accordance with their own permanent ideas of right and of justice, and that unless this be done, law, because it commands no loyalty, ensures no obedience. The whole history of the connection between the two islands which make up the United Kingdom is a warning of the wretchedness, the calamities, the wickedness and the ruin which follow upon the attempt to violate this fundamental principle not only of popular, but of all good and just government. Home Rule may appear to be an innovation. It is in this point of view simply a return to the essential ideas of English constitutionalism, it is an attempt to escape from the false path which has been pursued for centuries, and to return to the broad highway of government in accordance with popular sympathy. At this point, however, the argument from the will of the people merges in the much stronger and more serious train of reasoning derived from the teaching of history. [Sidenote: 3. Argument from Irish history.] _The argument from Irish history._--Appeals to the lessons of the past are at times in the mouths of Home Rulers, as also of their opponents, a noxious revival of ancient passions, or (it may be) nothing better than the use of an unreal form of rhetoric; yet a supporter of Home Rule may use the argument from Irish history in a way which is at once legitimate and telling. On one point alone (it may be urged) all men of whatever party, or of whatever nation, who have seriously studied the annals of Ireland are agreed--the history of the country is a record of incessant failure on the part of the Government, and of incessant misery on the part of the people. On this matter, if on no other, De Beaumont, Froude and Lecky are at one. As to the guilt of the failure or the cause of the misery, men may and do differ; that England, whether from her own fault or from the fault of the Irish people, or from the perversity of circumstances, has failed in Ireland of achieving the elementary results of good government, is as certain as any fact of history or of experience. Every scheme has been tried in turn, and no scheme has succeeded, or has even (it may be suggested) produced its natural effects. Oppression of the Catholics has increased the adherents and strengthened the hold of Catholicism. Protestant supremacy while it lasted did not lead even to Protestant contentment, and the one successful act of resistance to English dominion was effected by a Protestant Parliament supported by an army of volunteers led by a body of Protestant officers. The independence gained by a Protestant Parliament led, after eighteen years, to a rebellion so reckless and savage, that it caused if it did not justify the destruction of the Parliament, and the carrying of the Union. The Act of Union did not lead to national unity, and a measure which appeared on the face of it (though the appearance it must be admitted was delusive) to be a copy of the law which turned England and