Irish measure which struck at the root of a frightful social evil and of a vicious political system.  But the idea expressed by Burke—­the spirit of his whole argument—­went far beyond this particular absentee tax or any similar tax proposed, as happened in one instance, by a Colony.  It was the superbly grandiose expression, and all the more insidiously seductive in that it was so grandiose, of a principle which all thinking men now know, or ought to know, is the negation of Empire, which lost us America, which came within an ace of losing us Canada, which might well have lost us South Africa, and which has in very fact lost us, though not yet irrevocably, the “affection,” to use Burke’s word, of Ireland.  We may call local patriotism “narrow and insulated,” if we please, but we recognize now, in every case save that of Ireland, that it is the only foundation for, and the only stimulant to, Imperial patriotism.

Chatham, an Englishman of the English, was nevertheless a better Irishman than Burke, and therefore a better Imperialist.  “The tax,” he wrote, “was founded on strong Irish policy.  England, it is evident, profits by draining Ireland of the vast incomes spent here from that country.  But I could not, as a Peer of England, advise the King, on principles of indirect, accidental English policy, to reject a tax on absentees sent over here as the genuine desire of the Commons of Ireland acting in their proper and peculiar sphere, and exercising their inherent exclusive right by raising supplies in the manner they judge best.”  Chatham, in short, applied precisely the same argument to Ireland as, in his memorable speeches of the next year (1774), he applied to America, and in both cases he was right.  The only mistake he made was in his estimate of that travesty of a representative assembly, the Irish House of Commons, which, at the secret instigation of the Viceroy, though without actual coercion, eventually threw out a tax so distasteful to its English patrons.  But the argument for financial independence remained unassailable, and eventually the Irish Parliament itself summoned up the courage to adopt and act upon it.

It may seem almost impossible that in a body so corrupt and exclusive a national sentiment should have arisen.  But every elective assembly, however badly constituted, contains the seeds of its own regeneration, and, under even moderately favourable circumstances, moves irresistibly towards freedom.  The pity was that circumstances, save for one brief and invigorating interlude, were persistently unfavourable to Ireland.  The task was enormous, demanding infinitely more self-sacrifice than even the ablest and most prescient of her Parliamentarians realized.  Until it was too late, in fact, they never awoke to the true nature of the task, dazzled by illusory victories.  Rotten to the core as the Irish Parliament was, they sought, strengthened by popular influences, to make it the instrument for freeing Ireland from a paralyzing servitude; and up to a point they succeeded, but they did not see that the only security for real and permanent success was to reform the Parliament itself.  There the inveterate spirit of creed and class ascendancy, resting in the last resort on English military power, survived long enough to nullify their efforts.