“War is the statesman’s game, the priest’s delight,
    The lawyer’s jest, the hired assassin’s trade.”

He repudiates the notion that man, if left free, would wantonly heap ruin, vice, or shivery, or curse his species with the withering blight of war; and he shows us how

   “Kings, priests, and statesmen blast the human flower,
    Even in its tender bud; their influence darts
    Like subtle poison through the bloodless veins
    Of desolate society.  The child,
    Ere he can lisp his mother’s sacred name,
    Swells with the unnatural pride of crime, and lifts
    His baby sword even in a hero’s mood. 
    This infant arm becomes the bloodiest scourge
    Of devastated earth:  whilst specious names,
    Learnt in soft childhood’s unsuspecting hour,
    Serve as the sophisms with which manhood dims
    Bright reason’s ray, and sanctifies the sword
    Upraised to shed a brother’s innocent blood.”

In other places he seems to prophetically point out what this generation appears to comprehend—­the judiciousness of arbitration—­which in the future will be the true panacea for this frightful affliction of humanity.

To the current Irish questions Shelley devoted much of his time, and took up his residence in Dublin, to aid the independence of Ireland, which might, under proper treatment, have been made one of the brightest spots in the British Dominions; but the inhabitants of which, owing to centuries of English misrule and oppression, had, in certain parts, fallen into a condition not much superior to that of those of Central Africa.  When we contemplate what Ireland was before the Norman and Saxon had set their feet there, the most prejudiced antagonist of the Celtic race cannot but be astonished at the picture presented to us after their usurpation.  When Saxondom was in a state of barbarism, this branch of the Celts was civilized.  Aldfred, king of the Northumbrian Saxons, has given us the experiences of a Saxon in Ireland over a thousand years ago.  In a poem of his own composing, he tells us that he found “noble, prosperous sages,” “learning, wisdom, welcome, and protection,” “kings, queens, and royal bards, in every species of poetry well skilled.  Happiness, comfort, and pleasure,” the people “famed for justice, hospitality, lasting vigor, fame,” and “long blooming beauty, hereditary vigor”—­and the monarch concludes his really curious account by saying: 

   “I found in the fair, surfaced Leinster,
    From Dublin to Slewmargy,
    Long-living men, health, prosperity,
    Bravery, hardihood and traffic.

    I found from Ara to Gle,
    In the rich country of Ossory,
    Sweet fruit, strict jurisdiction,
    Men of truth, chess-playing.

    I found in the great fortress of Meath,
    Valor, hospitality, and truth,
    Bravery, purity, and mirth—­
    The protection of all Ireland.