Madam, - We are constantly told that unionist leaders are plain speakers, literal-minded people without patience with or understanding of the nuances, aspirational rhetoric and shades of meaning favoured by nationalists.
Does that mean that the public utterances of Dr Paisley and Mr Trimble really do reflect a coarse, ignorant bigotry? Or do they mask strange sensitivities which lesser breeds cannot hope to understand? - Yours, etc.,
FRANK FITZPATRICK, St Kevins Parade, Dublin 8.
Madam, - On Thursday, the very day your cartoonist pictured Ian Paisley after his abhorrent remarks about Brian Cowen, I came across in my files an old clipping from your paper in which Kieran Fagan quoted Jonathan Swift, a man of the cloth who knew right from wrong: "We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love each other."
How sad that, two-and-a-half centuries after his death, this thought remains relevant.
How sad, also, that Ian Paisley has not learned at his great age that when one's argument is weak, one makes a personal attack rather than address the subject. The man has passed his "use by" date. - Yours, etc.,
JEANETTE F. HUBER, Kinsale, Co Cork.