156 



The Review of Reviews. 



THE OUTLOOK IN IRELAND 



On the Eve of Home Rule. 



Mr. Sydney Brooks contributes to the Forliii^hlly 

 Reviaa an article entitled " Aspects of the ' Religious ' 

 Question in Ireland." Pray note that the "religious" 

 is in inverted commas. Mr. Brooks says that the 

 Roman Church is in favour of Home Rule only so 

 long as it is sure of not getting it. They fear that 

 Home Rule in Ireland will mean an anti-clerical 

 Ireland, and that popular feeling might very soon be 

 brought into sharp collision between the priesthood 

 and questions of education. He ridicules the idea 

 that in a Home Rule Parliament the Catholics would 

 attempt to suppress their Protestant neighbours : — 



The lines of division in any assembly that is ever likely to 

 meet on College Green would be primarily urban and rural, 

 and, in the fulness of time, clerical and anti-clerical, with the 

 farmers arrayed against the traders over questions of taxation in 

 the first instance, and the Catholic, Episcopalian and Presby- 

 terian clericals allied against popular control of education in 

 the second. 



In conclusion, he adjures all stout foes of Rome 

 to reconsider their attitude, to consider whether or 

 not it would be ever possible to get rid of absolute 

 domination in Ireland, except by confronting clericalism 

 with the only power that has ever succeeded in sub- 

 duing it— the power of an educated, self-governing, 

 responsible democracy. 



The Financial Question. 



Mr. Williams contributes to the Conkviporary 

 Revieiv an interesting paper, purely financial, on the 

 Imperial funds spent in Ireland : — 



Ireland raises in revenue, based upon Imperial taxation, 

 about 52 per cent, more than twenty years ago, and appears to 

 do so quite as easily as before. Ireland has, during the same 

 interval, increased her expenditure on that civil government by 

 about 126 per cent.— from 5 million pounds to ilj million 

 pounds ; and about 25 per cent, of that remarkable increase is 

 due to the Old Age rensions'granted. 



A Gloomy Forecast. 

 The Quarterly RitUjc devotes its last paper to a 

 discussion of Home Rule finance. It takes a 

 gloomy view as to the financial outlook of a self- 

 governing Ireland. The reviewer recalls the pro- 

 posals that were finally embodied in M-r. Gladstone's 

 last Home Rule Bill, which it is worth while reprinting 

 for purposes of reference ; — 



The remodelled scheme embodied in the Bill in Committee 

 provided that (i) Ireland should contribute to Imperial expendi- 

 ture a quota of her true revenue from taxes, and the pro- 

 ceeds of the Crown lands ; (2) the quota sIkiuM be one-third 

 of such revenue ; (3) Ireland should be credited with the rest of 

 her tax revenue and any surplus from postal services ; (4) out of 

 this Irish revenue two-thirds of the cost of the constalmlaiy and 

 the Dulilin police, all civil government charges, and any ikficit 

 in postal services should be discharged ; (5) the control of (he 

 rates of Inland Revenue duties, postal revenue and customs, 

 as well as their collection, should remain with the Imperial 

 Parliament ; (6) if any war tax was imposed, all of it collected 

 in or contributed by Ireland should go to the Imperial 

 Kxchequer ; (7) these fmancial arrangements should last for six 



years, when (a) they should be revised as regarded the Irish 

 contribution to Imperial services, (b) the collection of the Inland 

 Revenue should be transferred to the Irish Government, and 

 (c) the Irish Legislature should impose the Irish stamp duties, 

 income tax and excise licence duties ; (8) a joint Committee of 

 the Treasury and Irish Government should be appointed to 

 ascertain the " true revenue " of Ireland. 



It was estimated that, under these modified provisions, the 

 total Irish revenue would be ^'6,922,000; the amount payable 

 to the Irish Exchequer, ^^4,660 000 ; Irish expenditure, 

 ;{,4, 148,000 ; and the surplus Jor Ireland, ;^5I2,ooo. 



CAN IRELAND FINANCE HERSELF?, NO, 



The situation is now much more difficult than it 

 was in 1893. Great Britain must now determine 

 either to grant to Ireland complete independence in 

 all matters of revenue and taxation, or to retain the 

 financial system of the Union. 



The reviewer maintains that on the figures as 

 they stand at present, and on the facts as they are 

 known to us, it is quite impossible for Ireland to 

 finance herself : — 



Even if a quarter of a million per annum could be saved by 

 reductions, Ireland would be pr.actically no nearer firianeial 

 salvation. Great Britain, unless she is prepared to permit the 

 disgrace and danger of a bankrupt dependency being created 

 beside her, must find fromjif4,ooo,o03 to /'5, 000,000 per annum 

 for Ireland, and must hand over its control to an Irish parlia- 

 ment. This is a height of altruism hitherto unattained in 

 politics or business. 



AN IMPRACTICABLE I O U. 



Any terms that the Irish may make to pay are no 

 more than an I O U, the payment of which cannot 

 be enforced. If it be replied that England can 

 stop her subvention to Ireland, and that this will 

 be her security for the repayment of the loan, the 

 reviewer replies that a national strike in Ireland 

 against repayment of land purchase and local loan 

 advances already made would be more than a 

 set-oft" and the Imperial credit of England wouki 

 be shaken to its foundation. If England goes to war 

 when Ireland has Home Rule, the Irish executive has 

 only to arrange to stop the payment of the land 

 annuities to destroy British credit and deal a blow 

 more disastrous than a defeat on the field of battle. 

 Hence the conclusion that once the Imperial Parlia- 

 ment gives up the executive control of Ireland and of 

 Irish finance, it betrays not only Irish Unionists but 

 the whole people of Great Britain. 



The Two Bundles. 



The belief that the parnits of the human race were 

 given a power of choice and used that in a way that 

 brought death into the world, which we find in the 

 Christian Scriptures, reappears in the legend of the 

 Awemba, who live on the Tanganyika Plateau. Sir 

 Harry Johnston, in 'i\i<i Journal of the African Society, 

 reviewing a book, says that : — 



Eeza, the (Jod of the .Sky, still remains incomprdiensible. 

 He has not only been the cre.itor of the sun, moon, and stars, 

 but he is the author of life and the creator of man. .\fter 

 making a man an<l a woman he clVered them two small bundles, 

 in one of which was life and the other death. Unfortunately, 

 the man chose the little bunillc of death. Yet in the minds of 

 the .\wcmba, I.cza is more associated with life than with death. 



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