For Ireland has signed us with the oil and chrism of her human sacrament, and even though we should deny the faith with our lips she would hold our hearts to the end.
But let us translate her triumph into more concrete speech.

The essential lesson of experience, then, is that no device, plan, or policy adopted by England for the subjugation of Ireland has ever been anything except an abject failure.

And the positive of this negative is that every claim that ever formed part of the national programme of Ireland has won its way against all enmities.

No plough to which she ever put her hand has been turned back or stayed eternally in mid-furrow.

It does not matter what period you call to the witness-box; the testimony is uniform and unvarying.