If the Canadian example be followed the Imperial Parliament will retain powers of control of such a far reaching character over Irish legislation, as ought to dispel the fears of timid souls who are reluctant to entrust the Irish people with the task of working out their own destiny. The Canadian veto has not been a dead letter, but has exercised its restraining influence, both actively and passively, over the Provincial Legislatures, which have naturally been averse to allowing matters to come to a crisis necessitating its use. Further, to follow precedent, the interpretation of the powers to be granted by the new Irish Constitution should rest in the last resort in an appeal to the Privy Council.
With both these safeguards inserted in the Home Rule Bill much of the objection commonly felt against the creation of an Irish Parliament, an objection largely due to loose thinking, should disappear. It may be argued that both in Canada and Australia disputes do [pg 426] occasionally occur between the State Legislatures and the Central Parliaments as to their respective rights. That is one of the inevitable disadvantages of a federal regime, but, as a very distinguished Canadian statesman once said to the writer, the counterbalancing advantages of a de-centralized system far outweigh all such drawbacks. No student of current politics can be blind to the fundamental fact that the amalgamating of the Parliaments of Scotland, Ireland and England into one legislature, without at the same time unifying the legislation of those countries, has produced a state of congestion and overwork which cannot be permanently tolerated. In existing circumstances neither matters affecting the whole Empire nor local legislative needs can secure a sufficient expenditure either of energy or time to do them justice. By partially reversing the process of unification through a devolution of powers to local legislatures we should be following a precedent that has proved successful in other parts of the Empire and in foreign countries while at the same time putting our action into harmony with the true process of evolution.
XVI.—Contemporary Ireland And The Religious Question
(I) A Catholic View. By Monsignor O'Riordan
It is as characteristic of those who have fallen in fortune to talk of their wealth as it is of the consumptive to talk of their health. It is natural. If they were conscious of having the reality they would not feel the need of convincing others that they had it. For a like reason those speak most of virtues and gifts who have them least. One rightly suspects the spirit of those who keep insisting that all are intolerant who think and act on other principles and in other ways than theirs. The word tolerance has met the fate of other words which denote excellent things; it has come to be misused. “Tolerance,” like “religion,” “liberty,” etc., has become a shibboleth, and like these it has been run to death.
When we speak of tolerance we necessarily refer to evil of some sort. In the matter of truth or untruth we are said to tolerate what is untrue, or what we think to be untrue. In the matter of right or wrong, we are said to tolerate what is wrong, or what we think to be wrong. If one says that he is tolerant of that in another which he himself believes to be true or right, he speaks as one who does not understand what he says. It is the same as saying that he is tolerant of his own convictions; in fact, that he tolerates himself. One is said to be tolerant of that in another which he [pg 428] thinks to be erroneous or wrong. Now, every principle which a man holds is a law to him. He may be mistaken; his principles may be false; but whilst he holds them as his principles he cannot under pain of inconsistency disown them in word or deed. No man has proprietary rights in principles. One has no right to compromise them. One may not barter them away, may not make them the basis of a policy of give and take. To do so would be to treat them not as principles but as mere opinions. Principles are things to stand on, not things to play with as with pawns on a chessboard. He who, whilst he professes some principle of belief or conduct in religious or civil life, is ready to agree with his neighbour in the opposite shows little regard for truth and little sense of duty. He who for the sake of some convenience is prepared to play with his principles has practically no principles at all. Such is one who professes universal toleration, although no person would be more pained at being thought an unprincipled man. It is a logical necessity for everyone to be intolerant of principles opposed to his own. In matters of mere opinion one may be, and ought to be, tolerant of the opinions of others, since in face of those opinions he cannot claim an objective certainty for his own. Let us illustrate this. A rationalist who denies the existence of any higher than natural causes cannot admit any event to be miraculous. He may ascribe it to some hypothetical natural cause, or he may have no cause to assign; but he cannot on principle assign a supernatural cause, for the simple reason that he ignores anything above the natural forces which come within the sphere of experience. Thus the rationalist who claims tolerance as his characteristic virtue is intolerant of any doctrine which supposes the supernatural. He must be so, or he lets the ground go from [pg 429] under his feet. Again, the Protestant on his principle of private judgment must be intolerant of any doctrine which supposes an infallible authority on earth claiming a divine commission to teach us the meaning of divinely Revealed Truths. A Catholic who believes in a Church of divine institution, one, visible, infallible, cannot be tolerant of a doctrine which makes different Churches belong by equal right to Christianity, each whilst conflicting with the others claiming Christ for its Founder. For the same reason a Catholic cannot be tolerant of a theory which holds all religions to be equally useful; that is, equally useless. He cannot be tolerant of any theory which involves a denial of Catholic doctrine, since he acknowledges an infallible authority as the source of the Catholic doctrine which he holds. I am now and here neither asserting nor denying any theory or any doctrine, Catholic or non-Catholic. I am only setting forth the inconsistency implied in the toleration of principles opposed to one's own, whatever those principles be. Is it then irreclaimable prejudice, or indifference to the obligation of principle, that makes some persons throw up their arms and raise a cry of horror when they hear that some Catholic has been excommunicated for having denied or questioned some Article of Catholic faith? What is taken as a matter of course and of common justice in every society and in every club in the country, namely that one who is false to his society and unfaithful to its rules deserves expulsion, is stigmatised as intolerance and moral tyranny in the Catholic Church. There are certain rules in every association which a member may not break under pain of expulsion. But a man may say what he likes, write what he likes, do as he likes; may deny every doctrine, despise every principle, and may nevertheless have, according to some, a right [pg 430] to remain a member of the Catholic Church out of which only Romish intolerance would drive him.