urce of fresh sectarian discord; the
calamities, the mistakes and the crimes which mark each scene in the
tragedy of Irish history, afford to Protestants and to Catholics alike
an exhaustless supply of recriminatory invective. But to evoke the
spectres of past ages is not the way to assuage the animosities of the
present day. The crimes of bygone generations are subjects for curious
investigation, but the determination of historical problems, even when
conducted in the spirit of the calmest enquiry, never removes the
difficulties of practical statesmanship. Apologies, at any rate, or
diatribes produced by the necessity for palliating or for denouncing
the misdeeds of other times, only add a new element of confusion to the
turmoil of political warfare. Whether the insurgents of 1641 massacred
every Protestant on whom they could lay their hands, or bear only an
indirect responsibility for the death of eight or nine thousand men and
women ruthlessly expelled from the lands of which in Irish eyes they
were wrongful occupiers, is a question to be settled by Mr. Froude, Mr.
Lecky, and Mr. Gardiner; but the barbarities of insurgent Catholics, and
the retaliatory severity of Protestant victors, which mark the fury of
an internecine conflict removed from us by the lapse of more than two
centuries have little to do with the practical question whether it be
expedient at the present day that the local affairs of Ulster should be
dealt with by a Parliament sitting at Dublin, or whether members from
Ireland should have seats at Westminster. Recrimination, while it adds
nothing to knowledge, disturbs the judgment of statesmen and of
electors; but not even the reckless resuscitation of bitter memories,
which ought to be forgotten, adds so much to the confusion of the day as
does the habit fostered by the illusions of language, and by the falsely
applied historical method, of speaking and thinking of England and
Ireland as though they were two human beings, who, on closing a
life-long quarrel, might be expected to entertain towards one another
those sentiments of regret, generosity, or gratitude which are proper to
men and women, but can only by the boldest of fictions be supposed to
enter into the relations between classes or nations. To this delusion of
personification is due the notion that Englishmen of to-day ought to
make compensation and feel personal shame for the cruelties of Cromwell,
or for Pitt's corruption of Irish patriots;