1My friends, I want you to listen to me with all your attention. I am going to address the largest assembly that ever met in the history of the world.
2We are here upon the spot where the first chieftains of Ireland were elected, and where they made the laws that governed the green island in peace and harmony.
3The site of this meeting was hallowed in history; it was the spot upon which Irishmen, from every part of the island, assembled to devise laws by which their country should be governed.
4It was also the home of legislation, the seat of her parliament, the centre of her councils, the scene of national gatherings.
5My first principle is that the will of the people is the source and origin of all legitimate power; my second, that all measures for the amelioration of the condition of the people must come through peaceful and constitutional agitation.
6I want nothing for the Irish but their rights, and I want nothing from you but your peaceful cooperation to get those rights restored.
7Among the means I propose to use is that of assembling large numbers of my fellow-countrymen, to show that our demand for justice is universal and that the voice of Ireland is the voice of Ireland’s people.
8We will break no law — we will commit no crime — but by the force of public opinion, by the gathering together of a people who know their rights and dare maintain them, we will achieve the repeal of the unjust union that binds our country.
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