We who have preserved through centuries of misery, the remembrance of lost liberty, are not now going to merge our unconquered souls in the base body of our oppressor.
One of the few Liberal statesmen England has produced, certainly the only Liberal politician she has ever produced, the late Mr.Gladstone, compared the union between Great Britain and Ireland to "the union between the mangled corpse of Hector and the headlong chariot of Achilles." (1890.) But, while I cannot admit that England is an Achilles, save, perhaps, that she may be wounded like him in the heel, I will not admit, I will not own that Ireland, however mangled, however "the plowers have ploughed upon her back and made long furrows," is in truth dead, is indeed a corpse.

No; there is a juster analogy, and one given us by the only Englishman who was in every clime, and in every circumstance a Liberal; one who died fighting in the cause of liberty, even as in life he sang it.

Byron denounced the union between England and Ireland as "the union of the shark with its prey.".