Assuming, then, thus much to be proved by the Constitution of the United States that national unity of the closest description is consistent with complete Home Rule in the component members of the nation, and by the history of Canada and the British colonial empire that an Imperial tie is sufficient to bind together for centuries dependencies differing in situation, in nationality, in religion, in laws, in everything that distinguishes peoples one from another, and further and more particularly that emancipation of the Anglo-Saxon colonies from control in their internal affairs strengthens instead of weakening Imperial unity, let us turn to Ireland and inquire whether there is anything in the circumstances under which Home Rule was proposed to be granted to Ireland, or in the measures intended to establish that Home Rule, fairly leading to the inference that disruption of the Empire or an impairment of Imperial powers would probably be a consequence of passing the Irish Government Bill and the Irish Land Bill.  And, first, as to the circumstances which would seem to recommend the Irish Home Rule Bill.

Ireland, from the very commencement of her connection with England, has chafed under the restraints which that connection imposed.  The closer the apparent union between the two countries the greater the real disunion.  The Act of 1800, in words and in law, effected not a union merely, but a consolidation of the two countries.  The effect of those words and that law was to give rise to a restless discontent, which has constantly found expression in efforts to procure the repeal of the Act of Union and the reestablishment of a National Parliament in Dublin.  How futile have been the efforts of the British Parliament to diminish by concession or repress by coercion Irish aspirations or Irish discontent it is unnecessary to discuss here.  All men admit the facts, however different the conclusions which they draw from those facts.  What Burke said of America on moving in 1775 his resolution on conciliation with the colonies was true in 1885 with respect to Ireland:—­

“The fact is undoubted, that under former Parliaments the state of America [read for America, Ireland] has been kept in continual agitation.  Everything administered as remedy to the public complaint, if it did not produce, was at least followed by an heightening of the distemper, until, by a variety of experiments, that important country has been brought into her present situation—­a situation which I will not miscall, which I dare not name, which I scarcely know how to comprehend in the terms of any description."[12]