'98 : AN APPRECIATION.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVI, Issue 9, 1 July 1898, Page 19

'98 : AN APPRECIATION.

The Wellington Post had the following admirable sub-leader on the Centenary of Ninety-Eight: — 'The citizens of Wellington will be asked on Friday next to join in honouring the memory of the courageous patriots who one hundred years ago defended their principles, even to the death. Primarily, the celebration concerns Irishmen whose ancestors fought and died manfully for the national cause, but the principles which the Irish leaders then upheld belong to all places and all times. It is not reballion for its own sake that we honour, for, unless it be absolutely necessary, rebellion, like war, is a deadly crime against humanity. But the rising of 1798 was forced upon the Irish by the arbitrary and unjust tyranny of the English Government. On the side of England were numbers, wealth, and power, but on that of the rebels were honesty, courage, and devotion. The three ideas which prompted the insurgents to take up arms were noble ones, and deserve especial honour in a free democratic community like our own. They were, first the union amongst all creeds and classes for the common good. In 1798, landlord stool by tenant and Protestant by Catholic for a common object, while Pitt and the English Government wished to spread disunion in order to consolfdate English supremacy. The second idea was that which William Ewart Gladstone so eloquently advocated during his closing years — namely, the full and free representation of all creeds and classes in an Irish Parliament. The third of the guiding principles of the rebellion was perfect religious liberty. Lwked at from this standpoint the 1798 celebration gains broj,d and noble proportions, which raise it above the mere Irish patriotic display to the larger plane of human efforts towards progress and light.'