  Out of the whirlpool of lies, misunderstandings, prevarications, distortions, inaccuracies and passions which go to the making up of history, can one secure some of the causes and effects connected with the Irish struggle since the Sinn Fein movement put aside pacific methods and became militant? Are there conclusions to be drawn? Three separate traditions seem to have been welded together for the purpose of uniting Ireland in a common cause. One tradition is the political tradition that Ireland possesses a national individuality, and must continue to struggle for the expression of that individuality until it is obtained. A second tradition is the Gaelic tradition, that Ireland must revive and cherish the Gaelic spirit, the Gaelic culture, the Gaelic language and literature. The third tradition is the tradition that internal affairs must be altered and improved. These three traditions came together in the Sinn Fein movement. The Irish Republic was to be an independent republic, it was to be as far as Each generation of Irish leaders, to grind their patriotic axes, have insisted that Ireland is a conquered country, suffering the fate of the conquered. The statement is too sweeping. Ireland has been part of a united kingdom with a common legislation. She has suffered to a certain extent from the too centralised parliament at Westminster, where her local affairs have frequently been crowded out. She has been legislated for as an industrial country when she is in reality an agricultural country. She has suffered from absentee landlords, another effect of centralisation. She has suffered in other ways; but she has suffered most of all from herself, from her inability ever to become united, to hold an individual opinion, to cease being hag-ridden by religion, which has starved her educationally. There have been bills passed for the rest of the British Isles which have not been passed in Ireland owing to the veto of the Catholic Church. One has only to compare the educational differences of the Irish people and the Scottish people, two nations of the same size, to comprehend what a heavy reckoning the Catholic Church will have to answer to some day. The Catholic Church has allowed ignorance and superstition. A certain intolerance can also be laid at its door, but not in any great degree. But in Ulster, Protestant Ulster, Protestantism has bred The old cry, Home Rule Rome Rule, was probably a false one. One of the results of the struggle for Irish independence has been the breaking of the power of the Catholic Church. The young men have in part educated themselves, and prevailing conditions have, whether for better or worse, matured their characters before their time. There is still a profound reverence and love for the Church; but the day has gone when it can dictate to the nation. While Sinn Fein was in its infancy the Church condemned the movement, when it grew strong the Church had to walk beside it with trembling steps and grave forebodings. The young generation of priests threw themselves into the Republican movement body and soul. But Ireland is still hag-ridden. So long as North and South take their religions as violently as they do, the two parts of the Irish nation can never come together. It does not look as if North or South will relinquish its belief. Protestantism fits the vigorous masculine Northerner, Catholicism suits the feminine, imaginative, easy-going Southerner. Because Ireland is Ireland the two religions make a fence which keep the peoples apart. It is a calamity. What a people might the intermarriage of North and South produce! So this fated nation has never had a single voice, and the British Government has perpetually Let us pass on. The history of Ireland has been a series of periods of agitation, sometimes culminating in open rebellion, alternating with periods of quiet, at the end of which time political firebrands once more bludgeoned the people into discontent. There had been such a period of calm, and then came the birth of the Gaelic League and a Celtic renaissance to herald in Sinn Fein. It was a bellows for the Sinn Fein spark. The manner in which the British Government dealt with the Sinn Fein situation when it did become a menace showed lack of imagination and lack of information. Two errors in policy were made, and in the second case the error was persisted in. Irishmen of all shades of political opinion have informed me that the irresolute conduct of the Cabinet over the Irish conscription issue during the European war was directly responsible for subsequent happenings. The young men of Ireland had become impregnated with the bellicose spirit which was abroad in the rest of Europe, and that spirit must finally find a way out through some channel or other. A firm conscription policy would have caused it to flow outwards The second case has been happening before my own eyes during the last eighteen months, and has been evidence of the lack of imagination and the little knowledge of the Irish temperament in Government circles. There were two alternatives for dealing with the Republican movement. One was to strike it a hammer blow while it was in its infancy, using all the impedimenta of war if necessary, aiming at speed in all things. The other alternative was to be generous and give a satisfactory measure of Home Rule.[1] The course the Government did adopt was doomed to failure. The Irish are a sensitive people and a spirited people. Public opinion in Ireland was dead against the Easter week rising of 1916, the British soldiers were cheered when they arrived; but four or five years of repression, of Irishmen hunted by Englishmen, of The Government’s influence was further weakened through its affection for Ulster. Though there was repression in the South, repression which was reluctant, but which grew more and more vigorous as difficulties increased, the Government had not the moral strength to adopt a firm attitude to the North. To be found with arms in the South and to be found with arms in the North was a different matter. Absolute impartiality throughout the length and breadth of the country and iron firmness in the beginning might have done much to mend matters; but the Government proved human, and was unable to belabour a man for loving it. Again, the Government was hampered by the spell which fell on the civilian population at the mention of Sinn Fein. 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