young generation, who have not yet lost the generous ardour of youth,
believe it is as possible to do great work and make noble sacrifices,
and to roll the acceptable smoke of offering to Heaven by your work
in an Irish parish, as in any city in the world. Like the Greek
architects--who saw in their dreams hills crowned with white marble
pillared palaces and images of beauty, until these rose up in
actuality--so should you, not forgetting national ideals, still
most of all set before yourselves the ideal of your own neighborhood.
How can you speak of working for all Ireland, which you have not
seen, if you do not labor and dream for the Ireland before your eyes,
which you see as you look out of your own door in the morning, and
on which you walk up and down through the day?

"What dream shall we dream or what labor shall we undertake?" you
may ask, and it is right that those who exhort should be asked in
what manner and how precisely they would have the listener act or
think. I answer: the first thing to do is to create and realize
the feeling for the community, and break up the evil and petty
isolation of man from man. This can be done by every kind of
co-operative effort where combined action is better than individual
action. The parish cannot take care of the child as well as the
parents, but you will find in most of the labors of life combined
action is more fruitful than individual action. Some of you have
found this out in many branches of agriculture, of which your
dairying, agricultural, credit, poultry, and flax societies are
witness. Some of you have combined to manufacture; some to buy
in common, some to sell in common. Some of you have the common
ownership of thousands of pounds' worth of expensive machinery.
Some of you have carried the idea of co-operation for economic ends
farther, and have used the power which combination gives you to