the home market has been started, and a commercial fever artificially raised; but while the great points remain undisturbed, the nations cannot be committed; the manufacturers applied for protecting duties, and have failed; the minister offered a system of reciprocity, and succeeded in Ireland, but has failed in England; he makes you another offer, inconsistent with the former, which offer the English do not support and the Irish de. precate. "We can go on; we have a growing prosperity, and as yet an exemption from intolerable taxes; we can from time to time regulate our own commerce, cherish our manufactures, keep down our taxes, and bring on our people, and brood over the growing prosperity of Young Ireland. In the mean time we will guard our free trade and free constitution, as our only real resources; they were the struggles of great virtue, the result of much perseverance, and our broad base of public action! We should recollect that this House may now, with peculiar propriety, interpose, bécause you did, with great zeal and success, on this very subject of trade, bring on the people, and you did, with great prudence and moderation, on another occasion, check a certain description of the people, and you are now called upon by consistency to defend the people. Thus mediating between extremes, you will preserve this island long, and preserve her with a certain degree of renown. Thus faithful to the constitution of the country, you will command and insure her tranquillity; for our best authority with the people is, protection afforded against the ministers of the Crown. It is not public clamour but public injury that should alarm you; your high ground of expostulation with your fellow subjects has been your services; the free trade you have given the merchant, and the free constitution you have given the island! Make your third great effort; preserve them, and with them preserve unaltered your own calm sense of public right, the dignity of the Parliament, the majesty of the people, and the powers of the island! Keep them unsullied, : uncovenanted, uncircumscribed, and unstipendi. ary! These paths are the paths to glory; and let me add, these ways are the ways of peace: so shall the prosperity of your country, though without a tongue to thank you, yet laden with the bless. ings of constitution and of commerce, bear attestation to your services, and wait on your progress with involuntary praise!" 『、。་ NATIONAL ECONOMY. ON the 9th of February, 1786, Mr. Thomas Connolly, of Castletown, the first Irish Commoner, brought forward the two following most. important resolutions: The first resolution-"That this House did, in the last Session, grant certain new taxes, estimated at 140,000l. per annum, for the purpose of putting an end to the accumulation of debt." The second-"That should the said taxes be continued, it is absolutely necessary that the expenses of the nation should be confined to the annual income." Few questions were ever discussed in the Irish Parliament, on which its character so much depended, as those very important resolutions submitted by Mr. Connolly to its consideration. In the Session of 1785, hopes were held out to the nation, that such an arrangement would be grounded upon the celebrated eleven Commercial Propositions, as would enable it to bear the burden of encreased taxation with ease and convenience-that trade would be so extendedthe resources of the country so enlarged-its con W dition in every respect so ameliorated-the additional taxation of 140,000l. per annum would, without distressing the people, have the happy effect of equalizing the expenses of the nation to its revenues.-The eleven Propositions, which had so elevated the hopes of Ireland, had equally alarmed the jealousy and intolerance of the Eng. lish merchants; and an universal clamour having been raised against them by ignorance and political intrigue, the Minister was obliged to aban don a system which promised so much immediate relief to Ireland, and such certain, though more remote, advantages to England.-In the place of those eleven Propositions, of which all parties approved-which gave satisfaction to the boldest assertor of Irish freedom, the Minister of England was compelled to substitute one which calmed and appeased the irritated feelings of Englishmen, while it outraged and insulted the pride and independence of Ireland.-This plan of Commercial adjustment, agreed to by the British Parliament, was sent over to Ireland for adoption or rejection by the Parliament of the latter ;-this Parliament, after a most able discussion of its merits, and an unparalleled display of eloquence by the patriots of that day, rejected the twenty propositions which contained this new system, with indiguation and contempt. -- The same incapacity to bear heavy taxation existed in 1786, as was experienced in 1784; and the opposition, at the head of which stood Mr. Connolly, conceived that half the promised advantages of increased trade, flowing from the operation of the original eleven Propositions, could not be realized; that the next duty of Parliament should be to economize the public expenditure as much as possible, thereby to compensate in some degree the loss of trade, and to enable the nation to bear up against the additional taxation, which had been granted in the hope of its enjoyment. In the last Session of the Irish Parliament, a resolution passed, containing the principle, "that the annual revenue ought to be equalized to the annual expenditure-a principle ruinous to the commercial and landed interest, unless followed up by the reciprocal principle "that the annual expenditure ought to be confined to the annual revenue ;" thus making the obligation mutual on the Minister and the Country. To meet this principle, Mr. Connolly proposed his second resolution. The Secretary and Chancellor of the Exchequer complained, that the object of the resolution was to bind up the hands of Government-to disable them from providing against any emergencies which might happen to arise-it deprived the |