LIBERTY, EQUALITY, FRATERNITY, UNION!
IRISHMEN:
You have not forgotten Bantry Bay – you know what efforts France has made to assist you. Her affections for you, her desire for avenging your wrongs and ensuring your independence, can never be impaired.
After several unsuccessful attempts, behold Frenchmen arrived amongst you.
They come to support your courage, to share your dangers, to join their arms and to mix their blood with yours in the sacred cause of liberty! They are the forerunners of other Frenchmen, whom you shall soon enfold in your arms.
Brave Irishmen, our cause is common; like you, we abhor the avaricious and bloodthirsty policy of an oppressive government; like you, we hold as indefensible the right of all nations to liberty; like you, we are persuaded that the peace of the world shall ever be troubled as long as the British Ministry is suffered to make with impunity a traffic of the industry, labour and blood of the people.
But exclusive of the same interests which unite us, we have powerful motives to love and defend you.
Have we not been the pretext of the cruelty exercised against you by the Cabinet of St. James? The heartfelt interest you have shown in the grand events of our revolution – has it not been imputed to you as a crime? Are not tortures and death continually hanging over such of you as are barely suspected of being our friends? Let us unite, then, and march to glory.
We swear the most inviolable respect for your properties, your laws, and all your religious opinions. Be free! Be masters in your own country. We look for no other conquest than that of your liberty – no other success than yours.
The moment of breaking your chains has arrived; our triumphant troops are now flying to the extremities of the earth to tear up the roots of the wealth and tyranny of our enemies. That frightened Colossus is mouldering away in every part. Can there be any Irishman base enough to separate himself at such a happy conjecture from the grand interests of his country? If such there be, brave friends, let him be chased from the country he betrays, and let his property become the reward of those generous men who know how to fight and die!
Irishmen, recollect the late defeats which your enemies have experienced from the French; recollect the claims of Honscoote, Toulon, Quiberon, and Ostend; recollect America, free from the moment she wished to be so.
The contest between you and your oppressors cannot be long.
Union! Liberty! The Irish Republic! Such is our shout. Let us march. Our hearts are devoted to you; our glory is in your happiness.
HUMBERT.