Page:Schüller - Jim Connolly and Irish Freedom (1926).djvu/29

 death; and we can bring to it the services of thinkers and organizers who know that different occasions require different policies—that yon cannot legalize revolutionary actions and that audacity alone can command success in a crisis like this."

This collaboration became a reality and under Connolly's influence the Volunteers moved more and more to the Left. The desire for revolutionary action grew amongst their ranks.

After a period of stormy events April, 1916 came. A highly charged atmosphere prevailed; mobilization of both sides began. The British government prepared for the disarmament by force of the "Volunteers" and of the "Citizen Army" and the destruction of the entire movement. Connolly and his friends were of the opinion that now the time had come for the revolutionaries to act and to proceed from the defensive to the offensive. The leaders of the Volunteers actually gave the order for general maneuvers on a large scale at Easter, i. e., in other words, the signal for a rising. At the last moment the petty bourgeois leaders of the Volunteers rescinded the order, mainly because the German help which they had expected had failed to arrive. This typical and despicable act of petty bourgeois cowardice was too late. It was not able to restrain the rising, but simply undermined the onslaught. The people from "Liberty Hall" who constituted the life and soul of the rising had already drawn up the proclamation of the Provisional government of an Independent Irish Republic. The workers and the revolutionary section of the Volunteers were not prepared to give in without a struggle and refused to carry out the order to disband. The rising was unavoidable.

In accordance with the plan previously drawn up, Connolly undertook the leadership without any hesitation.

He undoubtedly hoped that they would succeed in carrying with them the majority of the Volunteer Army; and that in any case the rising, even if it should fail,