law of exclusion, sacrificing the pretension | crown, but immediately dependant upon the of the few, who might feel differently from pope; that there exists in Ireland at this the mass of their own sect, to public tran-day a most numerous body of Roman cathoquillity and security. He has admitted that lic clergy devoted to the doctrinal opinions the Roman catholics were in general so of the church of Rome, and maintaining the strongly attached to the house of Stuart, as spiritual and ecclesiastical jurisdiction of to have justified the legislature in enforcing that court. In fact, the papistry is in many the oath of supremacy, and other tests, to points of view more formidable in the prethe exclusion of Roman catholics from po- sent state of Ireland, from the objects on litical power. He has debated much upon which it attaches, and the persons it influthat subject, and has justified our ancestors ences, and produces a more uncontrolable for their precaution. And I ask no other power over their people, than even before grounds of reason than those upon which the reformation. The objects of the first that hon. gent. has relied, to justify parlia- reformers were two-fold: the remedying ment in the rejection of the present catholic the avarice, voluptuousness, and power of claims. If attachment to the house of the clergy; the abolition of their separate Stuart has justified suspicion, and restric-courts of jurisdiction, and all those privitions from power, how much more strongly leges, exemptions, and distinctions, they does the general aversion of the lower order claimed or proposed, and which enabled the of catholics and of their priests, to Britain clergy to cope with princes, and to oppress and British connexion, justify all our pre- and insult the people. Princes and people caution! I do not hesitate to assert, that had feelings in common, that led them rawith the middling and lower orders of Ro- pidly to concur in those points with the reman catholics, and the generality of their formers; and countries the most catholic, clergy, under every change of governors or and the most devoted to the see of Rome, government, proposed or attempted, sepa- limited and curtailed its power and possesration from England has been the object in- sions, and wrested from it the supremacy in variably aimed at. Every passion, religious temporal matters. But matters of doctrine and temporal, all their traditions, all their being blended with matters of faith, and prejudices, unite to excite such feelings, and being admitted to be above the compreto render this sentiment predominant in hension of the lower and middling classes of their minds; and this house is deceived the people, not being equally apparent upon most fatally, if it suffer itself to be persua- the qualities of the mind, and the ostensible ded that they have changed those sentiments. conduct of those who governed or were go. The best historians agree that the Irish ca- verned by them, were not an object of jeatholics of King James's day used him but as lousy to princes, or of painful and degrading an instrument of separation; they rendered contrast to the people. The catholic clergy, him desperate with England to ensure suc- unequal, therefore, to combat the feelings cess to their design-a separation-by forc- excited by their luxury and power, seldom ing him to confiscate all the protestant and attempted to punish, or indeed to bring into British property in Ireland. The hon. gent. question, offences against their temporal inhas disclaimed, with great levity, all know-terests, but accused their antagonists of ofledge of councils, and of the former opi- fences against the fundamental articles of nions of the catholics, and has entered into faith, and, with consent of prince and peoabstract discussions of rights, and first prin- ple, inflicted punishments to any extent to ciples, for his purposes-in my mind with which their passions and vengeance led great judgment; but an application of men's them. The Roman catholic church, now, minds to the situation of the day, and to in Ireland, has all those sources of doctrinal existing circumstances, would prove fatal to influence over the faith of a bigoted people; his arguments, and to his object. Without their clergy frequently (as I admit), in the a knowledge of the catholic doctrines, and transactions between man and man, exercise of the influence of those doctrines, the ques-them for good purposes; but they also have tion cannot be fairly understood, and that the power of giving a direction to the popu wilful or assumed ignorance of their opinions lar mind, with an effect which is inconsist is unjustifiable in a gentleman agitating such a question. I repeat, that the influence of the Roman catholic clergy in Ireland is now most formidably great; that in that country, an hierarchy exists unconnected with the VOL. IV.

ent with the general safety; and, in corroboration of my opinion, I appeal to their conduct in the late and in former rebellions. In Ireland the British government seems, hitherto, to feel no apparent interest in op

3 P

stitution like that of this mighty empire, bend so far, as to sacrifice its bulwarks in exchange for the strength expected to be derived from the gratification of the feelings of a few individuals; those new doctrines which teach a man to forget all he owes to the laws, the constitution, and the king'; all that he owes to his family, his property, and his honour, if checked or controled in the pursuit of objects which he may be taught to over-value; and I lament that such loyalty is represented as only to be retained and secured by the sacrifice of our constitution! The numbers of the Irish catholics have been stated with a double object, to describe them as a source of strength, if conciliated, and of terror, if not gratified in their demands. If the higher classes of the catholics have influence, and have not hitherto exerted it, they can have no claims upon the confidence or gratitude of the legislature; but if (as I believe the

posed to the passions of the inferior people and the interested exertions of their clergy, I consider the yielding to their claims, a sacrifice of the constitution for a most trivial consideration. On more general grounds, the introduction into parliament and the cabinet of a certain number of the catholics, heading and acting as the organ of the catholic people, might be productive of the most fatal consequences; divisions might arise among the protestants, and a misguided monarch might attempt to obtain

posing the power and encroachments of the Roman catholic clergy; the people are left totally in their hands; and from that inattention, their great, and, in this debate, much-boasted influence has arisen: the Roman catholic clergy are now interwoven with the people in all their common transactions of life; true it is, they cannot punish criminals; but criminals bear no proportion to the number in any state. But I call upon gentlemen to consider, what is the effect of excommunication among the lower orders of Irish papists?-It excludes a man from his family, and renders him hateful to it; drives him from his little tenement, nay, precludes him from earning his livelihood, if dependent upon his labour; a power possibly greater than any possessed by the state, from its general diffusion, unsuspected influence, and extensive consequences: add to these considerations, the recollection of confiscated property, the long series of injuries alleged to have been committed by the Eng-case to be) they possess no power when oplish against the Irish, the remembrance of which has been constantly kept alive by tradition, and by recent exaggerated statements; and the well-known historical fact, that claims to property cannot fail for want | of hereditary succession, as, by the Brehon law, it exists not in individuals, but in the name and Sept; and the house will see the reasons and motives for that dislike to British connexion, which ever has, and still continues to influence the lower and more numerous part of the catholics of Ireland, a peasantry directed by a clergy generally ig-powers incompatible with the safety of our norant in every point but their school-divinity, all influenced by common motives of action, irreconcileable to British connexion at present; under such circumstances, though we cannot anticipate what growing wealth and more diffused intercourse may hereafter effect, we must still be on our guard. For these reasons I consider a knowledge of the doctrines of the see of Rome, and their actual influence upon the Irish clergy and the Irish catholics, as a most serious subject of consideration upon this occasion. As long as these prejudices and habits continue to influence their people, I am convinced no good effect can result from concessions. I am equally convinced that the better informed, the nobility and gentry, feel too many advantages resulting from their present situation, not to act with the ut-superior constitutional strength, justified most loyalty, and many, I admit, have already distinguished themselves by their conduct. But it would be reasoning like novelists, and not like statesmen, to make the great fundamental principles of a con

church and state, by the aid and support of that catholic party or interest. Such views were imputed to Charles the First; such conduct was certainly adopted by James the Second; and of that misguided effort we only escaped the fatal consequences, by placing the present royal family on the throne. The concessions now sought might also prove fatal to the catholics themselves, and tempt them (as it has hitherto done) into struggles for ascendancy, which might prove fatal to the privileges they now enjoy. Their advocates boast much of their wealth, fairly and honourably acquired under our mild and equal laws; honours have been conferred by the crown, or restored to their most distinguished families; the absence of jealousy, and the consciousness of our

our monarch in conferring these favours, and the protestant people in rejoicing at their attainment. But great states are distinguished by the wisdom of their precautionary measures; the wisdom of Bri

and loyalty of the protestants of Ireland ; let her be convinced, they feel their properties, their honours, and their lives, dependent upon British connexion: but if England unfortunately forgets what is due to, as brave and as zealous allies as any nation ever possessed, her protestant subjects of Ireland, she will have the most fatal reasons to lament her acquiescence in their and her own destruction. Let England be firm in her adherence to her laws and constitution. No catholic can be oppressed by the laws in Ireland; his property and his person are protected by the same code and juries that protect the protestant. If, notwithstanding these advantages, any of them should appeal to numbers, and be rashly tempted into rebellion, arms and the law must punish the rebels! With such impressions upon my mind, I should have felt myself unworthy of being the representative of my protestant countrymen, had I not borne testimony to their zeal and their loyalty, but had shrunk from the weight and talents of the hon. gent. I trust in God, and in the courage of the nation, that we are able to defend our laws, religion, and property; to maintain our faith, and to uphold the throne.

tish policy has led its councils to protect the crown from temptation, and to guard the conduct of the monarch against the effects of his passions and his wishes, by with-holding the instruments by which our constitution in church and state might be assailed and subverted. Should a British monarch entertain such views, the manufacturing and preparing instruments would alarm the jealousy, and enable the wealth and independence of the empire to rise in defence of its civil and religious liberties. As far as the feelings of the crown itself may be concerned, we must consider how cruel it would be to render the exclusion of such a description of subjects from his councils and the higher offices of state a matter of personal objection, and consequently of personal odium against the monarch himself. The catholics surely expect that the capability which they now wish to obtain should be productive of its effects. At present no individual can feel, in his exclusion from power, a personal degradation; he must attribute it to existing laws, and to the existing constitution. Give them capability, and then do not confer upon a great proportion that share in the cabinet and the councils of the crown which they fancy their boasted numbers and wealth Mr. William Smith proposed that the deentitle them to, and will you conciliate a bate be adjourned. He was perfectly presingle individual ? Will not discontent be pared to deliver his sentiments at the momore formidable than it is at present? On ment, if the house were willing to hear the other hand, what would be the senti- him, and other gentlemen who might wish ments and the sensation of the people of to speak on the important question before this empire, were they to see a protestant them. It would, however, be unbecoming monarch, whose tenure to his throne de- the character of the house, and the impends upon his fidelity to his religion, sur-portance of the subject, if they came to rounded by catholic counsellors? Could any circumstances reconcile them to such a choice in the monarch himself? And should the strength of parties (as it is sometimes supposed to have done) force such ministers, and such counsellors upon the throne, how miserable, how degraded must be the situation of our monarch, and how precarious the state of our religion and of our civil liberties! Such appear to me to be the inevitable evils of concession to the present claims; and if we are to be reduced to a choice of evils, and must consider catholic numbers (as the hon. members have held out) a source of intimidation, our ancestors have held Ireland in times infinitely more unfavourable, and against numbers infinitely more disproportioned; and I entertain no doubt that we should do so again. Let England but understand her true interest; let her justly appreciate the spirit, zeal,

any hasty decision.-The question of adjournment being loudly called for,

The Chancellor of the Exchequer expressed a wish that the discussion could have been terminated at that sitting, As, however, it seemed to be the wish of other gentlemen to deliver their sentiments, he thought it would be better to adjourn than to state them at a more advanced hour.—— The debate was accordingly adjourned till the following day.—The other orders of the day were also postponed, and, at 3 o'clock on Tuesday morning, the house adjourned.

HOUSE OF COMMONS.

Tuesday, May 14.

[MINUTES.]-On the motion of Sir John Anderson the house went into a committee on the report of the vintners' petition. The report was ordered to be received to

"Trifles light as air

Are to the jealous confirmations strong
As proofs from holy writ."-

It was a fact, that Cassio was in possession
of Desdemona's handkerchief; and though
the inference which passion drew was false,
yet the consequence was fatal. Such a state
of things as has existed in Ireland may be
seen too near, as well as from too great a
distance. Men, whose persons and families
have been exposed to all the miseries of civil
discord and insurrection, though of the best
abilities, and with the best intentions, pos-
sessing, too, every advantage of local in-
formation, and so far qualified to form the
most accurate' opinions, can scarcely claim
that other indispensable qualification of a
judge, impartiality: their having been in-
terested spectators of the scene, perhaps ac-
tors in it, incapacitates them in a great de-
gree for determining as correctly as we may
not unreasonably hope to do, with fewer
opportunities of observation.-But to apply
myself more directly to the argument of the
first gentleman I have alluded to, I would
remark that it puts an eternal veto on the
proposition before us.
While catholics re-
main such, they must, according to him,
necessarily be kept in this state of suspicion
and degradation! — and why? because
"the religion is unsafe, and its principles
are immutable." It is unsafe, because it
does not permit complete allegiance to a
protestant sovereign, and destroys all the
validity of those tests by which confidence
is secured, and truth ascertained among
men. These allegations, however, the
catholics deny; they deny that they hold
all the antiquated and absurd notions, which
from the musty records of ages long since
past, and councils almost forgotten, the hon.
gentleman would fix upon them, for no
better reason than the pretension of the
Romish church to be not only universal,
but immutable. I know, sir, as well as
that gentleman, that she has preferred this
claim; I, too, have histories of councils
and collections of decrees; but I also know
that to be unchangeable belongs not to man,
por to his best modelled institutions, far less

to those which vainly attempt to contravene
the laws of nature. Nothing sublunary is
permanent but those impressions stamped
by the Creator on the human heart, which
teach us to expect gratitude and love as the
general consequences of benefits conferred,
and discontent as the equally certain result
of oppression:
"If this fail,

The pillar'd firmament is rottenness,
And earth's base built on stubble :"

but it cannot fail; nor can those reasonings
be just, which assume that theoretical dog-
mas will, in the mind of man, for ever pre-
dominate over just and generous sentiments,
over every feeling of integrity and truth.
And this, sir, naturally leads me to that
point in which the catholics appear to have
met with treatment peculiarly uncandid and
'severe. Objections on the subject of oaths
are taken against them, if not contradictory,
at least inconsistent. If, from a regard to
conscience, they refuse to renounce opi-
nions which appear to them purely religious,
they are instantly loaded with the imputa-
tion of disloyalty; from which, on the
other hand, no protestations are allowed to
relieve them, because they are affirmed to
be men whom " oaths cannot bind." If
this be the case, sir, let the legislature be
consistent; if catholics be thus incapable of
being bound by moral obligations, if they
be unsusceptible of any other restraints but
those imposed by violence, let the penal
statutes be re-enacted, or at least, let us
consider whether it be worth while to keep
in forced subjection such an irreclaimable
race. But is this character justly ascribed
to them? on the contrary, do they not pro-
test against these imputations, and has not
their conduct justified their denial? Have
not thousands since the revolution endured
heavy restraints and severe penalties, rather
than take oaths which their principles for-
bad? Why, in our own days, have such
multitudes of priests relinquished their pro-
perty and their homes to avoid oaths which,
if it were innocent to have evaded by a dis-
pensation, it must have been even meri-
torious to have done so, when the interests
of their church had probably been essentially
served by their remaining at their posts?
Do not such facts under our own eyes speak
louder than a thousand arguments drawn
from theory and hypothesis? But this is
not all our government has shewn that it
entertains far different ideas. The majority
of the inhabitants of Canada being, like
those of Ireland, of the catholic persuasion