Happy St. Patrick's Day

Once again, I'm going to post Eamon De Valera's famous St. Patrick's Day speech of 1943. It has rather outlived its critics at this stage, since even liberals have got tired of bashing it. But it's certainly a counter-cultural vision for all that.

The ideal Ireland that we would have, the Ireland that we dreamed of, would be the home of a people who valued material wealth only as a basis for right living, of a people who, satisfied with frugal comfort, devoted their leisure to the things of the spirit – a land whose countryside would be bright with cosy homesteads, whose fields and villages would be joyous with the sounds of industry, with the romping of sturdy children, the contest of athletic youths and the laughter of happy maidens, whose firesides would be forums for the wisdom of serene old age.

The home, in short, of a people living the life that God desires that men should live.

With the tidings that make such an Ireland possible, St. Patrick came to our ancestors fifteen hundred years ago promising happiness here no less than happiness hereafter. It was the pursuit of such an Ireland that later made our country worthy to be called the island of saints and scholars. It was the idea of such an Ireland – happy, vigorous, spiritual – that fired the imagination of our poets; that made successive generations of patriotic men give their lives to win religious and political liberty; and that will urge men in our own and future generations to die, if need be, so that these liberties may be preserved.

Here's a good article by Conor Fitzgerald on the subject. (The previous sentence is a link, though it doesn't look like it on my screen.)

What's generally forgotten is that the speech was mostly about the Irish language; the famous part of it is just the beginning.

Happy St. Patrick's Day for all my readers. I spend a lot of time wondering why we have festivals. Almost everybody seems drawn to celebrate them, and they're inherently social; you need other people for them. Not just your family and friends, but strangers.

Some reasons I think we have festivals:

1) For fun and merry-making.

2) To emphasise community bonds, the existence of a community.

3) For continuity through time.

4) As landmarks in quotidian time; "I saw him last a little before St. Patrick's Day", etc.

5) For religious reasons, of course; to have sacred times and places.

Any other suggestions?