Liberal circles, that Ulster's repugnance to Home Rule was less
uncompromising than it formerly had been. On the contrary, he believed
that "there never was a moment at which men were more resolved than at
the present, with all the force and strength that God has given them,
to maintain the British connection and their rights as citizens of the
United Kingdom." Apart from principle or sentiment, that was an
attitude, he maintained, dictated by practical good sense. He showed how
Ireland had been "advancing in prosperity in an unparalleled measure,"
for which he could quote the authority of Mr. Redmond himself, although
the Nationalist leader had omitted to notice that this advance had taken
place under the legislative Union, and, as Carson contended, in
consequence of it. He laid special emphasis on the point, never
forgotten, that the danger in which they stood was due to the
hoodwinking of the British constituencies by Mr. Asquith's Ministry.

"Make no mistake; we are going to fight with men who are prepared
to play with loaded dice. They are prepared to destroy their own
Constitution, so that they may pass Home Rule, and they are
prepared to destroy the very elements of constitutional government
by withdrawing the question from the electorate, who on two
previous occasions refused to be a party to it."

He ridiculed the "paper safeguards" which Liberal Ministers tried to
persuade them would amply protect Ulster Protestants under a Dublin
Parliament, giving a vivid picture of the plight they would be in under
a Nationalist administration, which, he declared, meant "a tyranny to
which we never can and never will submit"; and then, in a pregnant
passage, he summarised the Ulster case:

"Our demand is a very simple one. We ask for no privileges, but we