The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1896-01-26

cost OF making as many pauper collins and the
labor OF digging as many pauper graves.
!, Dnrlng the past half century five millions
nave been forced to leave land which would
support them all in comfort were not its re-
sources drained by heartless landlordism and
us enterprise crippled by British misgovern-
ment. They who would seek the true cause OF
the poverty OF Ireland must seek it not in the
character of her religion or in the nature of
s Eet people: They must seek It IN the per.
slstent intolerance and in the persistent
injustice with which a stronger nation
mas treated a weaker. They must seek 1t In the
history of the last 600 years, history almost
as foul when England was Catholic country
as Wheh she separated from Rome.
men who know nothing OF this history
wonder when they see the passion displayed
by lr1shmen in speaking of British power.
What can they understand about the bitter
memories and the hateful imag1natlons which
the name of England coniures up. On this
SOIL there are thousands to-day who remem Der
the feVer-shtps and the great trenches where
the victims were thrown. Nameless shroud-
Tess, countless they lie on foreign shore until
on the last day they shall rise TO bear witness
against that Babylon which is drunk with the
oIood OF the saints. There are thousands more
VINO were cast by landlords within out OF the
nome which their fathers built, out OF the land
which their own labor had made profitable.
deprived by process of law of that which be-
tore God and justice was their very own, shall
we wonder that their blood bofls when they
think of the spoiler?
Yet this might be borne were it not that
even to this free land the minions OF Britain
NoAlO nAd strive 10 renew Iuc Olu
on these peaceful shores. The sons OF the men
whom England used as her tools TO Cypress the
irish at home are sent by that same power to
defame the Irish abroad. With hypocrisy on
their lips they come before the American
people and attempt to stab Ireland through
the Catholic Church. They try to cast the
blame OF England's misdeeds on that organiza-
ton which gave life and soul to the resist
ance to England's power. But it is too late
to deceive this country now. A greater man
than the spokesman of the A. P. A. failed, and
when Tom Burke answered Froude he
swered England for all time.
The most beautiful, the most touching, the
most ennobling chapter in the worlds history
is that which tells of the devotion OF the Irish
priests in the penal days. In labors abundantly,
in prisons frequently, in stripes above meas
ure, in deaths oft. In journeyings often in
perils OF water, in perils of robbers, in perils
from their own countrymen, in perlls from the
gentiles, in per1ls in the city, in perils in the
wilderness, in perils in the sea, IN perils from
false brethren, in labor and travail, in watch
ings, often in hunger and thirst, in Hastings,
often in cold and nskedness. Through the
long centuries of persecution the Irish priest
hood won the hearts OF the Irish people.
Against the oppreSsor they stood as a wall of
brass, and that the sentiment of Irish nation
atty exists to-day is due TO the fact that the
Irish are Catholics. 2. G. YoRKE.