FREEDOM

XIV. MILITARISM

XV. THE EMPIRE

XVI. RESISTANCE IN ARMS--FOREWORD

XVII. RESISTANCE IN ARMS--THE TRUE
MEANING OF LAW

XVIII. RESISTANCE IN ARMS--OBJECTIONS

XIX. THE BEARNA BAOGHAIL--CONCLUSION

+PRINCIPLES OF FREEDOM+

CHAPTER I

THE BASIS OF FREEDOM

I

Why should we fight for freedom? Is it not strange, that it has become
necessary to ask and answer this question? We have fought our fight for
centuries, and contending parties still continue the struggle, but the
real significance of the struggle and its true motive force are hardly
at all understood, and there is a curious but logical result. Men
technically on the same side are separated by differences wide and deep,
both of ideal and plan of action; while, conversely, men technically
opposed have perhaps more in common than we realise in a sense deeper
than we understand.

II

This is the question I would discuss. I find in practice everywhere in
Ireland--it is worse out of Ireland--the doctrine, "The end justifies
the means."

One party will denounce another for the use of discreditable tactics,
but it will have no hesitation in using such itself if it can thereby
snatch a discreditable victory. So, clear speaking is needed: a fight
that is not clean-handed will make victory more disgraceful than any
defeat. I make the point here because we stand for separation from the
British Empire, and because I have heard it argued that we ought, if we
could, make a foreign alliance to crush English power here, even if our
foreign allies were engaged in crushing freedom elsewhere. When such a
question can be proposed it should be answered, though the time is not
ripe to test it. If Ireland were to win freedom by helping directly or
indirectly to crush another people she would earn the execration she has
herself poured out on tyranny for ages. I have come to see it is
possible for Ireland to win her independence by base methods. It is
imperative, therefore, that we should declare ourselves and know where
we stand. And I stand by this principle: no physical victory can
compensate for spiritual surrender. Whatever side denies that is not my
side.

What, then, is the true basis to our claim to freedom? There are two
points of view. The first we have when fresh from school, still in our
teens, ready to tilt against everyone and everything, delighting in
saying smart things--and able sometimes to say them--talkin