i'm referring to the slightly hysterical remarks concerning edwards and this somewhat curious passage pearse in his address to his court martial and his prediction of future events in history would no doubt contrast edwards assertion when i was a child of ten i went down on my knees by my bedside one night and promised god that i should devote my life to an effort to free my country i have kept that promise first among all earthly things as a boy and as a man i have worked for irish freedom i have helped to organize to arm to train and to discipline my fellow countrymen to the sole end that when the time came they might fight for irish freedom the time as it seemed to me did come and we went into the fight i am glad that we did we seem to have lost we have not lost to refuse to fight would have been to lose to fight is to win we have kept faith with the past and handed a tradition to the future i assume i am speaking to englishmen who value their own freedom and who profess to be fighting for the freedom of belgium and serbia believe that we too love freedom and desire it to us it is more desirable than anything else in the world if you strike us down now we shall rise again and renew the fight you cannot conquer ireland you cannot extinguish the irish passion for freedom if our deed has not been sufficient to win freedom then our children will win it by a better deed