Sir Charles Russell was the guest of the Eighty Club
on Tuesday, and delivered a speech on the Irish Question, which had no new or strcng point in it, unless it were his rather frank remarks about the Irish Nationalist Members. "He could not," he said, "be responsible for the Home-rule Members with respect to much that they had said and done which he believed to be deplorable and condemnable ; but he was much struck by a remark which Mr. Dillon had made to him. He had said to Mr. Dillon that one of the greatest difficulties with respect to the Home-rule Members was their bad characters. Mr. Dillon replied that if it had not been for their bad characters, the ques- tion would not be so far advanced as it was at present ; but if the question were settled, it would be found that men of character, and position, and property, would take their full share in public affairs." That was what was said also in France in 1789. But did the revelation which succeeded, devour its own children only in order to revert to the control of "men of character, and position, and property," or rather to pass into the hands of men as far below the early revolutionists as terrorists are below reformers ?
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