A Home Ruler may, however, if hard driven, say that my interpretation of history is erroneous, and that a hatred to English law, and to all things English, and not a special dislike to the land law, is the sentiment which prevails over every other feeling of the Irish people. It is difficult to me to see how this view can be seriously maintained. Let us grant however for a moment that Home Rulers are right, and that millions of Irishmen are inspired with the passion of nationality. Even on this supposition the Home Rule doctrine stands in a bad way. If the demand of the Irish people be like that of the Italian people--a demand for recognised nationality--then the demand must be satisfied, if at all, not by Home Rule, but by independence. The most eminent among English Home Rulers believes that the law is hated in Ireland because it comes before the Irish people in a foreign garb. Mr. Froude in substance agrees in this matter with Mr. Gladstone, since he holds that "the real grievance is our presence in Ireland at all." But the eminent statesman and the distinguished historian draw a different inference from the same premises. Mr. Gladstone infers that Ireland can be satisfied by semi-independence. Mr. Froude infers that if we are to meet Irish wishes we must let Ireland be free. Mr. Froude's logic will be to most persons far more intelligible than the logic of the Liberal leader. Here, at any rate, we come to the true issue suggested by the phenomena of Irish history. Is Irish discontent due in the main to agrarian or to political causes? On the answer to this enquiry depends, as far as the argument we have in hand goes, the line of right policy in Ireland. But neither answer favours the contention of Home Rulers.[20] The argument from Irish history gives rise to, or, more properly speaking, contains in itself two further distinct lines of reasoning in favour of Home Rule, each of which supplements the other. The first of these aims at showing that to leave Ireland to herself is the only method by which to restore order throughout the country. This I have termed "the argument from the good effects of self-government," the other deduces from the necessity for Coercion Acts the conclusion that England cannot maintain order in Ireland: this I have termed "the argument from the necessity for Coercion Acts." These two lines of reasoning are simply an amplification of points suggested by the Home Rule argument from Irish history, and are of necessity therefore open to the same criticisms to which that argument is obnoxious. They have, however, each a certain value of their own, and have made an impression on the English public: they can each also be met by more or less special replies. The argument, therefore, from the good effects of self-government and the argument from the necessity for Coercion Acts each deserve separate statement and consideration. [Sidenote: 4. Argument from self-government.]