Shall we, then, purchase their applause at the
expense of their substantial, nay, their spiritual interests?
"It does, indeed, so happen that there are powerful motives on the other
side concurring with that which has here been represented as paramount.
In the first instance we are not called upon to establish a creed, but
only to maintain an existing legal settlement, when our constitutional
right is undoubted. In the second, political considerations tend
strongly to recommend that maintenance. A common form of faith binds the
Irish Protestants to ourselves, while they, upon the other hand, are
fast linked to Ireland; and thus they supply the most natural bond of
connection between the countries. But if England, by overthrowing their
Church, should weaken their moral position, they would be no longer
able, perhaps no longer willing, to counteract the desires of the
majority tending, under the direction of their leaders (however, by a
wise policy, revocable from that fatal course) to what is termed
national independence. Pride and fear, on the one hand, are therefore
bearing up against more immediate apprehension and difficulty on the
other. And with some men these may be the fundamental considerations;
but it may be doubted whether such men will not flinch in some stage of
the contest, should its aspect at any moment become unfavorable.
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