thods by which
they pursue them. They consider the present system of government too
radically wrong to mend, and they can undoubtedly point to agrarian
legislation as evidence of the effectiveness of the means they employ to
gain their end.

This view of things has sunk very deep into the Irish mind. The policy
of 'giving trouble' to the Government is looked upon as the one road to
reform and is believed in so fervently that, except for religion, which
sometimes conflicts with it, there is scarcely any capacity left for
belief in anything else. I am far from denying that the past offers much
justification for the belief that nothing can be gained by Ireland from
England except through violent agitation. Until recently, I admit,
Ireland's opportunity had to wait for England's difficulty. But, as
practised in the present day, I believe this doctrine to be mischievous
and false. For one thing, there is a new England to deal with. The
England which, certainly not in deference to violent agitation,
established the Congested Districts Board, gave Local Government to
Ireland, and accepted the recommendations of the Recess Committee for
far-reaching administrative changes, as well as those of the Land
Conference which involved great financial concessions, is not the
England of fifty years ago, still less the England of the eighteenth
century. Moreover, in riveting the mind of the country on what is to be
obtained from England, this doctrine of 'giving trouble,' the whole
gospel of the agitator, has blinded the Irish people to the many things
which Ireland can do for herself. Whatever may be said of what is called
'agitation' in Ireland as an engine for extorting legislation from the
Imperial Parliament, it is unquestionably bad for the much greater end
of building up Irish character and developing Irish industry and
commerce. 'Agitation,' as Thomas Davis said, 'is one means of redress,
but it leads to much disorganisation, great unhappiness, wounds upon the
soul of a country which sometimes are worse than the thinning of a
people by war.'[14] If Irish politicians had at all realised this truth,
it is difficult to believe that the popular movement of the last quarter
of a century would not have been conducted in a manner far less
injurious to the soul of Ireland and equally or more effective for
legislative reform as well as all other material interests.

Now, modern Nationalism in Ireland is open to damaging criticism not
onl