spirit has every where expired; Sweden has lost her liberty; England is declining; the other nations support their consequence by mercenary armies, or the remembrance of a mighty name; but you are the only people that have recovered your constitution-recovered it by steady virtue→→ you have departed from the example of other nations, and have become an example to them. You not only excel modern Europe, but you excel what she can boast of old. Liberty, in former times, was recovered by the quick feelings and rapid impulse of the populace, excited by some strong object presented to the senses. Such an object was the daughter of Virginius, sacrificed to virtue; such the seven bishops, whose meagre and haggard looks expressed the rigour of their sufferings; but no history can produce an instance of men, like you, musing for years upon oppression, and then, upon a deterinination of right, RESCUING

THE LAND.

"The supporters of liberty, in the reign of Charles I, mixed their sentiments of constitution with principles of gloomy bigotry; but you have sought liberty on her own principles; you see the delegates of the North advocates for the catholics of the South; the presbytery of Banger mixing the milk of humanity with the benignity of the gospel--as christians tolerant-as Irishmen united.

"This house, agreeing with the desires of the nation, relaxed the penal code, and by so doing, got more than it gave; you found advantages

from generosity, and grew rich in the very act of your bounty; it was not merely an act of bounty to the catholics; it was an act of bounty to yourselves; you hardly had given them privileges, when you felt your own, and magnified your liberty, by enlarging the sphere of its action: you did not give away your own power:-No-you formed an alliance with catholic power, and found in that alliance a new strength and a new freedoin. Fortunately for us England did not take the lead; her minister did not take the lead in the restoration of our rights; had England, in the first instance, ceded, you would have sunk under the weight of the obligation, and given back the ac-quisition with a sheepish gratitude; but the virtue, the pride of the people, was our resource, and it is right that the people should have a lofty conception of themselves. It was necessary that Ireland should be her own redeemer to form her mind as well as her constitution, and erect in her soul a vast image of herself, and a lofty sense of her own exaltation; other nations have trophies and records to elevate the human mind; those outward and visible signs of glory, those monuments of their heroic ancestors, such as were wont to animate the ancient Greeks and Romans, and rouse them in their country's cause; but you had pothing to call forth the greatness of the land, except injuries, and it is astonishing that you should have preserved your pride; but more astonishing that you should proceed with a temper seldom found

amongst the injured, and success never but with the virtuous; which not only elevates you above our own level, but makes you equal to those natious modern and ancient, whose histories you are accustomed to admire, and among whom you are now to be recorded. You have no trophies; but the liberty you transmit to your posterity is more than trophy. I dwell the more on this part of the subject, because I hold it necessary to pour into the public mind a considerable portion of pride, acting up to a good national character founded on a great transaction. What sets one nation above another, but the soul that dwells therein? that atherial fire: for it is of no avail, that the arm be strong if the soul be not great. The armies of England were most numerous under her late administration; but the English soul which should have inspired these armies, was gone. What signifies it, that three hundred men in the house of commons-what signifies it that one hundred in the house of Peers, assert their country's cause, if unsupported by the people; nor was this act of your redemption confined to any body of men; all have had a share in it; there is not a man that watches his fire-lock this right - there is not a grand jury-there is not an association, there is not a corps of volunteers, there is not a meeting of their delegates, that is not a party to this acquisition, and pledged to support it to the last drop of his blood. It seems as if the subjects of Ireland had met at the altar,

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and communicated a national sacrament. Juries, cities, counties, commoners, nobles, volunteers, gradations, religions, à solid league, a rapid fire.

Gentlemen will perceive I allude" to the transaction at Dungannon, not long ago that meeting was considered as a very alarming measure: but I thought otherwise-I approved of it, and considered it a great original transaction, and like all original nieasures, it was a matter of surprize until it became matter of admiration. What more surprising or less within the ordinary course of things, than the convention parliament; what more extraordinary transaction than the attainment of Magna Charta? It was not attained in parliament, but by the Barons in the field. Great measures, such as the meeting of the English at Runnymeade, the meeting of the Irish at Dungannon, are original transactions, not following from precedent, but containing in themselves both principle and precedent. The revolution had no precedent, the christian religion had no precedent, the apostles had no precedent.

"Did this meeting found itself on the constitution? yes; the constitution gives every elector a share in it; this forms a constitutional public. To preserve this share, the electors, must meet, must confer, must associate; for communities cannot exist as individuals. Was the community called upon to confer? yes; all the great constitutional questions had been lost; and the public cause, desperate in parliament, fell into the hands

of the nation. Had the late Irish minister, been less victorious here, he had not called upon all the nation to oppose him. Did the resolutions of this meeting tend to preserve the constitution? yes; the meeting resolves that the claim of the British parliament to bind Ireland is illegal'; is there any man on earth who will deny this position? For what are the volunteers associated, but for the preservation of the laws: and what is the claim of the British parliament but a subversion to all law. The meeting resolves, that the powers of the councils to smother and adulterate your laws, is a grievance; that is, they support your privilege, invaded by those powers; they support you if you are tenacious of your privileges; if not, they support parliament, parliament against you; the rights of parliament against the temporary trustee that would relinquish them. The meeting reprobates a perpetual mutiny bill; so do we all; the meeting protests against a dependant judicature, an independent army, against a legislative privy council, and a foreign parliament; a monstrous combination this; and not a constitution; something which supersedes you and your rights; and therefore these men, the good men at Dungannon, have acted for you, and have felt for you, and your privileges; and accordingly you have very wisely acceded to their resolutions, and put the Irish parliament at the head of this meeting and of this armament; and made their determination the great act; incontrovertible right, and unalter