Page:Hansard's Parliamentary Debates (1842).djvu/419

{|width="100%"
 * 813 || style="text-align:center;" | Poland. || style="text-align:center;" | || style="text-align:center;" | Poland. || style="text-align:right;" | 814
 * } out indiscretion. But we might tell Russia, that for centuries England treated Ireland as a conquered country; endeavoured to efface her nationality, and her religion; endeavoured to do to Ireland exactly what Russia is now endeavouring to do to Poland; that not only overwhelming force was employed, but that laws were introduced which have been admitted to be the most atrociously ingenious that ever were designed to torture and subdue a people? and what was the result?—that centuries of oppression yield us nothing,—that the Irish only clung to their customs and their creed with the greater tenacity—that they were not subdued, not extirpated, not changed—and that all that England obtained was weakness where she aught to have had strength, and abhorrence where the might have won affection. At last, thank God, the system of persecution was abandoned, and the experiment of kindness resorted to. I will not say, that it has, as yet, completely succeeded; we could not expect it, from our prolonged misconduct; but the good seed is sown, it has already begun to grow, and, in due season, will, I am convinced, produce a rich and abundant harvest. Surely, it cannot offend our august ally to be told that we find it more agreeable to begin to be loved than to continue to be hated; and if I am told that a state of which the nationality is respected, cannot be advantageously combined with a despotic empire, I will point to the analogous case of Austria and Hungary. I will recall to recollection the celebrated cry of "Moriamur pro rege nostro, Mariá Theresá:" a sufficient proof that the state of which the nationality is respected, may be the most zealous and devoted support of the empire to which it is attached. Despotism has its advantages as well as its disadvantages. The Emperor of Russia is possessed of unlimited power. He can make nations miserable or happy with a stroke of his pen. He, therefore, can make Poland happy if he will. Let him as we have done, try the experiment of kindness—remove grievances, redress wrongs; break the chain of the captive, recall the exile to in home; treat the brave as they deserve to be treated, with confidence, and earn from them respect and esteem in return—consult the wishes of the people over whom he rules—extend blessings as wide as his sway. This is "the sweetest, holiest, draught of power." By these means he will add strength to his empire, and glory to his name. "Hæc tibi erunt artes."—"These are imperial arts, and worthy thee." The hon. Member concluded by moving an address for certain Ukases, bearing date the 15th and 18th of September, 1841, issued by the Russian government and relating to the administration of the kingdom of Poland.

Sir F. Burdett, in seconding the motion, said, that he would not in the absence of any functionary connected with the foreign department of the late Government, make those observations on the subject so ably brought forward by the hon. Member, which he had come down to the House with the intention of making. He should therefore confine himself to the expression of the pleasure with which he gave his cordial support to the motion of the hon. Member, and would only further state, that he looked upon it as an earnest of the justice which this great country was at length prepared to do the ill-fated and unjustly-used Poles. He begged also to express his earnest hopes, that inasmuch as the present Ministry had incurred no responsibility whatever in regard to the acts of the Russian Government towards Poland, and as the late Government alone had participated in the responsibility which attached to this country for having quietly permitted them to be carried into effect,—he trusted the existing Ministry would still continue to act upon the same principle, and to refuse a participation in the responsibility assumed by their predecessors.

Mr. Hume would permit the hon. Baronet's example to influence him, and therefore would refrain from addressing the House at any length on the motion of the hon. Member; but he must express his hope that the people of Great Britain would at length agree to wipe off the stain which had been cast on them in consequence of their having quietly permitted the treaty of Vienna, to which this country was a party, to be so grossly violated as it had been in the case of the Polish nation. The British Government had often interfered abroad in matters which in no way concerned England; but, in 1830, when the fate of Poland was in the balance, and the mere expression of a wish on one part would have secured her independence, the Government of Earl Grey stood culpably by and saw her political exertions sacrificed. It was the duty of the British country to have supported the treaty they were