The Sun.
London, England, 1834-04-24 00:00:00

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manner their fixed determination to maintain the"
legisanys. union ; that it was Mk enly.for the interest

of the empire, but peculiarly for the interest of Ireland,
that they should declare that this Imperial Pirlianient
had given its best attention in matters of legislation
to that country, and in producing measures of the
most beneficial nature towards that object. (Hear.)
He further thought it was unnecessary for them to
accompany this declaration with a resolution that they

were determined not to commence a new course
with respect to Ireland, but that they were determined to
persevere in that course which they had hitherto pursued,
of giving their best attention to the affairs of Ireland, and
to do for it all they could. That would be a clause of the
amendment. He should propose farther, which
was probably an unusual step, but one not
without precedent, and one which the consideration of this
question would perfectly justify, namely, that this resolu-
tion should be communicated to the other House of Par-
liament in the shape of an address to the throne,
that both houses might express their opinion on the sub-
ject of the Legislative Union, and that they might re-
ceive, in due course, as they were likely to receive, the
answer from the Crown, approving of the resolution.
Let not hon. gentlemen think that this was a course
beyond the necessity of the case. Let them not think,
because to them the discussion of this question here, or
its agitation in Ireland, couldbe accounted for without raising
any impression on their minds that the question was likely
to be carried, that, therefore, this course was expedient.
But when that was made use of for the purposes of
agitation in another country (Loud and continued
theerinF), they would not do their duty if they did
'ot take the earliest opportunity of recording the
,firiet. determination to which they had come upon the
we.biect. (Cheers.) The course which he pointed out was
similar to tbe, taken by the Irish Parliament in 1782,
and therefore they were furnished with a precedent
by that Parliament, who, according to the hon. and learned
gentleman, had reached the brightest period of its exist-
!click... Before he proceeded to his own argument, he
bened permission to notice some of the topics which had
been adverted to by the hon. an& learned gentleman.
iliany of his observations had little or no bearing upon the
real question at issue. And with respect to his reference
to ancient times--his going back to the history of the pe-
riods of Henry the Third, Richard the Second, and Queen
Elizabeth—the only advantage which that could have was
to convince those who doubted the fact that in barbarous
ages, and during civil wars, great atrocities were com-
mitted, and extensive devastations of life and property took
place. No one but those who doubted these facts could be
instructed by what had fallen from the hon. and learned
gentleman; but what would they say if his (Mr. Rice's)
hon. friend, the member for Kent, were now to present a
petition praying that upon similar evidence the ancient
condition of that county should be restored? Would they
not treat it as so much nonsense ? But, the object of the
hon. and learned member being to enlighten them on the
subject of those atrocities,what was the first step he should
have taken ? Why, to have moved for the production of
the divorce that was obtained by King Breffiny from his
wife Eva, whom Morrough, King of Leinster, carried off,
for no one could deny that that was an act of great atrocity.
The an, and learned gentleman hadreferredtothe trans-
actions that occurred in the years 1246, 1278, and other
periods ; but what was the result of his own showing? Was
it not that on the part of the people of Ireland the deepest and
must constant anxiety had always existed to be admitted to
participate in the blessings of the English constitution and
.Bl.itish laws ? Indeed so strong was their desire to accom-
plish this object that they had even expressed their readi-
ness to sacrifice the large sum of 800 marks for it, and yet
this was one of the arguments put forward to induce that
house to repeal the legislative union. But it should be
borne in mind that the whole of this was designed to pro-
duce an effect, and that the scenes of horror and devasta-
tion recited by Spencer and Morrison were not referred to
for nothing. He verily believed that they were used for
the very worst purposes, and this he thought could not be
doubted when it was asserted by the hon. and learned gen-
tleman that the policy pursued towards Ireland by Eliza-
beth and her councillors, namely, to keep that country in
a state of misery and weakness, was followed with an un-
relenting perseverance, and as much alive at the present
day as it was in the reign of that Queen. But he would
ask them whose policy it could be at the present time to
keep Ireland in such a state? He did not believe there
was a single member of that house who would give his
sanction to such policy, and, what was more, he was
perfectly satisfied that the anxious, the unremitting desire I
of the British Parliament, was to improve the condition of
Irelanc'. Even the hon. member for Middlesex, who was ,1
a sort of Plutus in matters relating to public money, had,
notwithstanding his habitual stickling for economy, been
induced to vote supplies for Ireland. (A laugh. ) The
recital of atrocities and devastations into which the hon.
and learned member for Dublin had entered, was, how-
ever, intended to arouse indignation and disgust
elsewhere. (Hear, hear, hear.) But they should use
the history of the past for a better purpose than this,
and, instead of exciting the bad passions of the people,
they ought rather to teach them charity and brotherly
love. (Hear, hear.) The great object of the legislature
was to strengthen Ireland, and not to weaken her, by the
connection with this country. But before he passed from
this part of the subject he would read to them a passage
from a letter written by Mr. Burke to his son on the state
of Ireland, which was directly applicable to the line of
conduct which the hon. and learned member for Dublin
had pursued. Speaking of persons who followed the course
which the hon. and learned gentleman had adopted, Mr.
Burke stated that—
" For this purpose they revive the bitter memory of every dis-
sension, which has torn to pieces their miserable country for
ages. After what has passed in 1782, one would not think that
eecorum, to say nothing of policy, would permit them to call up
by magic charms the grounds, reasons, and principles of these
ten ibis-, confiscatory, and exterminating periods. They would
not set men upon calling from the quiet sleep of death any Sa-
muel, to sk him by what act of arbitrary monarchs—by what
inquisitions of corrupted tribunals, and tortured jurors—by what
fictitious tenures, invented to dispossess whole unoffending
tribes and their chieftains! They would not conjure up the
ghosts from the ruins of castles and churches, to tell for what
attempt to struggle for the independence of an Irish legislature,
end to raise armies of volunteers, without regular commissions
from t he crown, in support of that independence, the estates oftLe
old Irish nobility and gentry had been confiscated. They would
not wantonly call on those phantoms, to tell by what English
Acts of Parliament, forced upon two reluctant Kings, the lands
of their country were put up to a mean and scandalous auction
in every goldsmith's shop in London ; or chopped to pieces, and
cut into rations, to pay the mercenary soldiery of a regicide
Usurper. They would not be so fond of titles under Cromwell,
who, if he avenged an Irish rebellion against the sovereign au-
thority of the Parliament of England, had himself rebelled
against the very Parliament whose sovereignty he asserted,
lull as much as the Irish nation which he was sent to subdue
and confiscate could rebel against Parlament, or could rebel
against the King, against whom both lie and the Parliament,
which he served, and which he betrayed, had both of them
rebelled.
" The gentlemen who hold the language of the day know
perfectly well that the Irish in 1641 pretended, at least, that
they did not rise against the King, nor, in fact, did they, what-
ever constructions law might put upon their act. But full
surely they rebelled against the authority of the Pailiament of
England, and they openly professed so to do. Admitting (I have
now no time to discuss the matter) the enormous and unpardon-
able magnitude of this their crime, they rued it in their persons
and in those of their children and their grandchildren, evert to
the fifth and the sixth generations. Admitting, then, the
enormity of this unnatural rebellion in favour of the independ-
ence of Ireland, will it follow that it must be avenged for ever ?
Will it follow that it must be avenged on thousands, and per-
haps hundreds of thousands, of those whom they can never
trace by the labours of the most subtle metaphysician of
the traduction of crimes, or the m st inquisitive genealogist of
proscription, to the descendant of any one concerned in that
nefarious Irish rebellion against the Parliament of Eng•and ?
If, however, you could find out these pedigrees of guilt I
do nos think the difference would be essential. History records
many things which ought to make us hate evil actions; but
neither history nor morals nor policy can teach us to punish
innocent men on that account. What lesson does the iniquity
of prevalent factions read to us ? It ought to lesson us into an
abhorrence of the abuse of our own power in our own day,
when we hate its excesses so much in other persons and in other
times. To that school true statesmen ought to be satisfied to
leave mankind. They ought not to call from the dead all the
discussions and litigations which formerly inflamed the furious
factions which had torn their country to pieces. They ought
not to race into the hideous and abominable things which were
done in the turbulent fury of an injured, robbed, and persecuted
people, and which were afterwards cruelly revenged in the exe-
cution, and as outrageously and shamefully exaggerated in the
representation, in order, an hundred and fifty years after, to
find some colour for justifying them in the eternal proscription
and civil excommunication of a whole people."
He would take the liberty of observing that of allthe com-
mentators on history it had ever fallen to his lot to know
the hon. and learned member for Dublin was the least im-
partial. He used it for his purposes where it suited him,
and everything likely to have a contrary effect was dis-
missed as untterly unworthy attention in the most,convc-
nient manner. Thus all the enormities committed in
Ireland in the times of James I. and Charles 11. were
mere matters of domestic history. But if, in the discus-
sion of this question, they were to go back into the horrors
of Ireland, the list would be by no means confined to the
number or the period dwelt upon by the hon. and learned
gentleman. But he would not follow the bad example of
the hon. and learned gentleman, but would only observe
that he had omitted, as if "by particular desire," all
reference to scenes and acts of violence which occurred in
Ireland during the periods which he sought to represent
as being tranquil and prosperous. He would take the
very times and events selected by the honourable and
learned gentleman himself, and make them .the foundation
of his case ; and even upon those he could undertake to
make out an answer to the motion. The first inference the
lion. and learned member had drawn from his historical
commentaries was that England had no rights superior to
those of Ireland. He had laboured, and as he (Mr. S.
Rice) thought with different effect, because his labour was
unnecessary, to prove that England had no right of do-
mination of the sister Country. Why, was there
ever such a waste of argument resorted to ? It was
true there was a time when England had exercised
and contended for it, but it was an usurpation, and
he would show that he had been the recognised cha-
racter of her conduct in the very words of the act of the
union itself. But that was not the question now. Did
England now claim any such right ? (Cheers.) Would
any man be found to say that England had any such right?
Who governed Ireland now ? Who legislated for Ireland
now? Why, the Parliament of the United Kingdom, and
not the English Parliament. (Cheers.) A parliament in
which he was sure the hon. and learned member for Dub-
lin could not say that the talent and influence and power
of the Irish people were not ably and fully represented.
(Hear, and a laugh.) But the object of the hon. and