Still one will look out on the grim things of the hour, and hypnotised by the hour will cry:  “See the strength of the British Empire, see our wasted state; your hope is vain.”  Let him consider this clear truth:  peoples endure; empires perish.  Where are now the empires of antiquity?  And the empires of to-day have the seed of dissolution in them.  But the peoples that saw the old empires rise and hold sway are represented now in their posterity; the tyrannies they knew are dead and done with.  The peoples endured; the empires perished; and the nations of the earth of this day will survive in posterity when the empires that now contend for mastery are gathered into the dust, with all dead, bad things.  We shall endure; and the measure of our faith will be the measure of our achievement and of the greatness of our future place.

V

Is it not the dream of earnest men of all parties to have an end to our long war, a peace final and honourable, wherein the soul of the country can rest, revive and express itself; wherein poetry, music and art will pour out in uninterrupted joy, the joy of deliverance, flashing in splendour and superabundant in volume, evidence of long suppression?  This is the dream of us all.  But who can hope for this final peace while any part of our independence is denied?  For, while we are connected in any shape with the British Empire the connection implies some dependence; this cannot be gainsaid; and who is so foolish as to expect that there will be no collision with the British Parliament, while there is this connection implying dependence on the British Empire?  If such a one exists he goes against all experience and all history.  On either side of the connection will be two interests—­the English interest and the Irish interest, and they will be always at variance.  Consider how parties within a single state are at variance, Conservatives and Radicals, in any country in Europe.  The proposals of one are always insidious, dangerous or reactionary, as the case may be, in the eyes of the other; and in no case will the parties agree; they will at times even charge each other with treachery; there is never peace.  It is the rule of party war.  Who, then, can hope for peace where into the strife is imported a race difference, where the division is not of party but of people?  That is in truth the vain hope.  And be it borne in mind the race difference is not due to our predominating Gaelic stock, but to the separate countries and to distinct households in the human race.  If we were all of English extraction the difference would still exist.  There is the historic case of the American States; it is easy to understand.  When a man’s children come of age, they set up establishments for themselves, and live independently; they are always bound by affection to the parent-home; but if the father try to interfere in the house of a son, and govern it in any detail, there will be strife.  It is