er said a word in favour of
Home Rule. The more that England becomes sensible, as she must become
sensible, of the deficiencies of the present machinery for appreciating
the needs and giving effect to the wishes of Irishmen, the more disposed
will she be to grant them some machinery of their own.

As regards social order, I have shown that the choice which lies before
the opponents of Home Rule is either to continue the policy of coercing
the peasantry by severe special legislation, or to remove the source of
friction by buying out the landlords for the benefit of the tenants. The
present Ministry have chosen the former alternative, but they dangle
before the eyes of their supporters some prospect that they may
ultimately revert to the latter. Now, the only way that has yet been
pointed out of buying out the landlords, without imposing tremendous
liabilities of loss upon the British Treasury, is the creation of a
strong Home Rule Government in Dublin. Supposing, however, that some
other plan could be discovered, which would avoid the fatal objections
to which an extension of the plan of the (Salisbury) Land Purchase Act
of 1885 is open, such a plan would remove one of the chief objections to
an Irish Parliament, by leaving no estates for such a Parliament to
confiscate. As for coercion every day, I might say, every bye-election
shows us how it becomes more and more odious to the British democracy.
They dislike severity; they dislike the inequality involved in passing
harsher laws for Ireland than those that apply to England and Scotland.
They find themselves forced to sympathize with acts of violence in
Ireland which they would condemn in Great Britain, because these acts
seem the only way of resisting harsh and unjust laws. When the recoil
comes, it will be more violent than in former days. The wish to discover
some other course will be very strong, and the obvious other course will
be to leave it to an Irish authority to enforce social order in its own
way--probably a more rough-and-ready way than that of British officials.
The notion which has possessed most Englishmen, that Irish
self-government would be another name for anarchy, is curiously
erroneous. Conflicts there may be, but a vigorous rule will emerge.

Lastly, as to local government. If a popular system is established in
Ireland--one similar to that which it is proposed to establish in
England--the control of its assemblies and officials will, over
four-fif