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them . The dinner came off last Monday , under the ^ residence of Mr . Grimshaw , and attended by numerous local lights , beside Mr . Sharman Crawford and Mr . Kirk , M . P . Of course the sole point of interest in the evening was the speech of Mr . Bright ; from which we proceed to give some of the most striking passages . , . . After thanking them for the honour done to Free Trade principles , and to the party with " whom he worked , Mr . Bright gave his views of Irish character .
" Now I am one of those "who have never joined at all in the various charges which have been brought against the population of this island . I am . one who , from all my experience of the people of Ireland , am inclined to believe that , with certain variations , as in all countries , and among all people , the population have probably as many good qualities as are to be found among the people of any other country ( hear , hear , hear . ) I don't believe that the hundreds and thousands of men who travel from the far West of your country to all the counties of England and Scotland , to obtain a few weeks' well-paid labour , are men out of which nothing can be made ( cheers . ) I met a number of these men the other day in
the county of Mayo , who had lately landed at one of your ports , and walked across the island . I saw them at their last meeting , before separating to return to their respective homes , and I never saw a happier and more delighted class of people . They seemed to be rejoicing in the results of their industry in England ( hear , hear )—they seemed to be glorying in their economy and prudence ( cheers ) . I entered into conversation with many of them , and I found that they had brought home sums averaging from U . to 7 Z . and 81 ., as the results of their sayings of the late harvest ( hear , and cheers . ) Now , nothing can persuade me—nothing at least that I have yet seen—that men who do this , and do it year after year—that men
who make such extraordinary struggles that they may pay their rent , and keep their families and themselves in some degree of comfort and independence—ought not to be , and may not be , in a far higher and better position than they are to be found at the present time ( applause ) . Probably , too , what we observe with regard to that portion of your population which has emigrated to the United States is , on this point , still more striking and conclusive . It is stated , on good authority , that in the year 1851 , scarcely , if at all , less than a million sterling was sent from the United States to this country by Irishmen settled there , either to fetch their friends and relatives from Ireland to America , or to add to their comfort at
home ( hear , hear , and loud applause . ) Well , that is a fact which , when men declaim against the Irish population , they ought to bear in mind , because it is , I think , such as has no parallel in the . history of any country in the world ( loud applause ) In my opinion , it is a conclusive answer to the thousands of charges that are made against the population of this part of the kingdom . I have , however , taken other means to ascertain something of the character of this people ; for I have gone over a very considerable number of the large drainage works carried out under the Board of Works in the West of Ireland , and I have found that where there was steady work , the Irishmen who , at first , were not able to earn at piece-work more
than 3 d ., or 4 d ., or 6 d . a day , soon became able workmen , and able to realize Is . Qd . to 2 s ., or even more , per day ( hear , hear . ) I met a gentleman , who never should bo mentioned without respect in Ireland—I mean Mr . Dargan ( great cheering)—and if the honours that monarchy bestows were worth much , or bestowed as they ought to be , they would not be given to the bankrupt drones of your country , so much as to the captains and generals of industry , like Mr . Dargan ( continued cheering . ) I asked Mr . Dargan what he found in his intercourse with the Irish . I heard that ho had paid 50001 . a day in wages
for fivo years together , and as ho passed from one part of the country to another , engaged in those contracts , he did not carry his staff of workmen with him , 'but employed those ho found in each district ; and thus he must have got an intimate knowledge of tho peoplo . What ho said to mo was this— ' Depend upon it , tho people * of Ireland want only th ( # disciphno of steady industry , and they will givo as good a return in labour for tho wages paid them as any peoplo in tho world' ( cheers . ) And I have no doubt that Sir John Maeneill , and Mr . M'Cormick , or any other gentleman engaged in employing tho people- would coincide in tho testimony I luivo now quoted . "
Having thus spoken of tho people , Mr . Bright was naturall y led to tho master grievance ¦— tho land question . . "Tlioro is a great evil in Ireland not found at all to tho same oxtont in England . In Ireland the land is not possessed by tho peoplo . Tlioylivo upon it -or rather they "uiy bo said to sojourn upon it—they walk over it , they Rrovv potatoes upon it— -they drag out » i miserable existence upon it , but they do not possess it . And 1 believe that in that single fact and a great economical fact it is -is to bo found Uie true secret why tho peoplo of Ireland --or at joast its rural population , linn made lens progress during
M » o last one hundred and fifty years than tho people of England and Scotland . W «> are not responsible , in our K « noration , for tho fact Unit the land is not as much < Uv » ded amongst the people an we could wish . We are not *«> Nporisil > lo for the groat confiscations that , took place from «» " tin ,,, of Elizabeth to that of William ; and I think I > rd Clare says that the land was confiscated twice ¦ over Ouruijir that period . Hut we are responsible for that during ° . time , we have contributed to the maintenance of laws ¦ , U (! " '"ive perpetuated nearly all the evils which must , " arisen from the conlimjationu of earlier times ( loud ° " 0 «> rs . " )
And lHJ l ) rioji y traced the history of the peoplo in solution to tho land until bo anno to our own timo , wll « n , suid ho , tho population , devoid of n niiddlo cliuw ,
consists almost of abject paupers on the one hand , and bankrupt nobles on the other . " JSTow , it is not an uncommon thing in the House of Commons to attribute all the misfortunes or' Ireland to the famine . They forgot that Before the famine there were two millions of your people" who had no regular means of subsistence , and that the Devon Commission speaks of over two millions who were dwelling in hovels it was a scandal for a people to dwell in . But the famine came , and after it the break up of society , and the Encumbered Estates Court , which was wanted long before the famine—wanted even when Mr . Sinclaire was among the volunteers ( laughter ) . But so it was in Great Britain . When Catholic emancipation is granted , the alternative is
civil war . When reform is passed , the alternative is revolution . When eighty thousand slaves are emancipated in the West Indies , the alternative is immediate insurrection ( hear , hear , hear . ) And when the Corn Laws were abolished—although men were at work for that end eight or ten years who had convinced the majority of the people , still Parliament , with aristocratical opposition , did not succumb till the famine visited this island , and struck down hundreds and thousands of your people ( loud cheers ) . But the Encumbered Estates Court has come at last , and is probably doing more for the interests of Ireland , in giving an impulse to industry and making tho country worth living in , than all the laws that were passed since the Union ( loud cheers . ) It is odd that , though often
proposed and opposed , for Lord John Russell was alarmed , having a hostile House of Commons , and I must say that the wisest measures introduced there are most stoutl y opposed by men from this part of Ireland ( laughter ) , it is odd that now everybody acknowledges the benefit of that law . The other day I passed from Enniskillen to Ballyshannon , and on the south side of the road , about half a mile from Lough Erne , I saw a range of land , some of which may be called mountain land . For twelve miles it is in the best state for draining , in fact , it invites somebody to come and open a little sluice , to let the water run down into the lake ( hear , hear , and laughter ) . B , ut for twelve miles that land is nearly all covered with rushes . I believe that land , if it were put into farms and possessed
by fifty owners , and properly managed would , if tenanted , pay three times its present rent , and give six times as much produce as can now be got out of it . That land belongs to the Marquis of Ely . I know nothing of the Marquis of Ely—whether he is in the Encumbered Estates Court , or whether he has ample means ; but I do say that that land is a disgrace to its owner ( cheers . ) I believe , that , in a natural and right state of law , such a condition of things could not exist ( cheers ) . The object of the Encumbered Estates Court is to put the land into the hands of tho Seo ple . But we still maintain a law by which land , by eath , comes into possession of an oldest son ( hear , hear ) . There is an odious system by which a man—be he knave
or fool , stuffed up with pride , or filled with prejudicemay pass his hand to a deed , even just on the point of death , and decide for two or three generations what must be done for ten or twenty miles of country . That law of entail does all it can to bind this generation ; the law of entail appears to me , in tho manner in which it is acted upon , to bind the generation which is living to the generation that is dead , and it binds us to all the faults , the pride and the prejudices of tho dead ( cheers ) . I would have the law of primogeniture abolished ( cheers)—leaving to all men the right to divide their property as they like amongst their heirs , but if they dio without a will , then the law should do that which morality alone would sanction , and should divide the property of the father equally amongst his children ( loud cheers . )'
He entered deeply into tho religious question , and tho relation of the three churches to the state . " Animosities , arising out of religious differences , prevail to an exceeding extent in this country . I have met with many men who loll me that such is not the case , and they point to this man and to that man , and to three or four other men , perhaps of different religions , who , they say , care nothing at all about what their neighbours think . But I have formed a very different opinion ; t have been in many families , and I am thoroughly convinced that there is scarcely a social or political question which is not affected b y theso religious differences ; and , therefore , tho whole social atmosphere in your country is biassed by this very thing . ( Hear , bear , hear . ) This country , at present , possesses something over six millions of peoplo ; you have three Churches , which occupy tho main proportion of the people . The Catholic is tho most numerous of these ; then there an * the Church of the Kstablishment and the
Presbyterian Church , which , though numerous , are not no numerous as tins Catholic . Tho Established Church , which , I suppose , is not much more numerous than the Presbyterian -some have stated that the latter is the larger of the two ; at least , in tho north of Ireland , the ' Presbyterian is in a very considerable majority the IOstublished Church has an available annual income- —I . will not say so largo a sum as it is estimated at by some authorities — which I will take at 400 , 000 ^ . or oOO . OOO / . Some make it twice that , but it does not servo my puix pose the more to have tho figure greater . That Hum now is worth twenty years ' purchase , or about lO . OOO . OOO / . storling ; nnd that in the sum which tho State actually has granted for the keeping ,, f a Church for the purpose of its religion , and with an especial object of being a bulwark against the progress of the Church of Home , and of con - verting the Catholics to Protestantism . ( Hear , hear . ) Now , lot ; us dismiss from our minds any feelings that may exist there about those Churches ; lot us look at the
matter as wo would at a question of arithmetic , or a question of science , and with our passions unoxoil . ed . ( Hoar , hear , and cheers . ) . IJoohuho the time Iiuh eomo when everybody should get rid of passion in considering Mm condition of Irelantl . The Presbyterian Church is similarly supported by a grant of 40 , 000 / . annually , whioh , at twenty yearn' purchase , amounts to , we will say , a million sterling ; and tho Catholic Church hun ii ( J , ( KK )/ ., which , on
the same calculation , would amount to 600 , 000 Z . in round numbers . JNow , if the principle of religious liberty be admitted at all , this would seem , so for as we sec of it , to be a sad sort of an arrangement . If the Catholic religion is a legal religion , and if it is not a crime to bo a Catholic —and the law has admitted long ago it is not—then it appears to me that the arrangement is singular indeed ; for it appears that 500 , 000 ? . are granted every year as a bulwark against the Eornan Catholics , and for the purpose of converting . Catholics to Protestantism , while
26 , 000 ? . are granted annually to the Catholics for tho purpose of teaching men the Catholic religion , in order that they again may teach it to others . ( Laughter and cheers . ) ' Then , the Presbyterians , who , I know , are looked upon with great favour in high quarters when they do not meddle with dangerous questions —( hear , hear , hear ) —they have a sum granted them each year larger than tho Catholics have , although they do . not form more than one-eighth of the number of persons professing the Catholic religion . "
Comparing this with the Scotch Church , he continued : — " But in Ireland it unfortunately appears that the Established Church never was the church of the people or the nation —( hear , hear)—that it never was established here by their votes ^ by their consent or their will , in any shape whatever ; that it was established by wliat was then , and I wish it were not so much so now—a foreign country , and a foreign and conquering power . That Church lias , unfortunately , been alKed through all the time since its establishment with a course of political action which has not been considered favourable , or liberal , or just , to the greater portion of the population of Ireland . ( Cheers . ) It is a part of the original mistake that this country was to
be allied to England by force—( hear , hear)—that we were to be two kingdoms united under one Crown , by force of a garrison holding a particular form of religion , which was prevalent in England . ( Hear , hear . ) Now , I am not one of those who think it necessary that the people of a country should be of the same religion . I am rather of opinion that difference of sects in a country , with honest and just treatment , tends to greater activity , greater exertion and pi-ogress ; but difference of sects , where the Government has held up one sect as its favourite Church , through which it distributes its patronage , and uses it only to tie that country , then , I say , that hardly anything can be conceived more unfortunate than that there should be a difference of religious opinion and a difference of Churches
in such a country . ( Loud cheers . ) Now , what are the results ? I assume that every man here is as honestly anxious for the good of Ireland as I am , who am not an Irishman , arid there is no reason to doubt but that tho multitude who honestly differ from us are equally anxious as we are for the good of the country-.- But let us , I say , look at the results . It is . ' 300 yeai-3 since you bad a Parliamentary Church Establishment in Ireland . Whatwcro its objects ? To conquer Ireland by , or to prevent the diffusion of the Catholic religion ; or , further , to convert tho followers of the Catholic Cliurch to some form of Protestantism . Has it succeeded in any of those objects ? ( Cries of ' no , no . ' ) Is there at this moment , through the population of Ireland generally , a feeling of affection to the
Imperial Government ? ( No , no . ) Is there a common interest felt with England ? Is there not , on the contrary , lurking in the minds of hundreds and thousands of your people , such a feeling as ought never to exist , and 1 believe ' never would exist in any well-governed country ? So far from our being united under its system , there are many men in this room who recollect a most formidable rebellion , which but for an accident might have had very serious results ; and all of us can recollect those insurrections and incitements to insurrection which are discreditable to a Government :, even though Lhey may not be f ' ormidablo to its power . ( Hear , hear . ) And what had tho Established Church done ? According to the host data , it appears that tho proportion of Catholics in Ireland to
Protestants was , probably , before the famine , greater than almost at any period for the last 200 years ; and probably at this moment it is about as grout as it ever ban been during tho whole of that period . ( Hour , hear . ) The peoplo of IOngland are terrified at the approaches of the Church of . Rome . ( Hoar , hoar . ) You heard tho uproar that was made last winter about it . You saw ( he Imperial Parliament for a whole session busy in doing that which they knew would end in nothing . ( Heiir , hear . ) You have seen men from platforms vituperating tho people of 1 reland ; and the most powerful organs of the pi-ens from
week to week heaping insult of every kind upon the religion of nix or seven millions of the people of tho United Kingdom . ( Hear , nnd cheers . ) Well , they had had a Church established for three hunilrod years , with half-uniillioii per annum , for it , was hnlf-a-iniilion not . long ago ; 11 . Mt ill bore the same proportion to tho population that it did now ; and in ICngluud they have had an Established Church , with ten times more revenue , for the sole purpose , as they . said , of being a bulwark against the Church of Rome . Yet , notwithstanding all this , they seemed nioro afraid , in 186 'J , ol' that same Church Ilian over they won-. "
( Cheers . ) His remedy ( rather obscurely hinf . ed at by 1 . 1 io way , and rather implied than stated ) was voluntaryism , and the fullest religious liberty , the most complete equality , and tho encouragement of # ood feeling i" religion * mutter * uinoiitf men . Turning t » political topics , ho defended the ! character of Irish representatives | from Mr . Hume's charges Y \ and Irish priests : — " When \ was asked to this great linii (| iiet , reference wan made to tho part I had taken in and out of Purlim it . I am one of those , sensible of the fuel ,, that , whatever has been done within tho last thirty . yours within the imperial Parliament for freedom , it always had the . support of the majority of t . ho Irish representatives ; and I now believe ' that , if 'hero is to bo anything done in the way of liberal progroHti in tho next Parliament it would
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October 9 , 1852 . ] THE LEADER . &S 9 ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ ¦ - —— - ''— ¦ i ¦ ¦ ¦ -- ii—1 . 1 ¦ . i i . ¦ ... i ... in i i ¦¦¦¦ I ¦"" ' . __^__^ ^
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Leader (1850-1860), Oct. 9, 1852, page 959, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct1955/page/3/
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