Let the Party explain why, among their political duties, they neglected the duty of placating Ulster in their proper persons.  Why, in short, they boycotted Ulster and permitted political and religious and racial antagonism to grow inside of Ireland unchecked by any word from them upon that ground.  Were they afraid “nuts” would be thrown at them?  Whatever they dreaded, they gave Ulster the widest of wide berths, and wherever else they were visible and audible, they were silent and unseen in that part of Ireland.

The Ulster grievance is ostensibly religious; but safeguards on this count are so easily created and applied that this issue might almost be left out of account.  The real difficulty is economic, and it is a tangled one.  But unless profit and loss are immediately discernible the soul of man is not easily stirred by an accountant’s tale, and therefore the religious banner has been waved for our kinsfolk of Ulster, and under the sacred emblem they are fighting for what some people call mammon, but which may be in truth just plain bread and butter.

The words Sinn Fein mean “Ourselves,” and it is of ourselves I write in this chapter.  More urgent than any political emancipation is the drawing together of men of good will in the endeavour to assist their necessitous land.  Our eyes must be withdrawn from the ends of the earth and fixed on that which is around us and which we can touch.  No politician will talk to us of Ireland if by any trick he can avoid the subject.  His tale is still of Westminster and Chimborazo and the Mountains of the Moon.  Irishmen must begin to think for themselves and of themselves, instead of expending energy on causes too distant to be assisted or hindered by them.  I believe that our human material is as good as will be found in the world.  No better, perhaps, but not worse.  And I believe that all but local politics are unfruitful and soul-destroying.  We have an island that is called little.  It is more than twenty times too spacious for our needs, and we will not have explored the last of it in our children’s lifetime.  We have more problems to resolve in our towns and cities than many generations of minds will get tired of striving with.  Here is the world, and all that perplexes or delights the world is here also.  Nothing is lost.  Not even brave men.  They have been used.  From this day the great adventure opens for Ireland.  The Volunteers are dead, and the call is now for volunteers.