"Fellow citizens:The hour to try your souls and to redeem your pledges has arrived."

“I would not have taken off my coat and gone to work had I not known that we were laying the foundations by this movement for the recovery of our legislative independence.”

“The law gave those landlords extensive power at the present time, and unless they went in for a revolution he confessed he did not see how they were going to bring about a radical reform of the system of land tenure in this country.”

“The government, with its bayonets, will learn in a single Winter how powerless are armed forces against the will of a united determined, and self-reliant nation.”

“Without the help of the people our exertions would be as nothing.”

“Why should Ireland be treated as a geographical fragment of England, as he had heard an ex-Chancellor of the Exchequer call it some time ago. Ireland was not a geographical fragment, but a nation.”

“ou have an expenditure of five or six millions of pounds sterling—nearly all of it paid by the English taxpayers, and all for the purpose of screwing rack-rents out of the Irish tenants. I am very sure that that sort of thing will not be allowed to go on. Would not it be a very wise thing for the Irish landlords to recognize the situation in time, to see that if they do not be reasonable they will be chucked overboard altogether?”