It is not a concession which he rates at a low price; it is a proposal which he heart and soul condemns.'[54] These words were not written to meet the present condition of the controversy; they were published in 1887 at a time when no Gladstonian, except Mr.Gladstone (if indeed he were an exception), knew whether the retention in the Parliament at Westminster, or the exclusion from the Parliament at Westminster, of the Irish members, was an essential principle of Home Rule.
England again, it is alleged, suffers without murmuring all the inconvenience caused by the Irish vote at Westminster; and she may well, under a system of Home Rule, bear without complaint evils which she has tolerated for near a century.
The answer to this reasoning is plain.

It is a sorry plea indeed for a desperate innovation that it leaves the evils of the existing state of things no worse than they now are.

For the sake of the maintenance of the Union, which Unionists hold of inestimable value, England has borne the inconvenience caused to her by the Irish vote.

It argues simplicity, or impudence, to urge that England should continue to bear the inconvenience when the national unity is sacrificed for the sake of which it was endured.

But the reply does not stop here.