A PROPHET IN HIS OWN LAND.

Inangahua Times, Volume XI, Issue 1746, 20 August 1886, Page 2

A PROPHET IN HIS OWN LAND.

The following extract from Charles Lever's Irish work "The Knight of Gwynne " is interesting at the present time. On page 132 the Knight, in answer to Lord Castlereagh, says: " That's a point your lordship has not touched upon, but I'll tell you. Th. demagogue, the public disturber, the licensed hawker of small grievances. every briefless lawyer of bad fortune aud worse language, every mendicant patriot that eau minister to the passions of a people deserted by . beir natural protectors — the day will CDme, my lord, when these men will grow ambitious, their aspirings may become troublesome ; if you coerce them they are martyrs, conciliate them atid they are privileged. What will happen them ? You will be asked to repeal the Union, you will be cbatged with all the venality by which you carried your bill, every injustice with which it is chargeable, and with a hundred other faults and crimes witb which it is unconnected. You will be asked, I say, to repeal tbe Union, and make of this rabble, these dregs and sweeping* of the party, a Parliament. You shake your head. No, no; it is by no means impossible ; nay I don't thiuk it even remote. I speak as an old man, aud age, if it have any deficiences as regards the past, has at least some prophetic foresight for the future." Again, on page 184, the Knight says : "In tbe Lower House politics will become a trade to live by, and the Irish party, with such an admirable market for grievances, will lie of a strong and compact body in Parliament, too numerous to be bought by anything save great concessions. Englishmen will never understand the truth of the condition of the country from these men, nor bow little personal importance they possess at home. They will be regarded as the exponents of Irish opinion ; they will browbeat, denounce, threaten, fawn, and flatter by turns; and Ireland, instead of being easier to govern, will, be rendered ten tiroes more difficult by all the obscuring influences of falsehood and misrepresentation."