which would judge this great controversy as it is judged by
foreign nations, and as it will be judged by future ages. The
passions which inflame us, the sophisms which delude us, will not
last for ever. The paroxysms of faction have their appointed
season. Even the madness of fanaticism is but for a day. The
time is coming when our conflicts will be to others what the
conflicts of our forefathers are to us; when the preachers who
now disturb the State, and the politicians who now make a
stalking horse of the Church, will be no more than Sacheverel and
Harley. Then will be told, in language very different from that
which now calls forth applause from the mob of Exeter Hall, the
true story of these troubled years.

There was, it will then be said, a part of the kingdom of Queen
Victoria which presented a lamentable contrast to the rest; not
from the want of natural fruitfulness, for there was no richer
soil in Europe; not from want of facilities for trade, for the
coasts of this unhappy region were indented by bays and estuaries
capable of holding all the navies of the world; not because the
people were too dull to improve these advantages or too
pusillanimous to defend them; for in natural quickness of wit and
gallantry of spirit they ranked high among the nations. But all
the bounty of nature had been made unavailing by the crimes and
errors of man. In the twelfth century that fair island was a
conquered province. The nineteenth century found it a conquered
province still. During that long interval many great changes had
taken place which had conduced to the general welfare of the
empire: but those changes had only aggravated the misery of
Ireland. The Reformation came, bringing to England and Scotland
divine truth and intellectual liberty. To Ireland it brought