CHAPTER IX
AFTER HOME RULE
The advocates of Home Rule are invited to many ordeals by way of
verifying their good faith; perhaps the heaviest ordeal is that of
prophecy. Very well, people say, what are you going to do with Home Rule
when you get it? What will Irish politics be like in, say, 1920? If we
show embarrassment or offer conflicting answers, the querist is
persuaded that we are, as indeed he thought, vapouring sentimentalists,
not at all accustomed to live in a world of clear ideas and unyielding
facts. The demand, like many others made upon us, is unreal and
unreasonable. What are the English going to do with Home Rule when they
get it? What will German or Japanese or American politics be like in
1920? These are all what Matthew Arnold calls "undiscovered things." The
future resolutely declines to speak out of her turn. She has a trick of
keeping her secrets well, better than she keeps her promises. Professor
Dicey wrote a Unionist tract, very vehement and thunderous, in which he
sought to injure Home Rule by styling it a leap in the dark.
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