The life, trial and conversations of Robert Emmet, Esq., leader of the Irish insurrection of 1803 : $b also, the celebrated speech made by him on the occasionAnonymous
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The life, trial and conversations of Robert Emmet, Esq., leader of the Irish insurrection of 1803 : $b also, the celebrated speech made by him on the occasion
of his fellow, who believes or doubts a little more than the Government
standard—a Government steeled to barbarity by the cries of the orphans
and the tears of the widows which it has made.
[_Here Lord Norbury interrupted Mr. Emmet—saying, that the mean and
wicked enthusiasts who felt as he did, were not equal to the
accomplishment of their wild design._]
I appeal to the immaculate God—I swear by the throne of Heaven, before
which I must shortly appear—by the blood of the murdered patriots who
have gone before me, that my conduct has been, through all this peril
and through all my purposes, governed only by the convictions which I
have uttered, and by no other view than that of their cure, and the
emancipation of my country from the superinhuman oppression under which
she has so long and too patiently travailed; and I confidently and
assuredly hope that, wild and chimerical as it may appear, there is
still union and strength in Ireland to accomplish this noblest
enterprize.
Of this I speak with the confidence of intimate knowledge, and with the
consolation that appertaining to that confidence. Think not, my Lords, I
say this for the petty gratification of giving you a transitosy
uneasiness; a man who never yet raised his voice to assert a lie, will
not hazard his character with posterity by asserting a falsehood on a
subject so important to his country, and on an occasion like this. Yes,
my Lords, a man who does not wish to have his epitaph written until his
country is liberated, will not leave a weapon in the power of envy, nor
a pretence to impeach the probity which he means to preserve even in the
grave to which tyranny consigns him.
[_Here he was again interrupted by the court._]
Again I say, that what I have spoken was not intended for your
Lordships, whose situation I commiserate rather than envy—my expressions
were for my countrymen—if there is a true Irishmen present, let my last
words cheer him in the hour of affliction.
[_Here he was again interrupted; Lord Norbury said he did not sit there
to hear treason._]
I have always understood it to be the duty of a judge, when a prisoner
has been convicted, to pronounce the sentence of the law; I have also
understood that judges sometimes think it their duty to hear with
patience, and to speak with humanity; to exhort the victim of the laws,
and to offer, with tender benignity, his opinion of the motives by which
he was actuated in the crime of which he was adjudged guilty. That a
judge has thought it his duty so to have done, I have no doubt; but
where is the boasted freedom of your institutions—where is the vaunted
impartiality, clemency, and mildness of your courts of justice, if an
unfortunate prisoner, whom your policy, and not your justice, is about
to deliver into the hands of the executioner, is not suffered to explain
his motives sincerely and truly, and to vindicate the principles by
which he was actuated.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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