founded upon justice. De Beaumont at any rate teaches that to transform
Irish tenants into peasant proprietors would be the salvation of the
country:--

_"Plus on considère l'Irlande, ses besoins et ses difficultés de toutes
sortes, et plus on est porté à penser que ce changement dans l'état de
sa population agricole serait le vrai remède à ses maux....

"J'aurais mille autres raisons pour appuyer cette opinion; je m'arrête
cependant. Un lecteur anglais trouvera mes arguments incomplets. Tout
autre qu'un Anglais les jugera peut-être surabondants."_[19]

This opinion may be well-founded or ill-founded; but no wise statesman
will reject it without the maturest consideration.

History, then, if fairly interrogated, gives this result: Historical
causes have generated in Ireland a condition of opinion which in all
matters regarding the land impedes that enforcement of law which is the
primary duty of every civilized government.

From this fact Home Rulers draw the inference that the law is hated
because it is foreign, and that England should surrender to Irishmen the
effort to enforce legal rights, since this duty is one which can be
performed by a native and cannot be performed by any English or foreign
authority.

This conclusion is clearly not supported by the premises. If the source
of popular discontent be agrarian, then the right course is to amend the
land laws while improving the administrative system, and enforcing
justice between man and man.