agree with you that the continued Irish representation at
Westminster immensely facilitates such a step, while the contrary
provision in the Bill of 1886 would have been a bar. Undoubtedly
this is a matter which should be dealt with largely in accordance
with the opinion of the Colonies themselves, and if they should
desire to share in the cost of Imperial matters, as undoubtedly
they now do in the responsibility, and should express a wish for
representation at Westminster, I certainly think it should be
accorded to them, and that public opinion in these islands would
unanimously concur in the necessary constitutional modifications."

That is, if you will, thinking Imperially. Mr Redmond stands where
Parnell stood. He claims for the Irish people "the legislative and
executive control of all purely Irish affairs." But he is altogether
friendly to a later and larger application of the principle of autonomy.

But where, asks the triumphant critic not quite ingenuously, is the line
to be drawn between local and Imperial affairs? Problems far more
perplexed than this have been solved by the wit of man. The line was
drawn by O'Connell and Butt, by Parnell and Gladstone. It can be drawn
to meet the circumstances of to-day by men of goodwill, after discussion
and mutual adjustment. But why not postpone the case of Ireland until a
scheme of Home Rule all round either for the United Kingdom or for the
whole Empire has been worked out? We answer that Ireland comes first on
grounds both of ethics and of expediency. Through all the blackness of
dismal years we have laboured to preserve the twin ideas of nationality
and autonomy, and the labourer is worthy of his hire. But a Home Rule
assembly, functioning in Dublin, may well furnish the germ of a
reorganisation of the Empire. If so, let it be remembered that it was
not Mr Chamberlain but Daniel O'Connell who first in these countries