y, under those mysterious laws which rule the life
of all humanity, the laws which work their majestic will through the
ages, using as their ministers the ambitions and passions of men--it
happens rarely that a race keeps its unbroken life through thirty
centuries, transformed time after time by new spiritual forces, yet in
genius remaining ever the same. It may be doubted whether even once
before throughout all history a race thus long-lived has altogether
escaped the taint of corruption and degeneration. Never before, we may
confidently say, has a single people emerged from such varied
vicissitudes, stronger at the end in genius, in spiritual and moral
power, than at the beginning, richer in vital force, clearer in
understanding, in every way more mature and humane.

For this is the real fruit of so much evil valiantly endured: a deep
love of freedom, a hatred of oppression, a knowledge that the wish to
dominate is a fruitful source of wrong. The new age now dawning before
us carries many promises of good for all humanity; not less, it has its
dangers, grave and full of menace; threatening, if left to work
unchecked, to bring lasting evil to our life. Never before, it is true,
have there been so wide opportunities for material well-being; but, on
the other hand, never before have there been such universal temptations
toward a low and sensual ideal. Our very mastery over natural forces and
material energies entices us away from our real goal, hides from our
eyes the human and divine powers of the soul, with which we are
enduringly concerned. Our skill in handling nature's lower powers may be
a means of great good; not less may it bring forth unexampled evil. The
opportunities of well-being are increased; the opportunities of
exclusive luxury are increased in equal measure; exclusion may bring
resentment; resentment may call forth oppression, armed with new
weapons, guided by wider understanding, but prompted by the same corrupt
spirit as of old.

In the choice which our new age must make between these two ways, very
much may be done for the enduring well-being of mankind by a race full
of clean vigor, a race taught by stern experience the evil of tyranny
and oppression, a race profoundly believing the religion of gentleness
and mercy, a race full of the sense of the invisible world, the world of
our immortality.

We see in Ireland a land with a wonderful past, rich in tradition and
varied lore; a land where the memo