submitted to the constituencies.

I feel that I can add little or nothing to the weight of the arguments
contained in these papers, but I should like to give some reasons why I
earnestly hope that they will receive careful consideration.

The writers have endeavoured to approach their work with impartiality,
and to free themselves from those prejudices which make it difficult for
Englishmen to discuss Irish questions in a fresh and independent train
of thought, and realize how widely Irish customs, laws, traditions, and
sentiments differ from our own.

We are apt to think that what has worked well here will work well in
Ireland; that Irishmen who differ from us are unreasonable; and that
their proposals for change must be mistaken. We do not make allowance
for the soreness of feeling prevailing among men who have long objected
to the system by which Ireland has been governed, and who find that
their earnest appeals for reform have been, until recent times,
contemptuously disregarded by English politicians. Time after time
moderate counsels have been rejected until too late. Acts of an
exceptional character intended to secure law and order have been very
numerous, and every one of them has caused fresh irritation; while
remedial measures have been given in a manner which has not won the
sympathy of the people, because they have not been the work of the Irish
themselves, and have not been prepared in their own way.

Parliament seems during the past Session to have fallen into the same
error. By the power of an English majority, measures have been passed
which are vehemently opposed by the political leaders and the majority
of the Irish nation, and which are only agreeable to a small minority in