Ireland as it is, and as it would be under Home RuleBuckley, Robert John
History
Ireland as it is, and as it would be under Home Rule
Buckley, Robert John
Home rule -- Ireland; Ireland -- Politics and government -- 1837-1901; Irish question
The great bulk of the intelligent people of Ireland regard Home Rule
with dread, and this feeling grows ever deeper and stronger. The
country is at present exploited by adventurers, paid by the enemies of
England, themselves animated by racial and religious prejudices,
willing to serve their paymasters and deserve their pay rather by
damaging England than by benefiting Ireland, for whose interests they
care not one straw. Ignorance manipulated by charlatanism and bigotry
is, in these latter days, the determining factor in the destinies of
the British Empire. Intelligence is dominated by terrorism, by threats
of death, of ill-usage, of boycotting--the latter I am told an outcome
of an old engine of the Roman Catholic Church, improved and brought up
to date. Humphreys, of Tipperary, may know if this is true. It was
from one of the "Father's" feculent family, in the heart of his own
putrescent parish, that I heard of the local chemist who dare not
supply medicine urgently needed by a boycotted person, who was
suspected of entertaining what the learned Humphreys would spell as
"Brittish" sympathies.
Gort (Co. Galway), May 6th.
No. 19.--INDOLENCE AND IMPROVIDENCE.
Mr. James Dunne, of Athenry, is an acute observer and a shrewd
political controversialist. He said: "The people about here, the poor
folks such as the small farmers and labourers, have really no opinion
at all. They know nothing of Home Rule, one way or the other. If they
say anything, it is to the effect that they will obtain some advantage
in connection with the land. Beyond that they care nothing for the
matter. Not one has any sentiment to be gratified. They only want to
live, if possible, a bit more easily. If they can get the land for
nothing or even more cheaply, then Home Rule is good. They can see no
further than their noses, and they cannot be expected to follow a long
chain of argument. They believe just what they are told. Yes, they go
to the priest for advice under all circumstances. They ask him to name
the man for whom they are to vote, or rather they would ask him if he
waited long enough. They vote as they are told; and as the Catholic
priest believes that the Catholic religion is the most important thing
in the world, which from his point of view is quite proper and right,
he naturally influences his people in the direction which is most
likely to propagate the true faith, and give to it the predominance
which he believes to be its rightful due.
"The people round here are harmless, and will continue so, unless the
agitators get hold of them. They are ignorant, and easily led, and an
influential speaker who knew their simplicity could make them do
anything, no matter what. No, I couldn't say that they are
industrious. They do not work hard. They just go along, go along,
like. They have no enterprise at all, and you couldn't get them out of
the ways of their fathers. They'd think it a positive sin.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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