Maxims and Opinions of Field-Marshal His Grace the Duke of Wellington, Selected From His Writings and Speeches During a Public Life of More Than Half a CenturyWellington, Arthur Wellesley, Duke of
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Maxims and Opinions of Field-Marshal His Grace the Duke of Wellington, Selected From His Writings and Speeches During a Public Life of More Than Half a Century
Wellington, Arthur Wellesley, Duke of
Great Britain -- Politics and government -- 19th century; Wellington, Arthur Wellesley, Duke of, 1769-1852
I can assure your Lordships that there is not any man, either there or
here, who is more aware of the poverty of Ireland, and the dangers to
the empire from the state of the lower orders, than he who has now the
honour of addressing you. But I would have noble Lords to observe that
it is not by coming here to talk of the poverty of that country that we
can remove it. If noble Lords will endeavour to tranquilize the country,
and persuade those who have the means to buy estates and settle there;
by holding out to them a picture of industry and tranquility with its
other advantages, they will soon find the country change its aspect, and
complaints of the dangers arising from its poverty will no longer be
heard. The influence of the presence and fortunes of the proprietors of
land in Ireland spent in that country, would do more to serve it than
any legislative enactment parliament have it in their power to pass.
_November 2, 1830._
_Repeal averted by Emancipation._
The repeal of the union is opposed by the noble Duke opposite (the Duke
of Leinster) and all his friends in Ireland: it is opposed by all the
proprietors in Ireland, by the great majority of the Roman Catholics, by
nearly all the Protestants of Ireland, and with one exception by the
unanimous voice of the other House of Parliament.
Such is the present state of this question, but how would it have stood
had not that other to which he alluded been carried two years ago? And
how did that one then stand? Why, the noble Duke and all his friends,
and a large proportion of the Irish people, were anxious that that
question should be carried. Such, also, do we know to a certainty was
the desire of the majority of the other House of Parliament, whilst at
the same time there was in this House a minority in its favour, daily
acquiring greater strength; and at present, I presume, no one will deny
that a large body of the best informed people of this country were also
decidedly for conceding this point. We do not now stand on worse ground
on the question of the repeal of the union than we should have done had
not the Catholic question been carried. I do not see the advantage,
therefore, of repeating reproaches against me for having given way on
that occasion from fear. I gave way because I conceived the interests of
the country would be best answered by doing so; I gave way on the
grounds of policy and expediency, and upon those grounds I am at this
moment ready to justify what I did. The noble Lord must forgive me for
saying that the state of irritation which has continued to exist in
Ireland since that question was carried must not be attributed to the
King's Ministers: they have done every thing in their power to
conciliate, and heal the divisions which distracted that country for so
many years previously to the settlement of that question. It is not my
duty, any more than my inclination, to cast imputation on any man; but
this I will say, that if the King's Ministers had been supported as
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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