and latterly with great success, to win over English opinion to their cause, and it undermines the whole position occupied by Mr. Gladstone and his English followers.  They assume with undeniable truth that the English people will not at the present moment, except under compulsion, acquiesce in Irish independence; they further assume, and must from the nature of the case assume, that Home Rule under one shape or another presents a fair prospect at least of advantages not derivable from the maintenance of the Union, and is at the very worst so much less injurious to British interests than would be separation from Ireland, as to offer to England a reasonable compromise between the just claims of Englishmen to secure the prosperity of Great Britain and the greatness of the British Empire, and the legitimate desire of Irishmen for national independence.  If the proposition which it is my object to maintain turn out to be sound, all these assumptions fall to the ground, together with a host of fallacies for which these assumptions form the necessary basis.  The principle, in short, which it is my object to enforce—­that Home Rule in Ireland is more dangerous to England than Irish independence—­lies at the bottom of all the rational opposition made by Unionists to the creation of an Irish Parliament, and, together with the arguments by which the principle is maintained, and the conclusions to which it leads, forms the true and just and reasonable case of England against Home Rule.

[Sidenote:  Possible objections to method.]

The whole spirit and method of my argument is open to at least three plausible objections, which deserve examination, both because if left unnoticed they are certain to occur to and perplex any intelligent reader, and because their removal brings into relief the strength of my line of reasoning.

[Sidenote:  1.  Too abstract.]

First objection.—­To deal with a burning controversy in the abstract and logical manner suitable to the discussion of the problems of jurisprudence savours, it may be objected, of theoretic, academic, or pedantic disquisition more fit for a University class-room than for the living world of contemporary politics.

The force of this criticism does not admit of denial.  My method of treating the question of Home Rule is necessarily lifeless when compared with the vehement rhetoric or heated eloquence which characterises public or parliamentary discussion; it is also true that the argumentative treatment of matters affecting actual life always bears about it a certain air of unreality.