of wealth,' for of
this no man out of Bedlam except Mr. Gladstone dreams, but reasonable
prosperity. Vain to argue that Protection is folly. Englishmen think so,
and Englishmen are right. But English doctrine is not accepted in
Germany, in France, in the United States, or in the British Colonies;
why should Irishmen be wiser than the inhabitants of every civilised
country, except England? The fact, in any case, cannot be altered that
most Home Rulers are Protectionists, and that many of them desire Home
Rule mainly because they desire Protection for Ireland. Yet Protection,
at any rate in the form of a tariff, they cannot have.[84] Take again
the Restrictions imposed on the endowment of religion. All English
Nonconformists, and many English Churchmen, hold these Restrictions to
be in themselves politic and just. But the one strong reason for the
concession of Home Rule is that Irishmen disagree with English notions
of policy and of justice. No one can assign any reason why Irish
statesmen, Catholics or Protestants, might not feel it a matter of duty
or of policy to endow the priesthood, to level up instead of levelling
down, to enter into some sort of concordat with Rome. It is a policy
which is distasteful to English Nonconformists and to most Irish
Protestants. But under a system of Home Rule, at any rate, English
Nonconformists have no right to dictate the policy of Ireland. There is
not the remotest reason why Restrictions on the endowments of religion
and the like should not be hateful to Irishmen.

The limitations, in short, on the competence of the Irish Parliament are
inconsistent with the fundamental principle of Gladstonian statecraft.
It is a policy we are told of trust in the people, the limitations are
dictated by distrust of the Irish people; Home Rule is to be granted in
order that Irishmen may give effect to Irish ideas; the Restrictions are
enacted to check the development of Irish ideas, and to impose English
ideas upon the policy of Ireland.

As though, however, the Restraints were not enough to cause first
irritation and then agitation, the financial provisions contemplated by
the Bill are in themselves certain to generate, not future, but
immediate discord.

Of the financial arrangements instituted under the new constitution, my
purpose is to say very little. My object is not to show that Mr.
Gladstone's financial calculations are wrong, or that they are ruinous
to Ireland or unfair to England.