The Glory of English Prose - Letters to My Grandson by Stephen Coleridge
page 54 of 149 (36%)
page 54 of 149 (36%)
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"The constitution may be _for a time_ so lost; the character of
the country cannot be so lost. The ministers of the Crown will, or may, perhaps, at length find that it is not so easy to put down for ever an ancient and respectable nation, by abilities, however great, and by power and by corruption, however irresistible; liberty may repair her golden beams, and with redoubled heat animate the country; the cry of loyalty will not long continue against the principles of liberty; loyalty is a noble, a judicious, and a capacious principle; but in these countries loyalty, distinct from liberty, is corruption, not loyalty. "The cry of the connexion will not, in the end, avail against the principles of liberty. Connexion is a wise and a profound policy; but connexion without an Irish Parliament is connexion without its own principle, without analogy of condition; without the pride of honour that should attend it; is innovation, is peril, is subjugation--not connexion. "The cry of the connexion will not, in the end, avail against the principle of liberty. "Identification is a solid and imperial maxim, necessary for the preservation of freedom, necessary for that of empire; but, without union of hearts--with a separate government, and without a separate parliament, identification is extinction, is dishonour, is conquest--not identification. "Yet I do not give up the country--I see her in a swoon, but she is not dead--though in her tomb she lies helpless and motionless, still there is on her lips a spirit of life, and on her cheeks a |
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