Page:My Life in Two Hemispheres, volume 1.djvu/190

 immoral, nor do I believe it is the truth to say that the God of heaven withholds His sanction from the use of arms. From the day on which, in the valley of Bethulia, He nerved the arm of the Jewish girl to smite the drunken tyrant in his tent, down to the hour in which He blessed the insurgent chivalry of the Belgian priests, His almighty hand hath been stretched forth from His throne of light to consecrate the flag of freedom, to bless the patriot's sword. Be it for the defence, or be it for the assertion, of a nation's liberty, I look upon the sword as a sacred weapon. And if, my lord, it has sometimes reddened the shroud of the oppressor, like the anointed rod of the high priest, it has at other times blossomed into flowers to deck the freeman's brow. Abhor the sword and stigmatise the sword? No, my lord, for in the cragged passes of the Tyrol it cut in pieces the banner of the Bavarian, and won an immortality for the peasant of Innspruck. Abhor the sword and stigmatise the sword? No, my lord, for at its blow a giant nation sprang up from the waters of the Atlantic, and by its redeeming magic the fettered colonies became a daring, free republic. Abhor the sword and stigmatise the sword? No, my lord, for it scourged the Dutch marauders out of the fine old towns of Belgium, back into their own phlegmatic swamps, and knocked their flags, and laws, and sceptre, and bayonets, into the sluggish waters of the Scheldt. My lord, I learned that it was the right of a nation to govern itself, not in this hall, but upon the ramparts of Antwerp. I learned the first article of a nation's creed upon those ramparts, where freedom was justly estimated, and where the possession of the precious gift was purchased by the effusion of generous blood. My lord, I admire the Belgians, I honour the Belgians, for their courage and their daring; and I will not stigmatise the means by which they obtained a citizen king, a Chamber of Deputies ——"

Mr. John O'Connell declared that it was the strongest conviction of his soul that it would be unsafe to allow Mr. Meagher to proceed. If the meeting approved of these sentiments he and his friends would retire. Mr. O'Brien rose and spoke with marked seriousness and dignity.

"I am afraid that the alternative which has been presented