Another generation, pluming itself on its enlightened views and kind intentions, passed the Encumbered Estates Act, which delivered the Irish tenants over to the tender mercies of speculators and money-lenders; and then Parliament for a time closed its eyes and ears, and relied upon force alone to keep Ireland quiet.  It rejected every suggestion of reform in the Land laws; and a great Minister, himself an Irish landlord, dismissed the whole subject in the flippant epigram that “tenant-right was landlord-wrong.”  Since then the Irish Church has been disestablished, and two Land Acts have been passed; yet we seem to be as far as ever from the pacification of Ireland.  Surely it is time to inquire whether the evil is not inherent in our system of governing Ireland, and whether there is any other cure than that which De Beaumont suggested, namely, the destruction of the system.  It is probable that there is not in all London a more humane or a more kind-hearted man than Lord Salisbury.  Yet Lord Salisbury’s Government will do some harsh and inequitable things in Ireland this winter, just as Liberal Governments have done during their term of office.  The fault is not in the men, but in the system which they have to administer.  I see no reason to doubt that Sir M. Hicks-Beach did the best he could under the circumstances; but, unfortunately, bad is the best.  In a conversation which I had with Dr. Doellinger while he was in full communion with his Church, I ventured to ask him whether he thought that a new Pope, of Liberal ideas, force of character, and commanding ability, would make any great difference in the Papal system.  “No,” he replied, “the Curial system is the growth of centuries, and there can be no change of any consequence while it lasts.  Many a Pope has begun with brave projects of reform; but the struggle has been brief, and the end has been invariably the same:  the Pope has been forced to succumb.  His entourage has been too much for him.  He has found himself enclosed in a system which was too strong for him, wheel within wheel; and while the system lasts the most enlightened ideas and the best intentions are in the long run unavailing.”  This criticism applies, mutatis mutandis, to what may be called the Curial system of Dublin Castle.  It is a species of political Ultramontanism, exercising supreme power behind the screen of an official infallibility on which there is practically no check, since Parliament has never hitherto refused to grant it any power which it demanded for enforcing its decrees.

There is, moreover, another consideration which must convince any dispassionate mind which ponders it, that the British Parliament is incompetent to manage Irish affairs, and must become increasingly incompetent year by year.  In ordinary circumstances Parliament sits about twenty-seven weeks out of the fifty-two.  Five out of the twenty-seven may safely be subtracted for holidays, debates on the Address, and other debates