Why England Maintains the Union

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1887. Excerpt: ... survey the broad phenomena of Irish history, and consider what are the inferences which they really warrant. We must dismiss from our minds the notion, naturally fostered by common modes of speech, that England and Ireland are two persons individually and permanently responsible for the crimes and follies of past ages. We must be on our guard against taking it for granted that when anything goes wrong in national affairs there is always some man or men upon whom the blame can be fixed, as a murderer may be held guilty of murder, or a robber of theft. We should also remember that the most useful result of the study of history is to tone down those historical enmities whose bitterness is partly caused by forgetfulness of the fact that we cannot justly judge the conduct of actors in bygone scenes by a moral standard which was not theirs. The moral function of an historian is to lessen the hatreds which divide nation from nation and class from class, and which at the present moment are doing more to prevent real unity between the inhabitants of the two islands making up the United Kingdom than do unjust laws or vicious institutions. 19. Different Levels And Tendencies Of England And Ireland. The first fact which thrusts itself upon our attention is, that England and Ireland have from the first been standing on different levels of civilisation, and have moreover tended towards a different kind of development. Englishmen seldom understand how singular has been the growth of English institutions. They do not perceive that the gradual transformation of an aristocratic and feudal society into a modern industrial State, while retaining the forms and much of the spirit of feudalism, is a process which has hardly a parallel in any other European country, and which ha...