Case of the Protestants of Ireland (Classic Reprint)

Excerpt from Case of the Protestants of Ireland

But this is too grave a complaint. He is not invested with power. N o evil is intended. The experiment of force and stem ness was found injudicious or inconvenient; now there is a trial of skill between the British ministry and the champion of re peal. What has the first acknowledged move in the game brought to light? What has it effected? It has branded on the ministry the stigma of indiscretion. (g) They have themselves pleaded guilty to the charge. Bearing in mind the well known maxim, that an error is worse than a crime, his Ma jesty's ministers have passed over in silence the minor count in the indictment, and with characteristic manliness, have pleaded guilty to the graver accusation. So understood, the first move in the game has convicted government of indiscretion - has driven from their councils their acknowledged leader, and has deprived them of the powers by which, alone, they could restrain political agitation. It has gained for the champion of repeal the confi dence which success inspires. It has given him the measure of his antagonist's discretion, and it has released for him a power well proved, and adapted to the procuring further advantages. He is free to agitate. How that freedom may be exercised - whe ther it shall be most advisable to purchase great concession by indulging the ministry in a seeming repose, or to compel success by clamour, we may not pronounce; but we can well under stand that a minister of the crown may, at the opening of the next session of parliament, ask for congratulations on the tran quillity of Ireland, to purchase which he has silently made sacri fices greater than agitation would dare to demand; or he may turn the attention of the country to the disorder by which Ire land continues afilicted, and impress upon a compliant auditory the conviction that no sacrifice can be too great to prevent such agitation from swelling into civil war.

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