A UNIVERSAL QUESTION. 23
But it is not possible so to confine the discussion ; no more possible than it was possible to confine to France the questions involved in the French Revolution; no more possible than it was possible to keep the discussion which arose over slavery in the Territories confined to the subject of slavery in the Territories. And it is best that the truth be fully stated and clearly recognized. He who sees the truth, let him proclaim it, without asking who is for it or who is against it. This is not radicalism in the bad sense which so many attach to the word. This is conservatism in the true sense.
What gives to the Irish Land Question its supreme significance is that it brings into attention and discussion nay, that it forces into attention and discussion, not a mere Irish question, but a question of world-wide impor- tance.
What has brought the land question to the front in Ireland, what permits the relation between land and labor to be seen there with such distinctness to be seen even by those who cannot in other places perceive them is certain special conditions. Ireland is a country of dense population, so that competition for the use of land is so sharp and high as to produce marked effects upon the distribution of wealth. It is mainly an agricultural coun- try, so that production is concerned directly and unmis- takably with the soil. Its industrial organization is largely that simple one in which an employing capitalist does not stand between laborer and landowner, so that the connec- tion between rent and wages is not obscured. Ireland, moreover, was never conquered by the Romans, nor, until comparatively recently, by any people who had felt in their legal system the effect of Roman domination. It is the European country in which primitive ideas as to land tenures have longest held their sway, and the circum- stances of its conquest, its cruel misgovernment, and the
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