Respect is What We Owe and Love, What We Give




When Erin First Rose

God made a wonderful mother,A mother who never grows old;He made her smile of the sunshine,And He moulded her heart of pure gold;In her eyes He placed bright shining stars,In her cheeks the fair roses you see;God made a wonderful mother,And He gave that dear mother to me.

When Erin first rose from the dark-swelling flood,
God bless'd the green island, He saw it was good.
The Emerald of Europe, it sparkled, it shone,
In the ring of this world the most precious stone!

In her sun, in her soil, in her station, thrice blest,
With back turn'd to Britain, her face to the West,
Erin stands proudly insular, on her steep shore,
And strikes her high harp to the ocean's deep roar.

But when its soft tones seem to mourn and to weep,
The dark chain of silence is cast o'er the deep;
At the thought of the past, tears gush from her eyes,
And the pulse of the heart makes her white bosom rise.

"O, sons of green Erin! lament o'er the time
When religion was--war, and our country--a crime;
When man, in God's image, inverted his plan,
And moulded their God in the image of man.

"When the int'rest of state wrought the general woe;
The stranger--a friend, and the native--a foe;
While the mother rejoic'd o'er her children distress'd,
And clasp'd the invader more close to her breast.

"When with pale for the body, and pale for the soul,
Church and state join'd in compact to conquer the whole;
And while Shannon ran red with Milesian blood,
Ey'd each other askance, and pronounc'd it was good!

"By the groans that ascend from your forefathers' grave,
For their country thus left to the brute and the slave,
Drive the Demon of Bigotry home to his den,
And where Britain made brutes, now let Erin make men!

"Let my sons, like the leaves of their shamrock, unite,
A partition of sects from one footstalk of right;
Give each his full share of this earth, and yon sky,
Nor fatten the slave, where the serpent would die!

"Alas, for poor Erin! that some still are seen,
Who would dye the grass red, in their hatred to green!
Yet, oh! when you're up, and they down, let them live,
Then, yield them that mercy which they did not give.

"Arm of Erin! prove strong, but be gentle as brave,
And, uplifted to strike, still be ready to save;
Nor one feeling of vengeance presume to defile
The cause, or the men, of the Emerald Isle.

"The cause it is good, and the men they are true;
And the green shall outlive both the orange and blue;
And the daughters of Erin in her triumph shall share,
With their full-swelling chest, and their fair-flowing hair.

"Their bosoms heave high for the worthy and brave,
But no coward shall rest on that soft swelling wave;
Men of Erin! awake, and make haste to be blest!
Rise, arch of the ocean! rise, queen of the West!

Cliu - The Conception of Honor

"Am fear a thug buaidh air fhein, thug e buaidh air namhaid."
~ He who conquers the self, conquers a foe and makes a friend.



"It is the cultivation of this art that unfetters the body, strengthens it and makes it upright; it is it that gives a becoming deportment and an easy carriage, activity and agility, grace and dignity;- it is it that opportunely awes petulance, softens and polishes savageness and rudeness, and animates a proper confidence; it is it which in teaching us to conquer ourselves, that we may be able to conquer others, imprints respect, and gives true valour, good nature and politeness; in fine, which makes a man fit for society:"