tances, in this or any other country, to justify the use of
physical force for the attainment of political amelioration--a doctrine
to which he did not subscribe. He instanced various countries which had
attained their liberty by means of physical force. Then referring to the
period of 1782 in Ireland--"I say," said Mr. O'Brien, "if the Parliament
of England refused to accede to the national demand of the Volunteers to
have a free constitution, that the Volunteers would have been fully
justified in taking up arms in defence of the country." He, however, for
his part, considered the question a merely speculative one, as, so far
as he knew, no one contemplated an appeal to physical force, under the
present circumstances, which would be madness, folly, and wickedness. He
considered it very unwise to be putting those tests when there was no
occasion for them. He declared against permitting those Liberals, who
had taken place under the Whigs, to have a walk over; they should, he
maintained, be opposed by Repeal candidates, as nothing in the Whig
programme called for the anticipative gratitude of Ireland. Finally, he
expressed the hope that no rash attempt would be made to expel certain
members of the Association. "Let nothing," he said, "be done rashly; let
nothing be done to destroy this glorious confederacy, the greatest and
most powerful that ever existed for the preservation and achievement of
the liberties of a people."

Mr. John O'Connell, in a clever speech, replied to Smith O'Brien. He
defended the course his father had taken in not giving immediate
opposition to the Whigs, as several excellent measures might be expected
from them; besides, if they were driven from power they must be
succeeded again by the Tories, and although he was far from becoming the
defender of the Whigs, still they were better than the Tories; "if the
antecedents of the Whigs were bad, the antecedents of the Tories," said
he, "were most criminally bad." With regard to the graver question, the
chief cause of difference in the Association, the Peace Resolutions, he
said, "My honorable friend [Smith O'Brien] has deeply regretted the
resolutions that have passed here this day fortnight. He says he would
have come up here to modify them, if he were aware that they were about
to be brought forward. There may have been, unfortunately, a form
wanting; and I regret that any form of the Association should have been
wanting in any proceeding that he compl