from the lesser nation to the greater; but it is the plain
historical truth, it is the natural consequence of injustice, it is
the predicament in which every country places itself which leaves
such a mass of hatred and discontent by its side. No empire is
powerful enough to endure it; it would exhaust the strength of
China, and sink it with all its mandarins and tea-kettles to the
bottom of the deep. By refusing them justice now when you are
strong enough to refuse them anything more than justice, you will
act over again, with the Catholics, the same scene of mean and
precipitate submission which disgraced you before America, and
before the volunteers of Ireland. We shall live to hear the
Hampstead Protestant pronouncing such extravagant panegyrics upon
holy water, and paying such fulsome compliments to the thumbs and
offals of departed saints, that parties will change sentiments, and
Lord Henry Petty and Sam Whitbread take a spell at No Popery. The
wisdom of Mr. Fox was alike employed in teaching his country justice
when Ireland was weak, and dignity when Ireland was strong. We are
fast pacing round the same miserable circle of ruin and imbecility.
Alas! where is our guide?

You say that Ireland is a millstone about our necks; that it would
be better for us if Ireland were sunk at the bottom of the sea; that
the Irish are a nation of irreclaimable savages and barbarians. How
often have I heard these sentiments fall from the plump and
thoughtless squire, and from the thriving English shopkeeper, who
has never felt the rod of an Orange master upon his back. Ireland a
millstone about your neck! Why is it not a stone of Ajax in your
hand? I agree with you most cordially that, governed as Ireland now
is, it would be a vast accession of strength if the waves of the sea
were to rise and engulf her to-morrow. At this moment, opposed as