The generosity of the suicide on the part of the Confederation was met by a new chicane.  Though every member, whose character and talents could for a moment redeem the deformity, dulness and decrepitude of the Repeal Association, had passed from its ranks and enrolled themselves in the new League, it resolved to struggle on, acting as a check and a stain by its anility and crookedness, on the rising hopes of the country.  During the discussions that led to the formation of the league, it was emphatically announced by certain members of the Confederation that on no ground and for no purpose would they abjure one principle they ever announced.  Above all, they avowed their purpose to urge on the country the duty of armed resistance whenever its success appeared probable.  The Government heard of these avowals, and the time spent in captious discussions about moral nonentities and legal quibbles, when the stake was a nation’s death or life, was diligently employed by the Government in accumulating means of defence.

The motives of the principal promoters of the league are by no means questioned here.  On the contrary, it is freely admitted their convictions were as sincere as they were fatal.  The due appreciation of that movement requires that a few leading facts and inferences upon which it was based should be calmly considered.  The first and most important is the great change which had taken place in the feelings of the country.  The vast majority of the thinking population were ranged at the side of the Confederation.  So, too, was that of the people of the rural districts.  The intellectual leaders of the great Protestant party had actually identified themselves with it, and a reconciliation with the entire body of the Orangemen had been nearly effected.  Most of the men whose integrity and ability had preserved the lingering existence of the Association, openly avowed their approval of its principles, and such of them whose hearts were not mere empty sounds, would join its members at a crisis.

Thus stood the facts.  The considerations in favour of the junction were these:  Certain men of influence, who, contrary to their own convictions, adhered to the Association, in the commencement through fear, and still adhered to it through an unintelligible hankering after consistency, pressed for an opportunity where they might abandon their former associates without the appearance of abandoning their old principles.  There were others who followed a middle course, and were always with the greater crowd and the more intense enthusiasm, who demanded the same means of escape.

There was a consideration of some weight which no doubt influenced the decision of the Confederates.  It was this:  the Roman Catholic clergymen had given unmitigated opposition to the Confederation.  Their hostility had been the most formidable obstacle in its way; and it was assumed that the presence of some leading churchmen among the Confederates, would remove the distrust which the former opposition of the priesthood had mainly tended to create.