cannot live longer, for at that election it will be ground to powder between the upper and nether millstones of the regular Liberals and the regular Tories. The Irish struggle of 1886 has had another momentous consequence. It has brought the Nationalist or Parnellite party into friendly relations with the mass of English Liberals. When the Home Rule party was founded by Mr. Butt, some fifteen years ago, it had more in common with the Liberal than with the Tory party. But as it demanded what both English parties were then resolved to refuse, it was forced into antagonism to both; and from 1877 onward (Mr. Butt being then dead) the antagonism became bitter, and, of course, specially bitter as toward the statesmen in power, because it was they who continued to refuse what the Nationalists sought. Mr. Parnell has always stated, with perfect candour, that he and his friends must fight for their own hand unhampered by English alliances, and getting the most they could for Ireland from the weakness of either English party. This position they still retain. If the Tory party will give them Home Rule, they will help the Tory party. However, as the Tory party has gained office by opposing Home Rule, this contingency may seem not to lie within the immediate future. On the other hand, the Gladstonian Liberals have lost office for their advocacy of Home Rule, and now stand pledged to maintain the policy they have proclaimed. The Nationalists have, therefore, for the first time since the days immediately following the Union of A.D. 1800 (a measure which the Whigs of those days resisted), a great English party admitting the justice of their claim, and inviting them to agitate for it by purely constitutional methods. For such an alliance the English Liberals are hotly reproached, both by the Tories and by the dissentients who follow Lord Harrington and Mr. Chamberlain. They are accused of disloyalty to England. The past acts and words of the Nationalists are thrown in their teeth, and they are told that in supporting the Irish claim they condone such acts, they adopt such words. They reply by denying the adoption, and by pointing out that the Tories themselves were from 1881 till 1886 in a practical, and often very close, though unavowed, Parliamentary alliance with the Nationalists in the House of Commons. The student of history will, however, conceive that the Liberals have a stronger and higher defence than any _tu quoque_. Issues that involve the welfare of peoples are far too serious for us to apply to them the same sentiments of personal taste and predilection which we follow in inviting a dinner party, or selecting companions for a vacation tour. If a man has abused your brother, or got drunk in the street, you do not ask him to go with you to the Yellowstone Park. But his social offences do not prevent you from siding with him in a political convention. So, in politics itself, one must distinguish between characters and opinions. If a man has shown