Page images
PDF
EPUB

of the coffin, and the ribbons of the bride-at bed or board we must pay taxes.

The schoolboy whips his taxed top-the beardless youth manages his taxed horse, with a taxed bridle, on a taxed road -and the dying Englishman, pouring his medicine, which has paid seven per cent., into a spoon that has paid fifteen per cent., flings himself back upon his chintz bed, which has paid twenty-two per cent.; makes his will on an eight-pound stamp, and expires in the arms of an apothecary, who has paid a licence of a hundred pounds for the privilege of putting him to death. His whole property is then immediately taxed from two to ten per cent. Besides the probate, large fees are demanded for burying him in the chancel; his virtues are handed down to posterity on taxed marble; and he is then gathered to his fathers-to be taxed no more.

XX.-MR. O'CONNELL IN DEFENCE OF MR. MAGEE-THE LAW OF LIBEL.

GENTLEMEN,-You are now to pronounce upon a publication, the truth of which is not controverted. The case is with you: it belongs to you exclusively to decide it. His Lordship may advise, but he cannot control your decision; and it belongs to you alone to say, whether or not, upon the entire matter, conceive it to be evidence of guilt, and deserving of punishment. The Statute-law gives or recognises this your right, and imposes it on you as your duty. No judge can dictate to a jury-no jury ought to allow itself to be dictated to.

you

If the contrary doctrine were established, see what oppressive consequences might result. At some future period, some man may attain the first place on the Bench, through the reputation which is so easily acquired-by a certain degree of churchwardening piety, added to a great gravity and maidenly decorum of manners. Such a man may reach the Benchfor I am putting a mere imaginary case:-he may be a man without passions, and therefore without vices; he may be, my lord, a man superfluously rich, and, therefore, not to be bribed with money, but rendered partial by his bigotry, and corrupted by his prejudices; such a man, inflated by flattery and bloated in his dignity, may hereafter use that character for sanctity which has served to promote him, as a sword to hew down the struggling liberties of his country :-such a judge may interfere before trial, and at the trial be a partisan! For my part, I frankly avow that I shudder at the scenes

around me. I cannot, without horror, view this interfering and intermeddling with judges and juries: it is vain to look for safety to person or property, whilst this system is allowed to pervade our courts: the very fountain of justice may be corrupted at its source; and those waters which should confer health and vigour throughout the land, can then diffuse nought but mephitic and pestilential vapours to disgust and to destroy. If honesty, if justice be silent, yet prudence ought to check these practices. We live in a new era,- -a melancholy era-in which perfidy and profligacy are sanctioned by high authority: the base violation of plighted faith, the deep stain of dishonour, infidelity in love, treachery in friendship, the abandonment of every principle, and the adoption of every frivolity and of every vice that can excite hatred combined with ridicule,-all, all this, and more, may be seen around us; and yet it is believed, it is expected, that this system is fated to be eternal. Gentlemen, we shall all weep the insane delusion; and, in the terrific moments of retaliation, you know not, you cannot know, how soon or how bitterly "the ingredients of your poisoned chalice may be commended to your own lips."

Is there amongst you any one friend to freedom? Is there amongst you one man who esteems equal and impartial justice -who values the people's rights as the foundation of private happiness, and who considers life as no boon without liberty? Is there amongst you one friend to the constitution-one man who hates oppression? If there be, Mr. Magee appeals to his kindred mind, and expects an acquittal.

There are amongst you men of great religious zeal-of much public piety. Are you sincere? Do you believe what you profess? With all this zeal, with all this piety, is there any conscience amongst you? Is there any terror of violating your oaths? Are ye hypocrites, or does genuine religion inspire you? If you are sincere, if you have conscience, if your oaths can control your interests, then Mr. Magee confidently expects an acquittal.

If amongst you there be cherished one ray of pure religion if amongst you there glow a single spark of liberty-if I have alarmed religion, or roused the spirit of freedom in one breast amongst you, Mr. Magee is safe, and his country is served; but, if there be none-if you be slaves and hypocrites -he will await your verdict, and despise it!

XXI.—MR. SEWARD, ON THE DEATH OF O'CONNELL. THERE is sad news from Genoa! An aged and weary pilgrim, who can travel no farther, passes beneath the gate of one of its ancient palaces, saying, with pious resignation as he enters its silent chambers, 66 Well, it is God's will that I shall never see Rome. I am disappointed. But I am ready to die. It is all right!" The superb though fading Queen of the Mediterranean holds anxious watch, through ten long days, over that majestic stranger's wasting frame. And now Death is there! the liberator of Ireland has sunk to rest, in the cradle of Columbus! Coincidence beautiful and most sublime! It was the very day set apart for prayer and sacrifice throughout the world-for the children of the Sacred Island, perishing by famine and pestilence, in their homes, and in their native fields, and on their crowded paths of exile; on the sea, and in the havens, and on the lakes, and along the rivers of far distant lands. The chimes rung out by pity for his countrymen were O'Connell's fitting knell: his soul went forth on clouds of incense that rose from altars of Christian charity; and the mournful anthems which recited the faith, and the virtue, and the endurance of Ireland, were his becoming requiem. It is a holy sight to see the obsequies of a soldier, not only of civil liberty, but of the liberty of conscience of a soldier, not only of freedom, but of the cross of Christ-of a benefactor, not merely of a race of people, but of mankind. The vault lighted by suspended worlds is the temple within which the great solemnities are celebrated. The nations of the earth are mourners; and the "spirits of the just made perfect," descending from their golden thrones on high, break forth into songs. The lament comes forth from palaces deserted and from shrines restored; from Boyne's dark water, witness of the desolation; and from Tara's kingly hill, ever echoing her renown. But louder and deeper yet that wailing comes from the lonely huts on mountain and on moor, where the people of the greenest island of the seas are expir ing in the midst of insufficient though world-wide charities. Well, indeed, may they deplore O'Connell, for they were his faithful friends; and he bore them

"A love so vehement, so strong, so pure,

That neither age could change, nor art could cure!"

XXII. —MR. SHEIL'S REPLY TO LORD LYNDHURST.

THE Duke of Wellington is not, I am inclined to believe, a man of excitable temperament. His mind is of a cast too martial to be easily moved; but, notwithstanding his habitual inflexibility, I cannot help thinking, that, when he heard his countrymen (for we are his countrymen) designated by a phrase as offensive as the abundant vocabulary of his eloquent confederate could supply-I cannot help thinking that he ought to have recollected the many fields of fight in which we have been contributors to his renown. Yes, "the battles, sieges, fortunes," that he has passed, ought to have brought back upon him—he ought to have remembered that, from the earliest achievement in which he displayed that military genius which has placed him foremost in the annals of modern warfare, down to that last and surpassing combat which has made his name imperishable-from Assaye to Waterloo-the Irish soldiers, with whom our armies are filled, were the inseparable auxiliaries to the glory with which his unparalleled successes have been crowned. Whose were the athletic arms that drove your bayonets at Vimiera through those phalanxes that never reeled in the shock of war before? What desperate valour climbed the steeps and filled the moats at Badajos? All-all his victories should have rushed and crowded back upon his memory:-Vimiera, Badajos, Salamanca, Albuera, Toulouse, and, last of all, the greatest!-Tell me, for you were there,-I appeal to the gallant soldier before me,* from whose opinions I differ, but who bears, I know, a generous heart in an intrepid breast; tell me, for you must needs remember,— on that day, when the destinies of mankind were trembling in the balance—while death fell in showers upon them—when the artillery of France, levelled with a precision of the most deadly science, played upon them-when her legions, incited by the voice, and inspired by the example, of their mighty leader, rushed again and again to the onset-tell me, if, for an instant, when to hesitate for that instant was to be lost, the "aliens" blenched? And when at length the moment for the last and decisive movement had arrived, and the valour which had so long been wisely checked was at length let loosewhen with words familiar but immortal, the great Captain exclaimed: "Up, lads, and at them!"-tell me, if Ireland, with less heroic valour than the natives of your own glorious isle, precipitated herself upon the foe? The blood of England,

Sir Henry Hardinge.

300 READINGS IN SENATORIAL AND JUDICIAL ELOQUENCE.

of Scotland, and of Ireland, flowed in the same stream-on the same field. When the still morning dawned, their dead lay cold and stark together-in the same deep pit their bodies were deposited;-the green corn of spring is now breaking from their commingled dust-the dew falls from heaven upon their union in the grave. Partakers in every peril-in the glory shall we not be permitted to participate? and shall we be told as a requital, that we are estranged from the noble country for whose salvation our life-blood was poured out?

XXIII.—MR. (CHIEF JUSTICE) WHITESIDE, ON THE IRISH PEOPLE. THE Irish "the mere Irish". -have been described as creatures of impulse, without a settled understanding, a reasoning power, a moral sense. They have their faults, I grieve to say it; but their faults are redeemed by the splendour of their virtues. They have rushed into this agitation with ardour; because, it is their nature, when they feel strongly, to act boldly and speak passionately: ascribe their excesses to their enthusiasm,-and forgive! Recollect, that same enthusiasm has borne them triumphant over fields of peril and glory-impelled them to shed their dearest blood, and offer their gallant lives, in defence of the liberties of England. The broken chivalry of France attests the value of that fiery enthusiasm, and marks its power; nor is their high spirit useful only in the storm of battle; it cheers their almost broken hearts-lightens their load of misery when it is almost insupportable-sweetens that bitter cup of poverty which thousands of your countrymen are doomed to drink. What, that is truly great, has been, without enthusiasm, won for man? The glorious works of art—the immortal productions of the understanding-the incredible deeds of heroes and patriots for the salvation of mankind, have been prompted by enthusiasm alone! Cold and dull were one's existence here below, unless the deep passions of the soul, stirred by enthusiasm, were summoned into action for great and noble purposes the overwhelming of vice, wickedness, and tyrannythe securing and supporting of the world's virtue, the world's hope, the world's freedom! The hand of Omnipotence, by whose touch this island started into existence from amidst the waters that surround it, stamped, upon its people, noble qualities of the intellect and of the heart. Directed to the wise purposes for which heaven designed them, they will yet redeem-exalt-regenerate Ireland!

« PreviousContinue »