Thus Does Carthage Reason
For centuries Ireland has endured the tender mercies of the Carthaginian.
The Carthaginian came first as conqueror, presently discovered that conquest was government and afterwards discovered that government was philanthropy. He took the land, planted it with his adherents, proscribed the native institutions, persecuted the native faiths when they inconvenienced him, suppressed rebellion with fire and gallows, then expressed astonishment that the Irishman should be so unreasonable as to dislike him.
Every generation brought some new Carthaginian improvement.
If an Irishman possessed land, the Carthaginian found a better owner for it. If he resisted, he was a rebel. If he submitted, he was loyal. If he starved, he was improvident. If he emigrated, it proved that Ireland was overpopulated. If he remained and complained, it proved the incurable turbulence of the Irish character.
Thus does Carthage reason.
The Carthaginian Parliament could legislate for Ireland without Irish consent, dispose of Irish revenues, sustain an alien establishment, pack juries, suspend ordinary liberties, transport political enemies across the oceans and still congratulate itself upon the unparalleled freedom enjoyed under the Carthaginian Kingdom.
Then came the great hunger.
The Almighty sent the potato blight, but the machinery of rent, eviction, export and political economy did not fail. Ships continued to leave Irish ports while Irish families disappeared from cabins and roadsides. When Ireland emerged diminished by death and emigration, the wise men of Carthage discovered in the catastrophe yet another demonstration of the benefits of Carthaginian government.
A million and a half graves could not disturb their confidence.
Another million exiles could not embarrass their philosophy.
For the Carthaginian possesses a remarkable faculty, whatever happens under his dominion is either a blessing bestowed by Carthage or a misfortune caused by the people being governed.
Rebellion? Irish savagery.
Famine? Irish improvidence.
Eviction? The sacred rights of property.
Coercion? The preservation of order.
Emigration? The operation of natural economic laws.
Resistance to any of the above? Proof that still more Carthaginian government is required.
And always there is some respectable gentleman explaining that the difficulty is merely administrative. Carthage has perhaps been insensitive. Carthage must govern Ireland more sympathetically. There ought to be commissions, reforms, inquiries, concessions and carefully worded assurances that this time Carthaginian statesmanship has finally solved the Irish Question.
But the Irish Question has never been difficult.
It is the Carthaginian Question.
By what right does Carthage rule another nation?
Strip away the Acts of Parliament, proclamations, commissions, judges’ wigs, Castle officials, landlords’ writs and all the solemn machinery by which conquest dresses itself as legality and the matter becomes embarrassingly simple. Ireland was a country. Carthage conquered it. Ireland resisted. Carthage punished the resistance and afterwards cited the punishment as evidence that Ireland required governing.
There is the whole constitutional history in a paragraph.
Whenever an Irishman has objected too vigorously, Carthage has called him criminal, fanatic, conspirator or madman.
Wolfe Tone was unreasonable.
Emmet was unreasonable.
Mitchel was unreasonable.
The Fenians were unreasonable.
Apparently the only reasonable Irishman is the one who accepts whatever settlement Carthage has devised for him and expresses gratitude that it was not worse.
Yet governments pass, ministries fall and empires discover eventually that maps are not title deeds.
Ireland existed before the first Carthaginian official drew his salary for governing her and she will remain when the last has become an historical curiosity.
Until then, Carthage may keep its explanations.
We have heard them before.
Tiocfaidh ár lá.
