Delphi Complete Works of Richard Brinsley Sheridan

by Richard Brinsley Sheridan

  For my own part I rejoice at the opportunity. While men of powerful abilities are exerting every effort in the defence of Ireland’s national rights, I am happy to find an object within my capacity on a matter of so much importance; it has ever been my ambition, and where in my power, my endeavour to be of service to my country; consistent with my idea of that service, I think it my duty to declare, without further egotism or introduction of myself to Mr. Eden, that the tenor of, and sentiments contained in his letter to the Earl of Carlisle, OUGHT TO BE REPROBATED IN IRELAND.

  You confess in your exordium to your correspondent, that you are more destitute of competent information, IF POSSIBLE, than he has hitherto found you; how his lordship may have hitherto found you I know not, and therefore shall not infer that you were totally unfit for the “new task” which you had imposed upon yourself; but, Sir, let this circumstance be as it may, the want of competent information need not have discouraged you. If we may reason by analogy, according to the system established by your patrons, the ministry, incapacity is in no case a disqualification; the confession therefore of this want of competent information may not have been in you, Sir, any affectation of modesty, it serves only to anticipate an observation which every one must certainly make upon reading your performance. Neither, Sir, am I surprised at this your confessed want of competent information with regard to the present question; I have said, it relates to

  “THE RIGHTS OF A PEOPLE,”

  a term which I apprehend has been long banished the circle in which you move, and consequently cannot be there understood. I regret, Mr. Eden, that either from the blunder, or good intentions of governor Johnstone, you were deprived, on your embassy to America, of any conference with her senators; had you been so happy to have had any communication of sentiments with them on the “RIGHTS OF A PEOPLE,” you would have received such information that your competency on such a subject could never be questioned, and from the apparent integrity of your intentions, all perversion of understanding removed; I am convinced you would have sacrificed to your information every grace and favor of a court; but, Sir, agreeable to your present mode of thinking, you have not once in your letter touched upon THE RIGHT of the people of Ireland to a free trade. You say “we should divest ourselves of all prejudices contracted from the popular altercations of the day, that it is not the strict policy of a former century, or the accidental distress of the present hour;” here we have both hour and day, as if our sufferings, borne and growing in “this unweeded garden,” so long undisturbed, had their origin in the present hour, or at farthest a post or two before Mr. Eden thought proper to write his letter to lord Carlisle: it is impossible, Sir, with temper to canvas the many terms, phrases, and epithets in your pamphlet, so trifling in themselves and so disrespectful to this injured country; there are a few of them, however, that it would be criminal to pass over without animadversion; do you mean by “altercations of the day,” the unanimous sense of the people of Ireland? Do you call the long and shameful prohibition against the natural and just rights of this kingdom “an accidental distress of the present hour?” and do you stile the persevering, persecuting insolence of your countrymen, “an imaginary neglect?” One phrase you use indeed with some degree of justice; our demands you define to be “urgent eagerness;” be it so. When I admit the truth, I am indifferent to the tautology of the expression: the distress of Ireland you say “by whatever circumstances occasioned, exists and operates, Great-Britain cannot hesitate to give relief, the principal wing of her building is in danger.” Still, Mr. Eden, you avoid the claim of right, and choose rather that barren resource, the BOUNTY of Great-Britain; but you assert “she cannot hesitate to give relief.” The amasing fortitude of Great Britain is beyond comprehension, she is a very felo de se in heroism. The impotent efforts of her courage have almost wearied the arm of America; yet, Great Britain cannot hesitate to give relief; alas, Sir, you are in this assertion too full of the milk of human kindness. The feelings of your Great Britain are as ludicrous in the judgment of an Irishman, as the blush of Caesar in the opinion of Cato. You qualify indeed your generous assertion, for you add this relief is to be given, because it is for “the safety and strength of the great center edifice,” and you describe Ireland “the principal wing of HER buildings.”

  I will allow you, Sir, your figure in architecture, and if you please all the ability of a Dutch engineer, you shall dam up the ocean; but I know not where you will find that cement which can make Ireland, being a distinct kingdom, the wing, as you express it, of Great Britain’s buildings.

  I fear from the purport of your letter, you view this country as a province to your’s; if so, you are one of the worst mediators that could possibly appear; however I cannot help wishing you more success on this occasion, than the result of your embassy to America can give us reason to expect. The idea of conquest has been long since reprobated — the power of supremacy has in fact, though not of right, remained.

  When you say

  “the distress of Ireland, by whatever circumstances occasioned, exists and operates,”

  I am inclined to think that ill as you are informed, you are possessed of the knowledge of some latent causes or circumstances occasioning this distress; it would have been candid to have declared them; but as you are silent, I shall take it as admitted that the distresses of Ireland are occasioned by the arbitrary restrictions on her commercial rights, and that

  “nothing short of a FREE TRADE can give relief.”

  — There is but one assertion in this part of your letter which I can admit to be wellfounded and indisputable, namely, that our distress

  “exists and operates;”

  confident of its operation we can have no doubt of its existence.

  You tell us, Sir,

  “a kind and manly confidence in the equity and wisdom of Great Britain should regulate the expectations of Ireland.”

  You freely own

  “that the doubts and difficulties which the first view of the subject suggests to your mind, are such as preclude all farther reasonings without further information;”

  but in the same page you tell us that

  “when you state your reasonings you will be better understood.”

  — You say the questions to be asked are indeed

  “numerous, nice and intricate, and that the whole system of revenue is involved in the proposition.”

  You recommend candid recollection, fair and diligent enquiry, caution, minute investigation, much discussion, and mature deliberation: Now why and wherefore all these trappings of language? why is recollection, which is in its nature involuntary, to be governed by candour? and why shall diligence enquire, caution investigate, and deliberation discuss? — I will answer — Ireland demands what England has no right to refuse; unwilling to comply she would take every chance from time, hitherto by no means amicable to her interest; many events may happen before recollection can be perfectly candid, before caution can thoroughly investigate the whole minutiae of commerce, and before mature deliberation can discuss the involved system of the revenue. Peace may be, no matter on what concessions or conditions, purchased or obtained from Spain and France; Britain, now exhausted, will be sufficiently powerful, and then adieu to fair enquiry and candid recollection; farewell to all the fond hopes and honest expectations of poor deluded Ireland: her only asylum will be, in such case, THE WISDOM AND EQUITY of Great Britain. After deliberation, &c. you proceed with an army of doubts, bringing up many a perhaps and probably in their rear; and among a variety of novel remarks, as certain as your discovery that where distress exists it operates, you tell us that

  “political operations must often be influenced by circumstances; and that unadvised measures ought not to be adopted”

  — it is true, — your stile of reasoning, where certainty appears to demonstration, cannot be disputed; like an arithmetical rule it cannot err; something similar is the advice of Friar Laurence,

  “wisely and slow; they stumble who run fas
t;”

  and this, Mr. Eden, I have, after mature deliberation, diligent enquiry, and minute investigation, discovered to be the grand object of your pamphlet. I will not say you wish to confuse one of the most simple and least complicated questions ever agitated; but this I am at liberty to believe, that if your pamphlet is read with approbation, it will have that effect: I will not assert that your intention is for some malicious purpose, to cause delay in this country; but this I have a right to declare, that if your reasoning be adopted it will produce delay — the adage is in my favour — I think it dangerous. When, Sir, a people are convinced that their rights are withheld, they cannot, if capable, be too sudden in their resolves; and give me leave to remind you, that Ireland is now in this situation, that her success depends on expedition; deliberation, discussion and investigation, may be the political motto of your country; I trust, “carpe diem!” will be that of mine; but meet our wishes, and you will find this maxim verified by a nation— “the brave are always generous.” Considering, Sir, how ill-informed you were of your road, you have ventured to travel a considerable way, though you do not appear to have gained much ground. I shall not attempt to follow you, for you seem to me to be as little acquainted with the place you would go to, as of the road you are to travel; you have been taking the air in a labyrinth of your own creating, and after having tripped over many a path which led to nothing, you at length find yourself at the point from whence you set out.

  However, Sir, as your intentions seem to be good, though the effect of your opinion being pursued might be otherwise, I have, in reading your performance, endeavoured to rescue the text from all the prittinesses of point and antithesis, and to free it from a number of barren premises and inconsequent conclusions; the result is, you think, Ireland is distressed and ought to be relieved. But to pronounce upon the cause of that distress, or to point out the mode of relief, requires in your idea so much precaution, such diligent enquiry, such candid recollection, such minute investigation, and such mature deliberation, that, you doubt, you hesitate, your letter seems the chance medley of your pen, and in the end you give no opinion at all about the matter. To satisfy these doubts, Sir, as well as to give you, as far as my endeavours will permit, a little of that information you seem so desirous of obtaining, I flatter myself you will be obliged to me, should I comment upon such passages in your pamphlet as I have already taken notice of, or shall hereafter have occasion to quote.

  In the first instance you tell us a kind and manly confidence in the EQUITY AND WISDOM of Great Britain should regulate our expectations; — if, Sir, the equity and wisdom of the people of Great Britain could afford us any relief, confidence in them might indeed be well placed; but the people of Great Britain have long since forgot to take the management of their own affairs into their own hands, and I dare say you are one of those who would be very sorry if they were to renew the practice. I am convinced therefore you did not mean the wisdom and equity of the British people. — Is it upon those qualities in the British ministry that you wish us to rely? — Now, Sir, much as we respect them, for we, as well as the Americans, are certainly under great obligations to them, yet I think we shall scarcely agree with them in our ideas of wisdom and equity.

  As to WISDOM, WE think a part of it consists in profiting by experience, — in this we differ widely from the ministry, and it is because we think it wise to profit by experience, that we do not choose to place any confidence in ministerial wisdom. As to EQUITY — I believe it will be found that our notions on this head differ still more widely from their’s. We in this country annex certain ideas of distributive justice to the term equity — I do not say we are right in doing so, I would not dispute the authority of ministers, I only say the fact is so. Now I have endeavoured to find out the ministerial meaning of the word equity, and have for this purpose consulted the British statutes by way of dictionary. I there find that equity means a monopoly of trade and of liberty; it means authority without justice, and power without right; it is to treat fellow subjects, whom local circumstances separate from you, and inferiority of numbers place in your power, as the subjects of subjects, or rather as unarmed natural enemies. It is bountiful to suffer us to exist, and humanely to deprive us of the means of existence; it is to force us to purchase commodities, and to prohibit our earning the purchase money — it is to expect a revenue from the poverty ministers would entail, which could be yielded only by the affluence they would prevent — it is, in short, to say, that as far as your power can reach, liberty, independence, dignity, wealth and commerce shall belong to you exclusively: — dependence, poverty and restrictive laws shall be the portion of all who are connected with you. These, Sir, as far as I could collect from the dictionary I consulted, have been the various ministerial meanings of the word equity for two centuries back — perhaps it is very well explained there; but this is not exactly the sort of equity in which we can place much confidence.

  I shall not object to the next passage I have taken notice of, in which you proceed or attempt to state your reasonings, immediately after having acknowledged that without fuller information you are precluded from all farther reasoning upon the subject: — you might say that this would be carping at a term, that I should consider what the fact was, and that no one who was not determined to cavil, could possibly mistake what followed — for reasoning. — I admit the force of the observation, and shall proceed in my review of some other passages.

  You say the questions to be asked relative to the granting of a free trade to Ireland are indeed

  “numerous, nice and intricate; theoretical deductions will not assist us; trading establishments, regulations of commerce, and the whole system of revenue are involved in the proposition:”

  You express your fears at

  “reversing the system pursued by wise statesmen during two centuries”

  You dread

  “the giving a sudden shock or precipitate revulsion to the course of British trade, commerce and revenue:”

  And after having made some concessions in our favour, they are done away by your observing

  “that all those theorems of trade, however plausible they may appear on paper, must be received subject to much previous examination, and a diligent discussion of all collateral circumstances;”

  that you are not

  “upon a sudden outery, which like other commercial complaints may be fallacious or ill-founded, to make a sudden revolution in all the practical system of your trade; and upon the spur of a moment to overturn a plan of commerce and revenue which has been the work of ages.”

  What, Sir, is it you mean by a sudden outery, that may be fallacious or ill-founded? Do you call, Sir, the unanimous addresses of both houses of parliament a sudden outery? Do you call the unanimous voice of the whole people of Ireland a sudden outery that may be fallacious or ill-founded? — Read your statutes, Sir, which with a clerk-like care you have collected, and seem to have made so little use of — look at their effects — then tell us — the outery may be fallacious and illfounded. Your want of information, Sir, will not avail you here for your want of respect towards the legislature of Ireland, and the feelings of a whole people.

  I ask pardon, Sir, for the warmth into which you have betrayed me; — perhaps you were not aware of the force of what you said; — and as you have in most places used a multiplicity of words without saying any thing, — you have here, without knowing it, said a great deal in a few. It must be owned you for the most part shelter yourself under a number of laboured expressions, designed for ornament, and destitute of meaning; — you would hide the deficiency of your matter in the tinsel of your stile; — like a shining bubble, gaudy, light and empty, you float upon the surface of a subject, to enter deeply into which seems to require talents more weighty than your’s. You have indeed endeavoured to render the questions relative to the granting A FREE TRADE to Ireland, numerous, nice and intricate — you boldly assert that the proposition involves in it the whole system of the British revenue. —
I think, Sir, as you disclaim

  “all hasty inferences and decisive assertions,”

  you might at least have made an attempt at proving one of so much importance as the present. But, Sir, your subsequent arguments, if they tend to any thing, tend to prove that the British revenue has little or nothing to do with the question; and I will undertake to shew that your fears of reversing the system pursued by wise statesmen during two centuries, and of giving a sudden shock or precipitate revulsion to the course of British trade, are equally groundless. This grand question of granting a free trade to Ireland, which you have endeavoured to involve in so many difficulties, is contained in the simplest proposition imaginable — LET THE REGULATION OF THE IRISH TRADE BE LEFT TO THE WISDOM AND EQUITY OF THE IRISH LEGISLATURE.

  A FREE TRADE, Sir, the meaning of which you have affected not to comprehend, is such a trade as FREEMEN ought of right to possess — it is a trade subject to no restrictions in the country to which it belongs, but such, as the inhabitants of that country, being freemen, have through their representatives, consented should take place — What, Sir, is the meaning of the term FREE COUNTRY? — Your visit to AMERICA may possibly have helped you to comprehend, however unknown to you before: — Is it not, Sir, a country subject to no laws but those to which the inhabitants shall have directly or virtually given their assent? ought not this to have led you to what was meant by a FREE TRADE. Folly itself could never have conceived it to imply, a trade subject to no restrictions, any more than that a free country should be a country subject to no law; when then you call it

  “an undefined expression”

  you talk ignorantly — it is an expression as definite and determinate as in the nature of language can exist. — Now, Sir, let us examine what effect the leaving the regulation of the Irish trade to the WISDOM AND EQUITY of the IRISH legislature would have upon the revenue and commerce of Great Britain.

  The proposition, as far as it relates to Great Britain, can be considered only in two points of view; first, how far it can effect the British commerce and revenue, with regard to the trade immediately carried on between Great Britain and Ireland; secondly, how far it may interfere with the trade of Great Britain to foreign parts. — I shall here, Sir, remark once for all, that the present proposition has no relation whatever to the trade of Great Britain with any of the British settlements or colonies in Asia, Africa or America (I include America only for argument sake) — If Great Britain admits Ireland to a participation of her trade to such settlements or colonies, the Irish will consider it as a favour to which of right they have no claim, for which they will not only be grateful, but will be ready to make every equitable compensation in their power; this, however, must be a matter of future discussion, and must rest upon the mutual agreements of the parliaments of both kingdoms, and this may probably be a matter of mature deliberation.