But the Revolution operated differently in England and
Ireland, in many, and these essential particulars. Supposing the
principles to have been altogether the same in both kingdoms, by the
application of those principles to very different objects the whole
spirit of the system was changed, not to say reversed. In England it
was the struggle of the _great body_ of the people for the establishment
of their liberties, against the efforts of a very _small faction_, who
would have oppressed them. In Ireland it was the establishment of the
power of the smaller number, at the expense of the civil liberties and
properties of the far greater part, and at the expense of the political
liberties of the whole. It was, to say the truth, not a revolution, but
a conquest: which is not to say a great deal in its favor. To insist on
everything done in Ireland at the Revolution would be to insist on the
severe and jealous policy of a conqueror, in the crude settlement of his
new acquisition, as _a permanent_ rule for its future government. This
no power, in no country that ever I heard of, has done or professed to
do,--except in Ireland; where it is done, and possibly by some people
will be professed.
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