Daniel O'Connell

One day I was walking through London with Tom Campbell the poet, when we met a negro, who took off his hat and begged to thank me for my efforts against slavery. Campbell's poetic fancy was smitten, and he exclaimed with great fervour: …

What care I for the vagabonds if they were twice as powerful? I would rather have one Irish landed proprietor of weight than all their slave-breeders. It is ourselves alone must work out Repeal.

I was maddened when I heard the bells of St. Patrick's ringing out a joyful peal for Ireland's degradation, as if it was a glorious national festival. My blood boiled, and I vowed, on that morning, that the foul dishonour should not last, …

No man was ever a good soldier but the man who goes into the battle determined to conquer, or not to come back from the battle field (cheers). No other principle makes a good soldier.

How cruel the Penal Laws are which exclude me from a fair trial with men whom I look upon as so much my inferiors...

Gentlemen, you may soon have the alternative to live as slaves or die as free men

I believe that religion ought to be the basis of education; and I came over from Ireland for no other purpose than humbly to represent the necessity of making religion the basis of education, to establish it not only as a part, but an …

The principle of my political life … is, that all ameliorations and improvements in political institutions can be obtained by persevering in a perfectly peaceable and legal course, and cannot be obtained by forcible means, or if they could …

I want to make all Europe and America know it – I want to make England feel her weakness if she refuses to give the justice we the Irish require – the restoration of our domestic parliament...

So soon as Protestants of all sects combine to obtain our legislative independence the utmost cordiality will prevail, as in 1782, between all Irishmen, and we will be able to make the mighty change with perfect safety to person and …

Allow me, I pray you, to use the familiarity of a brother-Repealer in addressing you as if we were long acquainted, for, indeed, who ever joins in the struggle to make our beloved fatherland a nation again is dear to me.

I am most thoroughly convinced that the Repeal alone can keep secure the religion and the liberties of the Irish people.

There is an utter ignorance of, and indifference to, our sufferings and privations… What care they for us, provided we be submissive, pay the taxes, furnish recruits for the Army and Navy and bless the masters who either despise or oppress …

No person knows better than you do that the domination of England is the sole and blighting curse of this country. It is the incubus that sits on our energies, stops the pulsation of the nation’s heart and leaves to Ireland not gay …

Ireland has claims on your ancient race, as it is the only Christian country that I know of unsullied by any one act of persecution of the Jews.

Benefactor of the Human Race,—I avowed myself on the hustings this day to be a ‘Benthamite,’ and explained the leading principles of your disciples—the ‘greatest happiness principle’—our sect will prosper. I begin my parliamentary career …

If I get into the House, Catholic Education will have an unremitting and sincere advocate.

I say now, all all, shall be pardoned, forgiven, forgotten, upon giving us Emancipation, unconditional, unqualified, free, and unshackled.

What I now say I wish to reach England, and I ask, What is to be done with Ireland? What is to be done with the Catholics? One of two things. They must either crush us or conciliate us. There is no going on as we are; there is nothing so …

The combination of national action—all Catholic Ireland acting as one man—must necessarily have a powerful effect on the minds of the Ministry and of the entire British nation. A people who can be thus brought to act together, and by one …

Our enemies have long duped the people of England—indeed, that was not difficult; so dishonest and besotted a people as the English never lived. (Loud cheers.) Yes; they are dishonest and besotted! Individuals—many individuals, and classes …

My days – the blossom of my youth and the flower of my manhood – have been darkened by the dreariness of servitude. In this my native land – in the land of my sires – I am degraded without fault as an alien and an outcast.

Let us then, my beloved countrymen, sacrifice our wicked and groundless animosities on the altar of our country...let us rally round the standard of Old Ireland, and we shall easily procure that greatest of political blessings, an Irish …

Good God! what a brute man becomes when ignorant and oppressed! Oh, Liberty, what horrors are perpetrated in thy name! May every virtuous revolutionist remember the horrors of Wexford!