This state of things--a paradox in action--carries with it certain
metaphysical implications. The philosophers tell us that all morality
centres in the maxim that others are to be treated as ends in
themselves, and not as instruments to our ends. If they are right, then
we must picture Ireland as the victim of a radical immoralism. We must
think of her as a personality violated in its ideals, and arrested in
its development. And, indeed, that is no bad way of thinking: it is the
one formula which summarises the whole of her experience. But the
phrasing is perhaps too high and absolute; and the decline and fall of
Mr Balfour are a terrible example to those of us who, being young, might
otherwise take metaphysics too solemnly. It will, therefore, at this
stage be enough to repeat that, in contemplating the discontent and
unrest which constitute the Irish difficulty, Great Britain is
contemplating the work of her own hands, the creation of her own mind.
For that reason we can make no progress until we ascertain what sort of
mind we have to deal with.

I do not disguise from myself the extremely unpleasant nature of this
inquiry. It is as if a counsel were to open his address by saying:
"Gentlemen of the Jury, before discussing the facts of the case I will
examine briefly the mental flaws, gaps, kinks, and distortions of you
twelve gentlemen." There is, however, this difference. In the analysis
upon which we are engaged the mental attitude of the jury is not merely
a fact in the case, it is the whole case. Let me reinforce my weaker
appeal by a passage from the wisest pen in contemporary English letters,
that of Mr Chesterton. There is in his mere sanity a touch of magic so
potent that, although incapable of dullness, he has achieved authority,
and although convinced that faith is more romantic than doubt, or even
sin, he has got himself published and read. Summarising the "drift" of
Matthew Arnold, Mr Chesterton observes: