CHAPTER IV

THE UNION


The worst feature of Fitzgibbonism is that it has the power artificially
to produce in the human beings subject to it some of the very phenomena
which originally existed only in the perverted imagination of its
professors. Some only of the phenomena; not all; for human nature
triumphs even over Fitzgibbonism. There has never been a moment since
the Union when a representative Irish Parliament, if statesmen had been
wise and generous enough, to set such a body up, would have acted on the
principle of revenge or persecution. Nor, in spite of all evidences to
the contrary, has there ever been a moment when Protestant Ulstermen,
heirs of the noble Volunteer spirit, once represented in such a
Parliament, would have acted on the assumption that they had to meet a
policy of revenge. Nevertheless, Fitzgibbonism did succeed, as it was to
succeed in Canada, in making pessimism at least plausible and in
achieving an immense amount of direct ascertainable mischief.

The rift between the creeds and races, just beginning to heal three
generations after the era of confiscation, but reopened under the
operations of economic forces connected with race and religion, yet
perfectly capable of adjustment by a wise and instructed Government,
yawned wide from 1798 onwards, when Government had become a soulless
policeman, and scenes of frenzy and slaughter had occurred which could
not be forgotten. Swept asunder by a power outside their control,
Protestants and Catholics stood henceforth in opposite political camps,