Such were the attempts, made too late, to restore the State and eject the invader. One was dependent on the other. It was clearly impossible to restore the State until the invader had first been cast out. His presence in the country necessarily acted like an obstruction in the blood, and made it impossible for the body of the State to resume its health and perfect its functions until the poison had been expelled. This was so in the natural law of things; but, in addition to this natural and inevitable result, the invaders, in order to maintain their position in the country, set to work to create division between the scattered portions of the broken State. That was easy to do. The leaders in the different parts of the country have been blamed (by none more than by their nation) for serving their own sectional interests instead of the national unity. But how were they to discover the national unity, and how were they to distinguish, as we now can distinguish, between sectional and national interests? The history of mankind proves that in a broken State it is a simple task to create discord, and a giant’s task to create unity. The invaders acted at first from a common centre; and the nature of the case robbed the Irish Nation of any common centre from which to act. That was the first difficulty. Secondly, there are always men in every Nation who are willing to sell their honour. So long as Nations can repel invasion that fact does not become an active danger within the security of its State; but directly an invader enters a country, with gold and honours in his gift, it becomes almost impossible to overtake the poison that runs in every direction. Men grow suspicious of the most honest purpose if that purpose is not at once apparent; and if it is at once apparent it is thereby at once revealed to the enemy. Finally, most men are near-sighted; they judge of large issues by their immediate effects, and so mistake those immediate effects for the large issues, making it easy for an enemy to drive divisions in between sectional interests. These things are so, not necessarily because men are corrupt, but by the nature of things; and their combined result was the broken State of Ireland.