 974 
 
Hopes of Progress. 3 1 5 
 
 Note B.— Page 304. 
 
 The comparative progress of Belfast, commercially, may be understood 
 from reference to the increase of tonnage entering its port and that of 
 Liverpool, respectively, for the last twenty and fifty years : — 
 
 During the last twenty years, the tonnage entering the Port of Liver- 
 pool increased — 
 
 From ... 1,590,461 tons, in 1833, 
 
 To ... 3,912,506 „ „ 1852. 
 
 Or equal to about 145 per cent. 
 
 The tonnage entering Belfast, in 1833, was 233,121 tons. 
 
 But, in 1851, it had increased to 650,938 „ 
 
 Or equal to an increase of 180 per cent., or 35 per cent, more than Liver- 
 pool, during the last twenty years. Going back for fifty years, we find 
 the following result : — 
 
 In 1801, the tonnage which entered Liverpool was ... 459,719 tons. 
 In 1852 3,912,506 „ 
 
 Or equal to an increase of about eight and one-half fold. 
 
 In 1801, the tonnage which entered the Port of Belfast 
 
 was 54,338 tons. 
 
 In 1851 630,938 „ 
 
 Or equal to an increase of twelve-fold. 
 
 As to the growth of the population of Belfast, it appears that the first 
 census was taken in 1757 (96 years ago). It then possessed 1,779 houses, 
 containing 7,993 Protestants and 556 Eoman Catholics. Total, 8,549. 
 Of these, 1,800 were able to bear arms. The number of handlooms for 
 weaving linen was 399. The present population of Belfast (1853) is about 
 110,000, including Ballymacarrett, or equal to an average increase of 
 1,057 persons per annum ; and the number of spindles employed in spin- 
 ing flax by machinery, as has been stated, exceeds 500,000 ! 
 
 The position of Belfast as a commercial port in relation to other Irish 
 towns, will be understood by a reference to the foliowiiig table, compiled 
 
i6 
 
 Ireland 211 1853 : 
 
 by Braithwaite Pool, Esq., of a return of vessels registered at each port 
 in Ireland, with the tonnage entered and cleared, in 1851 : — 
 
 i 
 
 Vessels. 
 
 Tons, 
 
 Tonnape Entered 
 and Cleared. 
 
 1 Belfast 
 
 462 
 
 74,770 
 
 1,089,096 
 
 Cork 
 
 422 
 
 51,702 
 
 681,152 
 
 Dublin 
 
 444 
 
 39,353 
 
 1,393,822 
 
 Limerick 
 
 101 
 
 12,291 
 
 154,591 
 
 Newry 
 
 148 
 
 9,568 
 
 171,268 
 
 Waterford 
 
 190 
 
 22,750 
 
 359,563 
 
 All other Ports 
 
 482 
 
 51,000 
 
 1,146,886 
 
TRALEE ELECTION, 1863, 
 
The Tralee Election, 1863. 
 
 [This Address was delivered on the Hustings at the close of the Election 
 for Tralee, 1863.] 
 
 ELECTORS of Tralee^ — I thank you for the great honour 
 you have done me^ in making me the representative of 
 your ancient borough. I thank you, even more, for the manner 
 in which you have bestowed that honour ; — for the universal 
 kindness, the generous confidence, the cordial enthusiasm 
 which have met me, on every side, since I came amongst 
 you. I am, comparatively, a stranger to you — and yet not 
 quite a stranger. My voice has before been heard in this 
 Court-house, for defence and for prosecution — for the sub- 
 ject and the Sovereign ; and, on my visits to Tralee, I have 
 ever had a friendly greeting and a hearty welcome. And 
 I have now a closer connexion with your county, since a 
 most dear relative of mine has come to govern, in the heart 
 of its glorious mountains, a community devoted to Grod^s 
 holy service, in the education of the ignorant and the solace 
 of the poor. 
 
 You have returned me for Tralee, in the teeth of an 
 opposition of so strange a character, that this election will 
 be memorable in the history of such contests ; and with a 
 facility and completeness of success which, seem to me mar- 
 vellous, when I consider the multiplied agencies successively 
 arrayed against me. I have had three antagonists, and of 
 
320 Tralee Election, 1863. 
 
 every one of them I shall speak with sincere respect : Firsts 
 the Lord Mayor of Dublin, a personal friend of my own, a 
 member of my own great profession, the scion of a noble 
 house. Next, Captain Knox, a gentleman of high respect- 
 ability, distinguished in arms and in literature, and the 
 controller of an influential organ of Conservative opinion. 
 And finally, Mr. Denny, representing the proprietor of your 
 town, with all the strength which the great territorial 
 jDOSsessions of his brother and his own continual residence 
 amongst you may naturally supply. One after another, they 
 have tried their fortune ; and, one after another, they have 
 been compelled to retire. A fourth candidate, claiming 
 your voices as the heir of an Irish earldom, showed himself 
 in the lists, but vanished almost as soon as he appeared ; 
 and I do not number him amongst my real adversaries. 
 Towards all of them I have the kindliest feeling; but I 
 should be untrue to you, and to the great principles of 
 political morality, if I did not pronounce, in your name, the 
 strongest condemnation of that monstrous and unnatural 
 alliance which has vainly essayed to overbear your inde- 
 pendent action. In this free land, there must be jarring 
 opinions on public questions ; and every man, who honestly 
 asserts his own, is entitled to receive a fair and impartial 
 hearing. "VVe are bound to concede to our fellows the 
 liberty of thought and action which we claim as our 
 dearest privilege. The earnest Catholic and the honest 
 Protestant, the stanch old Tory and the advanced Liberal, 
 each is entitled to have his convictions respected by those 
 who differ from him. Under our Constitution, there were, 
 will always be, conflicting parties. They are a necessity 
 and a blessing. They control the conduct and correct 
 the errors of representatives and ministers; and forbid 
 the unhealthy stagnation of public sentiment. But was it 
 ever believed before that the professing advocates of Irish 
 
Tralee Election, 1863. 321 
 
 riglits and their bitter and outspoken adversaries — tlie ex- 
 tremest assertors of popular privilege and those who are 
 utterly opposed to its least extension, — the Conservative 
 and the Revolutionist, the Catholic and the Orangeman, — 
 could range themselves under the same banner and utter 
 a common war-cry ? Yet that ominous and unheard-of 
 €onjunction has been exhibited in your town, throughout 
 this contest. It is the birth of these latter times. It was 
 unknown to our fathers. May it not be bequeathed as an 
 «evil inheritance to those who shall come after us ! 
 
 Monstruui liorreiidum, ingens ! 
 
 Its existence would be incredible, if you had not seen it 
 flaunted, with frontless audacity, in the face of day. Since 
 Monday last, your streets have continually echoed with 
 harangues from men who on no one question, secular or 
 -sacred, have the slightest unity of thought, — combined 
 for the single purpose of accomplishing, by any means, 
 the defeat of a political adversary. The Lord Mayor of 
 Dublin — the elect of the Conservatives of its Corporation* — 
 brings with him to Tralee the eloquent editor of the Nation. f 
 Captain KnoxJ is sustained by the fiery oratory of Father 
 Lavelle. They have stood shoulder to shoulder, and uttered 
 alternate appeals to the passions and the prejudices of the 
 multitude, attempting to prevail by the wildest confusion of 
 principles and the most reckless disregard of the recognised 
 distinctions of party and of creed. Even if they had suc- 
 ceeded in defeating me, their triumph would have been a 
 disaster to the cause of Toryism ; for it would have heen 
 a triumph revolting to the moral sense and the manly spirit 
 of all who value consistency of principle and integrity of 
 
 * The Hon. J. P. Vercker. t IMr. A. M. Sullivan. 
 
 :|: The late Guptain Knox, then proprietor of the Irish Times. 
 
 X 
 
32 2 Tralee Election, 1863. 
 
 political conduct. As it is, they have been routed from 
 the field ; and their discomfiture, whilst it will damage the 
 Conservative party, will be hailed with rejoicing throughout 
 the empire, as a formidable check to the political demoral- 
 isation which their success might have spread, like a pesti- 
 lence, amongst our constituencies. 
 
 Personally, all the candidates have acted in the spirit of 
 gentlemen, and I have to thank them all for great courtesy 
 and consideration. Mr. Denny entered on the contest at a 
 late period. He found that an overwhelming majority of 
 the people gave me their warm support, and were resolute 
 to abide by their promises, with a firmness which makes 
 me deeply the debtor of all of them, — Catholic and Pro- 
 testant, Conservative and Liberal, — for I numbered amongst 
 my friends electors of very various opinions, who believed 
 me capable of service to your borough and to Ireland. As 
 an honourable man, he declined to seek success by attempt- 
 ing to coerce or cajole them to an abandonment of their 
 spontaneous pledges ; and when he found his position 
 hopeless, he gave me prompt notice of his resolution to 
 withdraw. I am confident that, great as his influence 
 unquestionably is, I should have prevailed, even if he had 
 been a candidate from the earliest moment ; but I owe it to 
 him to acknowledge, that his conduct was such as might 
 have been anticipated from a gentleman of his character 
 and position. 
 
 I am bound, however, to correct an erroneous statement, 
 which appears in his retiring address of yesterday. There 
 is no ground for the assertion that, before I came to Tralee, 
 pledges had been made and votes promised to me. When 
 I came, I believed that there was in the minds of the 
 Electors a good feeling towards me ; I believed that there 
 were many of you ready to receive me, with trust in my 
 honour and reliance on my truth. But when I arrived 
 
Tralee Election, 1863. 
 
 0^0 
 
 on last Saturday night, no man was bound to me. I came 
 to throw myself upon the people. I came to ask them 
 whether my character and my life gave me no claim on an 
 Irish constituency ? I came, assured that I should, at least, 
 command a fair and favourable hearing. And how was I 
 received ? How am I surrounded now ? Look at those 
 who are before you, — your wealthiest merchants, your 
 leading professional men, the most influential and intelli- 
 gent of every class of your community ; and there, in his 
 green old age, stands the distinguished man (James 
 O^Connell) who worthily represents a name which must 
 be undying whilst Ireland is a nation. He came from his 
 distant home to meet me ; he remained with me throughout 
 the contest ; if I had been his own dearest child, he could 
 not have treated me with more untiring kindness ; and, 
 as he stood by me through every stage of the struggle, he 
 is here to grace the victory by his venerable and noble 
 presence. When I came here, I knew scarcely a human 
 beiug in your town. I had never seen your good Vicar- 
 General and Parish Priest* in all my life. On the day after 
 my arrival, I was invited to meet him and the most influ- 
 ential members of the constituency at your Chamber of 
 Commerce, — an institution which represents worthily the 
 intelligence, integrity, and independence of your borough. 
 Your foremost men received me; your Yicar-General re- 
 ceived me ; I was introduced by Mr. Henry Donovan, to 
 whose stirring eloquence I owe so much to-day, and of 
 whom I shall only say that, having known him for one little 
 week, I understand and honour his clear, straightforward, 
 and manly character, as if I had been his familiar friend 
 through all my life. He introduced me to the Chamber 
 of Commerce — I spoke to its assembled members — I 
 
 * The Very Rev. Dr. ]Mawe. 
 X 2 
 
024 Tralec Election, 1863. 
 
 spoke to tliem, with plain and simple truthfulness, as to 
 my position and my views of public things; and, when I 
 had spoken, your Yicar-General rose up and proposed that 
 I should be accepted as the future representative of 
 Tralee. His proposal was received with unanimous ac- 
 clamation ; every gentleman in the room instantly pledged 
 himself in writing to support me, and from that hour 
 my election was secure. This brief explanation of the 
 course of events I have been driven to offer by the mis- 
 conception to which Mr. Denny^s address may have given 
 currency. 
 
 And now, a word about myself. I would fain avoid it ; 
 but attacks on my personal position, of the most various 
 and inconsistent kinds, make it essential that I should 
 defend it, and prove that you have not chosen an un- 
 worthy Representative. I have been resisted and assailed, 
 not from any allegation that I am incapable or unfit to 
 represent your borough ; but because I hold, in Ireland, 
 the place of first law officer of the Crown. My worst 
 adversaries have been good enough to acknowledge that, 
 if I were not Attorney-General, no Liberal or Catholic 
 constituency in the country need hesitate to commit to me 
 the high trust of guarding its public interests. And, 
 without vanity or egotism, I may presume to say that the 
 admission is reasonably justified, because I have been offered, 
 from time to time, the spontaneous suffrages of many such 
 constituencies. Before I attained the first place at the Bar 
 of Ireland, I declined them all. I have not had much desire 
 for a political career. I have been content to do my duty 
 in the quiet walks of my profession ; and I have not sought 
 promotion through the avenue of Parliament. I have not 
 desired your representation to advance my personal in- 
 terests. Standing where I am, I do not promote those 
 interests bv entering the House of Common>; and I enter 
 
Tralee Election, 1863. 325 
 
 it only because I can so best discharge the obb'gations, 
 and utiHse for pubUc purposes the influence, of the office 
 which I hold. 
 
 I do not come here to apologise for my possession of that 
 office. I hold no terms with the preposterous doctrine, that 
 a Catholic Irishman, faithful to his Church and true to his 
 country, is to ostracise himself, and decline a position of 
 dignity and power which he may have won by honest effort 
 and fair capacity. I am not unknown to Ireland. For 
 many a long year, my name has been familiar to her people; 
 and they have judged me not unworthy of much confidence 
 and much affection. I have never feared to avow my 
 principles ; I have never shrunk from the endeavour to 
 advance them. To men of my own religion, who have 
 mainly urged this argument agaiust me, it is thoroughly 
 known, that no year, for twenty which are gone, 
 has passed without some public service of mine to those 
 with whom, in race and sentiment, I am proud to be 
 identified ; — that there is no district, through the wide 
 realm of Ireland, in w^iich prelates, and priests, and lay- 
 men will not be found to testify to such service, rendered 
 with cordial and unpurchased zeal, whenever it could avail 
 for a good purpose. I belonged to a circuit which used to 
 be designated, far excellence, the Protestant Circuit of 
 Ireland. I fought my way to its foremost ranks; necessarily, 
 almost exclusively, sustained by those w^ho had no sympathy 
 with my religious convictions, and carrying with me, I 
 believe, their respect and kindly feeling. On my relations 
 with them, my professional progress has mainly depended; 
 and what I have done for my own people, I have done from 
 no hope of profit or wish to advance myself. 
 
 When the Attorney-Generalship was oftered to me by 
 those who knew well the course of my life and the 
 principles I had ever asserted, it was offered without 
 
326 Tralee Election, 1863. 
 
 solicitation, and accepted without qualification or con- 
 dition — without change of that course or compromise of 
 those principles. 
 
 For many generations, the just complaint of the Catholics 
 of Ireland has been, that, in their own land, they have been 
 without influence; that they have been excluded from 
 positions of trust and power ; that they have been a subject 
 people, ruled by a sectarian ascendency; that, in all offices 
 of importance — in the administration of public affairs, in 
 the magistracy, and in the courts of justice, — they have 
 found themselves excluded from the advantages possessed 
 by their fellow-subjects ; that they have been forbidden the 
 enjoyment of the means of social advancement, and fit 
 opportunities for the protection of their dearest interests. 
 Well, thank God ! The times have changed. A great con- 
 stitutional struggle — one of the most remarkable in the 
 history of the world, conducted to a triumphant issue by a 
 man of matchless intrepidity and eloquence — has thrown 
 open to them the portals of the Constitution, and enabled 
 them to compete, on equal terms, with their countrymen of 
 other denominations. And is it to be said that they are, of 
 their own accord, to forge again the fetters which were 
 broken by O^Connell ? Are they voluntarily to re-assume 
 the yoke which the Legislature has taken from their necks ? 
 Are they practically to re-enact the code of exclusion against 
 themselves, return voluntarily to the enslavement from 
 which they have escaped, after centuries of struggle and 
 sacrifice, and decline every opportunity of establishing, in 
 action, that social and religious equality which the law, at 
 last, permits them to achieve ? I, at least, shall never be a 
 party to a policy so insanely suicidal. I shall never agree 
 to abandon the vantage-ground we have so hardly gained, 
 or to aid the Catholic people, by any act of mine, in placing 
 themselves once more, with incredible fatuity, beneath the 
 
T^^atec Election, 1863. 327 
 
 heel of an iron domination from which they have been 
 legally enfranchised. I do not believe that^ in any other 
 nation, a policy so plainly destructive to its highest interests 
 would be advocated or adopted by any man pretending to 
 the possession of public spirit or common sense. There- 
 fore, when office was offered to me, I felt it a duty, not to 
 myself only, but to the community to which I belong, to 
 accept it; and I did accept it, as I have said, with- 
 out abandonment of an opinion or compromise of a 
 principle. 
 
 I am before you now, as I was when I laboured to 
 organise the Catholic Bar against the Ecclesiastical Titles 
 Bill, and received the unanimous thanks of the Catholic 
 Hierarchy; or when I drafted the declaration of the 
 Catholics of Ireland against the assault upon our Conventual 
 Institutions, and aided, to the best of my power, in the 
 effort by which that assault was successfully repelled; or 
 when, on very numerous occasions, I strove, as best I 
 could, professionally and otherwise, to secure justice and 
 protection for the Catholic priesthood and the Catholic 
 people. 
 
 I have been assailed by the marvellous combination to 
 which I have adverted, and its supporters in the press, 
 because I have taken office under the existing Government; 
 not as adopting the policy of all its members, or approving, 
 in any measure, many of the words which have been 
 uttered by some of them; — but because, between the 
 great parties in the State, which alternately and neces- 
 sarily assume authority I prefer, beyond all comparison, 
 a Liberal to a Tory administration. On questions of 
 foreign policy there is not any substantial difference between 
 them. Both are guided by the opinion of the majority of 
 the House of Commons, and neither could endure for a 
 week if that opinion were defied. But the attempt which 
 
328 Tralee Election, 1863. 
 
 has been made to identify me with sentiments of hostility 
 to the Holy See^ whether they are those of the Conservative- 
 JMinister who proclaimed the Pope^s dominions ''the plague- 
 spot of Italy/^ or by a Minister on the other side^ is utterly 
 UD justifiable. I am a Catholic, from the fullest conviction- 
 of my understanding — with the sincerest devotion of my 
 heart. I venerate the Holy Father as the supreme pastor 
 of the Catholic Church, who is at once the chief of the- 
 oldest monarchy of Christendom, and the spiritual ruler of 
 two hundred millions of men ; and I shall never be a party 
 to outrage on his august person, or abridgment of his 
 perfect independence. I especially venerate the existing* 
 Pontiff, who is endowed with the loftiest virtue and the 
 gentlest spirit of Christian benevolence — who demonstrated 
 his willingness to advance the freedom of his people, until 
 the spirit of revolution answered his favours with gross^ 
 ingratitude — whom all men, of all religions, approach with 
 reverence and leave with loving admiration. I do not hold 
 myself bound, in any way, to adopt any expressions in his 
 regard, which are not most affectionate and respectful ; and 
 I repel the imputation which would fix on me responsibility 
 ibr their utterance. 
 
 But, looking to Ireland, the land of my birth, my afiec- 
 tions, and my hopes; feeling that I am, like yourselves, in 
 blood and spirit. 
 
 Kindly Irish of the Irish ; 
 
 and feeling, too, that whilst we should girdle the world with 
 our sympathies, the simplest instincts of our nature and the 
 most cultivated reason combine to teach us, that our own 
 country should be the object of our dearest care, — I ask 
 myself, what public course her interests dictate to those- 
 who seek her welfare ? And whilst I see that, as to affairs 
 abroad, there is much identity in the views of English 
 
Tralee Election, 1863. 329 
 
 statesmen, I note a difiference of the completest kind as 
 to their policy at home. The difference is this, that, 
 under a Liberal ministry, those who accord in sentiment 
 and feehng with the mass of the Irish people have a fair 
 chance of obtaining power to serve them ; whilst a Tory 
 government, from the very necessity of the case, — from its 
 traditions, its connexions, and the obligations implied in its 
 existence, — cannot if it would, and would not if it could, 
 afford to that people such an arrangement of afiairs as can 
 give them any ground for confidence or attachment. Twice 
 within twelve years the Conservatives have had the rule of 
 Ireland; and ask yourselves, how many Roman Catholics 
 were admitted to a position of trust or influence nnder 
 either of their administrations ? The practical development 
 of the principle of the Kelief Act — the promotion of social 
 and religious equality — may be expected from the Liberal 
 party. All experience, and all the circumstances of the 
 country, make it hopeless that, under the Tories, such a 
 development can take place. I shall not enter into a 
 detailed argument on this great question ; but I have said 
 so much to show that, in my judgment, for Irishmen and 
 Irish interests, there is abundant reason to determine— as 
 between the possible rulers of the Empire — against those 
 who have never abandoned the principle of exclusion; 
 never repudiated the system of ascendency; never con- 
 ceded to the Irish people the privilege of a reasonable 
 share in the control of their tribunals, the administration of 
 justice, or the management of the institutions which most 
 affect their social well-being. 
 
 Need I tell you this, in a Court-house which still seems 
 to resound with the indignant shouts of the freeholders of 
 Kerry, when they met, in their strength, and gave its 
 death-blow to the Derby administration, — because from 
 the jury-box before you, on a political trial, its officers had 
 
^^o Tralee Election, 1863. 
 
 driven away every Catholic gentleman, — although tlie men 
 who were so insulted and outraged were amongst the 
 worthiest and the wealthiest, the most intelligent, the most 
 virtuous, and the most upright in the land ? Is all this 
 forgotten ? Can those who, for the past week, have raved 
 against the rational friends of liberty and Ireland, and 
 fawned, like spaniels, on a party which despises and 
 abhors, but condescends to use, them — can they induce 
 the country to forget that latest illustration of the un- 
 changed spirit of Tory rule ? 
 
 Or if, indeed, the memory of wrong be as fleeting as, 
 with some amongst us, appears to be the memory of 
 benefit and the gratitude which that memory should breed, 
 and if the lapse of three short years have obliterated from 
 the mind of Ireland the story of the trial of Daniel Sullivan, 
 at least there is at this moment in action before her eyes a 
 proceeding in the House of Commons, which — if anything 
 could check the phrenetic folly of a small section of noisy 
 people, who again invite Toryism to come and crush them- 
 selves and their country, — ought surely to have that 
 wholesome influence. In the prisons of England there 
 are multitudes of Roman Catholic convicts — very many of 
 them poor Irishmen and Irishwomen — who have fallen 
 from the ways of virtue, but have not lost the faith of the 
 Church. As the law stands, the priesthood are practically 
 excluded from the Enghsh gaols, and their Catholic 
 inmates are left without spiritual consolation or moral 
 guidance — without the chance of reformation through their 
 punishment — with the certainty, that it will only harden 
 their hearts, and make them more abandoned reprobates, 
 and more dangerous enemies of society, when they come 
 forth from the cells in which reliofion misfht have sfuided 
 them to penitence and peace, and prepared them to become 
 useful and law-respecting citizens. That this might be 
 
Tralec Election, i86 
 
 accomplislied, the Home Secretary^* a man of large heart 
 and noble nature, introduced a Bill into the House of 
 Commons, making some provision for the free access of 
 Eoman Catholic clergymen to Roman Catholic prisoners. 
 One would have thought it impossible, at this time of day, 
 to imagine opposition to such a measure — a moderate and 
 guarded measure — from any man of any religion, having 
 any regard to the dictates of humanity, the charity of 
 the Gospel or the manifest necessities of our social state. 
 Yet that measure has been virulently opposed, opposed 
 a outrance, by a powerful party, including many good men, 
 whose better reason has been clouded by their deep hatred 
 of Catholicism ; and, though some leading members of that 
 party have had the wisdom and the manliness to separate 
 themselves from the vast majority, the representatives of 
 Irish Orangeism are banded to defeat the efforts of the 
 minister who ventures to offer to the Catholic prisoner the 
 comfort and salvation, here and hereafter, which he might 
 find in the spiritual counsels and sacramental rites of the 
 priesthood of his faith. And yet, in the face of this 
 astounding fact. Catholics are to be found, and you have 
 seen them intrude themselves amongst you, who tell you 
 that the Catholic voters of Tralee should return to Parlia- 
 ment those who are identified in feeling, in thought, and in 
 open and bold profession, with the party which so tramples 
 on principles most dear to you ; in preference to a man 
 whose true allegiance to those principles even they do not 
 dare to question, and to a Government which is threatened 
 with defeat because it has ventured to propose a measure 
 of charity and mercy, on behalf of the helpless and 
 friendless Catholic criminal. 
 
 On my own part, I repel and denounce the doctrine of 
 
 * Then Sir George Grey. 
 
332 Tralee Election, 1863. 
 
 these men and their abettors ; and you have given it the 
 most emphatic condemnation^ in making me, to-day, your 
 representative. I have taken office — I have taken it under 
 the Government which is so resisted and assailed, and in 
 opposition to the parties so banded against me ; and you 
 have declared in electing me — and your judgment will be 
 of weight and power with the Irish people — that I should 
 have foregone my duty, not so much to myself as te 
 those whose public interests are dear to me, and who have 
 given me their regard, if I had declined to take it on such 
 grounds as are urged with a virulent acerbity only equalled 
 by their insensate folly; and prevented, perhaps for a 
 generation, the promotion of one other Catholic to the 
 place of usefulness and honour w^liich I have occupied, and 
 shall continue to occupy, w^tli honest impartiality, for the 
 benefit of all my countrymen. 
 
 You do not approve of all the acts of the existing^ 
 Administration, or adopt the principles of all the states- 
 men who compose it ; but you know that we are living in 
 a "work-day world,'' and not in the dreamland of Utopia. 
 You do not desire, that Irishmen should exclude themselves 
 from Irish offices, until they can establish a Government 
 perfect beyond exception, realising all their expectations, 
 and satisfying all their hopes ; and, in making a choice 
 between those who hold power and those who desire to 
 hold it, you do not forget, that some of the Ministers who 
 have become unpopular with many of our countrymen, 
 from occurrences of latter days, were our true friends 
 when friends were needed most, fought out the battle of 
 Religious Freedom in the face of all discouragement, and 
 remained for many a year in opposition, repelled by the 
 Court and distrusted by the people of England because 
 they were bent on achieving our Emancipation. Neither 
 are you unmindful that those Ministers have colleagues — 
 
TraUe Election, 1863. '^'>)'h 
 
 sucli men as the Duke of Newcastle, and Mr. Gladstone, 
 and Mr. Cardwell, and Sir Eoundell Palmer, who — actinq- 
 in a wise and courageous spirit, wliicli has guided them in 
 many things besides — at the peril of their political exist- 
 ence, breasted the tide of British prejudice and passion 
 during the discussion of the Titles Bill, and maintained 
 against it, with the Catholics of Ireland and England, a 
 struggle which, though unsuccessful, was not inglorious or 
 without great practical results. Nor do you forget that 
 you owe to them a Viceroy who has nobly associated an 
 illustrious name with the history of our country, by 
 devoting to her service, through his long public life, his 
 genial heart and accomplished intellect. You do not 
 forget these things — I do not forget them. We cannot 
 allow a bitter feeling of the hour to sponge out from our 
 memories all the sacrifices and services of the j^ears that 
 are gone; and with the men to whom we owe those 
 services and sacrifices I choose to act, rather than with 
 their adversaries, who have no claim upon our gratitude for 
 the past or title to our confidence in the future. 
 
 I am Attorney- General, and, save in the assumption of 
 that high office, I am as I have ever been. I have never 
 wavered in devotion to ray principles, or shrunk from 
 avowing them ; and it is a mean and poor conception, that, 
 for the emoluments of office cr the possession of authority, 
 I could forget my honour or palter with my conscience. 
 If any man dares to make the imputation, I answer by 
 pointing to the conduct of a life, which has not been idle 
 or hidden from my countrymen. It is too late for me to 
 alter that conduct, for any consideration which the earth can 
 give me. The shadow of a great sorrow has not fallen 
 upon my heart, without making me very careless of the 
 aims of mere worldly ambition ; and I am not likely now 
 — I trust I never have been — for any worldly benefit, to 
 
334 Tralee Election, i86 
 
 take any course wliicli honour does not dictate and con- 
 science tlioroughly approve. What I have been, I am ; 
 what I am,, I shall be — a Catholic Liberal — an Irishman, 
 not ashamed of his country, or slow to serve her, according 
 to the measure of his power. I hold the opinions enun- 
 ciated, the other day,* by a great Frenchman, the Count de 
 Montalembert ; and his profession of faith, religious and 
 political, is mine. I take his words, and adopt them as my 
 own : — ^^ I desire to serve the cause of liberty as dis- 
 tinguished from revolution, and the cause of Catholicism as 
 distinguished from despotism and intolerance — religious 
 liberty, sincere and equal for all, without privileges either 
 for or against Catholicism — political liberty, defended 
 against the encroachments of government, but also de- 
 fended against the immoral violence and the abject servility 
 of false democracy — liberty and authority, both kept 
 within the bounds of justice and truth — the faith which 
 respects honesty of belief and inviolability of conscience — 
 in a word, a ^free church in a free nation.' ^^ This is the 
 sum of the doctrine which I have cherished since my boy- 
 hood ; to which I shall cling as long as my life endures. 
 
 In the spirit of this doctrine, and to assert it on your 
 behalf, and on my own, and on behalf of all my country- 
 men — for I go to Parliament as the representative of all, 
 and not as the delegate of any — I shall mould my public 
 course. I do not boast of any special power to serve you ; 
 but what may belong to me I shall honestly exert. I shall 
 do what I can for the material and moral benefit of the 
 country which I love. I shall strive to enforce the right of 
 all the people, Protestant and Catholic, to equality before 
 the law ; and if I have not capacity to secure it, the will 
 and the effort, at least, shall not be wanting. 
 
 * At the Catholic Consjress of Malines. 
 
Tralee Election, 1863. 335 
 
 Since I became Attorney-General, I venture to believe 
 tliat I have not been_, in my official action, unfaithful to the 
 principles which T would willingly carry out, in a wider and 
 loftier sphere. I have had very serious duties to discharge. 
 I have had to grapple with turbulent Orangeism in the 
 North, and agrarian outrage in the South; and every- 
 where, without respect of persons, I have striven to 
 administer the law, with absolute impartiality and intrepid 
 firmness. In the North, notwithstanding a storm of 
 factious fury which raged for months around me, I have 
 not shrunk from enforcing the penalties provided by 
 the Legislature against all men of ail denominations who 
 disturb public order, and insult their fellow-subjects ; and 
 the result has been, that the insignia of party almost 
 ceased to desecrate the temples of religion, and unwonted 
 peace prevailed, at the latest anniversaries. In the Souths 
 I have had to encounter and to punish red-handed murder ; 
 and, though I and my colleagues have been obliged 
 personally to conduct, within a twelvemonth, more capital 
 prosecutions than have taxed the energies of law officers 
 for very many years ; and though in all those cases, save 
 one, convictions were accomplished, no man has ventured 
 to allege that, in any of them, the power of the Executive 
 was overstrained, or the machinery supplied by our Consti- 
 tution for the suppression of crime perverted, unwarrant- 
 ably, for the purpose of securing them. I trust I have 
 succeeded in demonstrating that justice loses nothing of its 
 efficiency because it is fairly and impartially administered. 
 
 One other word, on a matter which has been made the 
 subject of accusation against me. They say that witches 
 read prayers backwards ; and the act of my official career, 
 which I should most have expected to secure to me 
 some public trust and gratitude, has been tortured into a 
 topic of assault. I am a Commissioner of National Educa- 
 
2,^6 Ti^alce Election, 1863. 
 
 fcion, and I am charged before the Catholic people with the 
 high crime of reconstructing the National Board. I am 
 proud to have had a share in administering an institution 
 which, though it is not perfect — though it is capable of 
 much improvement, in many ways — though as, in some 
 degree, a compromise between conflicting parties in this 
 distracted land, it is necessarily open to animadversion and 
 discussion — yet seems to me, who have watched its 
 working with conscientious and anxious care, to be, on 
 the whole, in its practical results, the greatest boon and 
 blessing which, since Emancipation, was ever conferred on 
 Ireland by the Imperial Government. But I am doubly 
 proud of having been permitted to assist, even in the 
 humblest way, in the reconstruction of that institution, for 
 the purpose of securing at once its full efficiency, its 
 thoroughly impartial action and the public confidence in its 
 administration which efficiency and impartiality command. 
 Directing the education of hundreds of thousands of Irish 
 children, the vast majority of whom are Catholics, the 
 Board, when I first was honoured with a seat at it, had a 
 small minority of Catholic Commissioners. A wise and 
 able statesman * came to Ireland — a man of the clearest 
 judgment and the most perfect honesty — a man who, 
 though a stranger here, had capacity to devise nnd 
 courage to execute a great measure of justice to the Irish 
 nation. He proposed, amongst other changes, that there 
 should be equality between the Protestants and the Roman 
 Catholics on the Board of Education ; and he gave to the 
 Protestants ten Commissioners, and to the Catholics as 
 many, selecting for the office the wisest, the truest, and the 
 most trusted men of the respective Churches. I had an 
 humble part in carrying out that arrangement ; — it should 
 
 * Mr., HOW Yiscoiuit, Cardwell. 
 
Tralee Election, 1863. 337 
 
 secure to Mr. Cardwell the gratitude cf the country 
 which was favoured, for a time_, with his impartial rule ; — 
 and, yet, because I aided him to the utmost of my poor 
 capacity, you have been told that I am unworthy to be 
 your representative. 
 
 I glory in the crime imputed to me. I base upon it my 
 highest claim to any confidence or favour which may be 
 due to me, as an Irishman. I challenge for it, especially, 
 the generous recognition of the Catholic people, who are, 
 especially because of it, required to deny to me their trust. 
 In my judgment, it has been the noblest assertion of the 
 principle of social equality between Irishmen, — for ever 
 established by the Act of Emancipation — which has been 
 made, since that great charter of Irish rights was ceded to 
 Irish energy and Irish virtue, organised by the Irish 
 Liberator, and sustained and encouraged by the Liberals of 
 England against the fierce resistance of the Tory party, 
 whom Irish Catholics are now invoked to aid in the re- 
 establishment of their old ascendency. It has secured, 
 beyond all doubt or controversy, the perfect fairness of the 
 administration of the Board. It has made the mischief of 
 proselytism on the one side or the other an impossibilit}^ ; 
 and gives perfect warrant of fair play and honest dealing to 
 every class and creed. Admirable in its conception, its 
 working is as admirable ; and the whole course of events, 
 since the change occurred, has made clearer the wisdom 
 and the worth of Mr. Cardweirs bold and generous 
 policy. 
 
 I have been forced to speak of these things. I have 
 spoken of them with much reluctance, because they touch 
 myself; and self-eulogy, or the appearance of it, is to me 
 most painful. But I have been assailed virulently in speeches 
 and in newspapers; and I was bound to show you, in 
 grateful acknowledgment of the great favour you have 
 
 Y 
 
;^^S Tralee Election, 1863. 
 
 bestowed upon me, that I do not dishonour tlie choice 
 which you have made. 
 
 And I have not thought it needless or unbecoming, in 
 necessary defence of my own public character against the 
 attacks of extreme politicians on either side, to speak out 
 fearlessly the opinions which I have always entertained ; 
 which are the opinions of the old and tried friends of 
 Civil and Religious Liberty ; which I know to be cherished 
 by multitudes of the true and good amongst us, although 
 they have lately found a most imperfect utterance ; 
 and which I believe to be entirely in harmony with 
 sound reason, true patriotism and the real interests of 
 Ireland. 
 
 I have detained you, too long, in the discussion of 
 general topics — one word, before I conclude, as to your- 
 selves. You have bestowed on me the very highest distinc- 
 tion to which a citizen can aspire under a free, constitutional 
 government; audit behoves me to prove my appreciation of 
 the gift, by advancing your welfare according to my ability. 
 I have said, that I go to Parliament as a representative, 
 and not as a delegate; — with a free mind and an unfettered 
 conscience; — subject to the ordinary reticences and re- 
 straints of official position ; but claiming, as a counter- 
 balance, the benefits to bo gained from official influence, 
 fairly directed to useful ends. I shall do what I can on 
 public questions for the national interests ; but I shall feel 
 it my duty and my pleasure, also, to devote myself to 
 the promotion of the prosperity of the constituency to 
 which I owe so much. Since I came amongst you, I have 
 learned that there are several local matters in which the 
 people of Tralee, of every class and creed, take a very 
 deep interest; I have obtained, as to all of them, such 
 information as I could command; I shall make it ray 
 business to extend and complete that information, throug^h 
 
Tralee Electio7i, 1863. 339 
 
 the kindness of my friends around me, and tlien strive to 
 employ it for your best advantage. 
 
 The condition and management of your canal — the 
 prevention of the floods which often afflict your town, 
 producing great public inconvenience, and doing serious 
 damage to property and health — the claims of your 
 savings-bank depositors — the state of your postal arrange- 
 ments — these and other subjects have been suggested to 
 me as demanding prompt and careful attention, and that 
 attention I shall bestow upon them. Of course, I can 
 promise nothing as to results : I am not master of 
 them. I do not wield the powers of the Prime Minister 
 or the Chancellor of the Exchequer; I do not control the 
 Exchequer Loan Commissioners or the Board of Works. 
 I know that efforts have been already made, by men of 
 high position and great influence, and made abortively, a^; 
 to every one of the grievances which I would endeavour to 
 redress. But I do not despair. I came amongst you, as 
 Attorney- General — I go from you, as Member for Tralee. 
 And whatever can be accomplished by the exercise of such 
 capacity and experience as I possess, backed by the power 
 you have committed to my hands, and guided by an honest 
 purpose to labour earnestly in your service, I shall 
 endeavour to achieve. Man proposes ; God disposes. I 
 shall do my best for you ; and if I fail, the failure shall 
 not come from want of faithful efi'ort. 
 
 And now, farewell ! For the great honour you have 
 done me, again I thank you from my heart. 
 
LEGAL, EDUCATIONAL, AND SOCIAL 
 EEFORMS IN IRELAND. 
 
Legal, Educational, and Social 
 Refonns in Ireland, 
 
 [The Presidential Address delivered at the opening of the Social Science 
 Congress in Dublin, in 1881.] 
 
 IN the year 1861^ the Fifth Congress of the National 
 Association for the Promotion of Social Science was 
 held in this metropolis. It was a pleasant and a prosperous 
 meeting. There was much of genial hospitality and kindly 
 intercourse during its continuance ; and the business of the 
 Congress was conducted by very distinguished persons. 
 The place I have now the honour to hold was occupied by 
 one who gave it lustre by his high ability^ his singular en- 
 dowments_, and his life-long services in the cause of legal 
 and political reform and human liberty. Lord Brougham was 
 then in a ripe old age ; and he was well sustained by the 
 great French economist, Michel Chevalier, by Sir John Shaw 
 Lefevre, who was one of the wisest and worthiest men I have 
 ever known, and by my late lamented friend, Chief Justice 
 Whiteside. They have passed away. Their eminent associates 
 — Judge Longfield, Baron Holtzendorff, Sir Joseph Napier, 
 and others — still, happily, survive. I had the good fortune 
 to act along with them ; and I scarcely remember a week 
 spent with a more grateful combination of intellectual profit 
 and social enjoyment. I am reminded of it by some of the 
 old familiar faces which then became known to me, and are 
 now before me ; and I recur to the recollection, that I may 
 
344 Legal, Educational y and Social 
 
 express my confident hope of a repetition of tlie success 
 which was at that time achieved ; and offer to the Congrress, 
 on behalf of my countrymen^ the same warm and cordial 
 welcome which greeted its coming, ^^ twenty golden years 
 ago- 
 
 Usage casts upon me the honourable but onerous duty 
 of addressing some observations to this great assembly. I 
 call it onerous, remembering the long line of remarkable 
 men— which includes, with Lord Brougham, Lord Russell, 
 Lord Shaftesbury, Lord Carnarvon, Lord Dufferin, the pre- 
 sent Bishop of Manchester, and many more — who have been 
 your Presidents, and have exhausted all the forms of speech 
 which could be enriched by their high culture and wide 
 experience. I feel that anything I can say, in poor suc- 
 cession to them, must '' come tardy off/' But at least I 
 shall endeavour, avoiding the ambition of originality, and 
 foregoing the opportunity for eloquence, to speak of matters 
 which I may be supposed to understand, as I have had 
 practically much to do with very many of them ; and which 
 may have something of novelty and interest, as they pertain 
 to Ireland, and regard exclusively questions, within the 
 domain of social science, which bear on her condition and 
 affect her future. 
 
 It seems to me that your President should scarcely in- 
 trude on the sphere of those who will direct the proceedings 
 of special sections, by taking a particular subject, and 
 exhausting upon it ingenuity or erudition. Xeither do I 
 think that I can profitably range through the endless diver- 
 sities of human affairs with which your inquiries are con- 
 versant, and attempt to indicate all the aids which your 
 Association has given to the progress of those inquiries, 
 and all the successes which have encouraged its efforts for 
 the amendment of the Law and useful economic change. 
 Those aids have been effective, and those successes have 
 
Reforms in Ireland, 345 
 
 been great. For a quarter of a century, labouring, not at 
 your Congresses only, but at frequent meetings, in every 
 month, in London, your active members have watched the 
 progress of legislation, ascertaining and arranging facts on 
 questions of current interest, formulating Parliamentary 
 enactments, urging the appointment of Parliamentary com- 
 mittees, and circulating reports for the guidance of opinion, 
 in Parliament and out of it, which have had a very appre- 
 ciable and a very salutary influence. At my desire, your 
 efficient secretary has furnished me with a record of the 
 work of the Association since it was estabhshed in 1856; 
 and the continuous energy and unslumbering activity which 
 that record demonstrates, during the long interval, in pro- 
 moting measures of public utility — many of which have 
 obtained the sanction of the Legislature — have been most 
 meritorious and most honourable to the institution. 
 
 It has been of especial value in keeping up a perpetual 
 protest against abuses in law and procedure, which, though 
 of serious mischief, did not rouse popular feeling or attract 
 popular resistance ; and in making effectual claim to 
 necessary improvements, which were not easily capable of 
 general appreciation, or attractive of earnest support from 
 ordinary politicians. The Patent Law, the Law of Copy- 
 right, the System of Pubhc Prosecution, the Digest and 
 Codification of the Statutes, the Law of Evidence, Prison 
 Discipline, the Grovernment and Administration of Public 
 Schools, the Improvement of Public Health, the Promotion 
 of Temperance by wise arrangements as to the Licensing 
 System and the regulation of the Liquor Traffic, Trade 
 Unions and Strikes, the Protection of Life and Property at 
 Sea, these and a host of kindred matters have received 
 laborious attention from your Society, since the moment of 
 its birth; and it has done good service in them all, without 
 idle ostentation or pretentious publicity. 
 
346 Legal, Educational, and Social 
 
 As was long tlie fortune of its predecessor^ tlie British 
 Association for the Advancement of Science, it has been 
 made, more or less, the object of abuse and ridicule, by 
 persons having no sympathy with its purposes or capacity 
 to judge its work. And, no doubt, every such Association^ 
 which permits public discussion of controverted questions, 
 must sometimes tolerate empty talkers and conceited 
 sciolists, whose weakness or folly may give occasion for 
 sneering to those who delight, with reason or without, 
 '^to sit in the chair of the scorner.'^ But, in spite of 
 all their drawbacks, such discussions tend to awaken 
 thought and educate opinion. It is well that people should 
 meet together, and look each other in the face, and test 
 the value of their respective views, even at the cost of 
 listening sometimes to words which neither amuse nor 
 edify. 
 
 The result is valuable, if prejudice is dispelled and 
 toleration of honest difference promoted; and if, whilst 
 men appraise at tlieir true value exact science and in- 
 vestigation of the wonders and the beauties by which the 
 material universe attests the power and goodness of the 
 Creator, they are led to value also inquiries which affect 
 the order, the comfort, and the happiness of human life, and 
 are pursued, with fruitful interest, by those who believe 
 that" 
 
 The proper study of mankind is man. 
 
 Estimating thus the aims and the methods of your Asso- 
 ciation, I have resolved, instead of surveying the wide field 
 of its multifarious labours, to undertake an humbler task, 
 and to speak to you only of the legal and social reforms 
 which have been accomplished in Ireland since you were 
 last assembled here. I deem it fitting that your Congresses 
 should be utilised by something of local inquiry and local 
 
Reforms in Ireland. 347 
 
 information about tlie communities to wliicli tliey are suc- 
 cessively invited. In very many of those communities, 
 and, certainly, in Dublin, they have been the authors of 
 local improvements. Ireland, and her peculiar condition, 
 are not too well understood in other countries ; and som© 
 of you may be pleased to learn what she has striven to do, 
 and what she has achieved, in your own sphere of action, 
 from the date of our former meeting. I shall not trouble 
 you with elaborate statistics or lengthened disquisition, but 
 content myself, as I have said, with a simple indication of 
 a series of beneficial changes, which, to the people of 
 this island, have been reasonably subjects of congratula- 
 tion. 
 
 I shall point to those changes as they connect them- 
 selves with the several departments of the business of the 
 Congress. 
 
 And, first, as to those amendments of the Law which 
 were the exclusive object of that Society from which your 
 larger Association had its origin. Soon after 1861, a strong 
 Commission, having upon it the most eminent persons at 
 the Bar and on the Bench in Ireland and England^ — -^^ The 
 English and Irish Law and Chancery Commission," — after 
 many sittings in Dublin and in London, produced an ex- 
 cellent report as to the constitution of our legal tribunals. 
 It led to practical results of an important kind. Ulti- 
 mately the many and marked differences which, in 1861, 
 separated the EngHsh system from the Irish, were sub- 
 stantially done away; and that assimilation of practice 
 and procedure which, for manifest reasons, is so desirable 
 between systems of Judicature, identical in their sources 
 and their principles, was happily accomplished. I do not 
 say that further serious alterations may not be necessary in 
 the judicial machinery which has been so assimilated, and 
 may be still further assimilated with advantage ; but prac- 
 
34^ Legal, Educational^ and Social 
 
 tical improvements have been undoubtedly achieved, which 
 give to our central administration of justice a harmony and 
 an efficiency unknown to it before. 
 
 I cannot pause to indicate many of the details of those 
 improvements. But I may briefly say that, in the constitu- 
 tion of the Appellate Court of Ireland, and the substitution 
 of continuous action by two tribunals sitting permanently, 
 save in vacation and when the Judges are on circuit, for 
 the old trials at Kisi Prius after Term, the greatest benefit 
 has been conferred upon the pubhc. When the Barons at 
 Kunnymede gave their famous promise, ^' Nulli vendoinis, 
 nulli negahunus, nulli differemns, rectum vel justitiam/' — 
 of the three great undertakings — not to sell, or to deny, 
 or to delay justice — the last was not the least momentous. 
 For generations, the judiciary of these countries have been 
 happily free from the suspicion of corruption. No man 
 imputes to them a design to make commodity of their 
 office, by refusing his rights to any suitor, or trafficking 
 on their exalted trust. But ''the law's delay'' has never 
 ceased to be the subject of complaint, since Shakespeare 
 numbered it amongst the intolerable tortures of humanity ; 
 and any change which diminishes its mischief must be hailed 
 as a blessing by a civilised people. 
 
 The Appellate Court is open to complaining litigants in 
 every inferior tribunal, from that of the County Judge to 
 that of the Lord Chief Justice; and its despatch of business 
 is free from the obstructions and embarrassments which 
 were too effective for evil in the days of the Court of Error. 
 The Consolidated Nisi Prius Court gives quick and full 
 relief; and its value is demonstrated by the fact, that the 
 mere facility of approach to it has increased its business 
 remarkably — so that 215 cases tried by its Judges in 
 1878 became 266 in 1879, and 300 in 1880. 
 
 So much for the High Court of Justice, of which I can 
 
Reforms in Ireland, 349 
 
 speak no more. But equal or greater advance has been 
 made in the jurisdiction and arrangements of our County- 
 Courts. They were an old institution in Ireland, and fur- 
 nished the precedent for the County Courts of England. 
 So far back as 1796, the office of Assistant Barrister was 
 created, and his Court, with continually -extending civil 
 jurisdiction, became one of great importance to the people. 
 It was oddly constituted, being a court of law for the plain- 
 tiff, and a court of equity for the defendant. For a long 
 time, this had been found inconsistent with the effective 
 administration of the law. In very many cases, poor men, 
 or men of moderate means, were unable to assert plain 
 equitable rights, from incapacity to sue in the Court of 
 Chancery. Through the earnest intervention of my distin- 
 guished predecessor in the Court of Chancery (Dr. Ball), 
 the evil was rectified. The County Judge has now a 
 jurisdiction in equity, and, to a great extent, it is utilised 
 by the suitors of his tribunal. The local Judges in 
 England possessed it for twelve years before it was given 
 to their Irish brethren. But it is already employed more 
 largely here. In 1880, the Irish cases were 616, as com- 
 pared with 125 in the same extent of English population, 
 and the matters in dispute amounted in value to £59,996 
 in Ireland, whilst, in an equal extent of English population, 
 they w^ere only £17,560 in amount. 
 
 The benefit to the poorer country has been very great 
 indeed. 
 
 In many other ways, the County Courts — a highly-popular 
 branch of our judicial establishment — have had their juris- 
 diction extended, and been made more effective. And 
 equally in their action and in that of the High Court, we 
 need not be ashamed of Irish progress. 
 
 But I must pass to another topic. In the year 1861, the 
 Lunacy Laws of Ireland were almost in the condition in 
 
350 Legal, Educational, and Social 
 
 whicli they liad remained after the abolition of the Court 
 of Wards, save as to the establishment of District Asylums 
 for the poor, the inspection of Lunatic Asylums generally, 
 and the rules for the regulation of admission and 
 release. 
 
 The actual treatment of this unhappy class of our fellow- 
 beings had been greatly changed for the better from the 
 time, within living memory, \vhen they were dealt with not 
 as patients to be cured, or even as prisoners to be guarded, 
 but as caged beasts, to be tormented at the will of sordid 
 physicians or brutal keepers. Towards the close of the last 
 century, Pinel, in France, and Tuke, in England, exposed 
 the horrors of Bicetre, York, and Bethlem, and awakened 
 the public conscience to a sense of the cruelty and crime 
 which pervaded lunatic establishments, public and private, 
 without restraint or punishment. But the evil did not 
 promptly find a sufficient remedy. 
 
 It was only in 1815 that a Committee of the House of 
 Commons, making an authoritative pronouncement against 
 still existing iniquities, compelled protective legislation in 
 several measures which were, more or less, of service. At 
 last, in 1853, the Lunacy Kegulation Act was passed, and 
 for England, accomplished great and beneficial changes. 
 But when your Congress met in Dublin seven years after- 
 wards, that Act had not been extended to Ireland, and 
 •the protection given to our lunatics continued very inade- 
 quate indeed. In cases under the control of the Court 
 of Chancery, there was no sufficient provision for the 
 care even of those possessed of ample means, b}^ proper 
 visitation and report ; and none for the discovery of persons 
 kept privately in duress, and subjected to ill-treatment. 
 No lunatic could be brought under the protection of the 
 Court, without the great cost and painful exposure of a 
 Commission. And whilst such a state of thingfs was evil 
 
Reforins in Irelmid. 351 
 
 in relation to tlie rich, sufferers of small fortune could not 
 receive even that protection. 
 
 All this has been happily altered since 1861. Ten years 
 afterwards, the Irish Lunacy Regulation Act embodied all 
 the useful provisions of the English statute, and added 
 many which have been found most salutary. There is now no 
 necessity for a Commission in the vast majority of cases, 
 which are plain and simple, or unless the alleged lunatic be 
 of mental capacity to demand an inquiry, or lives beyond the 
 jurisdiction. The most careful investigation is instituted, 
 and the fullest notice given, in every case ; and, for the 
 past five years, only one Commission has been demanded, 
 and only one actually sped from the absence of the 
 lunatic. 
 
 The Act, thus cheap in its administration, and sparing, 
 as far as possible, annoyance or pain to relatives, — whilst 
 it is rigidly guarded against abuse, and has never, in a 
 single case, been assailed for any improper or incautious 
 application of its powers, — has been of large and in- 
 creasing utihty. In 1871, the number of returns furnished 
 to the Lunacy Office from the Committees of Estates was 
 97, and, in 1880, it had risen to 194; whilst, in 1871, the 
 reports from medical visitors had been 103, and, in 1880, 
 they had increased to 364. 
 
 This Statute, although successful in its operation, could 
 not reach a large class of persons in poor circumstances, 
 and, for their protection, a further Act was passed in 1880, 
 enabling the friends of an alleged lunatic to obtain from 
 the County Court Judge, at very little expense, a declara- 
 tion of lunacy, with a scheme for the management of his 
 person and his property ; and also to secure for him the 
 advantages of medical visitation and stated reports on 
 his condition and treatment. A similar Act was passed 
 for Scotland in the same Session (the Judicial Factors' 
 
352 Legal, Educatiortal, and Social 
 
 Act)j and in this needful reform Ireland and Scotland are 
 both in advance o£ England. 
 
 This will complete the necessary protection of persons 
 to whom the public asylums are not available^ from their 
 possession of pecuniary means ; but I lament to say, that 
 beyond the Court of Chancery, and the County Court, 
 and the County Asylum, there are multitudes of unhappy 
 creatures — people of weak and disordered minds — who 
 go at large through the country without any legal care. 
 They are numbered by hundreds and thousands. Years 
 ago, it was calculated that there were 8,151 imbeciles 
 and idiots in Ireland — of whom 1,740 were in work- 
 houses, G38 in asylums, and 5,733 utterly neglected. 
 The lapse of time has not lessened the number; and, 
 although various efforts have been made in the Legis- 
 lature to do something for these wretched sufferers, they 
 still remain wandering about in their unregarded misery. 
 This sad condition of things does not properly come within 
 the scope of an address, which aims to state achievements 
 and not failures in the way of v/ell-doing ; but I have felt 
 it impossible to part from the subject of lunacy law without 
 expressing my strong and earnest feeling, as I have often 
 expressed it in a higher place, against the scandalous 
 indifference with which so many of God's afflicted children 
 have been treated by the Legislature and the country. I 
 trust that the day is near when such a reproach will be 
 taken away from us ; and there has been good preparation 
 for the removal of it, in a lucid and careful report made by 
 a very able Commission, which was appointed by the lato 
 Government, and dealt with the subject largely. 
 
 AVhilst considering the legal changes which have affected 
 Ireland since 1861, I cannot fail to refer to one of the most 
 important of them all — the Keform of the Jury System. I 
 observe that the subject is to be mooted in one of your 
 
Reforms in Ireland. 353 
 
 sections, and I do not desire to forestal, in any way, its 
 discussion there. But I shall note shortly, as of some 
 interest, the circumstances under which that Reform was 
 introduced, and the objects of it. A Parliamentary 
 Committee, in 1852, had strongly recommended a change 
 in the existing law, in two particulars. It advised^ first, 
 that there should be a rating qualification for jurors^ and^ 
 next, that means should be adopted ^'to secure strict im- 
 partiality in the construction of the jury panel. ^' Before 
 1871, nothing had been done upon this recommendation. 
 The old leasehold qualification had almost ceased to exist, 
 and there was no substitute. The evidence was strong 
 that the jury system had broken down, as well from want 
 of qualified jurors as from the conduct of oflicials. The 
 necessity of change was manifest and imperative ; and that 
 necessity and the difficulty of it were equally demonstrated 
 by nine successive Bills which were prepared, year after 
 year, for the House of Commons, by nine successive law 
 officers, for the purpose of making it. They were all, 
 from various causes, utterly abortive. In 1871, the 
 necessity continued, with aggravation ; and I introduced, 
 in the House of Lords, the Bill which was accepted 
 by the Legislature. 
 
 Proceeding on the two recommendations of the Com- 
 mittee of 1852, it prescribed a rating qualification, and 
 aimed to secure '^strict impartiality^' by rendering the 
 Sherifi"'s packing of a jury impossible. It was sent 
 down to the Commons after the fullest opportunity for 
 deliberation, and after it had been circulated throughout 
 Ireland for a considerable time. No single objection was 
 made in Parliament or by the Press to any of its provisions, 
 and it was amended in the Lower House only by the 
 reduction of the amount of qualification it had fixed. It 
 passed, apparently, with universal assent. 
 
 z 
 
354 Legal, Educational, and Social 
 
 Afterwards, a great outcry was raised against it. By 
 some it was assailed because it took away from the Sheriff the 
 power of selection. That power had been a very formidable 
 one. He could array the panel just as_, for any purpose, 
 good or badj he desired to settle it. There was no check 
 upon him. He could eliminate altogether the jurors not 
 friendly to a cause he favoured ; or he could rank them so 
 low in the list as to make it impossible that they should be 
 called, and to render their attendance an idle mockery. 
 The arrangement of the jury, if he was disposed to arrange 
 it, proclaimed a foregone conclusion, and the game of 
 justice, as was said by a great advocate, in a famous case, 
 could be played '^ with loaded dice,^' — the stakes, I add, 
 being the lives and liberties of men. And the person 
 clothed with power to do these things was not the High 
 Sheriff, w^ho rarely interfered w^ith his deputy, but a man 
 who, trustworthy though he might be in the majority of 
 cases, might also be, in many, without character, as he was 
 without responsibility. The Act of 1871 was designed 
 strictly to carry out the recommendations of 1852. It took 
 away the possibility of any malversation of the Sheriff, by 
 depriving him of his power of arbitrary choice; and, for 
 the first time since the introduction of English law to 
 Ireland, gave the people an absolute assurance that, for no 
 purposes and in no circumstances, should a Sheriff in the 
 exercise of his official privileges, thereafter select a jury to 
 perpetrate injustice. 
 
 It threw open the jury-box to multitudes who had 
 suffered perpetual exclusion ; and offered them the chance 
 of that moral and political training which has been of such 
 profit to the English race, from their continual oppor- 
 tunities of taking a public and responsible part in the 
 administration of justice. And, of course, it brought a 
 crowd of comparatively humble people into a position they 
 
Reforms in Ireland. 355 
 
 had never occupied before. The higher class of jurors 
 shrank from association with those of lower station 3 
 and there were, inevitably, exhibitions of ignorance and 
 awkwardness in the performance of duties with which the 
 new men were unfamiliar, but which a little experience 
 would have enabled them to discharge eflBciently. 
 
 Circumstances have been greatly unfavourable to the 
 working of the new panels. The waves of popular 
 passion which have gone over Ireland would have strained 
 any system, whatever might have been its form or sub- 
 stance; and many of the failures of justice, which have 
 unfortunately occurred, have been caused by the abnormal 
 and unexampled influences with which we have had to 
 contend. This has been brought out very clearly by the 
 evidence before the Juries Committee, which has declared 
 that, in its opinion, the two principles of the Act, the 
 qualification by rating and the condemnation of selection, 
 under any circumstances, are just and wise, and ought to be 
 maintained. 
 
 Proof was given before that Committee that the new 
 jurors were gradually acquiring a knowledge of their 
 business, and an aptitude for the doing of it, when the 
 excitement of the time, in certain districts, interrupted the 
 course of their improvement, and induced decisions and 
 failures of decision which admit of no defence. But it 
 would be very unreasonable to form an adverse judg- 
 ment as to the permanent action of a just principle, 
 because, from a passing disturbance of the general mind, 
 its application may have produced a temporary mischief. 
 
 It is not within my province to discuss the suggestions 
 which have been made, for legislative consideration, to 
 meet existing evils. The rating qualification is elastic, and 
 its application maybe modified according to circumstances. 
 But the one lasting good, designed and accomplished by 
 
 z 2 
 
356 Legale Educational, and Social 
 
 the Act of 1871, was the abolition of Jury Packing, and 
 that good, I rejoice to believe, the solemn finding of the 
 Lords' Committee will secure for ever. 
 
 The Report has just been printed, and, on a subject of 
 such extreme importance, I shall not trespass much upon 
 your time by reading to you the few sentences in which it 
 pronounces the unanimous judgment of the Peers. They 
 express it thus : — 
 
 " We have received evidence from a considerable number of witnesses 
 connected with different parts of Ireland, and holding professional or 
 official positions which afford them opportunities of forminor an opinion, 
 on the general expediency of the new departure involved by the Act of 
 1871. To the principles upon which that Act was based the judgment of 
 these witnesses is, as a rule, decidedly favourable. 
 
 "The evidence which we have taken leaves no doubt (i.) that the 
 qualification required by the Act of 1833 (3 & 4 Will. IV., c. 91), which 
 remained in force till 1871, had become virtually obsolete, and that, 
 owing to the scarcity of qualified jurors, the sheriffs, in order to obtain a 
 jury panel, were in some instances actually driven to empannel persons not 
 legally qualified ; and (ii.) that the right of selection by the sheriff, 
 though probably not often abused, had created a general impression that 
 it was possible to pack the juries, and consequently had led to a wide- 
 spread suspicion with regard to their impartiality. 
 
 " Even those witnesses who are least favournble to the new system are 
 ont prepared to recommend a return to the old, in so far as it permitted 
 the selection of the jurors by the sheriffs. We share this opinion, and 
 believe that, in order to maintain public confidence, it is absolutely 
 necessary that the selection of jurors should depend upon a fixed system 
 of rotation, and not upon the discretion of any public official. 
 
 " We believe, further, that whatever modifications may be possible in 
 the law dealing with the qualification for service on the jury, that qualifi- 
 cation must, as a general rule, be founded, as at present, upon the rating 
 of the person qualified." 
 
 And in another portion of the Report the Committee 
 make this statement as to the causes of the existing state 
 of things, indicating that neither the principles of the 
 measure, nor the application of those principles, should be 
 held responsible for it : — 
 
Reforms in Ireland, 357 
 
 " The evidence which we have received forces upon us the conclusion, 
 that in a large part of Ireland no improvement in the composition of the 
 jury, consistent with the principles upon which we conceive trial by jury 
 to be founded, is likely to remove or materially to palliate the unfortunate 
 condition of things w^iich now obtains." 
 
 I pass from the history of legal reforms in Ireland, which 
 I might much extend, if time allowed me, to that of the 
 progress of her educational institutions. Their improve- 
 ment has been enormous, within the period to which I am 
 confining your attention. 
 
 And, first, as to Primary Education. The National 
 Board has existed for nearly half a century. It was the 
 greatest act of the late Lord Derby^s life, to have founded 
 it with the purpose of uniting separate religious and com- 
 bined secular instruction. By the mass of the Irish people, 
 it was received with gratitude and satisfaction, as a happy 
 contrast to the sectarian and exclusive systems which 
 preceded it. It was — as matters educational seem to 
 be throughout the world, — the subject of very bitter 
 controversy. Many missed with regret, in its theory of 
 comprehension, the ideal which would have given them 
 secular teaching, not separated from, but interpenetrated 
 with, religious knowledge. And the hostility of various 
 Churches was sometimes excited by compromises incon- 
 sistent with the admission of their conflicting claims. The 
 strife was long and earnest. But between opposing forces, 
 sometimes neutralising each other and sometimes sustain- 
 ing, by their adverse action, the common object of attack, 
 the Board continued to do its work, and gradually to earn 
 attachment from its adversaries. In 18G1, the war still 
 raged unpleasantly; although the wisdom taught by ex- 
 perience to the Commissioners, and the recognition of their 
 fair purposes and impartial administration, were gaining 
 them adherents on every side. Since that time, the de- 
 
358 Legal, Educational, and Social 
 
 velopment of the sj'stem lias been continuous as it lias been 
 vast. Just demands have been conceded — hostile preten- 
 sions have been reconciled — difficulties have been sur- 
 mounted, in many ways. And although some improve- 
 ments remain to be accomplished, the institution has spread 
 its beneficent influence, everywhere, from the centre of the 
 island to the sea, has multiplied its schools by thousands 
 and its pupils by tens of thousands, and widely commands 
 the confidence of the People. 
 
 I do not, in this place, dream of discussing the disputes 
 of the past, or the prospects of the future, but not- 
 withstanding my unwillingness to trouble you with dry 
 statistics, I cannot refrain from giving a few figures which 
 tell a marvellous tale of twenty years' endeavour and 
 success. 
 
 In 1860, the schools of the Board were 5,632; in 1880, 
 they were 7,590; in 1860, the pupils on its rolls were 
 804,000; in 1880, they were 1,083,020; in 1860, the 
 children in average attendance were 262,823 ; in 1880, 
 they were 468,557 ; and the Parliamentary grant which, 
 in 1860, was £284,468, was, in 1880, £722,366. 
 
 These figures exhibit the information obtained in 1861 as 
 to 1860 ; and the information obtained in 1881 as to 1880. 
 They need no comment ; and are, in themselves, happily 
 demonstrative of a great increase in the means of primary 
 public instruction and the number of those availing them- 
 selves of it ; notwithstanding that, in the meantime, there 
 has been no corresponding advance in the amount of the 
 population of Ireland. The apparatus of teaching has 
 been ample and eff'ective. The State has been very 
 generous ; and the classes for whose benefit it has lavished 
 its subventions, have proved their appreciation of the 
 benefit bestowed, by availing themselves of it, in ever- 
 increasing numbers. 
 
Reforms in Ireland. 359 
 
 As I have intimated, notwitlistanding tlie efiBciency of 
 the system, according to its principle, and the great pros- 
 perity it has achieved, it is capable of still further expan- 
 sion, and still enlarged utility. There are questions — as to 
 the training of teachers, the improvement of school attend- 
 ance, and others — which press for immediate solution ; but 
 they may best be relegated to your special section of 
 Education, which has the great advantage of the presi- 
 dency of the eminent and accomplished Resident Com- 
 missioner, Sir Patrick Keenan. 
 
 Whilst primary instruction was thus spread broadcast 
 through the toiling millions, the education of the Middle 
 Classes had fallen into a poor condition, as was clearly 
 pointed out in the elaborate report of the Endowed Schools 
 Commission of 1858. Those who could use the aid of the 
 National Schools employed it to admirable purpose and 
 with conspicuous success. They did so by seeking the 
 lower posts in the public service. But of higher places 
 they had no chance, as there was scant provision for their 
 further progress. At the taking of the Census in 1871, 
 it appeared that there was of the Catholic population of 
 Ireland 1 in 923 learning Latin, and of the Protestant 
 population, 1 in 259; whilst, of the Catholics, 1 in 1,209 
 was learning Greek, and of the Protestants, 1 in 398. 
 The opportunities for Intermediate Education — between 
 the Primary School and the University — were quite in- 
 sufficient, and they were made so, very much, by the action 
 of the National Board, which extinguished multitudes of 
 schools affording to the general community the means of 
 some classical and scientific instruction. Such schools were 
 once common in Ireland ; but when State education, good 
 and cheap, and, it might be, gratuitous, came into compe- 
 tition with them, they sank and perished. The result was, 
 as the Census Commissioners declared, that the intellect of 
 
o 
 
 60 Leo-al^ Educational, and Social 
 
 tlie country was " starved and dwarfed ^' ; and we were 
 threatened with a condition of things^ full of inconvenience 
 and fraught with danger^ in which the poorer classes of the 
 community might outrun the wealthier, and hold a lower 
 social place whilst they could boast superiority in mental 
 acquirement. 
 
 Happily, all this has been changed. In 1878, my noble 
 and learned friend, Lord Cairns, in an admirable address to 
 the House of Lords, introduced the Intermediate Education 
 Bill for Ireland, which was carried through Parliament 
 without opposition, and received in this country with 
 enthusiastic thankfulness. I have never known a measure 
 of any kind which attracted such unanimous approval from 
 all classes and denominations of the Irish People. 
 
 In my judgment, it has been found most worthy of that 
 approval. It has stirred the country with a new in- 
 tellectual life ; and, equally for the educators and the 
 educated, it has supplied a wholesome incitement to intel- 
 lectual effort. The standard of teaching has been raised. 
 The emulation of the masters has given new activity and 
 eflSciency to the schools. Obsolete methods and obsolete 
 works have been abandoned ; and the struggle for pre- 
 eminence has developed scholastic capacities and adminis- 
 trative powers, which no one imagined to exist amongst the 
 teachers of Ireland. 
 
 How the novel system has roused the spirit of Irish boys 
 and girls, and how their parents appreciate its advantages, 
 is best proved by the number of those who have given 
 notice of their purpose to be examined in 1879, 1880, and 
 1881 respectively. In 1879, such notice was given by 
 3,671 boys and 797 girls, in all 4,208 persons. In 1880, 
 4,493 boys and 1,477 girls, making in all 6,120, gave 
 notice ; whilst, in the present year, it has been given by 5,714 
 boys and 2,033 girls, in all 7,747 ! 
 
Reforms in Ireland. 361 
 
 Are not these numbers of singular interest and signifi- 
 cance ? Do they not show that the eagerness for knowledge 
 and the facility of acquiring it which, under the most 
 adverse circumstances, have characterised the Irish People, 
 through all chances and changes, still belong to them ? So 
 far, the result has not disappointed the expectation which 
 was justified by their antecedents, and there is no reason to 
 believe that they will not be able to utilise, in a higher 
 sphere, the endowments which the Intermediate Education 
 Act invites them to attain, as they have employed effectively 
 those for which, in a lower, they have been indebted to the 
 National Board. 
 
 The system is yet in its infancy ; and the wonder seems 
 to be, that it has grown to its great proportions with so 
 much rapidity and so few miscarriages. The reports of its 
 examiners present strong evidence of careful instruction 
 and sound acquirement ; and it is quite within the com- 
 petence of the Commissioners, as it is their earnest wish, to 
 make the mental work which they encourage and reward of 
 solid and substantial value. 
 
 Thus, the Primary and the Intermediate Education of 
 Ireland were happily cared for. There remained a difficulty 
 as to a National University. Our existing collegiate institu- 
 tions were, in many respects, admirable. Trinity College 
 and the Queen^s Colleges possess Fellows and Professors of 
 thorough competency for their duties, of consummate ability 
 and great accomplishments, who would do honour to any 
 seat of learning in the world. But, for reasons — the nature 
 and validity of which it is not needful, in this place, to 
 consider — the advantages offered by them to their students 
 were not available to very many who desired the training of 
 a University ; and for a lengthened period, at least for the 
 lifetime of a generation, effort after effort has been made to 
 procure the means of satisfying the aspirations of persons 
 
362 Legal, Educational, and Social 
 
 so denied it^ on conditions they might feel themselves con- 
 scientiously free to accept. Those efforts^ unhappily, were 
 without result, and a great public want remained to be 
 supplied. At last, in the estabhshment of the Royal 
 University, that want has been practically acknowledged 
 and dealt with by the Legislature. It is not yet in action, 
 and of course we cannot yet forecast its future. The 
 Statute which gave it being has left its constitution to be 
 shaped and fashioned by its Senate, under the supervision 
 of the Crown. But, for myself, I am fall of hope that it 
 will fulfil its high purpose, and bless Ireland with a com- 
 pleted system of satisfactory instruction. Its endowment 
 is not large, but suflBcient for a beginning ; and, if it does 
 its work faithfully and well, further provision will not be 
 wanting to aid in its expansion and increase its efficiency. 
 It recognises the rights of conscience, and is free from 
 offence to the keenest religious susceptibility. Its Senate 
 is representative in the truest sense; and the perfect 
 harmony which has marked the deliberations of so many 
 men of the most varied views — equally as to things sacred 
 and secular — has been auspicious of good to its own 
 prospects, and also to the country whose youth it is destined 
 to guide not only to the sources of knowledge, but also, I 
 devoutly hope, in the cultivation of mutual confidence and 
 kindness. 
 
 It is formed very much on the plan of the London 
 University; and there is no reason why it should not 
 emulate the efficiency and the usefulness of that successful 
 institution. I fully understand the grounds of the pre- 
 ference which many of us may entertain for residentiary 
 training. But all that is desirable cannot be at once 
 achieved. Perhaps, the special purpose of Parliament in 
 seeking to combine students of various creeds and classes 
 on terras safe, equal, and impartial for them all, could not, at 
 
Refoi'ins in Ireland. 363 
 
 least in the first instance^ have been carried out so well in 
 any other way ; and, at all events, it behoves us to make 
 the most of the opportunity which is given to us in the 
 present, without abandoning the hope of better things here- 
 after. 
 
 Thus, since the former meeting of the Congress, the 
 great work of National Education, which then had been 
 only begun, has been so far advanced that the way of 
 progress, from the primary elements of knowledge to its 
 largest and last developments, has been opened to all the 
 people. The humblest in rank may reach the highest 
 place in intellectual, and so, in social station ; and the 
 country will find its best enrichment in utilising the mental 
 power which has heretofore been unproductive. The boy 
 who is distinguished in the country school will be en- 
 couraged to compete at the Intermediate Examinations. 
 Obtaining his exhibition there, he may pass with honour to 
 the University : and, if the capacity be in him, he will have 
 the means of taking his place with the foremost of his age. 
 For the first time, such chances are given to all the youth 
 of Ireland. For the first time, we have assurance that their 
 ability will have a fair and full career. 
 
 I shall not trouble you by any reference to questions 
 which have been mooted as to the probable working of the 
 Intermediate Board and the Eoyal University. The time is 
 not ripe for the discussion of them ; and it will be wise 
 and becoming to await a little longer the teaching of 
 experience. 
 
 But this audience, especially the fairer portion of it, will 
 not blame me if I allude to and defend one especial 
 characteristic of the higher education which those institu- 
 tions offer to Ireland. Both of them afford the same 
 opportunities of progress — the same incitements to mental 
 culture, and the same rewards for intellectual merit — to 
 
364 Legal, Edtuational, and Social 
 
 women as to men. Tlie prizes^ the exhibitions^ the degrees, 
 which stimulate the Irish boy^s ambition, are placed within 
 the reach of the Irish girl ; and she has already given 
 abundant proof, as 1 have shown, of readiness to avail 
 herself of the novel advantagfe. 
 
 I regard this great concession with unmixed pleasure and 
 sanguine anticipation of its social usefulness. But I know 
 that others take a different view, and carp at the change as 
 a dangerous experiment. At all times, there have been 
 many who desired to keep woman in the position of a doll 
 to be dandled, or a drudge to be worked, or a machine to 
 be used for the profit or the pleasure of a master. We have 
 been familiar with sneers at '^ blue stockings,^'' and '^ books 
 in petticoats,'^ and with ungracious caricatures of learned 
 ladies, as necessarily exhibiting offensive conceit or 
 dogmatic coarseness. But ^'^the lions have been the 
 painters '^ ; and the pictures have been fashioned to please 
 men, perhaps unwilling to be matched with their sisters 
 or their wives, in pursuits in which they have painfully 
 suspected that they might not always hold a clear 
 supremacy. 
 
 Need I argue in excuse of an educational equality as just 
 and beneficial as it has been made inevitable by the course 
 of human progress ? 
 
 One of the highest achievements of Christianity, in the 
 amelioration of the world, was accomplished by the 
 elevation of woman from her debased condition. In its 
 divine dispensation, she took her proper place, as a respon- 
 sible and immortal being; and if the capacities bestowed 
 upon her are to have full development, should we not help 
 it in the largest and most liberal way? I do not pause 
 upon the idle controversy as to the comparative power of 
 the male and female intellect. They are very diverse in 
 their qualities ; each gifted with those which suit the sphere 
 
Reforms in Ireland, 365 
 
 appointed for its exercise ; each excellent in its own degree 
 and kind ; and neither to be ranked in disparaging contrast 
 to the other. Bat of woman^s intellectual power can the 
 contemporaries of Maria Edgeworth and Elizabeth Brown- 
 ing and G-eorge Eliot and Mary Somerville be capable of 
 doubting ; or of its worthiness to be aided by the best 
 appliances for its ripening growth and healthful activity, 
 which are employed to inform and strengthen the intellect 
 of man ? She has to discharge the highest duties of 
 humanity in her relations with her home j and will she 
 discharge them less efficiently if a mind^ well furnished 
 and wisely disciplined, lifting her above the debihtating 
 atmosphere of frivolity and folly, makes her a true help- 
 mate to her husband, and fits her to form the character of 
 her children, — putting far from them the temptations of 
 indolence and vice, and equipping them, with high principle, 
 pure morals, and sound culture, to bear themselves nobly in 
 the world ? 
 
 Her possession of abundant knowledge need not derogate, 
 in the smallest measure, from the grace and tenderness 
 which are amongst the dearest characteristics of her sex ; 
 nor will her enlarged intelligence disqualify her for the wise 
 and orderly government of a family. Some of us have seen 
 with delight, and remember with enduring gratitude, the 
 combination of sense and information, of clear judgment 
 and firm will, with perfect gentleness and loving care for 
 all about them, in wives and mothers worthy to be ranked 
 with the '^ valiant woman ^^ of Holy Writ, the heart of 
 whose husband trusted in her, and whose children, arose 
 and called her blessed; who opened her mouth with 
 wisdom, and in her tongue was the law of kindness. Her 
 kindness was not less kind because it was associated with 
 her wisdom ; and her husband did not cherish her w4th less 
 attachment because that wisdom made her worthy of his trust. 
 
366 Legal, Editcational, and Social 
 
 Some seem to think tbat knowledge must unsex tlie 
 woman, and lead her to intrude on the proper business of 
 the man. But surely it is not so. Their provinces are 
 separate. Nature has marked the line between them, and 
 it should never be overpassed — Isoii omnia possumus 
 omnes ! There are vocations which physical and mental 
 constitution and the necessity of things assign to each 
 respectively, and the woman's influence is never so great 
 and true as when she confines herself to those which pro- 
 perly belong to her. The offer to her of instruction in the 
 whole range of science and letters, on a complete equality 
 with man, does not involve or imply approval of the appli- 
 cation of that instruction to any purposes which the con- 
 ditions and ends of her existence should not permit her to 
 pursue. Fulfilling those conditions and aiming at those 
 ends, she may have full occupation for all her powers, 
 without impairing the high instincts, the delicate suscepti- 
 bilities, and the sacred afiections which make her own 
 happiness and purify and bless her household. She may 
 realise in her daily life the picture of Wordsworth, with 
 which you are familiar — and all the more, the higher is her 
 culture : — 
 
 The reason firm, the temperate will, 
 Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill ! 
 A perfect woman nobly plann'd 
 To warn, to comfort, and command. 
 And yet a spirit, still and bright, 
 With something of an angel light. 
 
 In connexion with the subject of Education, I ought to 
 observe that, whilst Eeformatories had been brought into 
 operation in Ireland in 1858, we had no Industrial Schools 
 in 1861, or for many years afterwards, although they had 
 before been established in England and Scotland. In 1868, 
 the Industrial Schools Act was introduced for Ireland by 
 
Reforms in Ireland. 367 
 
 tlie 0^ Conor Don^ and carried througli Parliament_, with 
 considerable modifications. It has since been worked, 
 under the able and humane superintendence of Sir John 
 Lentaigne, with excellent effect. There were fifty -six 
 schools in operation on the 31st December^ 1880, and on 
 that day there were in those schools, — Boys, 2,404 ; girls, 
 3,295; in all 5,699. There was an increase of 365 boys 
 and 222 girls on the previous year. 
 
 Thousands of children have been thus saved from cor- 
 ruption and crime, and trained to become useful citizens. 
 It was a strange anomaly, in 1861, that whilst the criminal 
 child was cared for, fed, lodged, and instructed, the home- 
 less vagrant, who had done no wrong, was allowed to perish 
 in ignorance and destitution. I cannot occupy time in 
 describing the details of the administration which has made 
 the Irish Statute a real boon and blessing to the country. 
 But I trust that those of my auditors who have not seen the 
 school at Artane will pay it a visit. There is not in the 
 empire an institution of tbe sort more admirably managed; 
 and it will sufficiently indicate the methods which have been 
 pursued in Ireland, and the advantages which have been 
 secured for so many unfriended children. 
 
 The Irish Industrial Schools Act, although aimino* at the 
 same objects, and generally containing the same provisions, 
 as that which was long before framed for England, is not, 
 unfortunately, identical with it in some respects. Thus, 
 whilst in England the guardians of the poor can transfer 
 children to industrial schools, and provide for their main- 
 tenance, no such power has been given to Irish Guardians. 
 The result is disastrous here. The pauper child must con- 
 tinue in the demoralising atmosphere of the workhouse, 
 until he becomes unfit for any of the proper uses of human 
 life. He is in the hands of adult paupers, whose character 
 and example offer no fit model for imitation. He does not 
 
368 Legal, EdtLcational, and Social 
 
 receive the discipline or tlie teaching whicli might give him. 
 the hope of a prosperous manhood ; and he is liable to that 
 induration of the heart which has been observed to belong 
 to young persons brought up as paupers "whom nobody 
 owns/^ — in gloomy isolation, and untouched by the kindly 
 affections of family life. Certainly, there is no ground for 
 this distinction between the Statutes in England, and 
 Ireland. Nor is there any for another, which casts on the 
 managers of our industrial schools the burthen of pur- 
 chasing land and erecting buildings without the relief which 
 is afforded, in Scotland and England, by the authority en- 
 trusted to public bodies, for the erection and maintenance 
 of such schools at the general expense. It seems strange 
 that the poorer country should bear the heavier burthen. 
 
 Nearly £200,000 have been expended by Irish managers 
 out of their own resources, or from the charitable contri- 
 butions of the public, in procuring sites and completing 
 houses, and the pressure upon them must have been very 
 great. 
 
 I do not see any reason for maintaining a different rule 
 in the two countries, and I trust that the distinction may 
 be speedily done away. 
 
 I do not advert to the Irish Convict System, which has 
 had such excellent results, or to our Irish Reformatories, 
 as both had existence before 1861, and do not, therefore, 
 come within the plan of my address. I spoke of them 
 largely at our last Congress in Dublin; and I shall only 
 call attention to a new experiment in connexion with them, 
 which is now in progress. 
 
 In the year 1880, 84 boys and 12 girls, under twelve 
 years of age, were committed to Reformatory schools in 
 Ireland, after having been imprisoned in gaols for fourteen 
 days and upwards. The effect of such imprisonment, on 
 children so young, has been found to be contaminating 
 
Reforms in Ireland. 369 
 
 and injurious; and, for the purpose of preventing this ill 
 result, a probationary industrial school has been certified by 
 the Chief Secretary, at Kilmore, in the county of Dublin, 
 for juvenile offenders under twelve years of age, who will 
 be transferred, on reaching that age, to industrial schools, 
 or may, after eighteen months, be placed in the homes of 
 their relatives, if willing and qualified to receive them with 
 advantage. 
 
 I have never been able to appreciate or approve the 
 reasons for the rule which interposes the prison, with all 
 its evil influences, between the Court of Justice and the 
 Reformatory School. I am very glad that the experiment 
 I have described has been undertaken; and I trust that it 
 may issue in a larger change of reformatory discipline. I 
 mention it here, though somewhat out of place, because 
 I believe that it will be of interest to many who have 
 laboured for the redemption of criminal children ; and that 
 it is of importance as testing the value of the questionable 
 practice to which I have referred. 
 
 Another great improvement, accomplished since 1861, 
 was in some sense attributable to the Congress of that year. 
 All that I have said, and much more, as to the mischief of 
 their residence in workhouses, was urged at its meetings, in 
 favour of boarding-out orphan and deserted children, who 
 were then pining in those establishments, maintained and 
 educated there, and without provision for any other dwelling. 
 For a quarter of a century, after the enactment of the Irish 
 Poor Law, they had so remained; undergoing, in many 
 places, a miserable process of moral and physical deteriora- 
 tion — often exposed to the pollution of vice — and always 
 liable, as I have said, to be made hard and selfish, from 
 the want of any natural culture of the aff*ections. They 
 dragged through their young lives without hope or com- 
 fort, and left their prison-houses, in too many cases, only 
 
 2 A 
 
370 Legal, Edticational, and Social 
 
 to become absorbed amongst the most incorrigible of the 
 criminal classes. 
 
 Earnest appeals were made at your Congress against 
 this state of things. Excursions were planned to visit the 
 homes of children boarded out in the county of Dublin^ and 
 their better and happier state attracted great attention. 
 In the result, the Boarding-out Act of 1862 was passed, 
 not without difficulty; and although the limitation to the 
 age of thirteen, and the restrictions enforced on our Guar- 
 dians of the Poor, which are more stringent than those of 
 the English Poor Law, lessen its advantages, it has con- 
 ferred enormous benefits on many thousand little ones, who 
 enjoy health and happiness in the open country, are trained 
 to honest toil, and ultimately take their proper places as 
 useful members of a community, to which, if they had not 
 been rescued from the workhouse, they would have proved 
 a burthen and a curse. 
 
 I pass on to tell you what has been done, since 1861, in 
 a department not less important than any other within the 
 range of your inquiries — the department of Public Health. 
 In that year, Ireland had, as its chief sanitary authorities, 
 expiring Parish Yestries, clothed with antiquated powers, 
 which had been vested in them so far back as the year 
 1818. There were some other bodies established for similar 
 purposes, under statutes which had once had equal appli- 
 cation to England and Ireland, but had continued in action 
 here after they were repealed in England. Five years after 
 the meeting of the Congress, in 1866, the Vestries were 
 finally abolished, and the Guardians of the Poor were en- 
 trusted with sanitary powers identical with those existing 
 in England and Wales. The change was great and whole- 
 some; and was pushed to better issues when the Local 
 Government Board was created in 1872. It was armed 
 with large authority, and acted with energy and success. 
 
Reforms in Ireland. 371 
 
 A Statute of 1874 developed the sanitary system, and 
 brought it into full operation throughout the country. 
 
 Under that Act, the whole of Ireland was divided into 
 Sanitary Districts, called Urban Sanitary Districts and 
 Eural Sanitary Districts. The Urban Districts consist of 
 towns having a population exceeding 6,000. The govern- 
 ing body of the town is made the sanitary authority. The 
 rural districts consist of the Poor Law Unions, and the 
 Boards of Guardians are the sanitary authorities. There 
 are now 56 Urban Sanitary Districts and 163 Kural Sani- 
 tary Districts ; and in each of those districts a complete 
 sanitary staff has been organised, under the orders of the 
 Local Government Board. The Medical OflBcer of the 
 Dispensary District is, in all cases, the sanitary officer or 
 medical officer of health. The principal duty of the sani- 
 tary authorities and their officers consists in the inspec- 
 tion of their districts, and in taking all necessary steps to 
 compel the removal or abatement of nuisances, provide 
 a proper supply of water, and construct, or cause to be 
 constructed, where it may be necessary, proper sewers and 
 drains. 
 
 The Public Health Act of 1878 repealed all previous 
 Sanitary Acts, re-enacting, amending, and consolidating 
 their provisions, so as to comprise in one Statute the 
 entire Sanitary Law as it at present exists in Ireland. 
 
 The scope of the statute is comprehensive, and the 
 machinery for effectuating its beneficial purposes is com- 
 plete. I rejoice to say that its worth has been widely recog- 
 nised, and the increasing activity of the local authorities 
 is demonstrated in the most conclusive way, by the amount 
 of their expenditure for the last six years, as it appears in 
 the audited accounts of the Board. 
 
 It is not easy to over-estimate the importance to Ireland 
 of the work which is thus proved to have been done. 
 
 2 a2 
 
372 Legal, Edttcational, and Social 
 
 It has been of double advantage, by relieving the poor 
 at seasons of sore distress, and securing the permanent 
 improvement of the health of the community. 
 
 Again, I think I may confidently say, that, in a depart- 
 ment so deeply affecting the comfort and the happiness of 
 a people, Ireland need not be ashamed of the progress she 
 is making and has made. 
 
 And, for her, that progress is especially important. 
 Health and social morals run closely together. Cleanliness 
 and godliness are in alliance ; and wholesome and com- 
 modious dwellings are important instruments of civilisation. 
 The squalidness of his home drives the artisan for light and 
 solace to the public-house. The mud cabin, with its single 
 room and crowded foulness, is not very compatible with the 
 formation of habits of ordered industry; and, save in a 
 country still marvellously pure, its inmates would be sub- 
 iected to many dangers. It is of great consequence, for 
 reasons like these, which might be largely multiplied, that 
 our sanitary work should extend, not merely to lodging- 
 houses, but, as far as may be, to the dwellings, generally, 
 of the humbler classes ; and that the English effort in that 
 direction which has been so happily prosecuted under the 
 benevolent guidance of Lord Shaftesbury should have wide 
 and cordial imitation here. 
 
 I do not desire to take credit to your Association which 
 it may not fairly claim ; but you will permit me to mention, 
 in illustration of the topic I have last considered, a not 
 unpleasant reminiscence of 1861, of which record is made 
 in the biography of one of our philanthropic citizens. In 
 the autumn of that year, Mr. Senior and Mr. James 
 Haughton resolved to give some practical application to 
 wise suggestions which had been made as to the utility of 
 ornamental gardening in public parks, such as beautifies 
 those of London, at the expense of the Imperial taxes. 
 
Refo7n7is m Ireland. 373 
 
 They prepared a memorial to the Executive. It was re- 
 ceived with favour; and the People's Garden rose into 
 existence — at once a boon to multitudes who enjoy its 
 beauty _, and a worthy monument to the genial and accom- 
 plished Viceroy — a true lover of the country he delighted 
 to make his home — whose statue continues to adorn it. 
 
 And^ touching thus on a local theme in connexion with 
 Public Health, I may be permitted to allude to the great 
 undertaking by which, to the lasting honour of the man 
 who conceived it and completed it, in spite of misconcep- 
 tion and resistance, this city receives an abundant supply 
 of pure water, secured by a vast but most profitable expen- 
 diture, which amounts, I am informed, up to the present 
 time, to £530,000. Nor should I forget to mention, in the 
 same connexion, the gratitude which is due to a munificent 
 nobleman, who has lavishly em.ployed his fortune in ren- 
 dering one of the finest squares in Europe a place of joyous 
 resort to his fellow-citizens. 
 
 I can only make the briefest allusion to a measure most 
 worthy of attention in the Department to which I am re- 
 ferring — the Irish Sunday Closing Act. It was hotly con- 
 tested and violently denounced ; but it has succeeded beyond 
 expectation ; and its moralising influence in removing, even 
 partially, the withering curse of national intemperance, has 
 made it a practical reform of a high order. T cannot dwell 
 on the mode of its operation ; but the results are indicated 
 in the most conclusive way by the unanswerable evidence 
 of our criminal statistics. In 1878, when it was in action 
 for a few months, the number of punishable cases of 
 drunkenness was reduced by 3,000, as compared with the 
 year 1877. In 1879, when it was in full force, the reduction 
 was 11,000, and last year it was 22,000 — the number of 
 offences, which, in 1877, was 110,000, having fallen to 
 88,048. It is not wonderful that success so signal, proved 
 
374 Legal, Educational, and Social 
 
 by these figures and in many otlier ways^ should already 
 have induced wise and good men to imitate the example of 
 Ireland in other districts of the Empire, with the sanction 
 and by the authority of the Legislature. And does it not 
 give us fair ground for hope, that the undoubted and most 
 salutary improvement in the drinking customs of the 
 wealthier classes may be gradually extended to the multi- 
 tudes beneath them ; and that we may be emancipated, 
 more and more, from the cruel dominion of a vice which 
 is to us the perennial source of crime and misery, and 
 degrades these kingdoms in the estimation of the world ? 
 
 It would be impossible for me, after such a merciless 
 exhaustion of your patience, by the presentment of so many 
 subjects within the limits of a single address, to dwell upon 
 the topics in connexion with Irish progress which would 
 properly range themselves within your departments of 
 Economy and Art. They press for attention which I cannot 
 give to them. But, touching only the siimma fastigia 
 renimy I would not leave imperfect my inadequate enume- 
 ration of things accomplished within twenty years by 
 omitting mention of the most memorable of them all — the 
 Act which recognised the principle of Religious Equality, 
 and the Land Eeforms of 1870 and 1881 — transcending, 
 for the Irish people, in the greatness of their conception 
 and the magnitude of their results, any legislative measures 
 of the century. 
 
 They need no further reference ; but the Congress may 
 recognise, as a matter of special and present interest, that 
 a movement has begun for the promotion of Irish Manufac- 
 tures. This was essential to us. Exclusive reliance on their 
 agricultural resources by the vast majority of our people 
 has been the cause of stagnation in their national life, and 
 continually-recurring penury and suffering. The composite 
 blood of mixed races tends to their mental and physical 
 
Reforms in Ireland. 375 
 
 supremacy ; and mixed industries are needful to a com- 
 munity whicli aims to be prosperous_, especially if it is at 
 the mercy of an uncertain climate. Ireland needs manu- 
 facturing success to save her from the calamities entailed 
 by varying seasons^ and secure her proper station in the 
 world. She has ample capacity to attain it, and only needs 
 the will and a knowledge of the way. It is, therefore, in 
 the last degree satisfactory to find that all her classes, of 
 all religious and political denominations, are emulating each 
 other in a great endeavour to supply this cardinal necessity. 
 We must wish it God speed ! But whilst we do so, and 
 help it as we can, we should remember that similar attempts 
 have been made in other times, and issued in disappointing 
 and disastrous failure. And we should learn from the sad 
 experience to avoid the errors which have baffled hope and 
 efifort like our own. Much patience and perseverance are 
 needed to build up the broken fortunes of a nation. En- 
 thusiasm exhausts itself. The violation of economic laws 
 is surely followed by disaster. And if we would succeed 
 in this needful undertaking, we must not forget that, 
 in the long run, the best article will command the highest 
 price; and that to hold our ground, in the open com- 
 petition which tests conflicting powers, we must apply 
 ourselves to the industries specially suited to Ireland, and 
 likely to be most profitable here ; and become possessed of in- 
 dustrial habits and industrial aptitudes fitting us to meet our 
 neighbours in an honourable rivalry, in which for them, as for 
 uSj there will be ^^ a fair field and no favour.^^ The value of 
 organisation is great. The ardour of preparation is encou- 
 raging. Exhibitions and councils, and committees and 
 subscription lists, are of value, as they fix attention on the 
 ample and undeveloped resources of the island; awaken to 
 honest effort, and confirm well-founded expectation ; inspire 
 us with self-reliance and self-respect ; and so lead on to the 
 
2) J 6 Legal, Edttcatio7ialy and Social 
 
 promotion of a sound industrial system, approving itself 
 to mankind by the worth of its productions. If this be 
 achieved, we shall redeem the failures of the past ; if it be 
 not, we shall only repeat them. But we need not fail. In far 
 worse times, our forefathers were proving their fitness for 
 industrial eminence, when an unworthy intolerance of their 
 prosperity forbade its continuance and increase. It has 
 never fully rallied. But the hour has come for its revival. 
 The blow which destroyed it cannot be repeated. In 
 happier circumstances, it will have free scope for the largest 
 expansion, and if it do not flourish, the blame will be 
 our own. 
 
 The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars. 
 But in ourselves, that we are underlings ! 
 
 Only a word as to our relation with the department you 
 have lately added to your Programme. The conditions of 
 life in Ireland have not been, for many a century, consistent 
 with the successful culture of the Fine Arts. They could 
 not flourish in times, too much prolonged, of turmoil and 
 misery and social chaos. A\^e boast an ancient civilisation, 
 which distinguished our island when darkness brooded on 
 the world, — connecting the learning of famous seminaries, 
 to which multitudes flocked from other nations, witb 
 excellence in art, still evidenced by the venerable ruins 
 of our churches, and by remnants of rare workmanship 
 in the precious metals and the sculptured crosses and 
 rich illuminations of early Christian times, which have 
 survived ages of strife and suff'ering, and are still to 
 be inspected in our Irish Academy and Trinity College. 
 We are proud of their attestation to the old endowments 
 of a country which, in later days, has vindicated its 
 claim to artistic eminence by the works of Barry, and 
 Maclise, and Hogan, and Foley, and others who are gone : 
 
Reforms in Ireland. 2)77 
 
 and of living men who inherit their genius^ and will 
 emulate their fame. 
 
 We have been placed at a serious disadvantage. The 
 poverty of Ireland has not permitted a large patronage of 
 art^ and those who have been distinguished in any of its 
 branches have found irresistible attraction and abundant 
 reward in the English metropolis. But I am glad to be 
 able to say that here, also, we have been making sub- 
 stantial advances. We have never, in later days, had such 
 appliances and helps for the rising artist as we now 
 possess. 
 
 Our National Gallery, under wise and conscientious 
 supervision, continually undergoing fresh development, 
 need not shrink from comparison with similar institutions 
 of the Continent. Its contents are very choice in their 
 character, and very comprehensive in the range of their 
 subjects. A Science and Art Museum has been established 
 with every prospect of giving, in a short time, effective 
 encouragement to art-studies as applied to manufactures. 
 Our Hibernian Academy was never so prosperous and so 
 well endowed. Its visitors are increasing annually by many 
 thousands, and, notwithstanding the hardness of the times, 
 the purchasers of pictures become, year by year, more 
 numerous and more liberal in their expenditure. I allade 
 to these things only that I may not omit all reference to 
 our successful action in connexion with one of the most 
 interesting of your Departments; but I do not desire to 
 intrude on the province of my noble friend, who will pre- 
 side in it, and more fittingly explain the nature and extent 
 of the improvements to w^hich I have lightly pointed. 
 
 I have completed the task I proposed to myself, in a 
 manner inevitably unsatisfactory and imperfect. I could not 
 recount transactions ranging through twenty j^ears, in the 
 time prescribed to me, and hope to do so with any com- 
 
378 Legal, Educational, and Social Reforms, 
 
 pleteness. But I shall be content^ and you will pardon my 
 many shortcomings, if I have indicated to you the results 
 of honest effort by Irishmen of this generation, in obtaining 
 for their country amended laws — cheap and facile justice — 
 education, liberal, impartial, and available to all — the 
 enforcement of the crowning virtue of a Christian civilisa- 
 tion by sheltering the friendless child and watching over 
 the unhappy lunatic — free and equal exercise of the rights 
 of conscience — increased provision for the national health 
 and comfort — and security in his possessions and encou- 
 ragement to his industry for the tiller of the soil. In the 
 midst of many troubles and much discouragement, these 
 have been steps of real and cheering progress — improve- 
 ments permanently conquered from the past, and auspicious,, 
 as they will be fruitful, of a happier future. They all belong 
 to the great field of social reform which you desire to culti- 
 vate ; and I am sure you will appreciate them, and find in 
 them cause for pleasure and hopefulness in the prosecution 
 of your labours. To those labours I leave you, thanking 
 you for your patient kindness, and again bidding you a 
 cordial welcome to the Capital of Ireland. 
 
A LITERARY INSTITUTE IN DONEGAL, 
 AND ITS USES. 
 
A Literary Institute in Do7iegal, 
 and its Uses. 
 
 [This Paper was read at the Opening of the Literary Institute at 
 Letterkenny, in 1877.] 
 
 SOME months ago, I had business to do in Donegal, and 
 the friends who then received me, with a cordial 
 kindness I shall not soon forget, showed me, amongst other 
 objects of interest, the handsome building in which we are 
 assembled, — at that time approacbing its completion. They 
 told me of the motives which had prompted them to attempt 
 the establishment of a new institution for popular instruc- 
 tion and enjoyment, and of the purposes to which they 
 meant to devote it. They told me, further, that it would be 
 non-political and non- sectarian, and that its advantages, — 
 social, moral, and intellectual, — would be freely shared by 
 all. They did me the honour of expressing their belief 
 that, if I would assist at the opening of it, I might pro- 
 mote its well-being and do some public [service. I could 
 not refuse compliance with their wishes. Accordingly, I 
 am here : and I shall be happy if my presence may avail 
 for the smallest benefit to a good work in which I rejoice 
 to participate. 
 
 So much it becomes me to say, in explanation of my 
 coming, for such an object, to a place with which I have no 
 immediate connexion. But I would not have you regard 
 me as altogether a stranger to your county. I have owed 
 good offices to many of its friendly people. I have 
 
382 A Lite7'aiy Institute in Donegal ^ 
 
 been long familiar witli its scenery and its annals. I have 
 not been unconscious of tlie common pride of Irish- 
 men in a district forming, witli its gray mountains and 
 pleasant valleys, one of the loveliest portions of that girdle 
 of beauty which compasses round about the shores of our 
 island \ and I have shared their common interest in the 
 brilliant deeds and sad reverses which have made your local 
 history so picturesque and touching. I do not forget the 
 relations of your ancestors, in the ages that are gone, with 
 the old Celtic stock, to which I am proud to owe my origin ; 
 or the struggles, the triumphs, and the sorrows which once 
 associated, for good or evil, the fortunes of Tyr-Connell 
 and that fair Tyr-Owen in which my fathers dwelt. With 
 such feelings and such memories, I am glad to be amongst 
 you. 
 
 I have thought, on full reflection, that I shall best dis- 
 charge the duty cast upon me by telling you, briefly and 
 plainly, the reasons why I regard this Institute as honour- 
 able to those who have founded it ; fit to confer real benefits 
 on your community, without distinction of party or religion ; 
 and, therefore, worthy of the support of reasonable men. I 
 may so, perhaps, do more practical service, than if I enter- 
 tained you [with an address on any special subject of literary 
 or scientific interest. 
 
 And first, let me say how much I am gratified by the 
 reflection, that your undertaking is the spontaneous 
 issue of your own intelligence and free-handed liberality. 
 It is a monument of self-reliance and self-assertion, and 
 furnishes an example which other parts of Ireland would do 
 well to imitate. 
 
 You are far away from the centres of wealth and com- 
 merce. You have no means to lavish on palaces of industry 
 and stately colleges, such as, elsewhere, attract the praise 
 of men. Until now, no railway has reached this town ; 
 
A7td its Uses, 383 
 
 though^ happily, tlie want will soon be supplied, and its 
 great capabilities of improvement properly developed. Your 
 people remain in comparative isolation. They do not wage 
 the battle of life with the fretful energy and absorbing 
 care, which mark the civilisation of our time. They have 
 compensation, and possibly more than compensation, in 
 simplicity of manners and domestic purity, such as, if they 
 can be matched, cannot, certainly, be bettered in the 
 world. They are much as they were in times long gone ; 
 largely speaking their own old language and following their 
 own old ways. 
 
 Yet, under a strong sense of the need of giving to your 
 young men a higher intelligence and a better training, you 
 have, in such circumstances and for such a community, 
 from your personal resources, erected a structure, with all 
 fit appliances towards that good end, of which you have 
 reason to be proud. 
 
 I do not undervalue the aid of the Treasury. I do not 
 hold cheap the sanction of the Government. There are 
 undertakings to the success of which such aid and sanction 
 are, of course, essential. There are institutions which 
 cannot exist without them. In these countries, perhaps, 
 the danger is, that the principle of '^ laissez faire " 
 may be applied excessively, and that assistance to indi- 
 vidual effort may be too grudgingly afforded by the State. 
 But, on the other hand, without trust in themselves no 
 people can prevail. Governments may remove obstacles to 
 action ; and they ought to assist, where assistance is indis- 
 pensable and will be of manifest advantage to a nation. 
 But we must for ever be our own best helpers. Our own 
 successes are the real and the true, — 
 
 Et genus, et proavos, et quce non fecimus ipsi, 
 Vix ea nostra voco. 
 
384 A Literary Institute in Donegal, 
 
 What is properly ours is of our own making : and 
 De Maistre was not far wrong when lie said_, tliat what 
 costs us nothing is nothing to us. 
 
 Cities in your northern province have built up a great 
 prosperity, without the aid of special favours from Parlia- 
 ments or administrations. They are justly proud of their 
 independence, and keenly enjoy the triumphs they have 
 gained. In your place and measure, you are treading in 
 their footsteps ; and the proceedings of this night should 
 inspirit and sustain all who are prepared manfully to 
 strive in the spirit of the promise : Aide-toi, et le del 
 t'aidera! 
 
 There are many towns in Ireland, more populous and far 
 more rich than this, in which such institutes as yours would 
 be of inestimable advantage. What you have done, with 
 narrower means and poorer opportunities, they may wisely 
 imitate ; and I regard it as a chief credit and blessing of 
 your work, that it furnishes encouragement and guidance 
 to voluntary efforts of a like kind, which may mould for 
 good the lives of coming generations. 
 
 I have spoken of the spirit of your action. Let me turn 
 to some of its aims and probable results. The founders of 
 this Institute saw that, in a place so remote, and in 
 circumstances so unfavourable, the opportunities of self- 
 improvement for the young were very scanty. They saw 
 also that, in our time, the acquisition of knowledge has 
 become, for most men, at once an absolute condition of 
 success in life and a probable assurance of it. Competitive 
 examination — whatever may be its shortcomings, and 
 they are many — opens the way of honourable progress : and 
 those who cannot accept its chances must often abandon 
 hope and wither in obscurity. Irishmen have not been 
 slow to avail themselves of the better system which has 
 superseded the monopolising favouritism of the past ; and. 
 
And its Uses, 385 
 
 wherever they have been permitted to obtain needful 
 culture, they have taken foremost positions in the intel- 
 lectual race. 
 
 Unhappily, that culture is too often beyond their reach. 
 The condition of education amongst us is still, in many 
 respects, very deplorable. This is not the place or the 
 time to consider why it is so ; to discuss the vexed ques- 
 tions which are largely raised about it ; or to suggest the 
 measures by which it may best be improved. Taking it 
 only in connexion with the matter I have in hand, it is 
 enough for me to indicate that whilst our primary schools 
 are, in many respects, excellent and do great service — 
 whether subsidised by the liberality of the State or 
 conducted, without earthly reward, by self-sacrificing 
 brotherhoods — we are miserably wanting in the appliances 
 of intermediate instruction. In that respect, the provision 
 for our middle classes is utterly inadequate. Even the 
 seminaries which they formerly frequented have been, to a 
 large extent, destroyed by the inevitable rivalry of new 
 institutions, primarily designed only for the masses : and 
 they have lost, in numerous districts, the opportunities of 
 training in classics and science which were enjoyed by 
 those who went before them. The result, unquestionably, 
 is that a great and grievous want is felt throughout the 
 country. The proper preparation for competition is often 
 unattainable. The level of intelligence is lowered; and 
 we hear from examiners for matriculation in colleges, and 
 from persons of authority abroad, serious complaints of the 
 imperfect information exhibited by Irish youths, often of 
 high natural capacity and eager aptitude for study, but put 
 at disadvantage and subjected to defeat, by an absence of 
 early instruction for which they are in no way responsible. 
 
 This is sad ; and it is sad, also, to feel that, as another 
 consequence of the want to which I point, we are failing in 
 
 2 B 
 
o 
 
 86 A Literary Instihite in Donegal, 
 
 the circulation and enjoyment of a sound and wholesome 
 literature. The bookshops in our country towns are not 
 nearly as numerous or as well furnished as they ought to 
 be^ or as they would be, if we were a reading people ; and 
 although there are still publishers in Dublin of enterprise 
 and energy_, the trade in books has manifestly deteriorated. 
 
 And thus the evil works,, by action and reaction. The 
 decadence of schools of a higher order induces a want of 
 the taste for letters which ''' grows by what it feeds on''^; 
 and the absence of that taste diminishes or destroys the 
 sense of the importance and necessity of mental cultiva- 
 tion^ which would compel the creation of a teaching power 
 sufficient to produce it. 
 
 I speak of this subject with pain^ but with a profound 
 conviction that it is of the most vital moment to the very 
 highest interests of Ireland. This is no time for retro- 
 gression. It is no time for standing still. The world is 
 moving forward, and we should be ashamed to lag behind. 
 We are not wanting in the faculty of progress. We do 
 not lack quickness of perception, or capacity of labour, or 
 appreciation of the profit and delight of intellectual 
 activity. We have no reason to suppose that the qualities 
 which, rightly employed, won for our country, in the long- 
 gone centuries, the proud title, — ^'insida doctorum et sanc- 
 torum/' — are not ours to-day. And we are more fortunate 
 than our forefathers of later generations. Still, as I 
 believe, only in the opening of a happier era, and affected 
 inevitably by the evils of a melancholy past, we have seen 
 great changes which have swept away many difficulties and 
 invited our country to a new career of moral and material 
 advancement. I do not speak as a politician in an address 
 to an Institute which is strictly non-political, and I avoid 
 any subjects of possible controversy in an assembly which, 
 happily and exceptionally, comprises men of the most 
 
And its Uses. 387 
 
 various views in politics and religion. But we must all 
 concur, tliat we cannot rest in contented ignorance^ or fail 
 to prepare ourselves to make the best use of tlie good 
 influences wliich promise a better future for our race. I 
 earnestly trust, we shall not ; but, surely, it is lamentable 
 that whilst the want of a higher education, which I have 
 deplored, continues unsupplied, generation passes after 
 generation, with lapsed opportunities and bafSed hopes, 
 and individual sacrifices are as numerous as national dis- 
 credit and disaster are extreme. 
 
 The responsibility is great, indeed, of those who are, in 
 any way, answerable for the continuance of such a state of 
 things. I have referred to it as illustrating one of the 
 main motives of the founders of your Institute, who re- 
 solved that, in their own sphere, they would strive to 
 relieve themselves from any share in that responsibility. 
 They could not control the action of Governments or infuse 
 wisdom into the counsels of statesmen. They were tired of 
 waiting, whilst childhood grew to adolescence and youth to 
 age, without the advantages needful for the progress of a 
 people, and due to them as social and moral beings. They 
 saw that they could supply those advantages, at least 
 within narrow limits and in a moderate way, and give to 
 the families of your town and county some opportunity of 
 becoming acquainted with the literature of the past and the 
 present, and keeping abreast with the progress of modern 
 intelligence. They saw, also, that they could assist the 
 youth of Donegal in striving for that honourable advance- 
 ment which is no longer compatible with stagnation of the 
 mental powers. 
 
 Accordingly, they undertook the task which is to-night 
 completed. They set about the erection of this commodious 
 building, which will afford the use of a library and reading- 
 room, a circulating library, a fine lecture-hall, and a school- 
 
 2 B 2 
 
SS A Literary Institute in Donegal, 
 
 room of great proportion s^ for instruction in the mornings 
 and the evenings. The design was carried into effect with- 
 out noise or ostentation, and its framers may congratulate 
 themselves on its perfect success. In a place like this, their 
 effort must have been difficult as their end was good ; and 
 those who come after them may yet have reason to hold 
 their names in benediction. 
 
 If the scheme be carried to its results in the wise and 
 energetic spirit which has given it origin, sound instruction 
 may be secured, and a comprehensive and well-selected 
 library formed, at little cost; and those to whom the means 
 of mental training are now denied, will be enabled to 
 cultivate that friendship with books which endures when 
 other friendships fail us, — which time does not chill or 
 change of fortune weaken, — which stimulates our youth to 
 worthy action, and solaces our age in its decrepitude. 
 They may disport themselves in every region of the vast 
 domain of letters. They may form that love of reading 
 which Gibbon declared he would not exchange for the 
 treasures of the Indies. They may study the historians 
 who chronicle the workings of Providence on earth, and 
 develope the philosophy which teaches by example. They 
 may rejoice in communion with 
 
 The gentle poets who have made us heirs 
 Of truth and pure delight in deathless lays, 
 
 and grow familiar with the thinkers by whom the great 
 dogmas of morals and religion have been maintained, for 
 the salvation of society and the completer assurance of our 
 immortal hopes. And now and hereafter, gifted men may 
 be found amongst you, who, without such instruction and 
 endowment, must have sunk into their graves, 
 
 To fortune and to fame unknown, 
 
And its Uses. 389 
 
 but^ with their aid^ may play high parts in the world's great 
 drama, and cover with honour the land that bore them. 
 
 So far for this Institute, as an instrument for intellectual 
 training. Its founders had another end in view. They 
 desired that it should also afford harmless and wholesome 
 enjoyment. They had found that here, as elsewhere in 
 Ireland, habits of intemperance have done much injury. 
 I do not believe that, amongst you, they are carried, to such 
 excess as in other places. But intoxication is the ^^ ver 
 rongeur " — the unspeakable curse of our people ; and 
 " obsta princijiiis^' has, always, been the counsel of the 
 wise. It was conceived that, to correct such habits and 
 to prevent the formation of them, the supply of simple and 
 honest pleasures would be of high importance; and that 
 supply has been sought not only in the literary organisation 
 of which I have spoken, but also in appliances more ex- 
 clusively for amusement — a billiard-room, ball-courts, and 
 things of a like kind. 
 
 Of this branch of the Institute, all who know human 
 nature and human life are sure to approve. If it avail, in 
 any way, to check intoxication, it will be a priceless bless- 
 ing. Need I speak of the miseries and scandals with which 
 that vice has blighted a country, but for it eminently moral 
 and, at present, almost free from the taint of serious crime ? 
 You all know how fearful are its consequences. It blackens 
 the fairest prospects and withers the highest hopes. It dulls 
 the intellect and kills the best affections of the heart, it 
 destroys the sweet charities of life; makes God^s great giic 
 of free wiU vain ; and degrades natures that were generous, 
 to the overmastering slavery of the basest self-indulgence. 
 It makes earthly pandemoniums of homes which should be 
 happy ; and dooms their inmates to life-long torture. It 
 gives criminals to our gaols, and beggars to our work- 
 houses ; and perverts the prosperity, which increases wages 
 
390 A Literary Institute in Donegal ^ 
 
 and should increase comfort and strengthen virtue^ into a 
 devilish engine for the proportionate increase of vice and 
 wretchedness. Exaggeration of its evils is impossible. 
 Their enormity transcends the force of language. The 
 squalid dwelling ; the outraged wife ; the starving child ; 
 the shattered frame -, the quick decay; the delirious agony; 
 the despairing death-bed^ and the pauperis grave ; — these 
 are familiar horrors which proclaim^ with eloquence more 
 scathing than words can utter^ the fate of the drunkard 
 and the misery of all who have relations with him. The 
 old poet understood our fallen nature when he said^ — 
 
 Unless above himself he can 
 
 Erect himself, how mean a thing is man ! 
 
 If, on the contrary^ he takes the downward course, he 
 will grow far worse than mean, and to the ungoverned 
 appetite of the brute may be swiftly added the atrocity of 
 the demon. 
 
 No wonder that men labour to find the remedy for an 
 evil so grievous. It is not easy of discovery. Mere legis- 
 lation will not suffice. Sumptuary laws have never moralised 
 a people. Bad men are not made good by Act of Parliament. 
 Statesmanship may do much in removing the occasions of 
 sin and the incitement of temptation. It may make wise 
 sanitary arrangements, which help on spiritual as well as 
 material progress ; and whatever in this way may be reason- 
 ably accomplished, we are bound to do by our most sacred 
 obligations to Humanity and to God. But true reforma- 
 tion must come from within. The root of moral evil is in 
 the soul of man ; and until it is torn away no real cure can 
 be effected by external action. 
 
 Unless changed habits and changed feelings induce a 
 change of life, statutes threaten and judges punish vainly. 
 
And its Uses, 391 
 
 The Roman satirist expressed a triitli of all time in his 
 pregnant question : — 
 
 Quid leges, sine moribus, 
 Van 86 proficiunt? 
 
 If moral restraint is wanting^ what avail your laws ? 
 
 Neither, for the children of toil, is it sufficient to feed the 
 intellect with knowledge. When long hours have been 
 spent in labour, men need repose, and crave for occupations 
 which may not tax further their outworn energies. The 
 exhausted body does not accept as pleasure a strain upon 
 the mind ; and imperfect information and poorly-cultivated 
 tastes do not well prepare us to engage with easy satis- 
 faction in grave thinking, -or any high exercise of the 
 imaginative faculties. 
 
 After a hard day's work, men seek a pleasant evening ; 
 and this we must afford them, or the consequences will be 
 formidable. We must try to wean them from evil, and lure 
 them to good, by inducements suitable to their condition 
 and capacities, of which they can appreciate the value. 
 We must show them that enjoyment is not the monopoly of 
 vice; and supply it in innocent and wholesome forms, as 
 the alternative of that which leads to shame and ruin. 
 
 I rejoice to say, that the founders of this Institute have 
 recognised these truths, and desire to give them practical 
 application. They know that, for those who are absorbed 
 in long and exhausting labours, — even when the law has 
 done its best, and such imperfect mental discipline has 
 their circumstances permit has been applied to them, — 
 there is still need of a kindly care which shall lead them to 
 the way of well-doing in the vacant hours, when idleness, 
 ''the mother of mischief,'' prompts them to dangerous 
 thoughts and unseemly actions. 
 
 Leisure is a blessing or a curse^ according to the use we 
 
392 A Literacy Instihite in Donegal, 
 
 make of it ; and for masses of our people, as things stand, 
 it is almost universally a curse. In most of the Continental 
 nations^ there are ample opportunities for enjoying and 
 utilising the periods of rest, which the Creator has made 
 necessary to our existence. In many of them, the climate 
 alone is a source of happiness. The brilliant sunlight, the 
 buoyant air, the continuous clearness of the atmosphere 
 invite to out-door pleasures which are cheap and simple as 
 they are sufficing ; and no one can have seen the multi- 
 tudes who congregate to partake of them, when the day is 
 over, in some of those favoured lands, without the assur- 
 ance that — 
 
 They feel it is a luxury to be. 
 
 Besides, the ^^ sweet South ^^ has in its climate none of 
 those incitements to indulgence in stimulating drinks which 
 are found in the cold and humid North, and its superior 
 temperance has less merit, for there is little inclination to 
 excess. 
 
 And, besides, in foreign countries, there are often arrange- 
 ments of the best kind for the gratification of the multi- 
 tude. Their houses may be humble, but they are generally 
 neat and clean. Spacious parks are opened, giving health 
 and comfort to those who use them ; and music is supplied 
 abundantly, of high quality and without cost to individual 
 persons. 
 
 In Ireland, unhappily, things are otherwise. Our climate 
 — excellent in many ways — is soft and genial, aud, save in 
 certain conditions of health, wholesome and enjoyable. But 
 it is uncertain, and has too much of damp and gloom to 
 tempt us to much continuance under the open sky. 
 
 The dwellings of our working classes are often unfit to 
 shelter human beings, — incapable of order or decency, and 
 a positive scandal to our civilisation. 
 
 Of the other appliances for popular comfort and recrea- 
 
And its Uses. 393 
 
 tion at which I have glanced, we have lamentably few. I 
 do nob believe that, in all Europe, the}^ are so poorly fur- 
 nished; and I know few duties of statesmanship or 
 enlightened charity more imperative than that of en- 
 deavouring to supply them. 
 
 What are — what must be — the effects on our social con- 
 dition ? The artisan, who has been engaged in weary and 
 unbroken effort from the early dawn, comes home at night 
 to a place, as I have said, often nnfit for human habitation, — 
 disgusting in its squalor, and pestilential in its filth, — to find 
 his family huddling together, without the most ordinary 
 means of making life pleasant or endurable. He may have 
 four or five hours to spend after his work is over; and how, 
 in such circumstances, is he to get through them ? Is it 
 wonderful, that he withdraws from his dismal den and its 
 foul surroundings, and seeks, in the absence of all better 
 things, the light, the warmth, and the companionship of 
 the public-house, where he finds excitement, and purchases 
 it, too often, by ruining his body and his soul ? 
 
 Or, take another case. The early closing movement had 
 a great aspect of beneficence. It seemed accordant with 
 the wisest speculation and the most genial kindness, that 
 young people should have their working-hours abridged, 
 and be so enabled to cultivate themselves and make their 
 lives more agreeable and better. And this good result, I 
 have no doubt, has sometimes been obtained. But suppose 
 an assistant or apprentice in any town, where shops close at 
 six or seven o^clock, finds himself, after discharging his 
 duties faithfully throughout the day, driven to consider what 
 he shall do with his evening. He may have no friends to 
 visit. He may have no aptitude for study. He may have 
 no books to read. What is he to do ? How is he to while 
 away the dreary minutes till his bed hour comes ? And 
 shall we be surprised, if, in the absence of all means of 
 
394 ^ Literary Institute in Donegal^ 
 
 employing tliem profitably^ he turns tliem to ill account 
 and allows himself to be drawn to the haunts of evil which 
 will be found always inviting him to enter ? What is his 
 alternative ? What is his protection ? He may for a time 
 resist temptation ; but our humanity is very weak, and we 
 know little of it if we wonder at his almost inevitable fall. 
 
 I am aware that efforts have been made to give working 
 people dwellings fit to be occupied without the moral mis- 
 chiefs to which I have pointed. And I know, also, that 
 good employers in great houses have arranged for the care 
 and instruction of their young servants during the evenings. 
 Those who have done such things are entitled to all honour ; 
 and a great deal more, I fervently trust, may be ac- 
 complished in the same direction. But, meanwhile, 
 enormous mischiefs continue to prevail ; and the illustra- 
 tions I have chosen are sadly practical and real at the 
 present hour. 
 
 The value of your Institute, if it tend, in any material 
 degree, to supply the terrible want I have described, 
 cannot be over-estimated. The law must do its part. The 
 school must do its part. The Church must do its part ; but 
 neither coercive penalties, nor opportunities of literary 
 acquisition, nor earnest zeal and eloquent remonstrance, 
 sustained by the divine authority of religion, will dispense 
 with the necessity of weaning men from vice by giving 
 them facilities for the practice of virtue ; and antagonising 
 temptations to an evil career, by countervailing allurements 
 to a worthier life. 
 
 The ideal set before themselves by the founders of your 
 Institute was, in this regard, a very noble one. If it be 
 realised, as it certainly may be, one great want of our time 
 will be supplied for this part of the island ; and again, the 
 example set by you may have, and ought to have, ready imi- 
 tation in many an Irish town, where people who are good. 
 
And its Uses. 395 
 
 and wish to be better, are longing for the helps you design 
 to afford. With pleasant rooms and attractive literature 
 and musical performances, and friendly conversation and 
 innocent amusement, you may redeem from error and 
 confirm in virtue. Man has been described as a ^^ bundle of 
 habits " : and those which he forms, under such happy in- 
 fluences, will purify his nature and give order to his life. 
 
 I might say more of the uses to which such an institution 
 may be applied, but I have pointed sufficiently to its im- 
 portance, for the purposes of social morality and educational 
 training. Need I urge the duty of affording it efficient 
 support and keeping it in healthy activity ? Need I press 
 upon those for whose benefit it has been created, and who 
 should be very thankful for it, the necessity of availing them- 
 selves of its advantages, and the propriety of demonstrating 
 their gratitude, in the most acceptable way, by practically 
 showing how well those advantages are appreciated and 
 how profitably they are employed ? 
 
 To many, I trust, it may open a prosperous career : to 
 some, it may give the opportunity of rising to high position 
 by the cultivation of special gifts : to all who come within 
 the sphere of its influence it should be a welcome agency 
 for making them wiser and better men. And all should 
 receive the help it offers — even if that help should not bring 
 the endowments of riches or of rank, which the world most 
 values — with a deep sense of the aid it may afford to secure 
 the blessings derived from a cultivation of those pure affec- 
 tions and a firm adhesion to those sound principles, which, 
 in every station, exalt the human character, and give to our 
 existence on this earth its truest dignity and grace. 
 
 Howe'er it be, it seems to me 
 
 'Tis only noble to be good ; 
 Kind hearts are more than coronets, 
 And simple faith than Norman blood. 
 
39^ ^ Lite7'ary Instihtte in Do7iegal, 
 
 We are not born into the world merely to secure material 
 advantages^ to hunt after honours^ or accumulate wealth ; 
 and the humblest man who comes into the halls we open 
 to him, to-night_, with an honest purpose of self-improve- 
 ment and a real design to seek such guidance as may make 
 his life more useful to his fellow-creatures, and more satis- 
 factory to his own conscience, may find in them more profit, 
 although he remain in his obscurity, than many another 
 whose stronger ambition and greater powers may send him 
 forth from them to achieve a loftier place. 
 
 But, though this be so, and though it is fitting that the 
 true value of culture should not be mis-estimated, or the 
 relative importance of material and spiritual advancement 
 misunderstood — for the mass of men the prizes of success 
 are required to prompt them to fruitful action ; and, un- 
 doubtedly those prizes may be honourably sought aud won 
 with blameless pleasure. There are few of us who could 
 address Fortune in the words of the Laureate : — 
 
 Smile and we smile, the lords of many lands ; 
 Frown and we smile, the lords of our own hands, 
 For man is man and master of his fate ! 
 
 In one sense, he is : — in the sense of which the Stoic dreamed 
 and which the Gospel realised by its counsels of self- 
 abnegation and detachment ; but there are not many so 
 learned in the science of the saints, as to be indifferent to 
 the results of their endeavours. And I do not suppose that 
 the young men who may be attracted to this Institute will 
 not strive to utilise its training by arming themselves for 
 the difficulties they must encounter, if they would outrun 
 their fellows and make their mark in life. Very many of 
 them, I am sure, will do so : and they may well be em- 
 boldened to the trial, by the knowledge, that, in spite of 
 disadvantage and discouragement, Irishmen, in later times — 
 
And its Uses. 397 
 
 as I have already noted — have held their own and more than 
 their own, in the endless competitions which have tested 
 capacity and acquirement. In no boastful spirit, I again 
 remind you that, proportionally with their numbers, their 
 successes have been very great. In every branch of the 
 Civil Service, they have forced for themselves an honour- 
 able recognition. Abroad, they have risen to the most 
 coveted and eminent posts. A Northern Irishman directs 
 the commerce of the Chinese Empire.* Another Northern 
 Irishman — a very dear and honoured friend of mine, after 
 holding, with high distinction, the Premiership of the great 
 dominion of Victoria, now occupies the foremost place in its 
 Legislative Assembly by the unanimous choice of the repre- 
 sentatives. f Our colonies have — I believe, every one of 
 them — had Irish Governors; and a distinguished com- 
 patriot of your own, born almost within a stone's-throw 
 of the place in which I stand, has held the dignity suc- 
 cessively in Queensland, New Zealand and Victoria. J I 
 cannot speak, as I would wish, in his own presence and that 
 of his venerated brother, § of another Donegal man|| who 
 reached, at an early age, the highest position at the Bar of 
 the colony in which he had chosen to commence his pro- 
 fessional career; and, having well and faithfully discharged 
 the high functions of its Attorney-General, has returned — 
 at once with youthful vigour and ripe experience — to win 
 new honours in his own land. 
 
 I have thought fit to refer to these things, because such 
 examples of well- won success may profitably excite honest 
 emulation and rouse dormant energy ; but is it needful that 
 I should appeal to recent events, in this historic region, 
 where thronging memories of the past connect themselves 
 
 * Mr. Hart. f Sir C. Gavan Duffy. X Sir G. F. Bowen. 
 
 § The late Most Kev. Dr. MacDevitt, Bishop of Raphoe, who presided 
 at the meetin^r. II Mr. E. 0. MacDevitt 
 
39^ A Literary Institute in Donegal, 
 
 with, your effort of the present^ and impel you to make it 
 worthy of the men who have gone before you ? 
 
 Those memories are proud and they are mournful. I do 
 not ask you to recal the days of pomp and splendour when 
 the O'Donnell stood upon the Rock of Doon, and received 
 from the successor of Columb-Cille the white rod which 
 symbolised at once the authority, the purity, and the justice 
 with which, he promised to wield the sceptre. Nor shall I 
 stir you with, a narrative of the conflicts of the time when 
 a Fitzgerald, the bravest of the Anglo-Norman race, 
 encountered the chieftain of Tyrconnell and each fell, fight- 
 ing, by the other's hand. Nor shall I tell the sad story 
 which, to this hour, so touches the hearts of Irishmen, of 
 the flight of the great Earls from the Rathmullan shore to 
 hide their broken fortunes in the obscurity of exile, and 
 yearn, through dismal years, for return to the land they 
 had left, until foreign earth received their dust in the capital 
 of Christendom. 
 
 But it is fit and becoming that I should ask you to 
 remember, whilst we inaugurate an Institute designed 
 to diffuse knowledge and improve morality, that Donegal, 
 in the distant past, when intellectual darkness was settling 
 down upon the world, and the ruin of Imperial Rome was 
 followed by barbarous anarchy, had teachers, eminent alike 
 for their learning and their sanctity, directing schools 
 which possessed liberal endowments and gave sound in- 
 struction not to the Irish only but to those who sought it 
 from afar: — amaiidati in Hiheruiam ad disciplinas. The 
 most conclusive evidence assures us that, in the sixth 
 century, Moville and Clonard and Derry had seminaries 
 whose masters were of high repute ; and in that century, 
 to be trained in those seminaries, was born, close to this 
 town of Letterkenny, the illustrious man to whom, it is 
 said in your ancient Martyrology, the Apostle of Ireland 
 
And its Uses, 399 
 
 proplietically gave tlie title of Dove of the Churclies 
 (Collum Cille). He was^ at once^ a poet^ a scholar;, and 
 a saint. In his own country, he was the founder of many 
 schools and monasteries. He encouraged the bards of his 
 time to preserve the muniments of their nation : and when 
 his zeal in God^s service drove him to carry the glad 
 tidings of salvation to the Scottish Isles, — radiating from 
 lona the light of learning and religion across tempestuous 
 seas, and spending himself in toils and wanderings to 
 evangelise the people of Britain, — he continued to be an 
 earnest student, and left writings behind him which jus- 
 tified the eulogium of Adamnan, his biographer and 
 successor, on his eloquence and wisdom. On such an 
 occasion as this, there is a special fitness in the reve- 
 rent recollection of one so wise and holy, who always 
 combined intellectual labour with his works of piety and 
 mercy : and whose name, after 1,400 years, is still dear 
 to the hearts and blessed by the tongues of the people 
 around us. 
 
 One remembrance more it behoves me to awaken, — 
 that of the Four Masters, to whom we owe the preser- 
 vation to Ireland of a mass of her historical recollec- 
 tions, — ^^ the immortal life of an historical nation," — 
 which, but for their labours, must, to a great extent, 
 have perished for ever. When they gathered with pious 
 care the ancient records which had been spared by time 
 and civil strife, and made a faithful digest of them in 
 those Annals which O^Gurry describes as "the largest 
 collection of national, civil, military, and family history 
 ever brought together in this or, perhaps, any other 
 country," — they did not know the value of the service 
 they were rendering. They did not know that days, 
 even more evil than had been theretofore her miserable 
 portion, were coming to afflict their country, in which 
 
400 A Literary Institute ifi Donegal. 
 
 many of those precious records must^ probably, be de- 
 stroyed. The mischief was averted by the devotion of 
 Michael O'Clery and his Franciscan brethren ; and if 
 Ireland shall ever possess a complete and authentic 
 history, she must acknowledge, with gratitude, that she 
 owes it largely to the Monks of Donegal. 
 
 There are other local memories on which I would gladly 
 dwell, as full of interest and instruction on such an occa- 
 sion. But I have already outrun the time allotted for my 
 address ; and I have said enough to justify me in asking, 
 whether the emotion roused in you, I doubt not, even by 
 this brief recurrence to the lives and doings of famous 
 men, does not stir you with some ambition to imitate them, 
 however humbly, by aiding in a new endeavour for the 
 cultivation of that love of knowledge, of virtue, and of 
 God, which once inspired them on your native soil ? 
 
 In conclusion, let me assure you of the true pleasure I 
 have had in meeting you for a purpose so very worthy, and 
 of the value I attach to the more than cordial welcome you 
 have given me. To me, this day will be always memorable 
 for the kindness of which I have been the object. And to 
 you it may be memorable also, as that on which you in- 
 augurated, under fortunate auspices, an Institution — 
 destined, I trust, to promote liberal culture and pure 
 morality for many generations — in an assemblage which, 
 by its rare union of adverse creeds and parties for one 
 noble end, does honour to Ulster, and is of the happiest 
 presage for the future of Ireland. 
 
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1 8 A List of 
 
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