HOME RILE

Evening Star, Issue 14497, 24 February 1911, Page 1

HOME RILE

AN ULSTfvRMAN'S APPEAL. In a long and impressive letter to 'The Tinics,' the Rev. ])r George Hanson, Belfast, makes an earnest appeal to English Nonconformists on behalf of the- Protestants in Ireland. I am not (he says) fully convinced of the wisdom of giving what is called "Home Rule" to Ireland. If there could be a scheme of. federated Assemblies devised for all four countries ;dike, I should be in favor—or rather tolerant—of a measure of self-government for Ireland. But why should Ireland, tho least homogeneous of the four nationalities, with its fierce internal feuds, be selected for an experiment of so hazardous a character? It ought, in simple justice, to be. "Home Rule" all round, or not at all. Let me beg Nonconformists to consider patiently another aspect of the question—viz., the determination of the large section of the Protectant population to resist (even to blood) any attempt to impose on them the rule of the Redmondite party. However mistaken and futile the call to arms, tho antipathy to " Home Rule." which rightly or wrongly is regarded by most Ulster Protestants as equivalent- to " Rome Rule," is intense beyond description, and might flame out in tierce lighting that only seas of blood would quench, or smoulder on in suppressed discontent and potential conspiracy full of danger to the State in the near or distant future. It is not that your Ulsterman is unwilling to trust his Roman Catholic countrymen with his life and fortune; he is profoundly and incorrigibly distrustful of the Church of Rome, which, he is convinced, would be put in a position of unchecked supremacy, and would use her authority for all it iu worth to oppress Protestants. What he dreads i 6 Popish ascendency and intolerance. You may call him a bigot if you will;. but ho is a bigot as Dr Clifford is a bigot, in his uncompromising hostility to priestcraft and all its ways and wiles. Deliver your Ulsterman from the fear of Romish tyranny, and he would accept " Home Rule " to-morrow. The appeal that I make to my old friends in England is this:—Will you tako care that, in any scheme of self-govern-ment that may 1» prouoeed,, every possible

security is given that the authority of the Pope shall not be sulfered to interfere with (he civil and religious hbeities of the humblest citizens': Will you not, my brethren, take infinite pains to secure your follow'-Protestants from any risk of ecclesiastical despotism ? MR REDMOND'S ANSWKR. Speaking at Dublin tho other day. Mr John Redmond said that the Protest ants of Ireland were apprehensive that Homo Rule would mean Koine Rule and the curtailment- of their civil a.p.d religious liberties. They should remember in reference to this matter the words of O'Connell, who said: "The Catholics of Ireland would always take their religion from Rome, but that they would as soon take their politics from Oonistantinople." That spirit existed in Ireland to-day, and it was the same in 1881, when an Ambassador from the English Government was sent to Rome to get a ban put on the collection of the Parnell testimonial, and that spirit existed in the breath of those Cat holies who were devoted to Rome heart and soul in the matter of their religion. This lecture contained a- ie&on to their Protestant fellowcountrymen, and they might be easy in their minds that in an liisb Parliament the polities of the country would not be dictated from Rome or from any other place outside the shores of this country. Protestants would have equal rights and privileges with their Catholic brethren, and in that new Assembly which was coming they would have ample opportunity given to them of reviving the glotir-r of the Protestants of 1782. Much of the lecture dealt with the oppression of the Catholic majority by the Protestant minority in days that were passed. ThankGod those times were changed, and he took leave to say that tho Catholics of Ireland 60Ught only one revenge, and that was to be allowed to extend to their Protestant fellow-countrymen equally with themselves the rights and privileges of free men in a land which, after all, was for Protestants as well as Catholics.