from those of their subjects. Ignorance and want of sympathy produced
all the evils of cruelty and malignity.

Bad administration, religious persecution, above all a thoroughly
vicious system of land tenure, accompanied by such sweeping
confiscations as to make it at any rate a plausible assertion that all
the land in Ireland has during the course of Irish history been
confiscated at least thrice over,[16] are admittedly some of the causes,
if they do not constitute the whole cause, of the one immediate
difficulty which perplexes the policy of England. This is nothing else
than the admitted disaffection to the law of the land prevailing among
large numbers of the Irish people. The existence of this disaffection,
whatever be the inference to be drawn from it, is undeniable. A series
of so-called Coercion Acts passed both before and since the Act of Union
give undeniable evidence, if evidence were wanted, of the ceaseless, and
as it would appear almost irrepressible, resistance in Ireland offered
by the people to the enforcement of the law. I have not the remotest
inclination to underrate the lasting and formidable character of this
opposition between opinion and law, nor can any jurist who wishes to
deal seriously with a serious and infinitely painful topic question for
a moment that the ultimate strength of law lies in the sympathy, or at
lowest the acquiescence, of the mass of the population. Judges,
constables and troops become almost powerless when the conscience of the
people permanently opposes the execution of the law. Severity produces
either no effect or bad effects, executed criminals are regarded as
heroes or martyrs, and jurymen or witnesses meet with the execration,
and often with the fate, of criminals. On such a point it is best to
take the judgment of a foreigner unaffected by prejudices or passions,
from which no Englishman or Irishman has a right to suppose himself
free: