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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 
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 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. 
 
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Treasury of Irish Eloquence, 
 
REV OR CAHILL. 
 
TEEASUET 
 
 OF 
 
 Irish Eloquence, 
 
 BEING A COMPENDIUM OF 
 
 lEISH OMTOM AND LITEMTUEE, 
 
 COMPILED WITH ANNOTATIONS FROM 
 
 Thos. Davis, Dr. McNeyen, Dr. Madden, J. Bnrke, and others, 
 
 CONSISTING OF SPEECHES OF 
 
 EDMUISTD BURKE, CHARLES PHILLIPS, 
 
 HENRY GRATTAN, DANIEL O'CONNELL, 
 
 JOHN PHILPOT CURRAN, RICHARD LALOR SHEIL, 
 
 ROBERT EMMET, THOMAS D'ARCY McGEE, 
 
 THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER, A. M. SULLIVAN, 
 
 RICH'D BRINSLEY SHERIDAN, MICHAEL DAVITT, 
 
 i 
 
 WITH LECTURES, SERMONS, AND LETTERS OF 
 
 DR. CAHILL, VERY REV. THOMAS N. BUHKE, 
 
 EEV. BERNARD BUCKLEY, ARCHBISHOP McHALE, 
 RT. REV. THOMAS NULTY. 
 
 Illwstrntjli toiil] |lunuows |0rtraits, ^tms, ik,^ 
 
 SOLD ONLY BY SUBSCRIPTION. /^^^coi^*''".>i';^%> 
 
 
 BOSTON, MASS.: ., ^^^ ., 
 
^1 
 
 COPYBIGHT, 1S82, 
 
 By murphy & MCCARTHY. 
 
 DnrPT, Cashman Co., Printers, 
 Fayelto Court, Boston 
 
Treasury of Irish Eloquence. 
 
 PEELIMINARY. 
 
 Some one has said, "the voice of eloquence is sweeter than the 
 voice of song." It was a well-spoken tribute to the power of an art, 
 lieavenly in the magic of its inspiration, superior to music's charms 
 in thrilling the ear, and privileged to sway by conviction the reason 
 of the soul. In presence of its mighty influence, we must recognize 
 the omnipotence and efficaciousness of that highest eloquence, bora 
 of pure and lofty ideas, of religious and patriotic feelings, and of 
 noble and generous sentiments. Good ideas, eloquently expressed, 
 conduce essentially to the intellectual elevation of every community. 
 To meet the necessities of a higher education, and needs of an appre- 
 ciative people, we advance this compilation, presenting specimen gems 
 of the most beautiful in oratory and literature. We have long felt the 
 want of a book of Irish eloquence, wherein could be found collected 
 stray pieces, models of their kind, scattered throughout the lil)raries 
 and elocutionary works of our land. In this volume, replete with 
 emanations of genius and fervency from the pulpit and tribune, with 
 flashes from the pen of the patriot and scholar, the youth of the 
 countr^^the students and admirers of an exalted oratorical literature, 
 and the friends and devotees of Christianity and Ireland everywhere, 
 may contemplate treasures of eloquence endowed with a national and 
 religious character. For ages, the religion and patriotism of the 
 children of Ireland, have found utterance in a wonderful and emotional 
 tongue ; nor is it in the province of a far more gifted pen, to convey 
 
 (V) 
 
YJ TKEASUKT OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to our readers' miuds, an adequate idea of the grandeur of the elo- 
 quence of Ireknd, descended from the lone talent of a distant age, 
 "when but one oasis bloomed amid the desert of intellectual darkness, 
 and that one, Ireland ; gleaming through centuries of unparalleled 
 wrong and oppression, startling the world with its splendor, melting 
 humanity to tears, personating an irresistible genius, and bi-aving the 
 tempests of tyranny and time, but to glow with a brilliancy reinforced 
 by the progressiveness of the hour in which we live. To Iieland — 
 mai'tyred motherland — we look for that soulful and impassioned, 
 eloquence that springs from patriotic devotion, and is begotten of 
 the sufferings of a crushed but unconquei'ed nation ; and to the one 
 apostolical church we turn for the words of sublime and solemn inspi- 
 ration that lift the soul to heaven and liberty. It can bo sublimely 
 said of the oratory of Ireland, that, while advocating the claims of 
 catholic liberty, it was not confined to the utterances of one kind of 
 religionists, for it fell from men's lips whose highest belief lay in the 
 religion of justice, whose loftiest mission was the redemption of 
 brother men, and whose most orthodox inspiration came from th& 
 God-given principle of universal liberty and man's equality. 
 
 One, among the many great ones, must ever remain unforgotten, 
 wherever in the wide world heroism is honored. In our country's 
 school-readers may be found !i model of eloquence, framed from the 
 lips of the patriot-martyr of 1803, from which the scholar for all 
 time may learn his first lesson of manhood and patriotism. Preem- 
 inent in the grandeur of their devotion and conception, translated 
 into every living tongue, the burning words of Eobert Emmet, in 
 the face of death, deep graven on the hearts of Irishmen and free- 
 dom-worshippers, will remain forever, though he who spoke them 
 met a felon's doom — for he died for his fellow-men, that they might 
 live happy in the sunshine of liberty, — asking, as a dying wish, that 
 his "epitaph might not be written till his country should take her 
 place among the nations of the earth." Soon shall the earnest trib- 
 ute of a nation redeemed, illumine that unwritten epitaph. 
 
PRELIMINARY. y^ 
 
 No lover of the sublime in classic or sacred oratory, can refuse 
 the homage of his appreciation to that island, that alone, amid the 
 nations, has reproduced the Cicero and Demosthenes of his dreams, 
 in a Curran and a Grattan, and gave to the world a pulpit-eloquence 
 outstripping Massillon, in the discourses of a Father Tom Burke. 
 No eulogium of ours is needed to chai'acterize the eloquence of the 
 illustrious agitator, Daniel 0"Connell. But why particularize ? It 
 would require almost interminable space and time to call the roll of 
 that prodigious galaxy of genius, which has extended to every clime, 
 covered every emergency, and excited the admiration of the world. 
 The immortal Henry Clay, and Prentiss of Mississippi, have declai-ed 
 that "Ireland has furnished more than her share to the world of 
 genius and talent and heroism," and history contirms that declara- 
 tion. 
 
 Our readei's may here find the oratorical splendor of Grattan ; the 
 rhetorical grace of Curran, Phillips, Shell, and Sheridan ; the logical 
 fluency of Cahill, Burke, McHale, and Nulty ; the popular oratory of 
 Daniel O'Connell ; the pulpit-eloquence of Father Tom Burke, Ber- 
 nard Buckley, and others ; Emmet's Dying Speech ; the patriotic 
 brilliancy of "Meagher of the Sword," McGee, A. M. Sullivan, 
 and last, but not least, the indefatigable agitator who, allied to the 
 indomitable Charles Stewart Parnell, may be caUed the founder of 
 The Irish National Land League, Michael Davitt. 
 
 We hope the choice of the selections may be acceptable to our 
 numerous readers ; and closing this labor of affection, we pray that 
 the dissemination of these treasures of eloquence among the people 
 of our country, may produce a bountiful harvest of good ideas, a 
 beauty of expression, and an appreciation of the sublime in oratory ; 
 besides engendering in the youthful mind a higher ambition for 
 learning, and an inclination for a higher order of reading in time to 
 come. Present and unborn representatives of the Irish race may 
 look up to these examples of national genius, and feel proud of a 
 fatherland redeemed from centuries of adversity, by the intellectual 
 
Yiii TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 superiority of its sons. May the man of letters read, and drink in 
 the logical brilliancy and rhetorical grandeur of its pages. May the 
 student draw from its unfailing fountain, the essence of his noblest 
 theme. May the scorner and the bigot here learn his misconception 
 of a people's character, and, above all, may those to whom it is 
 entrusted as a sacred and honored relic of fatherland, ponder it 
 deeply, cherish it proudly, and quote it effectually on the occasion 
 of its utterance. May the oratory of Ireland and the primitive 
 church ever animate the generations of our race, and serve to advance 
 their amelioration, until all national and religious aspirations arc 
 .fumUod. 
 
 P. R. M. 
 
 Pko\tdf.xce, K. I. (Emmet Anniversary), March i, 1S82. 
 
Contents. 
 
 Eet. D. W. Cahill, D. D. : Page 
 Address delivered at Glasgow, at the anniversary dinner, on St. 
 
 Patrick's day, 3 
 
 The Fidelity of Ireland in defence of her Liberties and her Ancient 
 Religion : Lecture delivered at the Academy of Music, New 
 
 York, March 17, 1860, 21 
 
 Immaculate Conception, 43 
 
 Last Judgment, 67 
 
 Dr. Cahill to five Protestant Clergymen, 75 
 
 Letter of Dr. Cahill, to the Right Hon. the Earl of Derby, . . 84 
 
 Key. Michael Bernard Buckley: 
 
 Panegyric on St. Finbar, Patron Saint of the Diocese of Cork, . . 99 
 
 Sermon on the Profession of a Nun, 114 
 
 Sermon on the Blessed Virgin Mary, 122 
 
 Lecture on the National Music of Ireland, 131 
 
 Lecture on John Philpot Curran, 159 
 
 The Irish Character Analyzed, 181 
 
 Vert Rev. Thomas N. Burke, O. P. : 
 
 Answers to Froude. First Lecture delivered in the Academy of 
 
 Music, New York, November 12, 1872, 203 
 
 Second Lecture, delivered in the Academy of ]\Iusic, New York, 
 
 November 14, 1872, 231 
 
 Third Lecture, delivered in the Academy of Music, Njw York, 
 
 November 19, 1872, 251 
 
 Fourth Lecture . 269 
 
 Filth Lecture, 287 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 Hon. John Philpot Cueran: 
 
 Speech on Attaclimeiits,Fcbruary 24, 1785, .... 
 
 Speech on Orde's Commercial Propositions, June 30, 1785, 
 
 Speech on Pensions, March 13, 1786, . 
 
 On Stamp Officers' Salaries, February 4, 1790, . 
 
 On Government Corruption, February 12th, 1791, 
 
 On Catholic Emancipation, February 18, 1792, . 
 
 In defence of Rev. William Jackson, April 23, 1795, 
 
 Suspension of the Habeas Corpus, October 14, 1796, 
 
 Last Speech in the Irish House of Commons, May 15, 1797, 
 
 For Peter Finnerty, Publisher of the " Press," December 22, 1797, 
 
 Page 
 315 
 321 
 335 
 339 
 345 
 365 
 362 
 376 
 379 
 
 Hon. Richard Lalor Shell : 
 
 Clare Election, 423 
 
 Repeal of the Union, 457 
 
 Orange Lodges, 479 
 
 Irish Municipal Bill, February 22, 1837, 487 
 
 The Irish Catholics. Speech at Peaendcn Heath, October 24, 1828, . 505 
 
 Speech in I'eply to Mr. McClintock, 517 
 
 Speech on the Duke of York, 629 
 
 Hon. Henry Grattan: 
 
 Declaration of Irish Rights, April 19, 1780 639 
 
 Philippic against Flood, October 28, 1783, 556 
 
 Commercial Propositions, April 12, 1785, 561 
 
 Anti-Union Speeches, January 16, 1800, 572 
 
 Anti-Union Speeches, May 26, 1800, 695 
 
 Invective against Corry, February 14, 1800, 611 
 
 Daniel O'Connell, M. P. : 
 
 Speech at Limerick, 1812, 618 
 
 Speech in the British Catholic Association on the Defeat of the 
 
 Emancipation Bill, May 26, 1825, 630 
 
 Speech on the Treaty of Limerick, .... . . 647 
 
 Speech at the second Clare Election, 659 
 
 Speech at Mullaghmast Monster Meeting, September, 1843, , . 666 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 XI 
 
 Charles Phillips, Esq.: page 
 
 A Speech delivered at a Public Dinner given to Mr. Finley by the 
 
 Roman Catholics of the Town and County of Sligo, . . . 677 
 
 A Speech delivered at an Aggregate Meeting of the Roman Catho- 
 lics of Cork, 688 
 
 Speech delivered at a Dinner given on Dinas Island, in the Lake of 
 Killarney, on Mr. Phillips' health being given together with 
 that of Mr. Payne, a young American, ..... 699 
 
 Speech delivered at an Aggregate Meeting of the Roman Catholics 
 
 of the County and City of Dublin, 704 
 
 Hon. Edmund Burke: 
 
 Speech on American Taxation, April 19th, 1774, .... 725 
 Speech on taking leave of the Electors of Bristol, .... 775. 
 Select Passages on the Impeachment of Warren Hastings, . . 77& 
 
 His Grace the Most Rev. Dr McHale, Archbishop of Tuam : 
 
 To the Most Rev. Dr. Manners, Protestant Archbishop of Canter- 
 bury, Primate of all England : The Question of Divorce between 
 
 George IV. and his Queen, 791 
 
 To the Most Rev. Wm. Magee, D. D., Protestant Archbishop of 
 
 Dublin, 799 
 
 Dr. McHale's Letter to Lord Bexley, 806 
 
 To the Protestant Archbishop of Tuam, 814 
 
 Christmas Day at the Vatican, 818 
 
 Letter from Rome : Visit to the Pope. A Manuscript Letter of 
 
 Mary Queen of Scots. The Tombs of O'Neil and O'Donnell, etc., 824 
 
 A. M. Sullivan, M. P.: 
 
 Address delivered by A. M. Sullivan, M. P., in his own defence, in 
 
 Green Street Court-House, Dublin, February 20, 1868, . . 833 
 
 Richard Brinslet Sheridan: 
 
 Speech delivered in Opposition to Pitt's first income tax, . . . 859 
 
 Robert Emmet: 
 
 Powerful address of Robert Emmet, delivered at his trial before 
 
 Lord Norbury, Sept. 19, 1803, 869 
 
Xii CONTENTS. 
 
 Michael Davitt: paoe 
 
 Future Policy of Irish Nationalists, 879 
 
 Thomas Fkancis Meaghee: 
 
 Speech at Conciliation Hall, Dublin, July 28, 1846, .... 897 
 
 Thomas D'Arct McGee: 
 
 Speech before the Irish Protestant Benevolent Society, Quebec, 
 
 May, 1862, 907 
 
 Eight Rev. T. Nultt, D. D. Bishop op Meath: 
 
 To Joseph Cowen, M. P., Newcastle-on- Tyne 913 
 
ADDRESSES, LECTURES and SERMONS. 
 
 Rev, D, W, Cahill. 
 
 [1] 
 
Rev, Dr. Cahill's Address, 
 
 Deliyered at Glasgow, at the Anniversary Dinner on 
 St. Patrick's Dat. 
 
 ^^R. CHAIE^MAN and beloved Fellow-Countryimen, — I do 
 ^^j^ believe there is no nation in the world aljle to shout 
 
 r'% with the Irish. Our countryman, Dean Swift, counselled 
 the Irish people, in his day, not to make speeches at public 
 meetings, for fear of the Attorney General. " Do not speak," said 
 he, "when you meet, as the law may punish you: but there is no 
 law against shouting, — hence, groan and shout." And from that 
 day to this, we can groan and shout better than any people in the 
 whole world. Till I came here on this evening, I thought I could 
 never forgive either Lord J. Russell or Lord Palmerston ; but the 
 speakers who have preceded me have inflicted such a castigation on 
 them, that, with your kind permission, I will forgive them, — not in 
 this world, — but in the next. For this purpose, I must have the 
 key of the Kingdom of Heaven, and also the key of the other place, 
 in order that, when I first let them out, I can next let them in. 
 
 Mr. Chairman, you have exaggerated my small services in refer- 
 ence to the pul)lic letters which I have written. Whatever merit I 
 may have, consisted in my knowing well the history of Ireland. 
 The history of other countries is learned from the cool pen of the 
 historian, but that of Ireland is learned from the crimsoned tombs 
 of the dead. The history of other nations is collected from the 
 growing population and successful commerce, but the sad story of 
 Ireland is gathered from the deserted village, the crowded jjoor- 
 house, and the mournful swelling canvas of the emigrant ship. You 
 gave me too much credit for those slender productions of mine, and 
 
4 TREASUEY CF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 perhaps you are not aware that it was on the graves of the starved 
 and shroudless victims of English misrule I stood when I indited the 
 epistles. I dated them from the grave-pits of Sligo and the fever- 
 sheds of Skibl)ereen. If I seemed to weep, it was because I fol- 
 lowed to coflinless tombs tens of thousands of my poor, persecuted 
 fellow-countrymen ; and if my descriptions appeared tinged with 
 red, it was because I dipped mj'^ pen in their fresh bleeding graves 
 in order to give suitable coloring to the terrific page on which a cruel 
 fate has traced the destinies of Ireland. It was not my mind but my 
 bosom that dictated ; it was not my pen but my heart that wrote the 
 record. 
 
 And where is the Irishman who would not feel an involuntary 
 impulse of national pride in asserting the invincible genius of our 
 own creed while he gazes on the crumbling walls of our ancient 
 churches, which, even in their old age, lift their hoary heads as faith- 
 ful witnesses of the past struggles of our fiiith, and still stand iu 
 their massive frame-work, resisting to the last the power of the 
 despoiler, and scarcely yielding to the inevitable stroke of time? 
 And where is the heart so cold, that would not pour forth a boiling 
 torrent of national anger at seeing the children of forty generations 
 consigned to a premature grave, or banished by cruel laws to seek 
 amongst the strangers the protection they are refused at home ? 
 
 Nature does not deny a home to the untutored savage that wanders 
 naked over her boundless domain ; even the maternal genius of the 
 inhospitable forest gives a welcome asylum to her young ; she brings 
 them forth from her bare womb, suckles them on her stormy bosom, 
 and feeds them at her desert streams. She teaches them to kneel 
 beneath the dark canopy with which she shrouds the majesty of her 
 inaccessible rocks ; she warns them to flee from danger in the moan- 
 ing voice of the unchained tempests, and she clothes her kingdom 
 in verdure and sunlight to cheer them in their trackless home. Well 
 has the divine heail of Campbell given a preference to the savage 
 beast over the ill-fated lot of the exiled Irishman, in these immortal 
 lines which express the history of our nation : — 
 
 " Where is ray cabin door fast by the wildwood, 
 Where is my sire that wept for its fall? 
 Where is the mother that watched o'er my childhood ? 
 Where is my bosom friend, dearer than all? 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 5 
 
 ' Sad is my fate,' said the heart-broken stranger, 
 
 ' The wild deer and wolf to a covert can flee ; 
 
 But I have no refuge from famine and danger, 
 
 A home and a country remain not for me.' " 
 
 Oh ! if St. Patrick were now to visit Ireland, what changes could 
 not the historian recount to him since he first set his Apostolic foot 
 on the soil? For many centuries after he died, Ireland enjoyed a 
 profound peace and a national prosperity. While, on the fall of the 
 Roman Empire, most of the kingdoms of Europe rose up in vindi- 
 cation of their national rigiits, and all the neighboring nations were 
 filled with the disastrous accompaniments and results of war, Ireland 
 cultivated the arts and sciences, and practised the sublime pi-ecepts 
 of the Gospel to perfection. She was the seminary M'here Europe 
 was then educated, and whatever progress has been made by them 
 in lettei-s and religion, they must own that they lighted the torch of 
 Science and Faith at the sacred fires which burned on the altars of 
 Ireland. No doubt, a storm has in later daj's been evoked from the 
 abyss by the emissaries of Satan against this ancient creed. It has 
 burst over Ireland with an awful violence, and in its devastating 
 passage over our fine country it has blown down the venerable insti- 
 tutions of past ages ; it has rent the monarch oak which crowned 
 the forest with its lofty majesty, but the trunk and the roots were 
 too strong to be torn by the rage of the hurricane ; and here we are, 
 the new growth of the flourishing branches sprung from the old stock, 
 and likely to rise higher, and to sjiread farther than the parent tree, 
 which, three centui'ies ago, reached to the skies over Ireland. 
 
 In fact. Catholicity, if I may so speak, is almost natural to an 
 Irishman. He is, as it wei'e, a Chi-istian before he is baptized; he 
 inherits faith by a kind of freehold grace which St. Patrick has 
 bequeathed to the most remote posterity of Ireland. You can effiice 
 every feeling from his heart but Catholicity ; you can crush out every 
 sentiment from his mind but the love of his altai-s ; you m-iy break him 
 into pieces, and crush him into dust, but like the diamond in frag- 
 ments, faith shines in him to the last. The smallest particle of the 
 Irish nature — the poorest, the most abandoned of Ireland's sons, — 
 reveals the sparkling inheritance as well as the most noble and lordly 
 possessor ; in fact, the darkness of the night is more favorable for 
 seeing the native light of the fragment, than the goldeu hours of 
 
Q TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 noonday sunshine ; and thus the midnight of national trial is the best 
 time to behold the ctrulgenee of Ireland's creed, and to test the 
 essential splendor of her national faith. Or, as our own bard has 
 it, — 
 
 " The gem may be broke by many a stroke, 
 But nothing can cloud its native ray, 
 Each fragment will cast a light to the last ; 
 
 And thus Erin, my country, though broken thou art, 
 There's a lustre within thee that ne'er can decay, 
 
 A spirit that breathes through each suffering part. 
 And smiles at thy pain ou St. Patrick's Day." 
 
 No doubt, you have heard the amusing feet of the Irish in a 
 certain town in England, when, in 1850, they proceeded there to 
 burn the Blessed Virgin in effigy. When all was ready for the 
 idolatrous conflagration, the Irish were seen collecting in patches of 
 tens and twenties, in the square where the fagots were prepared. 
 The police observed that each Irishman had a short, thick stick 
 thrust up the sleeve of his jacket ; and on asking what use they 
 intended to make of these dangerous weapons in the present in- 
 stance, one of the Irish said — "Why then, your honor, we were 
 afraid you might not have wood enough to burn the Virgin out and 
 out, and we brought these few Icippeens, asthore, to keep up the 
 blaze." It is unnecessary to say that the Virgin was not burned on 
 that day ; and the Irish on returning home, were heard saying to 
 each other — na boc?dish, avick. 
 
 As your chairman has given me credit for having some knowledge 
 of astronomy, I must take the liberty of informing the people of 
 Scotland that the length of the day and night in Ireland is twenty- 
 four hours, and that it was twelve o'clock noon, in our colonies in 
 the east, at about four o'clock this morning in Ireland ; and again, 
 that about this present hour, while we are filling our si^arkling 
 glasses, the Irish are just going to Mass, with the shamrocks in 
 their hats, at twelve o'clock in America. The Irish soldier, there- 
 fore, on this morning, at four o'clock, saluted the glorious memory 
 of St. Patrick at the mouth of the Ganges ; he began the shout in 
 the east as the sun culmiu\ited over Pekin , and as the day advanced, 
 and that shout rolled along the foot of Himalaya, it swept across 
 the Indus, passed over the track of Alexander the Great, was heard 
 in ancient Byzantium, disturbed the slumber of the sleeping brave 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 7 
 
 in the gray field of Marathon, reverberated along the Seven Hills of 
 Eome, and almost awoke, about ten o'clock this morning, old Eom- 
 ulus on the banks of the Tiber. 
 
 Owing to the mysterious destinies of Ii'eland and of our scattered 
 race, there is not a spot, from the Yellow Sea to the Pillars of Her- 
 cules, from Garryowen to Melbourne, in which some merry Ii-ish- 
 man does not on this day fix the green shamrock in his cap, and, 
 with overflowing soul and wild transports of native joy, sing the 
 inspiring airs of his country, and chant aloud the magical tune of 
 "St. Pati'ick's Day in the morning." But the commemorating voice 
 of this day through primaeval Asia and old Europe is weak in com- 
 parison to the power it attains when it has crossed the Atlantic, and 
 reached the friendly, crowded shores of young and vigorous Amer- 
 ica. There many a fond Irish heart welcomes the well-known 
 cheers, as they burst in the patriot skies of Bunkers Hill : there 
 the shout assumes the majesty of thunder as it rolls in peals, again 
 and again repeated, .over the boundless prairies that skirt the Missis- 
 sippi, and is echoed and re-echoed along the chiselled AUeghanies, 
 until it dies away into silence about two o'clock to-night, as it re- 
 echoes the placid boundless bosom of the Pacific. 
 
 Thus round and round the globe is the voice of Ireland this day 
 heard by all mankind — thus her scattered and fated children sing 
 the wild song of their native land to the stranger — thus they pour 
 forth the patriot strains of their beloved country to the idolatrous 
 Tartar, to the polished European, and the savage Indian ; thus they 
 stretch their united hands to each other on this day, and round the 
 entire world they form a girdle of national love and patriotism, which 
 reaches from the east to the west, and we couple the north and the 
 south poles within the wide circle of our exiled but glorious affec 
 tions. He proceeded — Listen for a moment, about twelve o'cloc) 
 to-night, and you will hear our own harp pour forth its Irish, plain 
 tive voice from New York, across the broad enraptured waters of th / 
 Atlantic. Even now, if you will be quiet, you can audibly distin- 
 guish the shout of joy raised by seven millions of our blood, our 
 race, and our Faith, along the free shoi'es of glorious, hospitable 
 America. 
 
 Oh ! America, how I love your green fields, because they are now 
 the resting-place of the wandering children of our country I I 
 
g TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 worship your lofty mountains and your rich valleys, because they 
 afford an as^dum and a barrier against the storms of adversity, 
 which have swept away and withered the ancient homesteads of Ire- 
 land. I bless your majestic rivers, your magnificent lakes, because 
 I behold the friendly canvas of your marine spread on their joyous 
 waters, conveying my forlorn countrymen to a peaceful and plentiful 
 home. Oh ! America, I could die for your generous people, be- 
 cause they have opened their arms to welcome the ejected sons of 
 St. Patrick! — I long to stand in the presence of the patriot, the 
 accomplished Mrs. Tyler, and the incomparable ladies of America, 
 that I may offer to them the deep homage of my grateful heart — 
 that I may present to them the respect and the enthusiasm of the 
 people of Ireland, for the withering chastisement they have inflicted 
 on the sainted cruelty of the Duchess of Sutherland, and for the 
 grateful dignity with which they have exposed the well-meaning 
 hypocrisy of her noble committee. And I long to behold the 
 country where the broken heart of Ireland is bound for, her daugh- 
 ters protected, her sons adopted : where conscience is free, where 
 religion is not hypocrisy, where liberty is a reality, and ^vhere the 
 Gospel is a holy profession of Divine love, and not a profligate 
 trade of national vengeance. 
 
 How long, O Lord, wilt Thou hold Thy omnipotent scourge over 
 Ireland, the most faithful nation of all the kingdoms that possess 
 the Divine revelations from Heaven ? But till Providence is pleased 
 to staunch the flowing blood of Ireland, and to heal the wound, we, 
 her persecuted sons, are bound to raise the cry of horror against our 
 relentless oppressors ; to keep up through each coming 3'ear and 
 each century, the watchwoi'd of our sires for freedom, till the happy 
 day of our deliverance. It is glorious to struggle for the redemp- 
 tion of one's country ; it is base tamely to submit to the tyrant's 
 frown — liberty, and then death, is preferable to slavery and life. 
 Oh ! eternal liberty — inheritance of the soul ! 
 
 " Better to bleed for an age at thy shrine, 
 Than to sleep for one moment in chains." 
 
 Beloved fellow-countrymen, of late years I have had more oppor- 
 tunities of seeing the sufferings of the Irish than many others I 
 meet them at the seaport towns ; I hear their complaints ; I am 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 9 
 
 familiar with their hard ti'ials, and feel intensely their dire fate ; 
 and, in the midst of all their misfortunes, they never lose the native 
 affections of their warm Irish hearts. 
 
 About the year 1849 I went on board an emigrant ship at the 
 custom-house in Dublin in order to see the accommodation of the 
 I)oor emigrants. While walking on the deck, I saw a decent poor 
 man from the County Meath, with the ugliest dog I ever beheld in 
 his arms. He seemed to be keeping up a kind of private conversa- 
 tion with this dog, and occasionally he kissed him so affectionately, 
 that I was led to speak to him, and made some inquiry about him. 
 He told me that the dog's name was Brandy, that he and his mother 
 were in bis family for several years, and that he was the same age 
 as his youngest child. He continued to say, that on the day he was 
 ejected, and his house thrown down, Brandy's house was thrown 
 down too ; in fact, that the poor dog was exterminated as well as 
 himself. That he took pity on him, brought him to Dublin, paid 
 fifteen shillings for his passage to America, and that he would sup- 
 port him with his children as long as he lived. While we were speak- 
 ing, the dog began to bark ; on which I inquired what he was bark- 
 ing at. " Oh ! sir," said he, " he knows we are talking about the 
 landlord. He knows his name as well as I do, and the creature 
 always cries and roars when he hears his name mentioned." 
 
 Oh, many a trial the poor Irish have endured during the last six 
 years ! Many a volume could be filled with the cruel persecution of 
 the faithful Irish. From Galway to America, the track of the ship 
 is marked by the whitened bones of the murdered Irish that lie 
 along the bottom of the abysses of the moaning ocean. And yet 
 those that have reached the friendly shore still drag a heavy chain 
 which binds them to their native land ; still they long to see their 
 own beloved hills, and lay their bones mth the ancient dead of their 
 Faith and their kindred. And if death summons them beyond the 
 Mississippi, or amidst the snows of Canada, or the pestilence of 
 Mexico, they turn their fading eyes towards the day-star that rises 
 over Ireland, and their last prayer is offered to Heaven for the 
 liberty of their country — the last sigh to God is made for the fi-ee- 
 dom of her altars. 
 
10 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Rev, Dr. Cahill's Address to the Catholics of 
 Glasgow, 
 
 I R. CHAIEMAN, Ladies and Gentlemen, — I am laboring 
 on the present occasion under a deficiency, for which I am 
 convinced you will pardon me, namely, I am afraid you 
 will not understand me in consequence of my Irish accent. I 
 now beg to tell you, with the deepest feeling of a lasting gratitude, 
 that, although I have received many marks of_ public favor hereto- 
 fore in Ireland and in England, I have never found myself placed in 
 a position of such exalted distinction as on the [)resent occasion. 
 Surrounded as I am, not by hundreds but by thousands of gentle- 
 men and ladies, by priests and people, I return my homage for your 
 advocacy, on this evening, of a great principle in thus honoring the 
 individual who now addresses you. 
 
 Your eloquent and valued address, written on satin in golden 
 letters, shall be preserved by me as long as I live ; it is a model of 
 exquisite taste, and conveys impressions of affection which I shall 
 carefully bind up with the most cherished feelings of my life ; but 
 there is an eloquence of soul which the golden ink could not ex- 
 press ; and that silent thrilling language must be read in the merry 
 faces, the sparkling looks, and ardent bosoms which reveal to my 
 inmost heart the sincerity and the intensity of your feeling towards 
 me. 
 
 In associating me in the most remote connection wth the great 
 O'Connell, you do me an honor which would raise even a great man 
 to imperishable fame ; as you illume me with a ray from that im- 
 mortal name which sheds unfading lustre on the records of Ireland's 
 saddest and brightest history, and which will live in the burning 
 affections of the remotest posterity of a grateful country. I am 
 
EEV. DR. CAHILL. ^l 
 
 like a jolly-boat following a line-of-battle ship, as I move in the 
 foaming track of this leviathan giiardship of Ireland. Large as I 
 am, I am lost in the spray of the rudder ; and no one who has ever 
 witnessed the discharge of his broadside against the enemy, heard 
 the thunder of his command, or saw the fatal precision of his aim, 
 will ever think of comparing any living man to the great de])arted 
 Irish champion. And it was not the fault of our old commander if 
 his invincible barque did not convey the liberties of his country to 
 a successful issue — he sailed in shallow water, he was stranded by 
 necessity ; but no one has ever dared to say that either he or his gal- 
 lant crew ever quailed before danger, or struck their colors to the 
 enemy. And when the returning tide rises and the breeze freshens, 
 the old noble ship shall again set her sails before the wind ; and, 
 changing her name from Eopeal to National E(][uality, her fearless 
 crew shall again shout for freedom, and, with some future O'Connell 
 at the helm, she will and shall again face the storm, and ride the 
 swollen flood in pride and triumph. 
 
 Whenever I go to Dublin, I pay a sorrowing visit to the tomb of 
 our old commander, where I shed a tear over his ashes and plant a 
 flower on his grave. I mourn for the lip of fire which was -.vont to 
 kindle into resistless flame our universal patriotism ; I grieve for the 
 melting tongue that could dissolve the whole national will into a 
 flood of resistless combination ; and as I gaze on the dark vault that 
 spans the horizon of Ireland, and see pretty stars shining in the 
 Irish skies, I weep as I think on the brilliant sun that once careered 
 in these skies in peerless splendor, the luminary which guided our 
 destinies for upwards of half a century, but which now, alas ! has 
 set forever below the saddening west of time, leaving the crimson 
 clouds, like funeral drapery, to shroud the fading twilight that hangs 
 over his departed memory. 
 
 Oh, if he had lived to stand on the heights of Ireland, as the 
 churchyards during the last seven yeai's sent their united wail of woe 
 across our stricken land ; oh, if he had lived to gaze on the red 
 waves of the Atlantic, and heard the wild sinking shriek of Irish 
 despair, wafted from the moaning abysses of the deep, as our kindred 
 perished on their exiled voyage — he, and he alone, could raise a cry 
 of horror which would be heai'd in the ends of the earth — could 
 shake the foundation of the nations, and wrench justice from eA^en 
 
12 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the iron bosoms of our cruel oppressors. None but he could pro- 
 nounce the funeral oration of the Irish, for he had a voice that could 
 fill the world and enchain the attention of mankind ; and he alone 
 had a heart to express the greatness, the perfection, the fidelity, the 
 sufierings and the death-struggles of his unfortunate country. He 
 was Ireland's own son, the impersonation of her own heart — and he 
 alone could sit at her bedside and speak words of consolation for the 
 extermination and the massacre of her defenceless children. 
 
 Your allusion to my public letters makes me very happy. There 
 can be no doubt that England has endeavored, since the year 1815, to 
 bring to a successful issue the largest conspiracy ever perhaps known 
 in the whole world. When she placed Louis XVIII. on the throne 
 of France, after the battle of Waterloo, she found herself for the 
 first time, for the last seven hundred years, virtually directing the 
 politics and practically planning the counsels of France. This was 
 a bright opening to her intrigues and ambition ; and from this period 
 may he dated the commencement of a scheme which, for hypocrisy, 
 anarchy, deceit, and infidelity, has no parallel in the history of the 
 civilized world. 
 
 Secure in organizing an English party in France, she next jii'o- 
 ceeded to enslave to her views poor Spain, alrcadj' demoralized, 
 plundered, weakened and exhausted by the presence of two contend- 
 ing armies. England, therefore, first planned the separation of her 
 South American dependencies and allies, and hence she revolution- 
 ized all that territory into petty republics, and located a powerful, 
 designing party iu the Republics of Guatemala, Chili, Peru, Colom- 
 bia, La Plata and Montevideo. Spain herself thus became an easy 
 prey to her perfidious diplomacy; and hence, in the year 1832, she 
 changed the succession to the throne, divided the nation into two 
 hostile factions, and raised up at the Court an English party, which 
 governs there at the present moment. She even made a bargain, 
 which I am able to prove from undisputed documents, to lend money 
 to the Queen's party, on condition of guaranteeing to her the repay- 
 ment of the funds so given from the confiscation of all the Church 
 property of the nation. 
 
 In the year 1833 she carried out the same design precisely in 
 Portugal ; placed the daughter of a rebel son on the throne, advanced 
 money for the execution of this palpable rebellion, on the condition 
 
REV. DK. CAUILL. 13 
 
 of being repaid in the same way, — namely, the confiscation of all the 
 Church property in Portugal. Here again she planted her English 
 party, who rule to this day the kingdom of Portugal. And with 
 such desperate fidelity did England carry out her plans, that, within 
 two j'ears, she sold the churches in both countries, and converted 
 them into theatres ; she took possession of all the convents in Spain, 
 both male and female ; she seized all the large convents in Portugal ; 
 she banished from their cloisters one hundred and fifteen thousand 
 monks, friars and nuns, who perished of hunger, affliction, and a 
 broken heart. The debt due to England by Spain has been already 
 paid ; but I am in a position to prove that the wretched Portuguese 
 have not as yet cleared off their unholy national mortgage to the 
 English bankers, who, twenty yeai's ago, advanced the money on 
 English government security. 
 
 The Duke of Wellington has received many Protestant hiurels 
 from his campaign in Spain, and the partial historian pronounces 
 glowing panegyrics on his honor and character in the Peninsular War. 
 True, he paid, in gold principally, for the food of the English army 
 there ; but he inflicted a thousand times more injury on that country 
 than the plundering army of the French. Under pretence of depriv- 
 ing the French of any point of attack on the English, he threw down 
 the Spanish factories, burned their machinery, beggared their mer- 
 chants, ruined their commerce from that day to this, and has thus 
 been a greater enemy to Spain than the most savage Hun that ever 
 spread death and desolation over that fine country. 
 
 I must tell 3'ou an anecdote of Wellington. About the j^ear 1816, 
 there was a tavern in old Barrack Street, having over the door " the 
 sign of the old goat." The tavern keeper made a fortune by the 
 call of the County Meath graziers, who frequented his house. He 
 gave his daughter in marriage to a young man on the opposite side 
 of the street, who, seeing the good luck of his father-in-law, set up 
 a public house in opposition to the old man, and he, too, placed "the 
 sign of the goat" over his door to deceive the customers. The old 
 man then, in retaliation, wrote, in large printed letters, under his 
 sign, "the real old goat." But soon changing his mind, as the Bat- 
 tle of Waterloo had taken place tbe year before, he ordered a painter 
 to draw out the Duke of Wellington iu full military costume in place 
 of the old goat. The painter did execute the work, but he forgot to 
 
14 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 efiace the words of the old sign ; and there the Duke of Wellington 
 appeared with the General's truncheon in his hand, and having the 
 words, " the real old goat," written under him. I tell you, now, 
 that the real old goat was the most persecuting foe, the most deadly 
 enemy, that Spain ever saw. 
 
 The English conspirators being now secure in the principal thrones 
 of Europe, proceeded to Austria, where they encouraged the civil 
 war which has reddened the soil in human gore, and has eventuated 
 in the most disastrous results to that great Catholic country. Not a 
 city, town, village, in Austria or Hungary, in which an English 
 agent was not found woi'king like the devil in his vocation of civil 
 strife and national revolution ; and it is an admitted fact, that the 
 English party had become very powerful through every part of the 
 empire. But Switzerland was the great focus, where the English 
 party openly avowed their sentiments, and publicly threatened the 
 Catholic po\Fers of Europe with immediate civil revolution. 
 
 The world will be surjjrised to hear that the English party and 
 their confederates amounted in that country alone to the astounding 
 number of seventy-three thousand sworn enemies of Catholic mon- 
 archy. I here pledge myself before this assembl}' to prove the per- 
 fect accuracy of this st-itement. They next spread themselves into 
 Naples, where the King, unaware of this English conspiracy, 
 admitted them into his confidence, and gave them official places 
 in his public schools. They ultimately succeeded in forming a per- 
 fect network over the whole surface of Europe ; and while they were 
 laboring to lay the materials of a universal explosion beneath all the 
 Catholic thrones, they were confederating all the Protestant powers 
 to act with one simultaneous efibrt when the day of their matured 
 plans should have aiTived. 
 
 During all this time England appeared kind to Ireland ; spoke 
 largely of the Catholic monarchy in the Queen's speeches, and talked 
 of honor and international law. But under this exterior of good 
 feelings she preserved feelings of the bitterest private rancor towards 
 universal Catholic policy. 
 
 This conduct reminds me of an old Tory grand juror, from the 
 hanging town of Trim, in Ireland, during the judicial reign of Lord 
 Norbury. It was in the year 1818, when O'Connell was working for 
 Emancipation. This old gentleman had dined with Norbury, heard 
 
REV. BR CAHILL. ]^5 
 
 him speak against Catholic Emancipation, — took too much cham- 
 pagne, and fell in a ditch on his way home. He wore a fashionable 
 red waistcoat, and a turkeycock seeing the red color, flew to him in 
 the ditch, and commenced blubbering over the head of the juror. 
 He fancied it was Lord Norbury who was still inveighing against 
 Emancipation ; and whenever the turkeycock paused in his blubber- 
 ing elocution, the old juror would exclaim, "Quite true, my lord; 
 these are noble sentiments, worthy of your lordship, and highly hon- 
 orable to the Crown." ' Here the turkeycock would again resume, 
 and cry out " blubber, blubber, blubber," to which the old Bruns- 
 wicker would reply, — "I agree with your lordship ; your remarks 
 proceed from true Protestant principles worthy of a Bishop, and they 
 eloquently defend our Holy Chiu-ch ; I always admired your language 
 as the ornament of the bench, and we both shall die sooner than 
 retract one word of your brilliant speech, or emancipate these Cath- 
 olic rebels." Now, here was an old fellow so drunk that he could 
 not distinguish between Lord Norbury and a turkeycock, and yet 
 the devilment of bigotry was so much in him that he would not agree 
 to unchain the very men, who, perhaps, sat by his side on that day, 
 and for whom he had pretended to entertain feelings of friendship 
 and toleration. 
 
 Up to the year 1846, the office of a British minister seemed to be 
 revolutionizing the neighboring States and making royal matches. 
 They have attempted to place a Coburg in all the royal palaces of 
 Europe, and to transfuse the influence of England into the blood of 
 several roj^al houses. Not a revolutionist in Europe who was not the 
 intimate friend and correspondent of the English Foreign Secretary. 
 The very men most abhorred in their own country were received at 
 all the English embassies ; and thei"e could be no mistake that Eng- 
 land advocated their cause, approved their scheme's, and assisted 
 their machinations. Every rebel foreigner appealed to England for 
 advice, and in his difficulty flew to her for protection. 
 
 Concomitantly with this political scheme, the English Bible Socie- 
 ties, under the protection of England, sent their emissaries into all 
 these countries ; and by misrepresentation of the Catholic doctrine, 
 by lies of the grossest invention, and by bribery, they opened a 
 campaign of proselytism in every Catholic city in Europe, and 
 united their efforts against Catholicity with three resident conspira- 
 
26 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tors against monarchy. The lodging-houses, the hotels, and the 
 watering places, were everywhere filled with a swarm of soupers, 
 and biblemen, tourists, novelists, naval officers, military men, 
 young lords, correspondents of the London press, were to be found 
 at every town of the European continent, all pressing forward to 
 carry one point, namely, the slander of the Catholic priesthood. 
 Stories about convents, lies about priests, anecdotes of monks, filled 
 thousands of nicely bound small volumes, and sold at all the railway 
 stations in England ; and no less a sum than five million pounds 
 were annually expended by these societies through Europe in this 
 flagitious work of calumny, lies, profanation, and perjurj'. 
 
 Not au embassador, an attache, a charge d'affaires, a messenger, 
 was employed in our diplomatic circles who was not as unprincipled 
 a writer as Sir Francis Head, as conceited a historical libeller as 
 Macuulay, as great a hypocrite as Sir Stratford Canning, as ridicu- 
 lous a souper as young Peel, and as mean a bigot as Sir Henry 
 Bulwer. Not a man would be acci'edited to any Court who had not 
 the kidney of Shaftesbury, the rancor of Palmerston, and the intol- 
 erance of Russell. It was a strange sight, indeed, to behold other 
 names, which I shall not meirtion, teaching sanctity by corruption, 
 publishing faith by infidelity, propagating truth by lies, enforcing 
 purity by profligacy, and really worshipping God by the devil. 
 
 Fortunately for the cause of religion and of order, this doubly 
 infamous conspiracy has been wholly detected and laid before the 
 gaze of mankind : most propitiously, Louis Napoleon has succeeded 
 in rescuing France from an abj'ss of national disaster, and most 
 providentially ever^' Catholic country has escaped an awful catas- 
 trophe ; and they all now, by a united reaction, have detected 
 England's perfidy ; have banished her spies from their respective 
 territories ; have degraded her diplomatists ; insulted her name ; 
 banished her from their international councils ; and at this moment, 
 she hangs her head like a convict, in the presence of foreign courts 
 — the detected assassin, the perfidious enemy of the religion and 
 the liberties of Catholic Europe. 
 
 All these men are now defeated and degraded ; Russell is a dis- 
 carded hanger-on, waiting at St. .Stephen's behind the chair of a 
 successful rival ; Palmerston, like an ill-conducted servant, has been 
 reduced from Foreign Secretary to a detective sujierintendent of 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. \J 
 
 police ; and like an old jaded actor, who once took a first part iu 
 the performance, but being ultimately unable to act, still clings to 
 the stage, and earns his bread in a minor office, we behold in pity 
 the Foreign Minister, once the terror of Louis Phillippe — once 
 sneeping the Mediterranean with an invincible fleet — now reduced 
 to be a crown prosecutor against his former companions at Old 
 Bailey by day, while at night he receives a precarious employment, 
 snuffing the candles behind the scenes at Lord Aberdeen's benefit. 
 
 Lord Palmerston's fate reminds me of a man in the County Lei- 
 trim — a terrible bigot — who, during one of the paroxysms of a 
 brain fever, fancied that one of his legs turned Catholic. In his 
 indignation at seeing Popery contaminating his Protestant person, 
 he jumped out of a window to kill the Catholic leg, but he unfortu- 
 nately fell on the Protestant leg, and he limped on the Protestant 
 leg all the days of his life after. Poor Palmerston, I think, will 
 have an unbecoming halt during his life on his Protestant leg. 
 
 In what a proud contrast does not Lord Aberdeen appear in refer- 
 ence to his Whig predecessoi's. The friend of the Catholics, the 
 advocate of justice, the enlightened and consistent supporter of 
 toleration, he has won our willing veneration, and has earned the 
 respect of Christian Europe. No bigot, no hypocrite, no persecu- 
 tor, he has already gone far to heal the wounds of former adminis- 
 trations ; and by perseverance iu his honorable career, he will 
 succeed in due time in removing the contempt, and suspicion, and 
 the hatred, in which the British Government and the Protestant 
 creed have been held during the last few years by the Catholic 
 sovereigns and people of Europe. Many a million of money this 
 British fanaticism will yet cost England in the maintenance of an 
 army to defend her shores against the numerous enemies she has 
 made ; and the Protestant Church will soon learn to her cost, that 
 her lies and infidelities will yet concentrate upon her the just indig- 
 nation of mankind, and, at no distant period, will sweep her tenets 
 and her name from the map of Christian Europe. 
 
 When I use the word "England," I do not mean the noble, gener- 
 ous people of England; no, I mean the mean, the perfidious, the 
 persecuting Government of England. And all Europe now under- 
 stands this distinction as well as we do ; we thank God that England 
 is at length detected, convicted, and degraded all over the world. 
 
18 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 At this moment, whenever she speaks of civil liberty, all the world 
 calls her liar, tyrant, assassin ; whenever she talks of liberty of con- 
 science, all Europe scouts her as a persecutor, a hypocrite, an 
 unblushing slanderer ; whenever she attemjDts to introduce the name 
 of God, and to talk of sanctity, and of English Christianity, all 
 Europe burst out into an immoderate fit of laugliter, and cries 
 shame at her, and points to her treachery, her scandals, her murders, 
 her suicides, her blasphemies, her infidelities, her crimes, her enor- 
 mities ; and mankind considers Sodom and Gomorrah, and Bal^ylon, 
 as so many earthly paradises in comparison of the multitudinous 
 sinfulness of England. 
 
 She is met in every market-place in Europe at this moment, and 
 called liar, and demon ; her embassadoi's are jibed at this moment 
 at every court in Europe, and called hypocrites, soupers, infidels ; 
 and her travellers, tourists, correspondents, are watched in every 
 corner of Europe, as so many burglars, assassins, and demons of 
 naked infidelity. The Lord be praised, she is caught at last. Yes, 
 Ireland shall soon be free from English persecution, and from the 
 oppression of the Protestant establishment. 
 
 Two curses have been inflicted on Ireland, namely, the rackrent- 
 ing landlords, and the accursed tithes. These two embodiments of 
 malediction have bent Ireland to the earth, and have crushed her, 
 body and soul ; and like a swarm of locusts, they ate up every green 
 and living thing, and left nothing behind but the flint of the land. 
 After centuries of this oppression, it suddenly pleases our rulers to 
 make a law of Free Trade. No one, more than I do, advocates tiie 
 principle of cheap broad for the workingman, and of employment 
 for his children in the mechanical arts of commerce. But the prin- 
 ciple has introduced a scene of woe, which no pencil can paint. 
 The poor are exterminated, the ditches are crowded with the weak 
 and aged ; the poor-houses are charnel-places of pestilence and 
 death; and the emigrant ship, like an ocean hearse, is sailing with 
 her flag of distress hoisted, moving slowly through the waves, as 
 she throws out her putrid dead ; and, like the telegraph company 
 laying down their submarine wires, the crews of the emigrant ships 
 have learned, by long practice, to tell off a line of the Irish dead 
 along the bottom of the deep, and at the same time to sail six or seven 
 knots an hour. England has practised them in this ocean sepulture. 
 
REV. DR. C AH ILL. 29 
 
 SO that, before the end of the year 1849, they could smoke, tell off 
 the winding sheets, and sail, all at the same time, from this dexter- 
 ous, nautical, cholera practice. 
 
 Slen there are who assert that the Government could not avoid 
 this catastrophe. I answer, it is a cruel lie. If there must be a 
 change in the laws of trade, well, then, let it be made ; but let the 
 law-makers bear the respousibility. If they must have a new law, 
 well, then, let them pay for their whims ; let them make compensa- 
 tion for the damaging results of their own free, deliberate acts. 
 They say the law is good in priuciiile ; I answer, but bad in detail. 
 They say it has healthy premises ; I reply yes, and a deadly conclu- 
 sion. They say, it is perfect in argument ; but I assert, it is mur- 
 der in practice. They assert, it is the law ; but I resume, and say, 
 so much the worse — it legalizes and authorizes the public massacre 
 of the people. This is a legal mockery, to hear the legislators tell 
 the dying, starving, rotting peasant, that he ought to be quite con- 
 tent with his lot, since he dies a constitutional death, he will be 
 buried according to law, in a Parliamentary chui'chyard, and will 
 sleep till the day of judgment in a logical grave. 
 
 I am no politician ; all I know is, that the English laws have 
 killed the people ; and what care I for the principle of Protection, 
 or the logic of Free Trade, if the triumph of either party murder the 
 poor. And I reply to the free-trader and to the merchant, and to 
 the Cobden's school, by saj'ing, If you will and must have your way, 
 then be prepared for the consequences, meet the consequences, pay. 
 for the consequences — if there is to be suffering, then let the guilty 
 suffer — punish the landlords — aiflict the money-lenders — exter- 
 minate the House of Commons — murder the English Cabinets — 
 extirpate the Protestant church — yes, punish the guilty who pro- 
 duced the catastrophe : if there will be a famine, then buy bread for 
 the dying, give them the twenty millions of gold j^ou have in the 
 Treasury ; add twenty millions more to the national debt if neces- 
 sary — treat the Irish with the same justice as yon have treated the 
 slaves of Jamaica — do pay for your own acts — do punish the guilty 
 
 — but in the name of honor, truth, justice, humanity, and in the 
 sacred name of oaths pledged and ratified at the foot of the throne, 
 do not punish the innocent poor — spare the unoffending peasantry 
 
 — shield the defenceless tenantry who trusted you ; do not massacre 
 
20 ■ TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the millions who confided in your former laws, and as you have done 
 it — and massacred all Ireland trusting in you — I swear, before high 
 Heaven, that you have mixed up a curse with your bread, which 
 will eat into the marrow of your bones; and you have awakened in 
 the swelling bosom of Irishmen, a flame of legitimate anger which 
 will never be quenched, till you shall have made satisfaction for the 
 sutterings, the extermination, the expatriation, the death, and I shall 
 add, the massacre of the unoffending children of Ireland. 
 
KEV. DR. CAHILL. £1 
 
 Rev, Dr, Cahill's Lecture, 
 
 Delivered at the Academt of Music, New York, March 17th, 
 1860. — "The Fidelity of Ireland in Defence of her 
 Liberties and her Ancient Eeligion." 
 
 IpiADIES AND GENTLEMEN, — I assure you, though I have 
 . IJH had the pleasure of meeting you here before, I never was so 
 (^Jlii) completely overpowered in my life as upon the present occa- 
 .•^w. sion. I have made a bow to you as gracefully as I could, 
 
 ^ endeavoring to acknowledge the compliment you have paid 
 me, but that was with the front of my head. As thei'e are a great 
 many of my friends at my back, and as I am not able to make a bow 
 with the back of my head, permit me to turn about and make a bow 
 to the ladies and gentlemen behind me. I am endeavoring to take 
 in breath to give myself voice to fill this most extensive hall. Since 
 I have had the pleasure of being here with you, I have addressed 
 large assemblies in the city of New York and elsewhere ; but 
 whether it is the height of the hall, or whether it is my excitement, 
 I think this is the largest assembly I have ever seen in the whole 
 course of my life. I never shall forget the compliment paid to me 
 to come here this day. It is not so much the delight of meeting 
 you here as the delight I experienced in witnessing your glorious 
 procession. I came from the city of Troy yesterday. (A voice — 
 Where were you?) I like to see you all up to concert pitch, and I 
 would be a bad performer, indeed, if we don't have abundance of 
 melody this evening. I little thought of the glorious satisfaction 
 that awaited mc in looking at your procession. I assure you I never 
 felt more proud of Irishmen than on this day. I have been told that 
 if I had been present at the Cathedral this morning I would have 
 
22 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 learned eloquence from the most beautiful and polished discourse of 
 the gentleman who preached there to-day. I am sorry I could not 
 be there. It is a loss I shall regret as long as I live. 
 
 When I went out to look at the procession I was delighted to see 
 the number of banners, the cap of liberty over the harp of Ireland ; 
 and what I Avas very glad to see was the American flag side l)y side 
 with every banner as it passed my hotel. The stars and stripes went, 
 if I may use the phrase, hand in hand with the harp of Ireland. 
 How I longed to be a great man, as I saw every one uncover his 
 head as he passed the statue of Washington. I was delighted to see 
 such worship, if I may so speak, offered to the memory of the dead. 
 Thousands of men taking off their hats and bonding themselves in 
 humble posture as they passed by the "Father of his Country." I 
 was delighted to see one man drive six horses, but my astonishment 
 was drowned when eight horses came afterwards, to see the crowded 
 reins in the hands of the skilful driver. Then I Ijeheld the men clad 
 in armor passing along, and I saw the forest of steel lifted above the 
 barp of Ireland. A suggestive idea presented itself to my mind as 
 I saw brave men, in regular military step, with their muskets lifted, 
 their bayonets fixed, and there, going before, beside, and after, the 
 glorious harp of Ireland. 
 
 I saw the cavalry, the soldiers mounted on their beautiful horses, 
 and they held their swords so much to my taste, and they moved so 
 regular, and the whole procession was so orderly. There were Ire- 
 land and America joined in the two emblems, the Irish harp and the 
 American stripes and stars. But I was greatly astonished when I 
 saw a man driving twelve horses. The horses seemed to go by the 
 same kind of sense as if they were twelve human beings. When I 
 saw the driver with the bundle of reins in his hand, and the horses 
 ntoving with such regularity and precision, I said, I would like to 
 know the name of that driver. That man must be from Tipperary, 
 and his name O'Connell, for that is just the way O'Connell used to 
 drive a coach and four through every act of Parliament. 
 
 So you see I have been looking sharply ; and my weakness was 
 such, if you so call it, that, as the whole scene passed before me, 
 and my heart upon Ireland, tears, Irish tears, stood in my eyes. 
 Perhaps these tears made the men look bigger and finer, but I 
 thought they were the finest men I ever saw. I have seen the 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 23 
 
 rreuch, Austrian, and English armies ; I have seen two hundred and 
 fifty thousand men under arms ; but somehow or other, knowing that 
 the greater part of those passing before me were my countrymen, I 
 toolv it into my head, from magnifying them in my heart, that they 
 were the largest men I ever.saw. My feelings were more than excited 
 when I heard the beautiful band. Will you give me leave humbly to 
 say that I am a musician, and that I have heard in this city about the 
 best instrumental music I ever heard in my life. To-day the tunes 
 were all Irish, — " St. Patrick's Day," "Garryowen," "Nancy Dawson," 
 the " Young May Moon," the " Sprig of Shillelah ;" but the tune 
 which quite astonished me — I don't know what you call it here — 
 and that reminded me of my boyhood, was " Tatter Jack Welch." 
 I listened to them all with the greatest pleasure ; I was delighted 
 with them. A thousand thoughts passed through my mind. My 
 mind on that occasion was like a postman's letter-bag ; everything 
 was in it. I did uot laugh ; I had to cry. Had I been by accident 
 or otherwise in the back room when the procession passed, I should 
 have lost a glorious scene, which I shall tell of mauy a time vvheu I 
 return to my own country. 
 
 We are all here to celebrate the great festival of St. Patrick. I 
 am sure everybody will agree in saying that this is a great day for 
 Ireland, as well as for the entire Christian world. It is certainly a 
 great day for Ireland — the greatest we have. But if you only reflect 
 for a moment and read history, you will find that it is equally true 
 to say that it is a great day for the whole Christian world. 
 
 I siqDpose you do not forget that I have the shamrocks here 
 next to my heart. When I was coming from Ireland, I intended to 
 get a flower-pot made out of the clay of the County of Meath, and 
 a sprig of shamrock from the same soil, and put it in my trunk, and 
 bring the real shamrock to you ; but I have replaced it by an excel- 
 lent American shamrock, whose leaves are broader than those of the 
 Irish. 
 
 Men meet in America upon stated occasions to celebrate the mem- 
 ory of their great politicians ; if I may so speak, to worship the 
 heroes of their country. From the time of the Grecian empire to 
 the preseuf period this has been customary in all nations. Men 
 meet together to celebrate the memory of the man who struck off a 
 link from the chain of his country ; the memory of the poet, who 
 
24 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 elevated the genius of his nation by his divine poetical creation ; or 
 the memory of the artist, whatever art he may be engaged in ; and 
 all mankind rejoice, and feel pleasure and enthusiasm as they go for- 
 ward, to point to the genius of one of their countrymen. But what 
 signify art, and sculpture, and poetry, and patriotism, compared with. 
 Christianity ? 
 
 When we celebrate the memory of a saint, a universal joy is felt 
 in his country. Poets, sculptors, and politicians, and historians, and 
 painters, — they certainly generate a feeling peculiar to the various 
 departments for which they excel. Men celebrate the principle, but 
 do not imitate the men. We not only celebrate the principles of 
 St. Patrick, but try to imitate him in practice. The Christian's anni- 
 versary is superior to every other, because mankind not only wor- 
 ship the principle for which a saint or martyr died, but being a saint 
 and Christian, his memory is calculated to awaken an idea and 
 enthusiasm, not only to respect his principles, but to follow his 
 example in practice. Therefore, the anniversary of St. Patrick sur- 
 passes in that regard every other anniversary which can be brought 
 to jDublic notice. 
 
 St. Patrick rose over Ireland like a star in the west, and, like the 
 stars fixed in the blue vault of heaven, there he has remained from 
 that hour to this, not obscured by the storms of that country, and 
 not lessened in his lustre by all the eflbrts of man to distui'b the seed 
 which he planted ; and there he remains unobscurcdin the clear Irish 
 skies (clear in religion) ; and as fiir as human forethought can go, and 
 human sagacity can calculate, it is highly probable that Patrick's star 
 will never set in that west. This anniversary is therefore a glorious 
 day for Ireland. What a trifling incident laid the foundation for the 
 conversion and future character of Ireland ! A small boy on the 
 coast of France — a lad, sixteen years of age — was captured by 
 the Irish. I do not really like to call them Irish pirates, but some 
 historians say they were ; but whatever they were, they captured 
 Patrick at the age of sixteen and carried him to Ireland. He 
 attended swine on the mountains of Antrim and elsewhere for seven 
 years. His capture broke his father's and his mother's heart. All 
 his kindred bewailed him. His uncle, a bishop, was inconsolable. 
 He was a beautiful, fine j'oung man, guileless, and while upon th& 
 seashore was captured l)y Irish pirates, torn from his home, and sub- 
 
REV. DR. C A HILL. 25- 
 
 jected to a vassalage so low that he was commanded to attend swine 
 in the north of Ireland. We all saj'how unprofitable, how unhappy, 
 how unfortunate ! Yes, that is our logic ; but let us look at the logic 
 of the skies, and we shall see how fortunate, how happy, how glori- 
 ous, how consoling to Patrick himself and all his friends, and to the 
 entire Christian world. The logic of God is very different from the 
 logic of men. 
 
 When the people of old, about the year 1800 of the world, — that 
 is about 2200 j'ears before the birth of our Saviour, — went to build 
 the Tower of Babel, and built it very high, as a place of a refuge in 
 order to protect their kings and themselves in case of another universal 
 deluge, there was man's logic. God saw them building it ; the men went 
 to their work, and he confounded all their languages. The mason 
 called for mortar, the hodman brought up stone ; called for brick, 
 the hodman brought up wood ; and they were so confounded they 
 had to give up the work. You say. How trifling that is. Could He 
 not have shaken it down by an earthquake ? Could He not strike it 
 with lightning ? Could He not send His spirits and scatter it to the 
 winds? Yes, He could ; but He has a particular way of His own. 
 
 Twenty-two hundred years after that, St. Peter preached his first 
 sermon iu the streets of Jerusalem, a poor fisherman, an humble 
 man, illiterate ; and everybody said, " What, this is the poor fisher- 
 man speaking all our languages from the Black Sea, from Byzantium, 
 from ]\IesopoIamia, and all the neighboring countries. Here is this 
 poor fisherman speaking all our languages," — and three thousand 
 men became converted in a day. 
 
 Now, if God had not confounded their languages, they would all 
 have spoken one language, and Peter could not have performed that 
 miracle ; and, therefore, the thing that we I'egard so foolish in the 
 year 1800 of the world, turned out to be the most glorious fact after 
 the death of our Lord, and after the sermon of Peter. Hence, the 
 thing that looked so foolish in the eyes of man was glorious in the 
 eyes of God, a fact which ought not to be forgotten. So the little 
 incident of St. Patrick being captured and brought into Ireland, in 
 place of being unfortunate, is the most glorious fact related in the 
 entire history of the Christian world. In our logic, we lay our pre- 
 mises in the morning and draw our conclusions in the evening. We 
 lay down our premises, for example, at twelve o'clock, and draw our 
 
26 TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 conclusions at two or three, but God often lays down His premises 
 thousands of years back, and He will draw His conclusions twenty 
 centuries afterwards ; slow, but certain, like all great works ; and as 
 invincible, and as imperturbable, and certain as His own exist- 
 ence. 
 
 After having remained in the country seven years, by the same 
 miraculous guidance by which he was brought into Ireland, Patrick 
 escaped; but having escaped, and recollecting the condition of the 
 Irish, he was so moved that he determined to devote himself to the 
 Church : and he spent about twenty-two years preparing himself for 
 the priesthood by study ; and after twenty-two years, a long time 
 preparing for the priesthood, and preparing for the bishopric, he 
 presented himself to one of our greatest Popes, Pope Celestiue, who 
 gave him authority to go to Ireland. Accompanied by twenty fel- 
 low-laborers he landed in Ireland ^vith the Cross about the end of the 
 fourth century. Some say it was about the middle, but all admit 
 that it was the middle or the end of the fourth century, about 372. 
 
 Thus, from the simple incident of being captui'ed and carried to 
 Ireland, came his idea of becoming a priest and bishop, and after- 
 ward the great Apostle for the conversion of our country. St. Pat- 
 rick, therefore, carried out his labor like a true Apostle, and there 
 is no instance related in history of such success and such extents of 
 territory travei'sed. The number of bishops he ordained is miracu- 
 lous ; the number of churches — religious houses — he established is 
 wonderful. After converting the whole country, and after making 
 it into a garden of Christianity, he died, full of years, one of the 
 most remarkable men of whom any account is given on the page of 
 ecclesiastical history. He died about the year 441, near the middle 
 of the fifth century. Ireland, after its conversion, became the semi- 
 nary of Europe. The arts and sciences were taught there. 
 
 The churches that were built and the colleges that were constructed, 
 and the entire number of schools and seminai-ies, rendered Ireland, 
 bej'^ond dispute, the unrivalled seminary of Europe ; and we were so 
 happy. There was never so happy a nation as Ireland at that time. 
 Ireland was then engaged in trade with all the countries around the 
 Mediterranean. We traded with Egypt, with old Pagan Carthage, 
 and with Spain. I assure you that, while some writers represent us 
 ^s very ignorant from tlie fifth century up to the invasion by the 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 27 
 
 Danes, yet the Irish were as civilized, independent of religion, as 
 perhaps any northern nation of Europe ; and some go so far as to 
 state that the best of our poetry, and the highest of our musical com- 
 positions, are borrowed from that time. Other musicians dispute 
 that, but do not deny that Ireland was very high in the arts and sci- 
 ences, as well as being unrivalled in her religious profession, from 
 the middle of the fifth to the end of the eighth century. But, oh ! 
 the baneful effects of national divisions ! As your historian and fel- 
 low-countryman, delivering a lecture for you, I can conceal nothing 
 from you. I may say something that will hurt myself; but, beyond 
 all dispute, it is an unfortunate national character, from that period 
 to this, that Ireland has had multiplied divisions. We have had five 
 kings in those days, all rivals, —kings envy kings, — kings quarrel- 
 ing about their territory, and in various disputes, which tarnished 
 very much, indeed, the reign of religion. These five kings made 
 five divisions, which, I firmly believe, laid the foundation of our 
 national disputes. We are all cousins of a king. There being five 
 kings, and there being a very limited territory for each, each Irish- 
 man was a cousin of the king, or the king's wife. We are a royal 
 race, and will not admit that anybody in the world has better blood 
 in his veins than ours. Along with the divisions created by a hostile 
 countiy, I say positively that these five kings laid that deep founda- 
 tion of national discontent which has been the greatest misfortune of 
 our race. This chronic dissension is not in the nature of the people ; 
 it is in the soil ; the people are good, are very good ; but to be bora 
 in Ireland is to be an agitator. " I knew," said a certain person, 
 " of a man's going to where two factions were going to fight. ' AVhat 
 brings 3'ou here?' said the parish priest; 'you don't belong to the 
 Gowans or the Murphys.' ' No," says he, 'I don't.' 'What brings 
 you here ? ' 'I come here to fight on my own account.' " 
 
 Another enemy of ours, to show that the quarrelsomeness of the 
 Irish is due to the soil, says : " You may see in the Liverpool market 
 all the cattle of England together, the Berkshire, Devonshire, and 
 all the shires ; there they all are. They lay down with their legs 
 like the four legs of a table ; but bring in one Irish cow, and there's 
 a battle for the whole of them." 
 
 I have a problem in history to propose. You know I have been 
 a long time a professor of history. What a pity it is that, when Julius 
 
28 TREASURY OF ELOQUEJNCK 
 
 Caesar came to England, seventy-five years before the birth of our 
 Lord, he didn't conquer IreUmd as well as England, and teach us 
 unity. If we had been conquered in those days we should have been 
 united, we should have had the English principle in us, and we 
 should have avoided the disaster of being chained for more than ten 
 centuries. Another problem is, what is the reason that the Irish, 
 who are so fiiithful to one religious principle all over the world, can- 
 not be united in politics? I answer, because their religious leaders 
 never betrayed them, and the others always did. It would have 
 been, therefore, advantageous decidedly if that problem of history 
 had been carried out, and if Rome, in the year 75 B. C, having con- 
 quered Great Britain, had also conquered Ireland, and taught us 
 unity. That would have kept us together, instead of our being 
 chained and persecuted by a foreign, hostile nation. I have other 
 problems in history that I will leave you to answer yourselves ; I 
 •will not answer them. 
 
 Christianity was known in Rome early in the first century, where 
 Paul preached it. It was known in France at the end of the first and 
 the beginning of the second century. It was known in Ireland ia 
 the year 372 (St. Patrick) ; it was known in England 596 (Augus- 
 tine) ; it was known in America 1492 (Columbus and his followers) ; 
 it is not yet known in Tartary, and had it been, with the electric 
 telegraph as we now have it, we would have heard of it in three 
 weeks. 
 
 God does everything by human means, guided supernaturally, of 
 course. We have got the Gospel in our mouths, and we have to be 
 the heralds, and not angels, for it is spread all over the world, and 
 we have to carry the Cross, not upon the wings of the lightning, but 
 upon our own shoulders. I will give you a fact : Christianity took 
 fifteen centuries to travel here, and it is not yet known in Tartary, 
 where it would have been known if there had been civilization the 
 same as here, showing that civilization aids materially in the propa- 
 gation of the Gospel, a point not to be forgotten. Now we have 
 passed over, if I may so call it, the early history of Ireland. From 
 the fifth to the eighth century we were very happy, with the ex- 
 ception of those divisions which invited the Danes to invade us. I 
 begin at the foundation-stone of the history of Ireland, and I will 
 bring my beloved countrymen, step by step, but briefly, from the 
 foundation up to the present moment. 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 
 
 29 
 
 Divided by our kings, we were invaded by the Danes, and were 
 presecuted for over two centuries by them. Our churches and libra- 
 ries were burned, and our best records destroyed. It was only in the 
 eleventh century that they were finally conquered by Brian Boroinihe 
 at Clontai'f. During the invasion, religion, education, civilization, 
 literature, and our history all suffered, and we were thrown into a 
 state of barbarism from which we afterwards emerged with great 
 difiiculty. 
 
 The Roman Empire fell iu the fifth century. Its downfall com- 
 menced in the second century. The Romans left England in the 
 year 441, about the time St. Patrick died; they were called home 
 to defend Italy, under Valentine, their Emperor. They fell shortly 
 after that — about thirty j'ears ; that is, about the year 475. Spain, 
 France, Barbary, in Africa, and Asia Minor, all formerly depend- 
 ants, mere provinces of Rome, now assumed their independence. 
 There was one universal war from about the year 475 up to the 
 eleventh century ; and all the dependent nations recovered their 
 liberty from the great tyrannical power, which held sixty millions of 
 slaves. "Will you say you are accurate?" lam. There were 
 sixty millions of slaves in that one empire, comprising half of Asia, 
 half of Africa, and almost the whole of Europe. These slaves were 
 among the chief agents who afterward conquered that country. 
 When Rome was overturned all the dependent countries went to 
 war. What was the consequence? Ireland, being far from the 
 seat of war, cultivated and taught the arts and sciences ; and foreign 
 nations sent their chiklren to Ireland to be educated. France and 
 Spain were at war defending their liberty, while we were undis- 
 turbed. We had, therefore, a large number of foreign chiklren 
 with us, cultivating the sciences. It was in the times of these dis- 
 turbances among foreign nations that very many entered the monas- 
 teries. That was God's logic. He saw that all these countries 
 would be deluged with blood, that carnage would deface the fields 
 of Europe. He saw that, perhaps, religion might fall temporarily 
 under these sad catastrophes of national disturbance, and therefore 
 he inspired thousands of men to go into the monastery. They were 
 freed from the services of war ; and they preserved the light of 
 literature and the blaze of religion that otherwise would have be- 
 come extinct. We preserved it in Ireland in the same way. The 
 
30 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 monks preserved it in those various ages c.illed the Dark Ages — 
 dark ages of the military laity, but not of the Church. Ireland was 
 not subject to these difficulties, and was then the seminary of Europe. 
 I can count no less than eight nations who would be obliged to ac- 
 knowledge that it was upon the altar of religion in Ireland that they 
 lighted their torches, and brought back faith and learning from our 
 own country to their own. 
 
 I now come to the worst page of Irish history. It is not a page, 
 it is a book, a book of national woe. Irish division, Irish royal 
 rivalship, and Irish want of trust in each other beti-ayed Ireland into 
 the hands of England. Dermott McMurrogh, an Irish king, being 
 beaten by one of his peers, went over to England and called for as- 
 sistance from England ; and he got it. Then were forged the chains 
 which we have been dragging from that hour to this : and then were 
 formed the fetters and the manacles which we have had upon our 
 feet and hands from that awful hour to the present moment — when 
 Ireland sold Ireland unto a hostile neighboring country ; and Henry 
 II. came over to enjoy the triumph on that occasion, with about 
 four hundred sail, in the year 1172. We were given over, bound: 
 hand and foot, to a powerful, hostile, united nation; and is it a. 
 wonder that our country, weak and divided, fell a victim to this 
 powerful and formidable confederacy ? Then were forged the chains 
 which from that hour to this have held us in subjection to a country 
 hostile to our liberty. "Is there no one," said Henr}' II., "to rid 
 me of this man?" meaning Thomas a Becket, the Archbishop of 
 Canterbury. And to Henry II. has been laid the guilt of instigat- 
 ing the murder of that man. He has been accused from that hour 
 to this of instigating the death of the Bishop ; and he came over to 
 Ireland with his hands red with the innocent blood of a Roman 
 Catholic prelate. 
 
 What could be expected of his successor? John began to reign 
 in 1199, and died 1216. He reigned seventeen years, and he was 
 the greatest tyrant our religion and our country ever had. His 
 soldiers with their swords cut down the corn, and left the people to 
 perish. He was the first man that forced the Irish to eat the grass 
 of the field. Remember what I say, and may j'ou never be sul)ject 
 to it, that when one man gets power over another man, he will never 
 part with his grasp but with his life. The most terrible thing in the 
 
REV. BR. CAHILL. 32 
 
 world is to give one man power over another man ; for when he gets 
 the power he will never part with it. John had that power, and he 
 persecuted us. He restrained our bishop and persecuted our priest, 
 thinking to seduce our bishops. John was a Catholic ; but there is 
 nobody in the world a greater enemy to his Church than a bad 
 Catholic, I will not say a nominal Catholic. But a bad man a 
 Catholic is the worst man in the world. He is a coward, knave, 
 that man ; he is a base impostor, that man ; he is an infidel, hj'po- 
 crite, that man. I could point out a powerful king at this moment 
 who has been persecuting us during these last seven years, who is 
 continual in his persecution, and among all the enemies of our faith 
 in Europe, that man is decidedly without exception one of the most 
 dreadful, diabolical, and formidable enemies of the Catholic Church. 
 To give 3'ou an idea of John's hatred of our race, I will state a 
 fact of history. When his army was quartered in Kilkenny, where 
 the young women were, as they are now, the most beautiful in Ire- 
 land, a regulation was made that every soldier that married a Kil- 
 kenny lady should get fifty lashes. Out of a regiment of 700 men, 
 699 of them got the lashes. If there are any lulkenny ladies here 
 to-night, they ought to show forth their gratitude Jiy giving a cheer 
 for the 699. Now, omitting any intermediate points, I will pass on 
 down to the times of Elizabeth, 1558. As I do not want to talk 
 bitter politics in this religious lecture, I will pass on through the 
 reigns of the Johns and the Henrys until I come to 1558. No Cath- 
 olic man could occupy but an acre of arable land and a half acre of 
 bog. How could they live upon an acre of arable land and a half 
 acre of bog? They did, however. The monasteries were all thrown 
 down. The churches to this day have the marks of the cannon-balls 
 in them, and many a time have I got out of my gig or from my horse 
 and gone into those churches and surveyed the walls, and taken oif 
 my hat for every stone in the wall. I have often stood beside these 
 broken and shattered walls, and musing said, "Hei'e are these old 
 walls broken and tottering on their foundation and covered with ivy. 
 They look like old fellows of a hundi'cd years of age, trying to stand 
 to tell their grandchildren what they saw when they were young 
 men. Tottering on their foundation, persisting against storm and 
 tide, striving to stand as long as they can, as it were to tell the un- 
 born genei'ations what they suffered for the Faith." How often have 
 
32 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 I pulled oS the ivy which clung to the stones found about these old 
 churches. I have often taken the ivy and put it in my pocket- 
 book, and said, " You mantled these towers heretofore in their orig- 
 inal pride and glory ; and now, faithful ivy, you cling to them with 
 fidelity when their fragments lie upon the ground in forgotten ruin." 
 I have made out the altar and the priest's grave. How often have I 
 stood where the altar was, and how often have I stood where the 
 priest's grave was, and said, " O God, if I could wish to make a 
 speech, this is the place. I would like to stand on the martyred 
 ashes of this pdor fellow. I would like to stand here at night when 
 the moon is setting, and when she casts her pale light above the 
 horizon. I would like to be in this old church." And I have said, 
 "O martyred priest, will you send some of the warmth of the spirit 
 you had when alive to teach me to speak with 3'our spirit in defence 
 of my country and my religion." 
 
 I remember the history of the poor priests in those days. With 
 a reward of £5 for their heads, they went from house to house, and 
 no one ever betrayed them. I remember a visit some time ago to 
 Donegal, with Dr. McKeuuey, who pointed out to me the Mass-rocks 
 and the slated points where the poor priests used to meet their flocks 
 at night ; and many a time on a Simday and a Monday the sun rose 
 on their familiar devotions, and at daybreak the priest was breaking 
 the bread of life to the poor children. They celebrated the Mass 
 under the broad canopy of the skies, in the sight of God and the 
 angels in heaven. I said to him, "These were the daj-s when the 
 priest entered the hearts of liis people, and he has remained there 
 from that day to this ; a spot from whence we are never dislodged 
 unless we cease to do our duty." He showed me the place wliere 
 one priest, McDonald, used to meet his flock. "Ah," said he at one 
 time to his flock, " I cannot meet j'ou in the daylight, but I will 
 come out at night. I am the shepherd, and I will whistle in the dark, 
 and then the sheep will know that the shepherd is present, and it 
 will repel the approach of the wolf. I will hold the whistle in my 
 mouth, and at night I will whistle, and my flock will hear it ; it will 
 keep them together ; it will repel the hostile step of the wolf." 
 It was upon those days that we used to meet the congregation at the 
 cross-roads, and from the practice of putting money in his hand to 
 keep him from starvation has come that glorious habit of giving a 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 33 
 
 shilling to the priest when he met his flock. I do not like it now, 
 but I would keep it up forever, in memory of those daj's. In those 
 days of persecution we never flinched, and such courage and in- 
 trepidity as were exhibited by the priests and the people of Ii'eland 
 during several centuries cannot be produced from any other portion 
 of history. For five centuries, Catholics and Protestants, one for 
 conquest and the other for bigotry, opposed our faith, and an Irish- 
 man never flinched. We lost scarcely a man from our ranks. We 
 stood together hand and foot, neck and shoulder, and w© have pre- 
 served to this day the very faith which we now advocate. 
 
 To give you an idea of the hatred in Ireland of a country which 
 oppressed us so long — I do not like to mention names ; but a most 
 eminent convert in Ireland, an Englishman, has been preaching in 
 Ireland what has been called a crusade for the conversion of Eng- 
 land, and asking every one to pay a certain sum and to be partici- 
 pants in the crusade with him ; and he thought to get us into this 
 crusade. Preaching this crusade at a certain parish, he thought he 
 had them all converted. When the congregation came around him 
 in the yard to see what kind of a man he was, he said, "Well, boys, 
 I hope j^ou listened to me." " We did, indeed." " Won't you pray 
 for England?" "Bedad, sir, if it does not displease you, we would 
 rather not." "But don't you like to see the English all saved?" 
 "Well, to tell you the truth, we would as soon see them as they 
 are." "You would not like to see them go to heaven?" "We 
 would rather see them going the way they are going." " But it is your 
 duty, since they are your enemies, to heap coals of fire on their 
 head." "Oh, faith, we'll do that ; we will heap them on as long as 
 you like." 
 
 In those days the Irish had to quit the country and go to the 
 mountains. Seventy thousand were banished, and the rest quit the 
 soil and went to the mountains, and they remained there, and when 
 Elizabeth died the possessors of the soil had it all to themselves. 
 And they said, "All this soil will do so very little good unless it is 
 cultivated, and we might as well bring them poor fellows down from 
 the mountains to cultivate the soil." And that was the first posses- 
 sion in Ireland, coming down from the mountains, taking a misei*- 
 able cottage or house, and cultivating the soil for the masters. And 
 that became the rule for a number of years after. After the death 
 
34 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of Elizabeth, we took into our head that her successor would be veiy 
 kind ; but it was far worse in a certain way. He even thought to 
 change our names. . He was the first, you know, that thought to 
 change our names, and he sought, in some cases, to make our names 
 like the English names. 
 
 And, therefore, all the McNeils in tlie north of Ireland, and the 
 McGuires, the O'Donnells, and the O'Neils, and all the other great 
 names in the north of Ireland, he undertook to change into Baker, 
 Smith, Grayson, Mason, Birch, Salmon, Pike, Herring, Brown, 
 Steele. He did not succeed to a great extent, and he banished them 
 out of the country. You can scarcely believe all that we suffered in 
 the time of James. We suffered a great deal from him, luit after 
 him we came to the worst of :dl, Cromwell. 
 
 [Dr. Cahill here related an anecdote of au Irishman going into the 
 west of England to apply for a day's work. The Englishman 
 replied, "I will not give it." "Why?" "A countryman of yours 
 came here last year, was six weeks sick, which cost me a good deal, 
 and his coffin and his burial cost me more." " Ah," replied the 
 Irishman, "if that is the only trouble, I will settle that with you 
 directly. I will get a character from nine English gentlemen to show 
 you I never died anywhei'e yet."] 
 
 I do not like to tell you what was done by his army in Drogheda 
 and Wexford. The young men had their brains beaten out against 
 the wall, and the babes were hurled into the air and caught upon 
 their pikes when coming down. There never was such a scene as 
 the daily intercourse of Ireland presented for four or five centuries. 
 When I have related our sufferings to the French, they could not 
 believe it. Said they, " How could you endure it? It was beyond 
 endurance." We have endured it, however, from that day to this. 
 There was no reign in which cruelty, tyranny and barbarity were 
 more in requisition, for the purpose of changing the faith of the 
 people, than that of Cromwell ; and yet not a single man abandoned 
 our ranks, or flinched from his duty. After Cromwell was removed 
 in 1660 (he reigned eleven years) , we came into the reign of William 
 and Mary, and instead of that being to our advantage, it was a reign 
 of greater persecution than au}^ before it, and put Irish fidelity to a 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 35 
 
 greater test in those days than, jserhaps, any other reign. It was a 
 persecution under a difierent aspect, to be sure, but still a cruel per- 
 secution. Shiel, our great Irish orator, once, in talking of that, 
 said, " What a shame that any government should permit this con- 
 tinual assault upon the Catholic faith. Surely every man would go 
 for the overthrow of such a government as that." Shiel worked his 
 way as an Irish orator of great power, and he aided very materially 
 in advancing the cause of emancipation. 
 
 Next came the reign of the Georges. We were then promised 
 education, and fair trial by jury ; but when the education came, it 
 was offered to us like a cup of poison, and the boon which was 
 boasted of all over Europe was such that we were unable to accept 
 it. We were unable to make use of our most elementary books. 
 Trial by jury was offered us, it is true, but it was made a real 
 mockery. We have one instance upon record of a certain trial being 
 got up in the reign of George III. A man was accused of murder, 
 and put in the dock ; witnesses were called, and a verdict of " Guilty " 
 having being brought in, the judge was putting on his black cap to 
 pronounce the sentence, when the man that was supposed to be dead 
 walked into the court. The counsel for the prisoner said, "Here is 
 the dead man ; he is alive, and, of courte, the A'erdict is wrong." 
 The judge took off his caj) and addressed the jury. " Gentlemen," 
 said he, "this is a most remarkable case. The man that was sup- 
 posed to be murdered is here, and is certainly alive. Your verdict 
 is, at the same time, quite correct. The testimony of the witnesses 
 gave you what is called moral evidence, and you pronounced what 
 is called a moral verdict ; that is, a thing that is morally true, but 
 not metaphysically true. It is possible that you could make a mis- 
 take, but there is no possibility of a mistake being made here. The 
 man is alive. So, while your verdict is before me as a moral verdict, 
 the man being alive stands before me as a metaphysical verdict. One 
 will admit of a mistake, but this cannot. You will have to go back 
 and reconsider your verdict." Tiiey did so, and in about ten minutes 
 they returned with a verdict of " Guilty." Said the judge, " How can 
 that be?" " Why, we will tell you. He stole a gray mare from one 
 of us about ten years ago." So they brought him in guilty of mur- 
 der for stealing a horse. If this were told of in any other part of the 
 world, persons would say that this was a fable. But the bigotry was 
 
36 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 SO great, the hostility was so great, that when we were about to hope 
 for emancipation, they were anxious to extinguish that hope : and 
 every enormity that seemed necessary for the purpose was readily 
 resorted to. 
 
 We come noAV to a late period of our history. Begin at the old 
 Babylonian Empire, the Persian Empire, the Eg^qitian, and Persian, 
 and Roman Empires, go through all the older Empires, and come 
 down all along through history, and I appeal to you as your his- 
 torian and countryman whether there is an instance on record of a 
 nation suffering so much. Is it not astonishing to every scholar 
 all over the world, and yet, here we are as heiu-ty as ever, as if noth- 
 ing had ever happened? You look as merry to me and you laugh as 
 hearty as if I were addressing you in the town of Cloumel, and you 
 look better, I think. You are even heartier fellows than then, and 
 you are all laughing together at the misfortunes of seven hundred 
 years. Do you recollect that beautiful passage of Moore? — 
 
 " Let Fate do her worst, there are relics of J03', 
 Bright dreams of the past, wliich she cannot destroy ; 
 Which come in the night-time of sorrow and care, 
 And bring baclc the features that joy used to wear. 
 Long, long Ije my heart with such memories filled! 
 Like the vase, in which roses have once been distilled; 
 You may break, you may shatter the vase, if you will, 
 But the scent of the roses will hang round it still." 
 
 We are not broken, and here we are as hearty as ever, as if noth- 
 ing had ever happened. It is not our fidelity that is so remarkable 
 as the buoyant spirit which follows us through the world. 
 
 I come now to our own times. You did not see that, though I did ; 
 perhaps a great ni:mbcr of you have seen it and heard of it, though 
 none of you have seen it as I have — I allude to the famine and 
 fever, when men went into their houses and sat upon their beds 
 and died of hunger, and women went in, and sat in their beds with 
 their little children, and died also of hunger. Men would be talking 
 to you as I now do, and die in a half minute. A cousin of mine, a 
 priest by the name of Brennan, who attended the Charity Hospital 
 in Dul>liu, used to carry a coffin from bed to bed, and say, "Now, 
 recollect that you will be in this in half an hour." They used to ask 
 him to turn back and come again, Init if he turned buck they would 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 37 
 
 be dead. Men would be walking along the road staggering ; you 
 ask thera what was the matter, they would reply, " We have the 
 famine fever." "Where are you going?" "To the fever hospital." 
 It was a sleepy fever that seized upon the heart as if a clockmaker 
 took the pendulum and made its oscillations less and less imtil it 
 stopped entirely. The blood grew less and less rapid in circulation, 
 and the poor fellows, as if their legs were of a ton's weight, staggered 
 along from their homes to the hospital. Their lands were given up 
 and they were sold in those days for the taxes, and many a man 
 made a fortune at that time. I know several lands in the west of 
 Ireland that were sold for the taxes. Men would give them up for 
 a trifle in order to get away, giving up the holding of sixty, seventy 
 and a hundred acres. The potatoes failed, and that was the heaviest 
 curse that ever fell upon Ireland — I will not say the heaviest curse, 
 but the heaviest trial. The church-yards are yet red with the blood 
 of the dead, buried without coffins. Can a man describe hell to 
 please the fancy ? How can a man walk over the graveyard of the 
 uncoffined dead and speak with politeness? Whenever I took. my 
 pen in hand to wi-ito upon these horrors, I found my blood run quick 
 and my Irish mind rise high and bitter in enthusiasm, and I was 
 obliged almost to dip my pen in blood in order to express the 
 anguish which agitated my very soul. We lost two and one-half 
 millions of our people. There is many a woman hSre before me, and 
 many a young man here who, if he told me his own case, would 
 equal my history. Notwithstanding the famine fever, the pycst of 
 your Church never left you. We walked into the houses of our 
 flock, we put our mouths upon your ear, and your mouth upon our 
 ear, and have we ever left you as long as the breath was in you ; 
 have we ever neglected to stand by your side ? It is not therefore 
 wonderful that I assume a tone of command over you, and dare to 
 speak to you with the command I now use, and insist upon j^our good 
 conduct ; we who would have died with your father, your mother, and 
 your children, who are prepared to spill our blood on every fitting 
 occasion for the purpose of maintaining the liberty of our country 
 and the freedom of our altars. I saw this famine and looked at it. 
 Of those that left the country 10,000 alone perished at Grosse Isle. 
 Two thousand perished with famine and scarlet fever, and those 
 two thousand lay in Sligo field for two days without an awning over 
 
38 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 them, and yet there were 24,000,000 pounds of gold in the British 
 Treasury. Who can paint that but an Irisliman, and who could tell 
 it in such language as an Irishman, with an Irish tongue in his 
 mouth ? If I were the best orator in the world and spoke the Eng- 
 lish language with the English accent, why it would not do at all. 
 It must be in the native Irish tongue. There were two and a half 
 millions of our people gone by the fiimine, and soupism, and exter- 
 mination. What was the next? Soup! striving to change our 
 religion for a bowl of soup. They came over to instruct us in their 
 religion, to change our faith, — and who were they who came ? 
 They wei-e old discarded policemen from England, weavers from 
 Manchester, cabmen from Loudon, — and these are the men that 
 came over to teach us religion. One of them who was teaching us 
 religion assumed the strong accent upon which they spoke, and said, 
 Whenever you mention tlie name of the Lord " mahk a boo " ; mean- 
 ing, of course, make a bow. A droll Irishman said, "These men 
 deserve to be encouraged. I'll tell you what they are going to give 
 us" (they used to give us food, and clothes, and employment, and 
 money). This droll fellow said, " They I'oally do give a good deal; 
 the fellows that join them will be well oil'; thej- will have employ- 
 ment, food, ten shillings a week in this world, and coals for all eter- 
 nity." Another fellow who came over to teach us religion, always, 
 when he said " upon his conscience," laid his hand upon his stomach. 
 These were the men who came over to tempt us from our faith, but 
 they l(jft work after thousands and tens of thousands of pounds were 
 expended. These were called soupists, and we heard several instan- 
 ces where they passed by the door of the cabin of a poor man, and 
 said, " Now we can give you food and work if you will join us " ; and 
 the poor fellow said, "Ah, no, no, I will never clothe my children in 
 perjury ; I will never fatten my wife by hypocrisy ; I will never 
 clothe my children with the wages of perjury, and no man might give 
 me to drink though presented in a cup of gold. It shall never touch 
 my lips, when the price of it is the betrayal of the Cross of Christ." 
 They spent thousands and tens and hundreds of thousands, and not 
 a man was ever converted. They said they came to give us the 
 Bible, and they said that they gave out a million of Bibles. I said, 
 according to that, every man, woman and child among the Catholics 
 ought to have three Bibles, the child on the breast ought to have 
 
KEV. DR. CAIIILL. 39 
 
 three Bibles, and I gave a challenge to produce me an}' one man who 
 ever received one from any one of them. We had our own Bible ; 
 we did not want their Bible. I also gave a challenge to produce any- 
 other man who ever saw them read a Bible g(jt from them, or to pro- 
 duce another man who ever saw any other man that over read of any 
 other man that read a Bible got from them. Yet, according to their 
 statement, the child at the breast would have three Bibles. After 
 the soupists came the exterminationists. Depth below depth, preci- 
 pice below precipice, a bottomless hell below a hell, — is it not a 
 wonder that we are alive ? 
 
 No man could believe, going through Clare, the extermination that 
 took place in those days. There were miles of the road, and no one 
 in it. During the famine fever I saw little children perfectly well, 
 except wanting food, with not a smile on their face. The little chil- 
 dren starving, and ie^er in their house, their father or mother dead, 
 and the little things sat by the walls, and crept about without a smile 
 in their fiices. Lamentation covered the country like a cloud. Did 
 you ever hear the case of the widow Burns ? Her first boy died, and 
 the neighbors came and dug the grave very deep. He died of fam- 
 ine fever. Then the second boy died, and she carried him on her 
 hack, and with a common shovel she lifted the fresh clay and depos- 
 ited the second sou over the first. The third son died, and she car- 
 ried the third upon her back and deposited him in the grave over the 
 second; and the fourth and fifth died, and the coffin came near to 
 the surface, and finally the jjoor widow died. Two women came to 
 bury her, — grateful woman ! She will go after her husband through 
 seas and seas, through fire and water. And when the men quailed, 
 and were afraid to enter the door of the dead, two women came, and 
 they laid the handle of the shovel along her dead body, and sur- 
 rounded her with wisps of grass, and they carried the poor woman, 
 one taking hold of one end of the shovel, and the other taking the 
 other end, and laid her on the coflins of her five sons. There is 
 famine fever for you, and there is extermination. There were two 
 and a half millions of our people lost. Many a man driven out at 
 that time has come to this country. If I could coin my heart into 
 gi'atitude, I would do so, and give it to the American people to 
 express my gratitude for their giving to my countrymen a home. I 
 
40 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 never meet with an American gentleman but that I wish to express 
 my heai'tfelt gratitude to him for the hospitality, for the home which 
 his country gave to my poor expatriated countrymen. 
 
 Now, when I go to the cattle shows "in Ireland and hear them 
 extolled, I am compelled to say, Why don't you tell the whole truth? 
 We have two ways of talking. A man that suppresses the truth is 
 one kind of a liar, and a man that suggests falsehood is another kind 
 of liar. ^Miy don't j'ou express the whole truth? You say that 
 your country is prosperous. Yes, it is the prosperity of the bee- 
 hive, when part of the bees are killed off to make room for the rest. 
 The country is prosperous by the murder of two million and a half 
 of Irish inhabitants. W^hy do j'ou praise that bullock? Don't you 
 know that he is the representative of a murdered family ? I cannot 
 bear to look at him, because I know that he occupies the place of a 
 poor Irishman, and his wife, and his children. These abominable 
 cattle shows ! I cannot endure them. Besides, they are not the 
 property of the people, but of the aristocracy ; they don't represent 
 the property of the farmers. Thej^ have been fattened upon the land 
 of the poor. The cattle shows are said to represent the prosperity of 
 the people. They represent the prosperity of the aristocracy. You 
 may as well say that the aristocrac}', with their richly-dressed wives 
 and servants in livery, represent the people. They have nothing to 
 do with the people of Ireland. The people of Ireland have been 
 banished to make wa}' for these cattle. Two and a half millit)ns of 
 our people have been murdered. Don't call this the policy of amel- 
 ioration ; it is the policy of exterminating one-half of the beehive 
 that the remainder may the better live. 
 
 Now, you have nearly the whole case of Ireland from the begin- 
 ning. It is getting late, and I must close. I am sorry that when 
 this meeting was called, they did not tell you to bring your night- 
 caps. 
 
 Not a man abandoned his faith ; no man flinched under eight hun- 
 dred years of persecution fov the purpose of overturning our faith. 
 Therefore it is just to say that no other nation has borne perse- 
 cution so long, and that no other nation has ever stood the 
 trial with such invinciljle faithfulness. I therefore ask you, as my 
 Irish fellow-countrymen, to look at the logic of God. Who knows- 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 41 
 
 but your expatriation and lodge in this country has been the logic of 
 God ? AYho knows but there is a great logic in this case ? Every man 
 who comes to this country comes as a minister of God. He main- 
 tains his faith ; and when he comes here under favorable circum- 
 stances, he gives his money to the building of a little chapel. An 
 Irishman has some faults, to be sure ; but whenever called upon to 
 subscribe for his religion, his hand. and his heart are always readj^ to 
 answer the call. The Irishman with his penny built all the churches 
 of Liverpool. The Irishman with his penny built all the churches of 
 London. I do not know whether I am correct, but I venture the 
 assertion that the Irishmen of New York have built most of your 
 churches here. The Irishman, faithful to his instinct and to his 
 national faith, never flinches in any part of the world. Eeligion 
 lives in him as it were fire in the flint. As you have only to strike 
 the flint with the steel and the spark will fly from it, — so, though 
 you may not see his religion, it will be manifested at once as soon as- 
 you subject him to temptation. Everywhere I have gone I have 
 called upon bishops and priests, and when I have asked them, 
 " What is the main stay of j^our religion ? " they have always replied, 
 " The Irish girls." Who knows but there is a great logic in our 
 expatriation ? If you and I were always at home in prosperity and 
 happiness, and we had money in the treasury, and we had armies 
 and conquest before us, do you think we would have more saints from 
 Ireland than now in our national adversity ? If the secrets of Heaven 
 were known, if we could consult His books. He would say to us, 
 Remain as you are ; the lessons of adversity which He preacheth are 
 lessons of salvation. Look at our Lord as he sits by the side of His 
 Father. What was His position ? He walked with His bai'e feet, 
 "with the crown of thorns upon His head. Has He not put His own 
 coat of suffering and humiliation upon your backs ? Does it not 
 show you to be more His child when dressed in His own livery? Do 
 not complain of your position. The logic of God is to gather more 
 from adversity than from national prosperity. And recollect, the 
 crown of Christ is not known by being set in precious stones. The 
 majesty of Christ is not recognized by a crown set with precious 
 stones, but by the crown of thorns. Who knows, if we were to 
 know the logic of God, that it would not be in our fevor ; and while 
 
42 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 temporal difficulties may pursue us, and while we are outcasts in 
 certain quarters, who knows but that in God's mind our present 
 position is one of the highest He can give us ? Wherever we go, let 
 us recollect two points : the first, to preserve our nationality, the 
 union of the race ; and the second, never to flinch from the faithful 
 profession of our national religion. 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 43 
 
 The Immaculate Conception, 
 
 A Seemon Delivered by Rev. Dr. Cahill, in St. James' Cathe- 
 dral, Brooklyn, on Sunday, March 25, 1860, foe the Benefit 
 OF THE Sisters or Mercy. 
 
 1^,EAEEST BRETHREN, — Mankind since tlie beginning of the 
 §^^ world never saw such a day as the anniversary we are now 
 f^ met to celebrate. This is the 25th of March, the date of the 
 1. Annunciation of the Blessed Virgin, the festival being put off 
 
 till to-morrow, but we meet to celebrate it on this day for a purpose 
 of my own, and I again repeat that up to that period and perhaps 
 since, mankind never did or never will behold such a day as the an- 
 niversary we now celebrate. God the Father, in a week painted the 
 skies — a great work. He took out His imperial compasses, and He 
 swej^t the wide arch of the Universe and within the circle He put all 
 things that the eye can behold. He painted the gorgeous and glo- 
 rious colors that we see above us. But the day that the Second 
 Person of the Trinity, the Son of God, deigned to unite Himself 
 with our nature — to descend as it were from His throne to unite 
 Himself with man, to elevate man to Heaven, above the angels — 
 the day that He did this is without exception the greatest and the 
 most glorious that mankind ever met to celebrate. 
 
 You are aware that when Adam fell the gates of Heaven were 
 bolted against him and his posterity. But yesterday a heap of clay, 
 to-day an organized being with an immortal soul, who could have 
 ever supposed he could rebel against God, his Father — his Creator? 
 Who could have supposed that he would have been so mad as to 
 forfeit for an apple his glorious privileges? The day Heaven was 
 bolted against him his race was excluded, the earth on which he stood 
 
44 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 was cursed, God withdrew his immediate pati'onage from him, and. 
 the darkness of night settled down lil\e a cloud over the whole earth. 
 But see how great is the justice of God, how impenetrable His ways, 
 how unsearchable His judgments, what may be called His just ven- 
 geance after thousands of j^ears, during which the earth was covered 
 with pitch darkness and man excluded, only to be saved by a belief 
 in a future day of hope. It is on this day that Heaven begins to l)e 
 reconciled to man, and the Second Person of the Trinity begins to 
 be united with our nature. Think till fancy is exhausted, and who 
 could have supposed that a rebel could be so lifted. The Son of God, 
 long before the foundation of the world was laid, long before the 
 Heaven of the angels was formed, long before a single creature was 
 created, long before Adam was made, addressed His Father and said : 
 Father, it is written in the head of the book that You could not be 
 pleased with the blood of goats and oxen. It is written in the head 
 of the book, in tlfe very first of Our transactions, that these sacri- 
 fices could not please You, and behold I come to ofi'er myself. ]\Ian 
 will fall — I know it, because I see into futurity. I know that Adam 
 will fall and I know that he can never redeem himself. How could 
 darkness produce light? How could crime produce virtue? How 
 can the rebel who is finite, pay off a deljt which is infinite? How 
 can fiaity pay infinity? Therefore, Father, do You recollect it was 
 entered into the book of Our transactions — it was not even at the 
 end of the first page, but it was in the beginning of the first page — 
 what St. Paul calls the masterpiece of the power and wisdom of 
 God. Man cannot pay You, therefore I stand before You in My 
 bare head, and I say, pour upon My head the vials of Your wrath. 
 Under the imputability of sin here I come as the only mode of com- 
 pensation, and i^our upon Me the vials of Your reddest wrath. 
 
 Four thousand years elapsed before that eternal promise was 
 fulfilled, but as sure as God lives that promise was to be fulfilled, 
 and therefore this is the day — the 25th of March — when the Angel 
 Gabriel announced to Mary that this great compact was to be realized, 
 and that God was to be united with man. And He stood before the 
 throne of God as a criminal to pay the infinite debt which Adam in- 
 curred by his transgression. This is decidedly the most important 
 fact that ever the Church of God could celebrate. I have, therefore, 
 taken advantage of this festival to discuss fur 3"ou one of the most 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 45 
 
 beautiful dograa.s of our taith, the Immaculate Conception of the 
 ever Blessed Virgin. But before I enter upon my subject I must 
 again return to a second view of the fact I have published to you, 
 namely, the fall of man. 
 
 If man had never fallen, all the writers that speak upon the subject 
 say, what a glorious place this earth would be. If man had never 
 fallen he would have been innocent, guileless, without sin, without 
 crime, faultless, no death, of course, for "death is the punishment 
 of sin" — such is the beautiful language of the Church. If he had 
 not fallen or sinned he would have had no fault, and how could 
 a being without fault be punished? An honest man would not 
 punish him, and certainly God would not. What a beautiful thought 
 of these sacred writers. Man, therefore, would finish his course 
 upon the earth, and when the time would expire that God allotted, 
 he would rise like a spark to Heaven. 
 
 At present there are about eleven hundred millions on the earth, 
 and about six hundred and forty thousand die every day, so that 
 every day more than half a million appear before the tribunal of 
 God. What an awful idea that is ! If, therefore, man had not 
 sinned, the same number would appear before the presence of God, 
 and be received into Heaven. Would it not have been easier for 
 God, you ask, to have all men appear from the depths of the sea 
 and the bowels of the earth at the last day, than to have them come 
 before Him when they die ? It was God's intention before man had 
 sinned, that when he had finished his earthly career he should rise 
 like a spark to the skies ; but he has now oi'dered it otherwise, iind 
 therefore at the last day all the dead shall arise at the sound of the 
 trumpet, and all mankind shall be gathered together to receive their 
 final judgment. Now, what a beautiful territory this earth would be 
 if there was no sin ; it is as perfect as omnipotence could make it, 
 given the material of which it is composed — the Omnipotent Power 
 could not make it better than it is. The only things by which it is 
 deformed are sin and death. All the irregularities which we see 
 arise from these, and were it not for sin and death we could look at 
 the blue vault over our heads, and admire its gorgeous beauty with- 
 out being oppressed with the thought that the earth beneath was 
 ■cursed b)' the transgression of man. 
 
 But how can any one be happy with death, the punishment of sin, 
 
46 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 and all its attendant evils. What a terrific punishment it is to lose 
 one's senses, to have our eyes glazed in death, to be hated and 
 abhorred by our nearest friends, to be put into a cofl5n, nailed up, 
 put into the earth, and devoured by worms. Who ever heard any- 
 thing like the sound of the clay falling upon the lid of the colBn. 
 And the woman that loves her daughter most hates her when she is 
 dead. She would not stay in the room in the dark with her ; she 
 would not sleep with her for all the world. Now, it is the same 
 way in Heaven. The fondest mother saved will abhor the daughter 
 damned. I come back to this world for my proof, and I say, " Why 
 is it, fond mother, you cannot embrace your dead, foul, putrid 
 daughter? " Because she is in a position in opposition to me — that 
 is, in death ; and when you are at the throne of God, you love every- 
 thing He loves ; His mind is your mind. His will is your will ; He 
 pierces you as the sunlight pierces the glass, you are filled with His 
 essence, His mind is identified with your mind, you like what He 
 likes, hate what He hates, but above all, you are an immortal, eter- 
 nal life, while your daughter is an immortal, eternal death, and your 
 abhorrence rises in proportion as eternity I'ises above this world. 
 What a terrific thing is sin, then, to be the cause of this death. 
 And we ha/e death everywhere — death in the air, death in the 
 water, death in the fire, death in our food, death in every pore of 
 the body, death from the hand of the assassin. How can any one be 
 happy in an eternity where all is death, the result of sin. 
 
 And if any one of you would now propose me the question — 
 " When Christ died, as you just said to us, did he atone for all the 
 transgressions of man?" He did. When His Father poured the 
 vial of His red wrath on His head did Ho make sufficient atonement? 
 He did ; for one drop of His l>lood was enough. He not only atoned 
 but multiplied atonement by infinity. You reply — " Is therefore 
 the debt of the damned not paid?" Yes, and more than paid. 
 " Why is not death removed, if the whole debt is more than paid ? " 
 I will tell you. Although God His Father has forgiven crime as to 
 its eternal punishment, he still leaves a temporal punishment be- 
 hind, to remind the sinner not to commit it again. On the present 
 point the grave is my proof. There is the atonement infinitely 
 beyond what is necessary ; that is my first proof, and the grave is 
 my second. Forgiven? We are more than forgiven, but when you 
 
KEY. DR. CAHILL. 47 
 
 see the fresh grave dug there is the temporal penalty ; and when you 
 see that the saint died, and the little baby coffined and carried to 
 the churchyard after being baptized — put in a little coffin, with its 
 little breastplate — the baby inside but a day old — and when I 
 meet a man of this world I say, " Stand, if you please ; let us accom- 
 pany this little fancral till I speak one sentence in your ear : Had 
 that child committed any crime of its own, personally?" "No." 
 "Why is it killed?" "Because it is the descendant of Adam, the 
 original rebel." "Oh! punishment for his crime ? " "Decidedly.'' 
 His eternal guilt forgiven, no doubt; and it has no personal sin to 
 sully the pureness of the soul — but a day old, and yet the imperial 
 lash is lifted over its head : it spai'es no one, the king, the beggar, 
 the saint, the sinner, the little baptized baby — all are to die under 
 the lash as the result of original sin. "And pray, sir," I am asked, 
 "if you now commit a mortal sin of your own, have you to do pen- 
 ance for it ? " 
 
 If the baby that committed no sin, but merely belongs to the race 
 of the rebel, and his crime is forgiven — the punishment of the grave 
 still remaining — and you commit a new sin of your own, will you 
 answer me, ai-e you not to perform penance for it? I appeal to the 
 grave, and I say you are bound to do penance all the days of your 
 life till the grave closes. I say, there is my proof, and if you com- 
 mit a new sin of your own is it not a clear case you are bound to 
 begin your penance even though the eternal guilt is forgiven? If 
 any man told you, God is good, you are forgiven- — I say yes, but 
 the grave is there, and it is an imperturbable fact ; everything shows 
 that. What a glorious day, therefore, this is —the beginning of a 
 new era, the descent of the Son of God to earth, and the lifting out 
 of hell, and the bringing of man up to heaven. I therefore take 
 advantage of this day to bring before you the Immaculate Concep- 
 tion, immediately connected with the two points to which I call your 
 attention. And you ask me what is the Immaculate Conception? 
 It is that the Blessed Virgin was not only free from personal and 
 original sin in this world, but that she was free from the stain when 
 she was in her mother's womb, at the moment of her conception. 
 She was not only pure after she was born, but by the decree of God, 
 she was free from the stain of original sin at the first moment she 
 had life ^ she was immaculate — stainless. But you say. How is it 
 
48 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 possible that aiij^ theologian can state that fact ? I will proceed to 
 the proof. Without personal sin, and without original sin ! What 
 an idea that ! Free at the moment of her conception — no sin. She 
 did not begin to be without sin at sixteen, or tifteen, or fourteen, or 
 ton 3'ears of age. I repeat it again and again, there was no moment 
 of her existence when she had sin, even original. You demand my 
 proofs and I proceed to give them to you, and I hope to make the 
 case satisfactory. 
 
 When Adam fell, as I just now pointed out to you, and ate the 
 apple, God, or as it is said in the Scriptures, an angel representing 
 Him said, "Adam, where art thou?" — why don't you appear? — and 
 Adam entered into a dialogue with the representative of God Him- 
 self. He said, " I heard Thy voice in Paradise and I was afraid, 
 because I was naked, and I hid myself." And God said to him, 
 "Who hath told thee that thou wast naked, but that thou hast eaten 
 of the tree whereof I commanded that thou shouldst not eat." And 
 Adam said, " The woman whom thou gavest me to be my companion 
 gave me of the tree, and I did eat." And God said, "Because you 
 have done this thing I have cursed the earth, and it will bring forth 
 thorns and thistles." And to the woman He said, "You sliall bring 
 forth your children in sorrow, and I shall place you under the do- 
 minion of your husband," and I know what a hard thing that is 
 sometimes. To the serpent He said, "Because thou has done this 
 thin"- thou art cursed among cattle, and I will put enmities between 
 thee and the woman, and her seed and thy seed. She shall crush 
 thy head, and thou shalt lay in wait for her heel." We are astound- 
 ed when we hear these words from God the Father in Paradise ! 
 What docs this language of God the Father mean — to the serpent, 
 3'ou shall be cursed among animals ? It means that a day will come 
 when woman, or the seed of woman, shall crush the serpent's head. 
 Who is the woman who shall do this ? The Mother of our Lord. 
 She it was who brought forth the Saviour, and thus crushed the 
 head of the serpent. 
 
 Oh, you say, that is a great expression, coming from the mouth of 
 God Himself. I am always carried away by the words of God Him- 
 self. God the Father, therefore, beyond all dispute, has foretold in 
 the Garden of Paradise, the very day that Adam fell, without a mo- 
 ment of interval, what He would do to save the fallen man. Said 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 49 
 
 He, you are cursed, but I hold out to j'ou a hope on the spot of your 
 salvation. The day will come when you shall trample on the ser- 
 pent, when the seed of the woman .shalf crush his head. And all 
 that believed in the future Saviour and kept the commandments were 
 saved . We believe in the Saviour having come — jjast tense — while 
 (hey believed in a Saviour who was to come — future tense. The 
 same principle, only that in the one instance it refers to the past and 
 in the other to the future, but the tenses and moods of grammar can- 
 not have any influence on the eternal principles of God. "Who is the 
 woman foretold four thousand years before she was born to be the 
 Mother of the Saviour? What kind of woman ought she to be? 
 A sinner? I should think not. I could not think that God the Father 
 would name a sinner to be the Mother of His Son. It does not look 
 like what He would do. I should expect she would be the most per- 
 fect creature that ever lived. I am now only in the beginning of my 
 discussion, and you will please to follow me accurately. I need not 
 say how delighted I am to see you come in such great numbers. 
 You please me beyond everything. You pay a compliment to me 
 and to the good Sisters of Mercy, who ai-e working and struggling 
 for you all. 
 
 Who, I ask, is the woman ? Is she a sinner ? I should judge not. 
 That would be a terrible case — that would be disgrace to God and 
 a scandal to man — it would be a premium on vice, putting the high- 
 est crown upon the individual in the possession of the devil — mak- 
 ing the Saviour drink the hot milk out of a heart possessed by the 
 devil. Oh, no, I don't l^elieve that. I would expect, therefore, that 
 she ought to be the most wonderful creature that ever came from the 
 creative hand of God. All the angels, perfect as they are, veil their 
 faces with their wings in His presence. They are creatures made by 
 God the Father ; they are not His relatives, but His Mother is His 
 nearest relative, and I can scarcely fancy, if the pure spirits cover 
 their faces with their wings, so pure is He, that He would select 
 for His Mother one who was stained with sin — it would overturn all 
 my ideas of the purity of the Creator. No, I don't believe that. 
 I cannot comprehend how the Infant Saviour could put His little 
 arms around the fleck of a being in mortal sin. I cannot conceive 
 how His little veins would be filled with her blood, and that the 
 blood of a being steeped in mortal guilt. I think there is no one 
 
50 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 before me that will not say, I am decidedly of your opinion so far. 
 I think she ought to be the most perfect being that ever existed. 
 
 Now we come to the ORl Law. Adam, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, 
 Jacob, Levi, Moses — seven men — whose lives bring us down to. the 
 year 2436, and yet in all this time there is not a word about Mary. 
 We hear no more of her except what occasionally flashes upon us 
 when the written law was given to Moses, and when she is spoken 
 of as some beautifid flower, a glorious Virgin, above the angels and 
 archangels, the Pride of the Nation, the Eoyal Virgin, descended 
 from a race of kings. Certainly it must be something very extraor- 
 dinary, for through their writings we have occasional flashes of this 
 mysterious creature. Well, from Moses to David we come to the 
 year 2900 of the world, and Mary, we are told, was a descendant of 
 David, a royal virgin, of royal extraction. Before we come down 
 any further we see that she certainly answers the description given 
 of her, and God said, "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my 
 Word shall never pass away." Every word He said aljout this 
 woman crushing the serpent's head is true, and it will take place in 
 the long length of His reasoning. We live but for a day — He is 
 for eternity. There is a woman that answers this description, is so' 
 very like her, and in the meantime while you are discussing this case 
 the whole thing is unravelled. 
 
 About the age of fifteen or sixteen j'ears the angel Gabriel met her 
 — no, not the angel, but the archangel Gabriel — the highest minis- 
 ter of the imperial court of Heaven — no, he did not meet her, he 
 was sent to her. He was sent from whom? From God the Father. 
 How beautiful ! Four thousand years after the fall of Adam. 
 "Hail, Mary!" he said — the highest word we have got in the He- 
 brew to express salutation. It is a word signifying the greatest ven- 
 eration in the salutation of anybody. " Hail, Mary ! " Who told 
 him that her name was Mary? "Full of grace ! " Just what we 
 expected : when anything is full of another it cannot contain any- 
 thing else. And what is grace? St. Paul tells us it is the emana- 
 tion of the Spirit of God ; and we are also told that it is the charity 
 of God poured out on human souls, an emanation of Himself. Of all 
 the addresses that have been conceived, was there* ever anything so 
 beautiful, and which so meets our case? "Hail, Mary, full of grace" 
 — full of the emanation of God ! Before I advance further with my 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 51 
 
 argument, I must say I avouIcT conclude from that very word that 
 Mary had personally no sin ; because if she had any sin, the words 
 of the angel could not be applied to her — she could not be the 
 Mother of God. And the poor people (I call them poor, not to ex- 
 press their poverty, but to show their afiection), they don't want 
 anything more than that — "Hail, Mary, full of grace!" — God 
 speaking these words, and out of His lips everything must be judged 
 according to its atomic value. 
 
 But is this all ? No. "The Lord is with thee." God is not only 
 your companion — He is with you. "Blessed art thou among 
 women ! " Avhich means you are more blessed than any other woman. 
 What women does he mean ? The women of that generation ? No ! 
 you are not to put that construction on it. He does not say blessed 
 in the past generation of women, nor in the present generation, nor 
 in the future generation ; He speaks of all women from the begin- 
 ning to the end of time. The Hebrew phrase signifies, you are 
 more blessed than all the women who have ever lived or ever will 
 live. We have a word in our own language which is somewhat like 
 it — we say "he is brave among the brave," or "he is learned among 
 the learned," meaning that even the brave acknowledge his superior 
 bravery, even the learned acknowledge the superiority of his learn- 
 ing. " Blessed art thou among women ! " INIary, you are full of the 
 emanation of God, and no woman that ever lived could equal you in 
 blessedness — "and blessed is the fruit of thy womb." 
 
 The same blessedness, the same freedom from sin is asciibed to 
 Mary as to the fruit of her womb. She was not and could not be as 
 perfect as He ; but in freedom from sin she was like Him. Don't 
 you see now the Holy Ghost in that phrase ? What man could paint 
 It in proper colors — Avho could paint even the very language ? I see 
 the inspiration of the Holy Ghost. " Blessed art thou among 
 women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb." The same word ap- 
 plied to Christ and to Mary. Had Christ any original or personal sin ? 
 Certainly not. Would you not take it that Mary was equal to Him in 
 point of blessedness ? " Hail, Mary, full of grace ! The Lord is 
 ■with thee ! Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit 
 of thy womb." Now, we have here the words of the Father in Par- 
 adise clearly expounded. She is the most perfect creature that ever 
 lived among women ; for although the Saviour had not as yet died 
 
52 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 and atoned for sin, she has no sin. Blessed ! No woman that ever 
 has been, or ever will be, is equal to you in blessedness. She is as 
 free from sin as Christ. 
 
 Does not St. Paul tell us that we were all born children of 
 wrath? He did, and so we are, except the cases that God did not 
 include, and there are such cases. So, then, we are not all born 
 children of wrath? We are, except the cases that are not included. 
 And cannot God make exceptions ? Cannot the King who made the 
 law make exceptions to the law? The monarch who makes imperial 
 laws can certainly make exceptional cases in their application. And 
 has he done so? He has in the case of John the Baptist — John, 
 who was sanctified in his mother's womb three months before he was 
 born — he was an exception to the law made by God Himself. And 
 we only ask for Mary three months beyond John the Baptist. I 
 proceed to read from St. Luke for you from chapter the first, begin- 
 ning with the twenty-sixth verse : 
 
 Aud in tlie sixth month, the Ang'el Gabriel was sent from God into a city of Gali- 
 lee, called Nazareth. 
 
 To a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Josepli, of tlic house of David; 
 and the virgin's name was Mary. 
 
 And the Angel being come in, said to her: Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with 
 thee : Blessed art thou among women. 
 
 Who having heard, was troubled at his saying, and thought with herself what 
 manner of salutation this should be. 
 
 And the Angel said to her : Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God. 
 
 Behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and slialt bring forth a son; and thou 
 Shalt call his name Jesus. 
 
 He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God 
 shall give unto Him the throne of David His father : and He shall reign in the house 
 of Jacob forever. 
 
 And of His kingdom there shall be no end. 
 
 And Mary said to the Angel : How shall this be done, because I know not man? 
 
 And the Angel, answering, said to her : The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, 
 and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee. And therefore also the 
 Holy which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. 
 
 And behold thy cousin Elizabeth, she also hath conceived a son in her old age; 
 and this is the sixth month witli her that is called barren : 
 
 Because no word shall be impossible to God. 
 
 And Mary said : Behold the handmaid of the Lord, be it done to me according to 
 thy word. And the Angel departed from her. 
 
 And Mary rising up in those days, went Into the hill country in haste into a city 
 of Judea. 
 
 And she entered into the house of Zachary, and saluted Elizabeth. 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 53 
 
 And it came to pass, that when Elizabeth heard the salutation of Mary, the infant 
 leaped in her womb. And Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost. 
 
 We are told the infant lecaped in lier womli. Perhaps 3^011 will 
 say this is all excitement ; but you will soon find it was not. " And 
 Elizabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost." Now she could not be 
 filled if there was original sin in her, and the consequence is that Eliza- 
 beth and her child were free from original sin by that fact, and that 
 John was sanctified three months before he was born. There could 
 have been no sin, of course, if she was filled with the Holy Ghost. 
 So that what St. Paul said was true, but these are the exceptional 
 cases. 
 
 "And she cried out with a loud voice, and said : Blessed art thou 
 among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb." Who told 
 Elizabeth that? The Holy Ghost. 
 
 " And whence is this to me that the mother of my Lord should 
 come to me ? " The English of this is : how have I deserved the 
 honor that the mother of my Lord should come to me ? Who told 
 her this ? The Holy Ghost. Is there no honor to be paid to Mary 
 after that, when the Holy Ghost utters such words ? Would you 
 not think that every scholar in the world would pay honor to this 
 woman's memory ? I would pay honor to the man who struck the 
 chains off his country ; I would pay honor to the man of charitable 
 heart, whose benevolence relieves the distresses of the poor and the 
 afflicted ; I would pay honor to the man whose look spreads sunshine 
 on the path of the unfortunate ; I dotft wonder at bigotry and preju- 
 dice refusing honor to the mother of God, but I wonder at the scholar 
 who refuses to do it. In England I know that the opposition to 
 Catholicity is so bitter, that whatever we honor they despise, 
 whatever we love they hate. Because we use holy water, they 
 ridicule it ; because we venerate the Cross, they would trample 
 on it ; because we have seven Sacraments, they will have none at all ; 
 and I should not wonder if, because we pray on our knees, they 
 would pray on horseback. 
 
 But let us i-eturn to the subject of which we were speaking — 
 "And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come 
 to me? For behold," said Elizabeth, "as soon as the voice of thy 
 salutation sounded in my ears, the infant in my womb leaped for joy. 
 And blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall 
 
54 TKEASUEY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord." And Mary 
 said : " My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced 
 in God my Saviour. Because he hath regarded the humility of His 
 handmaid ; for behold, henceforth all generations sliall call me 
 blessed." Here we have prophecy. What is she called? She is a 
 virgin, and her name is Mary ; she is blessed, and she says all 
 nations shall call her blessed ; and her words are fultilled, for is she 
 not called " Ever Blessed Virgin ? " I always write it in this way, and 
 so would any scholar. "Because' He that is mighty hath done great 
 things to me ; and holy is His name. And His mercy is from gen- 
 eration unto generation to them that fear Him. He hath exalted 
 tlie humble." She was humble and she was exalted. That is a 
 great passage. I am great, I am exalted, even the mighty God has 
 done great things to me. 
 
 About four years ago all the Bishops of the world were ^Titten to 
 by the Pope, to know what was their opinion in regard to the 
 Immaculate Conception. The words Immaculate Conception are not 
 in the text, but don't you think, from all the reasoning, that it is con- 
 tained in it? I think there is no man, or set of men, who would say 
 that any other case would fit this set of woi'ds, excej)t that of the 
 Immaculate Conception. We deduce the word sanctification from 
 the fact of his leaping with jo\^ — a deduction patent from that fact. 
 Now, if we could get a deduction of that kind in Mary's case, 
 should we not come to the conclusion that she must have been 
 immaculate ? 
 
 In the Apostles' Creed we say, " I believe in God the Father 
 Almight3^ Maker of Heaveu and earth, and in Jesus Christ, His 
 only Sou, our Lord, who was conceived bj^ the Holy Ghost, and was 
 born of the Virgin Mary ! " Born of the Virgin Mary ! Why, she 
 must be immaculate. Out of this principle in the Creed I take the 
 deduction — Immaculate Conception. These are very remarkable 
 ■jvords — " born of the Virgin Mary " — one of the articles of the 
 Creed at the time of the Apostles. Why, I must conclude that she 
 was immaculate in her conception. Accordingly all the Bishops 
 wrote to thi3 Pope, and the opinion of the whole of them is that the 
 Blessed Virgin was immaculate. We always believed that she was, 
 but it was never settled as a dogma before, although it was the uni- 
 versal belief of all Catholics. We all believed it, and we called upon 
 
REV. DR. CAIIILL 55 
 
 the Pope, the Father, to pronounce upon that article, and he has 
 done so. The only difference between now and the time before it 
 •was' pronounced, is that all must now accept it as an article of faith, 
 and that the man who refuses to believe it must suffer the penalty. 
 
 Dearest bi-ethren, I have now argued the whole case for you. 
 There is the doctrine that is now promulgated by the Pope. The 
 Immaculate Conception is a deduction implicitly contained in the 
 explicit first article of fidth, " born of the Virgin Mary" — conceived 
 of the Holy Ghost. The first article we believe in explicitly, and it 
 is contained in the other article we believed in implicitly. Mary, 
 the most glorious name in the Christian Church, foretold by God 
 the Father four thousand years before she was born. She stands 
 before all coming time as the IMother of God, regarded by Him as 
 His mother, and as in the case of the miracle at the marriage feast at 
 Cana, obeying her wish, and making even an apology to her for the 
 little word He said to her — "My hour is not yet come." Nay, 
 more, when hanging on the Cross, suspended between heaven and 
 earth, and when in His agony Ho saw His Mother kneeling at the 
 foot of the Cross — she who had followed Him when all else, except 
 His beloved disciple, abandoned Him — when He looked down and 
 saw His Mother weeping, He said to John, " Behold thy Mother " — 
 John, you whom I have loved more than all the other Apostles. He 
 gives her over His Apostles the same position which she held over 
 Him. What, over an Apostle, a Bishop, a pillar of the Church? 
 Yes, and He was to be submissive to her as a mother. She was to 
 exercise her maternal control over Him and over the Church. 
 
 Don't you think she has great power, then, and don't it stand to 
 reason that she ought to be the greatest of created beings ? There- 
 fore it is that we say Marjs Queen of Virgins, Queen of Pati-iarchs 
 and Apostles, Queen of all the Saints. How beautiful is that Litany. 
 What woman, therefore", would not place her daughter under her 
 protection and put her medal round her neck ? When I see a woman 
 Avho will not place her daughter, or a father who will not place his 
 son under her protection, I fear for that girl and I fear for that boy. 
 Teach your children to repeat the Litany oi" the Blessed Virgin. 
 What more beautiful prayer than that ? The Litany of Jesus in the 
 morning that He may protect us through the dangers of the day, and 
 the Litany of the Blessed Virgin at evening that she may watch over 
 
56 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 US through the night. The little children in Ireland attending those 
 schools by means of which they hoped to rob us of our faith say the 
 Angelus in her honor every day when the clock strikes twelve, and, 
 though they say it to themselves, the teachers know when they are 
 saying it, for the children bow their heads when they repeat the 
 sentence, "The Word was made flesh." The children were then 
 forbid to bow their heads, and what do you think they did? Why, 
 bowed them three times in place of once. That was the result of 
 interfering with their religious practices. 
 
 I have often praised the Northern Irish when speaking on that 
 subject for their adherence to their religion, for their unyielding 
 firmness on that pojnt, and I have attributed the fact of their being 
 such good Catholics to their being obliged to contend for their faith 
 and to make sacrifices for it. And they certainly are the best 
 Catholics in the island. 
 
 I have to thank you for coming here to-night in such numbers. It 
 is, as I have said already, the first time I have had the pleasure of 
 seeing you, and I thank you, not only for the compliment paid to 
 myself, but especially for the interest you take in the Sisters, and 
 of which your presence here to-night is a px'oof. You ought to ap- 
 preciate their labors, their devotion to your children, their care of 
 your sick. Do you not mark them going through your streets upon 
 their errands of mercy ? Do you not see them in your schools teach- 
 ing your children, and impressing on their youthful minds and 
 hearts purity and piety? Is not the mother's knee the first semi- 
 nary, and do we not receive from the mother's lip and the mother's 
 heart our earliest and most lasting impressions ? If, then, the in- 
 fluence of woman in that sphere is so deep and so widespread, what 
 do not we owe to those who fit them for it, who train them up in the 
 ways of virtue and ground them in the truths of then- religion? 
 And this we owe to the Sisters, and I am delighted to see by your 
 numbers to-night that you are conscious of this obligation and proud 
 to acknowledge it, and I now conclude by invoking the blessing of 
 God upon 3'ou all. lu the name of the Father, and of the Son, and 
 of the Holy Ghost. Ameu. 
 
EEV. DR. CAHILL. ^J 
 
 The Last Judgment. 
 
 A Sermon Delivered by Vert Rev. D. W. Cahill, D.D., ik: 
 
 St. Peter's Church, Barclay Street, New York, on Sundat 
 Evening, November 29, 1863. 
 
 |^,EAEEST BRETHREN, — God's word contains no subject 
 g^|i that is presented in such majestic grandeur, such withering 
 ^ terror, and yet such infinite joy, as the Gospel of this day 
 -L which I have just read for you. One does not know what 
 
 fact on this awful day is most wonderful ; whether we consider the 
 end of time, the destruction of the world, the multitudinous congre- 
 gation of all men, the fate of the damned, and the glories of the 
 blessed — j'ct incomprehensible as are all these considerations, they 
 all fade, when compai'cd with the majesty of God on that day, sitting 
 in imperial triumph on the clouds, surrounded by the whole Court 
 of Angels and Saints. It is the great day reserved in Heaven for 
 celebrating the triumph of virtue over vice, the dominion of the 
 Saviour over the power of Satan — the most awful hour Eternity ever 
 saw. It is the mightiest moment in the life of God ; it is the end of 
 Christ's mission on earth ; the consummation of all the mysteries 
 God ever published ; the final sentence of the wicked, Avhen God 
 and those they love are separated forever. In a word, the Gospel 
 of this day presents in one large view everthing glorious in Heaven, 
 terrible in Hell, awful in Eternity, and great in God. It is a picture 
 worthy of God, representing at once Earth, Hell, Heaven, with their 
 unnumbered populations. No serious man can behold it without 
 thrilling astonishment ; no Christian, however perfect, can look on. 
 it without terror ; no sinner can believe it without amendment. As 
 time once began, so time now ends. Only one condition of things 
 
58 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 now remains, namely, Eternity. Time is past on this day; a mere 
 second of existence in the life of God. 
 
 How wonderful is human language : though creatures of a moment, 
 we can discuss things eternal ; though mere worms, we can paint 
 things omnipotent : like the broken fragment of a mirror, reflecting 
 the whole firmament, in our slender phrase we can describe the in- 
 finitude of God. In all past scenes up to the present moment, 
 cvei-ything on earth was finite, limited. It was man who was the- 
 actor, and time was the condition of things. God is the actor on 
 this day, and Eternity is the condition. It is all infinity. This day 
 is the day of Christ. He summons all the dead : He commands all 
 Hell : He is accompanied by all Heaven. No tongue can, of course, 
 tell this scene. The soul's silent contemplation can best behold any 
 part of it. What brush, or what artist, could paint the sun in its 
 meridian glory? One glance at his burnished flood of gold will ex- 
 hibit him best. And who can describe the Redeemer on His own 
 d.iy of power and glory? St. Luke but faintly tells it when he 
 says : " The powers of Heaven shall be moved, and then they shall 
 see the Son of Man coming in a cloud, in gi'eat power and majesty." 
 When the day of general judgment will come, no mortal can tell : 
 the highest Archangel round God's throne cannot know it ; it is among 
 the eternal secrets of His own mind. It is a future free act of His 
 independent will ; and no creature can unlock the depths of God's 
 libertj^ We i-esemble Him in our spiritual essence to a small ex- 
 tent : we know the past and the present, in our own limited circle of 
 time. The angelic essence knows the past and the present in a 
 wider circle of knowledge : but no creature, however exalted, can 
 know the future, unless God reveals it. Futurity can have no i-eal 
 existence, since it has not as yet commenced to exist. It is solely 
 confined to the mind of God, the internal mind of God : and is there- 
 fore essentially beyond the reach of the higliest creature. We only 
 know that the terrible day of judgment will certainly arrive in some 
 future revolving century. The same Almighty word that called all 
 things into being has spoken it : the same unerring testimony that 
 built Nature has described its, future wreck. The feelings, the mad- 
 dening agonies, the very words of the burning inhabitants are 
 minutely detailed by the language of Christ Himself. The world, 
 therefore, destroyed by future fire under the anger of God, is as 
 
KEV. DR, CAHILL. 59 
 
 certain as any other jiast revealed fact published several centuries 
 before the actual occurrence. The earth, therefore, burning in 
 consuming conflagration under the angry breath of God's wrath, 
 preparatory to the general judgment and man's final doom, is a 
 future fact which is now a mere matter of time. It is already 
 written on the coming role of the history of Heaven. When it 
 will occur, creatures on earth cannot plead the excuse of being 
 taken by surprise. We had been warned of the drowning of the 
 earth by the angry flood ; and we saw it executed by overwhelming 
 cataracts from Heaven. We were informed, too, of the comiilg of 
 the Messiah thousands of years in advance : and we saw Him. We 
 heard the stroke of the hammer on Calvary ; we heard Hira cry and 
 we saw Him weep. In the present case we cannot be taken by sui-- 
 prise : we are already warned : the great day is approaching, like 
 those other events. But at what time no creature can tell. It is 
 folly to reason what He will do, judging from what He has done. 
 
 There was a time when there was no earth, no sun, no moon, no 
 stars ; when all the eye now beholds had no existence ; when there 
 was nothing, — all darkness, chaos, — when the Divinity reigned 
 alone ; when no created voice was heard through God's territories to 
 break the silence of illimitable space. Six thousand years have only 
 elapsed since He built the present world and peopled the skies with 
 the myriad spheres that hang in the arched roof above us. The 
 mere shell, the mere frameicork of this world may, perhaps, he 
 somewhat older, but we know when Adam was created with the cer- 
 tainty of a parish register. It may be about six thousand years ago : 
 and since that period the histor}' of man is one unbroken page of 
 wickedness and infidelity. Heaven once, in anger, nearly extirpated 
 our race ; and once, in mercy, forgave us. Yet, since, the earth is 
 stained with guilt red as scarlet ; and the patience of a God — 
 patience infinite — can alone bear it. Who can tell the amount of 
 the crime of even one city for one day ? But who can conceive the 
 infinite guilt of all peoples, of all nations, and all ages, ascending 
 and accumulating before God's throne since the beginning? God is 
 great in power, gi'eat in goodness, great in mercj^ great in wisdom ; 
 but he is more than great in patience, to bear the congregated 
 oflTences of countless millions, daily, hourly, provoking His anger 
 and opposing His will. 
 
(30 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 But, as the hour of man's creation and man's redemption was 
 arranged by God, and in due time occurred, so the moment for man's 
 total extinction on earth is approaching, and Avhen the time written 
 in the records of Heaven shall have arrived, that unerring decree will 
 be executed. By one word He made this world ; by one word He 
 can destroy it. By one stroke of His omnipotent pencil He drew 
 the present picture of creation ; by one dash of tlie same brush Ho 
 can blot it out again and expunge all the work of the skies. Who 
 can limit His power? In one second He can reduce all things to 
 their original chaos, and live again as He did before creation began. 
 He can, when He pleases, destroy all things — the soul excepted. 
 The soul He cannot annihilate. He made the world Himself — of 
 course. He can Himself destroy it. But Christ is the Kedeemer of 
 the soul, and, therefore, its immortal existence is as indestructible 
 as the eternity of God. Eedemption is a contract between the 
 Father and the Son. That contract cannot be broken without ignor- 
 ing the Cross. Hence, while God is at liberty to blot out His own 
 creation. He cannot annihilate the work purchased with the blood of 
 Christ. Hence, in the coming wreck, the soul cannot be destroyed. 
 And this is the idea that renders that awful hour a source of joy 
 unlimited to the blessed, and of terrors unspeakable to the wicked. 
 Yet although no one can tell when this fatal day will arrive, still it 
 may be fairly presumed to be at hand, when Christ's passion will be 
 disregarded on earth ; when vice will so predominate over virtue 
 that the worship of God may be said to cease ; when the destruction 
 of the earth will be a mercy, a duty of justice which God owes to 
 His own character and to the eternal laws of His kingdom. When 
 this time shall have arrived, we may fairly expect the day of the 
 general judgment. 
 
 From the lips of Christ Himself we have heard the entire account 
 of this terrible day. There can be no mistake : He makes a full 
 statement of the entire event. He assures us that in the latter days 
 the wickedness of society will burst all restraint, and, in open defi- 
 ance of Heaven, will blaspheme God. St. Mark, in the thirteenth 
 chapter, introduces Christ as saying : " When you shall hear of wars 
 and rumors of wars, fear ye not. For such things must needs be, 
 but the end is not yet. For nation shall rise against nation, and 
 kingdom against kinifdom ; and there shall be earthquakes in divers 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 61 
 
 -places, and families. These things are the beghiuings of sorrows. 
 But look to yourselves. They shall deliver you up to fancies ; and 
 in the synagogues you shall be beaten. And the ))rother shall 
 betray his brother unto death, and the father his son ; and children 
 shall rise up against their parents, and shall work their death. And 
 you shall be hated by all men for My name's sake ; but he that shall 
 endure to the end, he shall be saved. And when you shall see the 
 abomination of desolation standing where it ought not to be, he that 
 readeth let him understand ; then let them that are in Judea flee to 
 the mountains. In those days shall be such tribulations as were not 
 since the beginning of the creation which God created until now ; 
 neither shall be. And unless the Lord had shortened the days, no 
 flesh should be saved ; but for the sake of the elect which he hath 
 chosen. He hath shortened the days. For there will rise up false 
 Christs and false prophets, and they shall show signs and wonders 
 to seduce (if it were possible) even the elect. Take you heed, 
 therefore ; behold, I have foretold j^ou all things." 
 
 These are the words of Christ Himself, and they present a picture 
 of society of which there is no parallel in all the history of all the 
 past. ■ In this graphic description of Christ nothing is omitted in the 
 condition of the earth to render it a kingdom of perdition, the resi- 
 dence of Satan himself. It is damnation in theory ; it is hell with- 
 out fire ; it only wants the lakes of burning brimstone to make men 
 feel all the terrible realities of the damned. Who can describe this 
 rending scene like Christ himself? While He was addressing Mark 
 and Luke, He was at that very moment looking at the future terrors 
 He was then depicting. He was painting beforehand the future 
 realities which He had Himself planned. It is He Himself that will, 
 on the terrible day, boil the oceans with His angry breath ; it is He 
 Himself who will split the poles in His glance of fury ; it is He 
 who will hurl the stars from the skies and pour His wrath over the 
 devoted world. In fact our Lord was describing to Mark His own 
 Almighty anger, and warning mankind against the future catastrophe. 
 He was rehearsing for the Apostles and coming living ages the real 
 scenes of the future dead, and the eternal agonies of the future 
 damned. Who could paint l^lie Him ? He was reading from His 
 own book. He was presenting for our observation the total disrup- 
 tion of society, the entire overthrow of religion. The son killing the 
 
62 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 father, the father murdering the child ; wars, fliniiucs, signs in the 
 heavens — false Chriats, false prophets, the Gosi)ol imitated by false- 
 hood ; miracles repeated in magic fraud and in diabolical agency ; 
 blood in the land, perdition in the air ; hell above, beneath, all 
 round. God's law is so much overpowered by the predominance of 
 the devil, that the Trinity have no altei-native but to shorten time, 
 suspend creation, and put an end to the world. 
 
 Is not Satan very powerful ? and when the grace of God has been 
 extinguished in the soul, are not men plainly children of the devil? 
 It is creation without sun or light ; a cui-sed territory — terrain 
 misericB et tenebrarum, ubi umbra mortis et nullis ordo sed semj)iter- 
 nus horror inhabitat. The description of Christ, in St. Mark, is 
 clear. The crimes of men unnatural, shocking. The intellect per- 
 verted : the heart debased : all nature polluted. Scenes of terror 
 will be enacted which the world never saw before. Man will stare 
 in insane desperation at the wrath of God, which appears every hour 
 to be poured in renewed vengeance on all the children of men. If 
 mankind would study the present moral condition of depraved 
 society, and calculate the bleeding wounds inflicted on religion by 
 the progress of infidelity, the picture, as presented, is not far 
 removed from the iniquities here delineated by the Saviour, of the 
 crime and perdition of the latter days. The cup of human guilt is 
 not yet full in our time, but the world is rapidly advancing to the 
 goal which our Lord has so. plainly prophesied and so graphically 
 described. Christ has, beyond all doubt, described the burning,, 
 bottomless gulf; and He has pointed out the palpable road that 
 unmistakably leads to it. In the eternal age of God, a long, long 
 time may elapse before the great day will arrive ; but, as certain as 
 Christ has lived and spoken, the abyss, and the sentence, and the 
 pools of burning brimstone, are only a matter of time, and this little 
 span of space is only a single point in the infinitude of eternity. 
 
 "After this tribulation," says Christ, "the sun shall be darkened 
 and the moon shall not give her light ; the stars of heaven shall be 
 falling down, and the powers that are in heaven shall be moved." 
 And St. Luke, repeating the words of Christ, says: "There shall 
 be signs in the sun, in the moon, ajid in the stars : and upon the 
 earth distress of nations, by reason of the confusion of the waving 
 of the sea and the waves ; men withering away from fear and expec- 
 
KEV. DR. CAHILL. gg 
 
 tation of what shall come on the whole world, calling on the ground 
 to swallow them, or the mountains to fall on them, and on the rocks 
 to hide them from the face of the Lord." St. Luke and St. Mark 
 employ nearly the same words in copying the language of Chi-ist at 
 this fatal moment. Who can describe Infinite anger in a fury? 
 Who can paint Omnipotent power pulling down firmaments, and 
 suns, and stars, and moons : His will reversing His former creation ; 
 the earth trembling in desolation ? How minutely graphic is Christ 
 in this terrible description ; and have you noticed His last words, 
 where He says : " Have I not foretold all to you ? " This single 
 phrase is worth the entire history ; since it stamps the terrors of 
 this day with the certitude of any other truth of faith, any other fact 
 of the Gospel. 
 
 St. Mark continues to detail the order of this terrible hour. 
 Terror will follow on terror; curse upon curse, "till men will fall 
 away with fear." The sun being not quite extinguished, fatal gloom 
 will be spread over all things like a veil over, the face of the dead : 
 terrific signs are seen in the heavens, and all things announce that 
 time is at an end. St. John says, that before God pronounces the 
 final word there is silence in heaven ; and voices are heard in the 
 air, on the water, and on the earth. At length the skies open and 
 He pours out the first vial of His anger. And the end is come. 
 God speaks the command ; and all nature trembles as if in agony. 
 The seas swell, and boil, and rise, and lash the skies. The moun- 
 tains nod and sink, and the poles collapse. The lightnings flash, 
 and the moaning tempests sweep over the furious deep, piling up 
 ocean upon ocean on the trembling globe. The earth i-eels in con- 
 vulsion, and the whole frame of creation struggles. 
 
 A mighty conflagration bursts from the melting earth, rages like 
 a hurricane roundabout, devouring all things in its storm and flood 
 of fire, consuming the crumbling wreck of the condemned world. 
 The heavens become terrible, as the kindling earth and seas show 
 their overwhelming flashes on the crimson skies. The sun muflled, 
 the moon black, the stars fallen, floating masses like clouds of blood 
 sweep the skies in circling fury. The Omnipotence which, in the 
 beginning of time, formed all creation, is now concentrated in a 
 point; and, as it were, intensifies the infinity of His wrath, till His 
 anser can swell no higher ; and His voice is heard like thunder in 
 
(34 TRKASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the distance. With what eloquent terror does the Saviour paint 
 this scene in His own words : Men fainting away with fear, running 
 in wild distraction, calling on the ground to open and swallow them, 
 and the rocks to fall on them and hide them from the face of the 
 Lord." The earth on fire : the skies fiided : the sun and the stars 
 darkened or extinguished : mankind burning, dying : the angry 
 voice of God coming to judge the world : and Jesus Christ describ- 
 ing the scene, — are realities which the history of God has never 
 seen before ; and which never again will be repeated during the 
 endless round of eternity. 
 
 Reason asks : Oh, who is God? and what is Nature? and whence 
 is man ? and where is Heaven ? and why is Hell ? and what is our 
 destiny? Was the world made in pleasure, moved for a moment in 
 trial and suflering, and then blotted out in anger ? In one revolu- 
 tion of the earth on fire it is a blank. Like a burning ship at sea, 
 sinking to the bottom on fire, the earth vanishes into non-existence 
 under the blue vault, where it once careered in its brilliant circle. 
 Not a vestige remains of its omnii^otent path. Its wide territory is 
 a tenantless, dark waste — the myriad lamps of the skies extin- 
 guished : all former existences crumbled : silent forever : all chaos : 
 things are as if they had never been : the history of Earth and Time 
 a mere record of the forgotten past : a mere hollow vault in the 
 infinitude of space. Oh ! how true in this place ai-e the words, 
 " Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity, except to love God and to 
 serve Him alone." Great and Almighty God, what a decree is 
 this ! have all things come to this ? has all the past been a dream ? 
 what is futurity? is it like the past? where can the mind rest on this 
 tempest of the soul ? Foolish questions ; God has arranged this 
 condition of things. His sanctity, justice, power, wisdom, and 
 truth have arranged and executed this eternal decree. This is 
 enough. We can no more change this order of things than put space 
 in a nutshell, or destroy the being of God. God is His own master, 
 and in His own free will He has arranged this multitudinous terror. 
 But remember that in this desolation it is vice that trembles : virtue 
 is secure, as God is just. In this terrible moment virtue smiles in 
 happy repose on this second coming of Christ. Virtue is immortal : 
 like a sunbeam on the battle-field, invulnerable in a shower of death, 
 brilliant in the midst of carnage, and unsullied in the gore of the 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. (55 
 
 dead, the soul, by its immortal virtue, will shiue in undying lustre 
 in that terrific hour, amidst the shock" of Nature, the powers of 
 Hell, and the crash of myriad worlds. 
 
 Scarcely has the earth been consumed, and the living population 
 destroyed, when Michael the Archangel sounds his loud trumpet, 
 calling all the dead to judgment. He summons all Hell to attend ; 
 and commands all Heaven to appear and witness this last act of God 
 at the close of creation. At his shrill summons the bottomless pit 
 opens, and all those who had been lost since the beginning of the 
 world come forth from their fiery prisons. The unhappy of all 
 nations and ages come forth in one mighty mass, driven forward in 
 rending agony to the place of judgment, their wild lamentations 
 swelling as they advance, like the moaning of a tempest on their 
 wide and burning lakes. As creation has been destroyed or faded, 
 this terrific assemblage are in darkness, while they move on in 
 despair, in dreadful expectation of the coming of the Lord. As the 
 Saviour approaches, golden light appears ; the voice of a mighty 
 host is heard from heaven like the opening of the morning heretofore 
 in the East, every moment becomes more and more brilliant, till the 
 full day of Eternity opens out in all its gorgeous splendor, revealing 
 Christ, surrounded by His entire court, angels and saints, and seated 
 in majesty, as He has Himself foretold, in the clouds. Angels and 
 Archangels, and Cherul^im and Seraphim, and Powers and Princi- 
 palities apjDear on outspread wiugs, the first of the countless host. 
 Then all the Saints of the old law, the Patriarchs, the Prophets, all 
 who for forty generations lived and died in the belief of the 
 Kedeemer to come. Then all the Saints of the new era who partici- 
 pated in Christ's atonement, the twelve Apostles, all the Martyrs, 
 all the Confessors, all the Virgins, all the Religious of every clime 
 and color, who in every age bore testimony or died in attestation of 
 their faith. Then all the poor of every country, who, in their trials 
 and sufferings, their silent atflictions and broken hearts, never forgot 
 their duty to God : all, all appear crowned with glory, and clothed 
 in the sunlight robes of Heaven. Lastly, in the vast train of happy 
 creatures, comes Mary, the Mother of God, with twelve stars upon 
 her head, the moon beneath her feet. The Blessed Virgin sits at 
 the feet of her son, Jesus ; while He, with the Cross in His hand, 
 lifted high above all heaven, appears in the triumph of His second 
 
66 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 coining, seated in the clouds. In the two pictures now before us 
 read the entire history of God and Satan : the two opposite views of 
 sin and redemption. Now is the time to reason on our own condi- 
 tion, and to reflect well on the truths of religion, the eternal value 
 of faith, and the imperishable justice of God. This is the day in 
 which Christ shall receive compensation before God and man for the 
 injuries He has received, where oppressed virtue shall be rewarded, 
 and where triumphant vice shall be branded with perdition. 
 
 If God be bound to do justice to the meanest being in His king- 
 dom ; if justice and truth and sanctity demand the public exposure 
 and punishment of those who have wounded these attributes or prop- 
 erties of God, it is a clear case, justice requires that Jesus must re- 
 ceive from His Father compensation for the trials of His life and the 
 agonies of His death. A sinful world has ofl'endcd Him by mortal 
 guilt ; their damnation proves they died without repentance ; they 
 have thus refused to make atonement, and hence this is the day to 
 pay the debt to eternal justice. Impenitent crime, therefore, must 
 sufler eternal torment. 
 
 Oh, when Judas betraj-ed Christ, when the soldiers mocked Him, 
 spat in His face, and blindfolded Him, is it not surprising how the 
 angels could have borne these iniquities ? And when Pilate asked 
 the Jewish mob which did they prefer, Barrabas or Christ, they all 
 exclaimed " Barrabas : " and then they said, " Let His blood be upon 
 us, and on our children." Who can conceive how the archangels 
 did not beg of God to annihilate the whole race of men ? But the 
 mystery of the Cross had a different object, and hence this day is 
 the time for human punishment. See the millions of saved souls 
 that now stand in triumph round the Cross, all of whom He has saved 
 by His humiliations, debasement and death. These are the triumphs 
 by which He has conquered Satan, disarmed Almighty vengeance, 
 and peopled heaven with the countless host of Saints that accompany 
 Him in His second coming to-day. A glance by anticipation at this 
 terrible hour will teach more Gospel truth, and more deceit of this 
 world, than could be taught by any other lesson of instruction. 
 When in this world we see the starving and naked poor crawling 
 through the deserted lane, living, or rather dying, in the putrid 
 hovels of disease, while the abandoned profligate lives in riotous 
 prosperity, the corrupter of youth jibing death and mocking judg- 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 67 
 
 ment — one will ask, is there a God to look on quietly at this galling 
 starvation on one hand, and this scarlet iniquity on the other : he 
 will ask, is there no God to relieve the pitiful cries of the one, and 
 punish the scalding extravagance of the other. 
 
 Again, when one sees the pious, devoted child of God spend a 
 long weary life in prayer and sickness, in trial, in disappointment, 
 and yet in devotion to God, without a day, a moment of neglect or 
 dissipation, while the blasphemer or the infidel stands at God's own 
 gates insulting Him on His own throne, and teaching perdition to 
 all within his reach — one will ask, has God no feeling for religion, 
 no zeal for the human soul, to perpetrate this outrage on Himself, 
 this scandal on the Gospel, this bleeding corruption on the morals 
 and faith of the public ? How can God free Himself in these circum- 
 stances from being the abettor of infidelity and the encourager of 
 blasphemj' ? There must be a day for Christ to receive compensation, 
 for God the Father to defend Himself, for virtue to be rewarded, and 
 for vice to be punished in the presence of congregated mankind. 
 If this great day did not come, the Gospel might be said to be a 
 dumb mockery of justice ; the. punishment of hell without a judge or 
 a sentence ; the rewards of heaven without examination or a verdict. 
 The whole character of God, therefore, demands that His strict 
 justice to Christ and to virtue shall be made known ; while the same 
 eternal character of the same justice requires that the deceit, the 
 ingratitude, the blasphemy and the infidelity of the wicked shall be 
 weighed in the impartial scales of God's truth, and, after renewing 
 their former condemnation, plunged in the presence of Heaven and 
 Hell into eternal fire. 
 
 The bodies and souls of mortals being now united in the resurrec- 
 tion, all Heaven having taken their places, all Hell gives a last fave- 
 well look at the heavenly host that are spread all over all tlie skies, 
 like million armies encamped. The description of St. John is so 
 minute that we almost fancy we are viewing this great last scene ; 
 and, as Christ has already prophesied, we at this distance of space 
 and time feel our hearts trembling at the approaching sentence of 
 perdition about to be pronounced against so many billions of ill- 
 fated, unhappy creatures. At a given moment "a door was opened 
 in heaven, and voices were heard, and trumpets were sounded : and 
 there was a throne set in heaven, and upon the throne One sitting ; 
 
68 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 and there was a number round about the throne, and round about 
 the throne were twenty-four seats, and upon the seats twenty-four 
 ancients clothed in white garments, and on their heads were crowns 
 of gold ; and ft-om the throne proceeded lightnings and thunders. 
 And angels were crying with a loud voice : and there was before the 
 throne a multitude of all tribes and nations, which no one could 
 number, clothed in white robes, with palms in their hands. And 
 books were sealed, and angels held phials to pour out on the earth — 
 and God seemed to make some grand preparation. And an angel 
 having received a key, from the bottomless pit smoke ascended that 
 darkened all the air. And He that sat on the throne, from His face 
 fled away the heaven and the earth. And," said St John, " I saw 
 the dead, great and small, standing in the presence of the throne — 
 and the books were opened, and the dead were judged by the things 
 that were in the books — according to their works — and the sea 
 gave up the dead that were in it, and hell and death gave their dead ; 
 and they were judged every one according to their works." 
 
 St. John here adds his description to the clear detail of Christ ; 
 and, between the two, one thinks he is reading the facts after judg- 
 ment, rather than the facts before judgment. Christ takes His place 
 on the throne, looks to the right and to the left : opens the book, 
 and prepares to confirm the rewards of the blessed, and to repeat 
 before all the world the sentence of never-ending perdition of the 
 reprobate. We cannot tell how long the examination of a world's 
 guilt will continue. Time is now past ; Eternity has now com- 
 menced. We have no means of measuring time — and we are not 
 told how long this day will continue. He took six daj^s to create the 
 world : we cannot say how long it will take Him to judge the world. 
 Christ and St. John are silent on these two points. We only know 
 that He judges each soul according to the law written in the books. 
 If Christ Himself did not make the minute detail, and if St. John 
 did not add the further particulars of the countless host, we could 
 not fancy that Heaven had ever arranged this universal meeting, 
 trial, and sentence of all hell and heaven : concluding with the 
 eternal fire of the wicked, and with the never-ending happiness of 
 the blessed. The whole case has been painted bona fide for our 
 consideration : and hence we must copy the whole description into 
 the inmost memory of our hearts. The scene of this day surpasses 
 
KEV. DR. CAHILL. 69 
 
 all God's former character of Omnipotence. First think of the 
 assembly of a parish and rise step by step to the meeting of a county, 
 a province, a nation — then advance to all the nations of the earth : 
 then add to this aggregate the assemblage of all ages, past, present, 
 and future ; that is, the aggregate of three worlds — Earth, Hell, 
 Heaven during all time. 
 
 But how do we know what is the number of the angels : the popu- 
 lation of God's own kingdom since the beginning of Eternity ? The 
 population of these myriad spirits in His own boundless kingdom 
 may be so great that hell and earth may be a mere unit in the incal- 
 culable aggregate of all the creatures and children of the great God. 
 This day therefore is so great in the aggregate of numbers, in the 
 meeting of bodies and spirits, ia the presence of men and angels, in 
 the appearance of Christ and all God's creatures, in the burning 
 lakes of the abyss and the enrapturing enchantments of heaven, that 
 all other measurable things fade in comparison of the Day of the 
 General Judgment. In describing the terrors of the Day of Judg- 
 ment, where our Lord is introduced as speaking and acting, it is bad 
 taste to personify Christ in the sermon, firstly, because no creature 
 can personify Him in the smallest particular ; and, secondly, it is 
 impossible to represent His anger — but, for the sake of perspicuity, 
 sometimes the preacher personally assumes in this case the words 
 and manner of our Lord. As our Lord expresses the agonies, the 
 feelings, the very words of the reprobate souls, and as the examina- 
 tion of their crimes must occupy some time, heaven and hell must 
 mutually look at each other ; and the eye of Christ must rest on 
 many a familiar face and unhappy creature in the ranks of the 
 damned. 
 
 The Scriptures introduce a dialogue between Christ and the repro- 
 bate ; and the Old Testament actually represents Christ addressing 
 the damned while they cry and bewail their lot, and, by turns, peti- 
 tion aTid blaspheme till the gates of hell are closed on their piercing 
 agonies. Before the passing of the sentence, Christ exclaims : 
 
 Christ — Reprobate souls, the gates of hell are about to close on 
 you for the last time : your cries and your repentance cannot now 
 alter your condition. 
 
 The Reproved Souls — Can no circumstance change the approach- 
 ing sentence of eternal damnation ? 
 
70 TREASUKT OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Christ — What circumstance could mitigate a deliberate mortal 
 offence against the infinite love and mercy of the Saviour ? 
 
 The Damned Souls — The temptation of the riches which you be- 
 stowed corrupted our hearts : and the gift, in place of leading to 
 salvation, brought us to ruin and perdition. 
 
 Christ — See the millions who stand around this thi-one, who 
 lived laden with gold : see the kings, with their crowns sparkling 
 with jewels : see them clothed now with eternal glory. They were 
 saved by the wealth which you allege is the cause of your perdition. 
 They lived by works of charity, feeding and clothing the poor, and 
 advancing the support and maintenance of religion. Riches would 
 have equally saved you if you employed them with the grace of 
 God. But you purchased damnation at a large price — you insulted 
 the Trinity at an enormous cost — you served the devil with all the 
 extravagance that the most perverse education, the most expensive 
 iniquity and fabulous guilt of gold could procure. The unhappy 
 souls whom you have led to perdition are calling on Me for your 
 blood : and your stormy bed of eternal fire is already prepared for 
 your never-ending agony. 
 
 The Eeprobate — And you gave us passions which inflamed our 
 nature, overcame our reason, deranged our will, and forced us from 
 religion and from God. 
 
 Christ — See all the anchorites that surround Me here. They had 
 the same flesh and blood as you. They are saved. You never 
 asked for the grace of resistance. The burning of a city is but a feeble 
 illustration of the unrestrained, resistless flames of the passions of 
 your untamed heart. Fearing you had not sufficient inflammable ma- 
 terial to spread the conflagration of yourself, you have purchased all 
 the fuel which could inflame to fury the inextinguishable passions, 
 which are only exceeded in extent and intensity by the boiling cal- 
 dron in which the reprobates are buried in eternal torment. There 
 was nothing that could encourage, flatter, foment human passion, 
 which you did not purchase, by land and sea, to increase your guilt 
 and to swell the anger of God. 
 
 Reprobate — I did not know till after my death the extent of my 
 offences. 
 
 Christ — You must remember that I was spit upon, mocked, 
 blindfolded, bruised for you — flogged for you. The stroke of the 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 7X 
 
 hammer on Calvar3' was heard in heaven, as they nailed Me to the 
 Cross. You cannot forget it was for you I died. I called to My 
 Father for relief in My agony. No ! no ! no ! was the reply I heard 
 through the closed gates of heaven. You were among the number 
 that put Me to death : yet I held My arms open for your forgiveness 
 till your last breath. And your greatest crime during your whole life 
 is your present daring declaration, that you did not know your guilt 
 was so great, although I saw you in Jerusalem : I had my eyes fixed 
 on you in the hall of Pilate ; I saw you at the pillar — you held the 
 scourge. It was you that fitted the nails to My hands and feet, 
 plunged the spear in My side, and jibed and mocked Me as My last 
 breath was escaping from My quivering lip. You soon shall see Me 
 on My throne of judgment, passing sentence on your scarlet crimes, 
 while Hell moans and Heaven weeps at the terrors of INIy anger. 
 
 Reprobate — Did You not see my damnation before I was born ? 
 
 Christ — Not till after j-our death. 
 
 Reprobate — Did You not see all futurity from the beginning of 
 eternity? You therefore saw my perdition before I was born. 
 Hence, my damnation is inevitable. 
 
 Christ — The power which I possess of seeing all future things 
 from eternity is a property of My own ; but this property of Mine 
 has no influence whatever on your actions — My foresight does not 
 influence your liberty, no more than your seeing other men in- 
 fluences their free actions. Precisely the same. 
 
 Reprobate — Did not You decide my fate before I was born ; and 
 hence my perdition became inevitable ? 
 
 Christ — No. I have seen all futurity from all eternity. The 
 decree is written on the walls of heaven. But I saw it in order, and 
 in the order in which it occurred. Hence. I saw your birth _^)\si!, be- 
 cause it was first ; then I saw your life and actions next, because 
 \h&j folloived your birth : then I saw your death, because it followed 
 your life ; and then I pass judgment the last, because it is the last. 
 But I did not pass sentence before your birth, because I cotrLD not 
 SEE your death before your birth — it is impossible. Hence, I pass 
 sentence like any othre judge ; having first seen your life and death. 
 
 Reprobate — But is not Your decision a^jce-judgment? 
 
 Christ — No. Mine is ajjos^-judgment : being decided o/lferyour 
 death in My eternal decree. 
 
72 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Keprobate — But could my judgment be different? 
 Christ — Certainly, if your life were different. The whole case 
 can be settled in one word — you have yourself made your case. I 
 have merely judged it. If I made your case, you are right, but I 
 have not directly or indirectly made your case — your case is your 
 oion independent free act. 
 
 Damned Soul — Cannot the penalty of millions of years atone for 
 my sin ? 
 
 Christ — No : years are time — that is, the stroke of ajDendulum : 
 and you know the stroke of a clock cannot blot out a mortal offence 
 I to God. 
 
 Damned Soul — Cannot Your Father forgive us ? 
 Christ — My Father will not, cannot forgive you. "When I was 
 on earth I joublished to all mankind, that without faith it was im- 
 possible to please God. I declared that no one could be saved 
 without my blood : you have died not only loithout My blood, 
 you died against My blood : you died without living faith : with- 
 out any faith : now, in the insane supposition that you should be 
 received into heaven, I am made a liar before the whole Court 
 of Heaven : I am ungodded on My own throne, and hence I should 
 stand on the gates of heaven and resist your entrance into My 
 kingdom with all the power of My Godhead. You therefore can- 
 not be saved : your relief therefore from hell to heaven is not 
 within the possibilities of the truth, the justice, and the mercy of 
 My Father : you ask Me to stand in opposition to Myself : to 
 make the abyss to be hell and heaven at the same time. 
 
 Damned Soul — Cannot ages of fire blot out my sin against 
 God? 
 
 Christ — You know that fire cannot change vice into virtue, nor 
 change the anger of God ; and hence fire cannot burn out mortal 
 guilt. 
 
 Damned Soul — And is there no hope ? 
 Christ — No possible hope. 
 
 Damned Soul — Hell contains thi'ee infinities : infinity of God's 
 anger, infinity of fire, infinity of duration — what have I done to de- 
 serve these three infinities : a poor finite creature ? 
 
 Christ — You have committed the greatest crime that time or 
 I eternity has ever beheld — you have imbued your hands in the blood 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 73 
 
 of the Saviour of the world. You are an accomplice in the death of 
 Christ : the death of the God-Man. 
 
 Damned Soul — How can I be an accomplice ? 
 
 Christ — If one man killed another man, or thousands of men 
 aided in putting him to death, each is guilty, and all are guilty, equally 
 guilty, and hence all who commit deliberately mortal sin, have de- 
 liberately aided in nailing Christ to the Cross. You are, therefore, 
 an accomplice in the death of Christ — stained with His blood : a 
 crime so great that the fire of hell can never burn it out. 
 
 Damned Soul — And is there no change in hell ? 
 
 Christ — No change. The kingdom of hell is as well founded as 
 the kingdom of heaven — one is founded on My power and My 
 mercy : the other is founded on My power and My anger : and I am 
 as much God in punishing vice as rewarding virtue. You mistake 
 the Trinity : We did not make or create Ourselves : We are the 
 living essence of things : essential first beings, loving living virtue, 
 and hating living vice ; We are the essence of life ; We cannot die : 
 you mistake Us ; every mortal sin, unatoned, unrepented, is fixed 
 in permanent malice ; it burns forever like a lake of pitch, and must 
 remain eternally unextinguished : and an act of meritorious virtue 
 is, on the other hand, as irremovable in glory as the pillars of the 
 throne of God, and must last forever; you mistake Us, and you 
 mistake yourselves. 
 
 This is the first day of eternity to you — time is past — everything 
 will now wear a different appearance — eternity is so large and time 
 is so small, that the death of Adam, the first man, and the death of 
 the last man here to-day, are two points so close, that they seem to 
 touch : your crimes will now surprise yourselves : the sanctity of 
 God will astound you ; sin will appear under new terrors, and heaven 
 will look happier than your fancy had ever painted it — everything 
 will now appear in its own true colors. You have oppressed and 
 killed the poor : you have corrupted the innocent and you have filled 
 hell with the victims of your lust ; your scandals have blasted faith 
 and converted the Gospel into shame ; you have dared the Trinity 
 at Our own gates ; you jibed death, defied hell, and mocked heaven ; 
 My blood is thick on your scarlet hands ; your damnation is fixed ; 
 your tempestuous bed is made in hell, and you are doomed to writhe 
 in eternal fire ; I lived for you : I died for you : I watched you. 
 
74 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 once My own child, to save you ; the saints, the angels followed you 
 to the gates of hell, to intercept you and to gain your soul : you re- 
 sisted all and damned yourself in spite of the prayers of the living, 
 the cries of the saints, and the burning petition of the Saviour of the 
 world ; the happy fields of Paradise now lie before you for the last 
 time ; but you never shall again behold them ; the million suns that 
 bum on the eternal hills shall never again shed their lustre on you ; 
 the peace, and joys, and gloi-y of heaven you shall never taste ; the 
 companions of your youth whom you loved shall never see jou : and 
 you shall be cast away from God as far as omnipotent anger can 
 throw you. 
 
 Eeprobate souls, darkness and torture are now your eternal lot ; 
 and when the gates of your fieiy prisons shall close forever between 
 you and Me, storms shall rage over lakes and oceans of fire and 
 brimstone, where the consuming waves shall never reach the shore, 
 and where one ray of light shall never burst through the infinite 
 chaos that lies between you and Me. Your position, in place of 
 being the source of pain to the blessed, is a relief: heaven is freed 
 from your blasphemies : your scandals can no longer grieve the 
 Holy Ghost : the Cross can no more suffer for your infidelities : and 
 My wounds will no more bleed afresh from your apostasies : heaven 
 rejoices in your damnation : time and sin are at an end : the saints 
 and angels love what I love, and they hate what I hate : and as the 
 gates of hell close on you, in eternal banishment, heaven will raise a 
 jubilee of joy at your never-ending sentence : Begone, ye accursed, 
 into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels. Then turn- 
 ing to the blessed with a countenance full of sweetness, He exclaims : 
 Gome, ye blessed of My Father , jjossess the kingdom p)rej}ared for yoti 
 from the foundation of the loorld. 
 
 Dearest Brethren, the coming certainty of this awful day, the de- 
 claration of Christ announcing His anger and sentence, ought to 
 chraige the life of many a sinner : and I pray God that these words 
 of mine may sink like a burning brand into the hearts of those who 
 hear me. 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 75 
 
 Dr, Cahill To Five Protestant Clergymen. 
 
 Lettekkenny, May SOtli, 1.853. 
 Reverend Sir, — We, the undersigned, having heard you deliver a controversial 
 lecture this evening in the chapel of Letterkenny, feel it our solemn duty, as minis- 
 ters of God and embassadors of Christ, to protest against the doctrines set forth by 
 you, as unscriptural and contrary to tlie teaching of the Catholic Church. We 
 would therefore take the liberty of inviting you to a public discussion, to be carried 
 on in a kind and Christian spirit, in which we call upon you to prove that the doc- 
 trines contained in the twelve supplementary articles of the creed of Pope Pius IV. 
 were ever propounded and set forth In the Christian Church as a creed before the 
 year 1564. 
 
 Secondly — We invite you to bring on the platform your rule of faith, and give us 
 your Church's authorized interpretation of the sixth, ninth, aud tenth chapters of 
 St. Paul to the Hebrews — -or, if you prefer it, your Church's authorized exposition 
 of the simplest portions of the Holy Writ — the Lord's prayer. 
 
 Thirdly — Wc invite you and any number of your brother priests to meet an equal 
 number of clergy of the Church of England, to prove the assertions you used in 
 endeavoring to establish the unscriptural doctrine of the sacrifice of the Mass. 
 Trusting you will receive the iuWtation in the same spirit in which it is dictated, 
 we remain yours faithfully in Christ, 
 
 F. GooLD, Archdeacon of Kaphoe. 
 
 J. Irwin, Rector of Aughaninshin. 
 
 R. Smith, Curate of Cornwall. 
 
 J. W. Irwin, Curate of Eaymohy. 
 
 J. LiNSKEA, Glenalla. 
 
 I^EVEEEjSTD sirs, — I have the honor to acknowledge the 
 §1^ receipt of your polite note, dictated in a spirit of great 
 f^ courtesy, and having stamped on it the clear impress of the 
 ■I distinguished character of the gentlemen whose names it 
 
 bears. I shall then at once proceed to give a hasty reply to those 
 passages in your respected communication which demand commen- 
 tary from me. 
 
 Firstly, then, I solemnly deny, and conscientiously protest against 
 
76 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 your unauthorized assumption of calling yourselves "the ministers of 
 God and embassadors of Christ ; " and I complain loudly of your 
 most unjustifiable intrusion in designating your modern local con- 
 venticle by the name of the " Catholic Church." Gentlemen, I 
 assure you I do not mean, even remotely, to utter one offensive 
 sentiment to you personally by telling you that you are libelling 
 God and calumniating the Apostles in using this language. You 
 are, on the contrary, the ecclesiastical ministers of the British Par- 
 liament, you are the clerical embassadors of the Queen of England, 
 and you are the rebel children of the most terrific apostasy the world 
 ever saw. The Thirtj^-nine articles of your creed (which learned 
 Protestants call contradictory and incongruous) are the accidental 
 result of a majoi'ity of voices in the British senate-house of that day. 
 This act of Parliament forms the preface of your Book of Common 
 Prayer, and the decisions of that Parliamentary session are unavow- 
 edly the very basis and the theological title of the Anglican creed, 
 as expressed in these Articles. In point of fact, and according to 
 the language of the English Parliament, that creed should be appro- 
 priately called a " bill," like any other Parliamentary bill passed by 
 a majority in that house. Beyond all doubt, its proper name should 
 be " the Protestant Eeligion Bill," or some other such designation, 
 proceeding, as it does, professedly, and originating officially from 
 the decision of the senate-house, and from the authority of the 
 Crown. The authority does not even pretend to be derived from 
 Christ, as it acknowledges itself to be fallible, and, of course, pro- 
 gressive and human. 
 
 And the Prime Minister of England can lay aside any of your 
 present opinions when he tiiinks fit, as was recently proved in the 
 case of the Rev.* Mr. Gorham; and the Queen can annul the united 
 doctrinal decision of your national convocation at her pleasure. 
 Argue this case as you will, and call this authority by whatever 
 name you please, there it is, the supreme arbiter of your Church, 
 the essential sanction and source of your faith. Thus, in point of 
 fact, you pray to God as the Premier likes ; and you believe in God 
 as the Queen pleases ; and you multiply or diminish the articles of 
 your " Religion Bill" as the Parliament decides. You are, there- 
 fore, judicially and officially, the very creatures of the State ; and 
 you wear your surplices and preach by precisely the same autliority 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 77 
 
 with which a midshipman wears his sword, or a Queen's counsel 
 appears in a silk gown ; you derive your jurisdiction from an 
 authority at which the very Mohammedans staud in stupid amaze- 
 ment — viz. : an authority which places a child in a cradle, a young 
 girl in her teens, or a toothless old hag in the place of the twelve 
 Apostles, standing in the footsteps of Christ, the seat of wisdom, 
 the oracle of divine truth, and the expounder of Revelation. Except 
 that we know this statement to be a fact from undeniable evidence, 
 no man living could ever think that an}^ man in his senses would 
 submit to such an outi'age on the human understanding. Sir Thomas 
 More, the Chancellor of England, with thousands of others, pre- 
 ferred to die at the block sooner than submit to this mockery of 
 God. This is the ludicrous jurisdiction under which you teach and 
 preach ; but to call yourselves " the ministers of God and the embas- 
 sadors of Christ," is an act of such reckless forgetfulness of your 
 position (in refei'ence to jurisdiction), as to set all the delicacies of 
 truth and fact at defiance in a matter of the most public and palpable 
 notoriety ; in truth, it is unbecoming effrontery. 
 
 Again, all Christians of all denominations admit that the repeated 
 pledges and promises of Christ guarantee the indestructible existence 
 of a true Church forever on the earth. The word of God the Father, 
 fixing our sun in our skies forever, is not more clear and emphatic 
 than the word of God the Son in placing the true Church in a per- 
 manent unclouded existence on the earth forever. At the time of 
 your separation there was only this one universal Church on earth ; 
 there being but one in existence, it must have been this true one so 
 guaranteed. You have avowedly separated from this Church ; and 
 at that time, in order to mark the doctrinal character of your con- 
 duct, you called yourselves by the appropriate name t)f Protestants. 
 You, therefore, at that time, resigned your title to the Catholic 
 Church, which you abandoned. You rebelled against her authority, 
 and from that hour to this you stand expelled from her spiritual 
 territory, and excommunicated by her judicial penalties. On that 
 occasion you severed yourself from the source of all her spiritual 
 power, and broke the link that bound you to the long chain of apos- 
 tolic jurisdiction. Will you kindly inform the world when and 
 where did you become reunited to that Church? You now call 
 yourselves " Catholic ! " Or are you now beginning to be ashamed 
 
78 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of the word " Protestant ? " You see that this word argues the want 
 of legithnate title to the Christian inheritance, and you are trying to 
 insert a word by fraud into your forged deed. 
 
 Why do you not use the other three marks of the true Church, 
 and call yourselves, "One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic?" Ah, 
 reckless as you are in your assumption, you are afraid of the jibes 
 of the historian to assvmie the other three marks. As long as your 
 interminable (750) changes in faith are recorded, it would be inju- 
 dicious to invest your Church with the attribute of unity ; as long as 
 the public reads the plunder of the abbeys and hears the universal 
 spoliation of the poor, while the I'ed gibbet of Elizabeth surmounts 
 your communion table, and while your modern towers publish 3'onr 
 recent origin, it would be drawing rather too largely on the public 
 credulity to stifle this glaring evidence of your sins and character, 
 and to call yourselves, "One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic." No, 
 no ; you are too clever and discerning to attempt this palpable 
 imposture ; and hence you are content to assume slyly the single 
 term of "Catholic ; " and thus you endeavor to regain the place you 
 have forfeited, and repair the connection you have broken. But, 
 gentlemen, this dodge will not do ; you may impose on your own 
 flocks, who don't know you as well as we do ; but as long as I am 
 placed as a sentinel at the ivy doors of the old Church, you shall not 
 enter under false colors. Come in your own clothes as Protestant 
 ministers. Parliamentary embassadors, modern Biblemen, from a 
 petty district, but you shall not assume the mark of the universality 
 of time and place Avhile I am present. Like sparrows hatched in an 
 eagle's nest, I shall teach you that, although you have been born 
 near us, you have neither the shape, color, or genealogy of the roj'al 
 breed of the Apostles, under whose wings your Church has been 
 fraudulently introduced and nurtured into an illegitimate existence. 
 
 Whenever, therefore, you may in future honor me with any com- 
 munication, may I beg you will announce yourselves in your Protest- 
 ant profession ; appear in your own modern dress, assume your own 
 Pai'liamentary titles, and do not add to your fonner prevarications 
 to the living by coming now in the end of time laden with the spoils 
 of the dead. Dress yourselves like Luther and Calvin, and Knox 
 and Cranmer; come with a sword in your hand, like Zuinglius, and 
 with an axe, like your first apostles ; don't assume the holy cross ; do 
 
REV. DR CAHILL. 79 
 
 not put on the robes of Jerome or Chrysostom ; do not, for shame, 
 rob the dead of their hoary honors ; do not appear in the unsullied 
 robes of the Apostles, whom your ancestors have betrayed; do not 
 wear the crowns of More and Fisher, won on the block which your 
 GosjDel had erected. This passage brings me in presence of the 
 second part of your note. 
 
 In consequence of the existence of an infallible authority framing 
 our laws and promulgating our Faith, it would be clearly an act of 
 the most palpable inconsistency to subject to your decision, or to the 
 award of a public meeting of fallible men, the doctrines already fixed 
 by an unerring tribunal. You ai'C true to your principles in seeking 
 and yielding to this decision, since private judgment is your first 
 principle ; but I cannot subject my Faith to such a standard, believ- 
 ing, as I do, that a living authority has been permanently appointed 
 in the Church of Cimst, invested with a command from Heaven to 
 teach all men, and sustained by the official presence of the Holy 
 Ghost, as a legislative guarantee for the immutable truth of its decis- 
 ions. There are no passages in the Scriptures, on any subject of 
 Divine faith, put forward in stronger or more emphatic language 
 than these parts of Revelation which enforce the permanent, un- 
 changeable existence and practicable agency of this tribunal. The 
 existence of Christ, or the facts of the Cross, the Eesurrection, and 
 Ascension, are not expressed in a clearer ofiicial enactment than the 
 record of this living court of infallible decision. I can no more 
 doubt the existence of the Saviour, than disbelieve this official pre- 
 rogative of the Church of Christ. I believe the one with the same 
 precise amount of evidence I believe the other ; and if you bring a 
 doubt on the authority of this court, you necessarily call in question 
 all the other parts of the record of salvation. So perfectly logical 
 is the inference, that history sustains my assertions on this vital 
 point ; and it is quite true to say that since the fatal period of your 
 separation, and since you preached the overthrow of this first princi- 
 ple, you have opened the flood-gates of latitudinarianism, and filled 
 every Protestant country in Europe with wild rationalism and naked 
 infidelity. 
 
 In a thousand years hence, when Protestantism will be only rec- 
 ollected in name, like Ariauism or any of the other varieties of 
 human wickedness or folly, the future ecclesiastical historian will 
 
80 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ■write the thrilling record ; namely, that of all the phases of irrelig- 
 ion which have appeared on the earth, the Anglican heresy has 
 inflicted the deepest wound on Revelation, from its encouragement 
 to human pride and its official flattery of human passion. Human 
 reason, in its practical workings, has never been the same in the 
 same country, the same age, or even the same man. If we except 
 the truths of mathematical science, human reason is ever changing, 
 and I think it ought to be readilj^ admitted that a God of rigid jus- 
 tice and truth could never build the unerring enactments of revela- 
 tion and salvation on a shifting basis of such a variable construction. 
 "Within the last twenty-five years I have seldom read the proceed- 
 ings of any Protestant assembly on matters of religion, in which the 
 principal topics have not been, viz. : "The usurped infallibility of 
 the Church of Rome, and the new articles of faith of the Roman 
 Church." The ancient Pi'otestant clergy of Ireland did not utter 
 these falsehoods ; they lived contented with their titles, and enjoyed 
 their glebes and drank their claret without this eternal calumny of 
 the plundered Catholics. But within the last quarter of a century a 
 swarm of young clerical aspirants invade all the public places, stand 
 in all the thoroughfares, and are heard on the four winds roaring and 
 bawling, wherever you turn, against the Church of Rome. They 
 are to be seen at all the Protestant print-shoi3S, book-stands, rail- 
 road stations, bazaars, excursion trips, botanical reunions ; and I 
 dare say you will admit the powerful fact that they have no conver- 
 sation, no entertainment for all who have the misfortune to come 
 within the range of their clerical contact, save one ceaseless, inde- 
 cent abuse, misrepresentation and calumny of the principles of the 
 Catholic creed. And I am quite willing to admit that these gentle- 
 men are persons of finished education, and of delicate truth, and of 
 elegant courtesy in their social character on most other points ; but, 
 in reference to Catholicity, they are not ashamed to utter statements 
 too foolish to be noticed, or too gross to be told. Having appar- 
 ently no parochial duties to discharge, their sole occupation seems 
 to be calumniating their Catholic neighbors and forging misstate- 
 ments of the Catholic clergy, who never speaiv a word of oflence to 
 them, either in our public or private intercourse. We cannot in 
 these days instruct our people without public insult, nor can we 
 defend our doctrines from misrepresentation without sickening chal- 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 81 
 
 lenges from school-boy declaimers, — raw, jejune clerical graduates 
 seeking notoriety in the service of God ( ?) by falsehood, malignitj% 
 and sedition. This is a painful state of society. The conduct of 
 your brethren on this subject has long since formed the topic of 
 public condemnation even throughout Europe, and has by its excess 
 and extravagance nauseated the public taste, and beyond all doubt 
 has raised the spirit of inquiry in the detection of this indecent im- 
 posture, and now universal exposure. 
 
 I am led into these observations by your remarks on the creed of 
 Pius IV., in which you assert that novelties have been introduced 
 into our faith. 
 
 Gentlemen, in all the public speeches and writings of your breth- 
 ren, they all (I hope not through calumnious design) make one com- . 
 mon mistake, viz. : You call " a new decision of a council " by the 
 name of a new act of faith, — an addition to the old creed. It is not 
 so. The new decision of a council is rather a sign of an old doctrine 
 than the evidence of a new one ; it is the collected expression of the 
 old belief of the Church embodied in a new decree ; so that, so far 
 from being an evidence of a new thing, it is, on the contrary, an 
 inevitable demonstration of an old thing. It is the official appli- 
 cation of an old truth and pi-inciple to some new heretic, or some new 
 error; so that while the heretic is new to whom it is addressed, and 
 the case is new to which it is applied, the principle and the truth so 
 applied is ipso facto already known as the statute law of the Church ; 
 and ten thousand new cases may be settled by one old princiiDle, just 
 as the Chancellor settles the unnumbered new cases of his court 
 without adding one tittle to the old statute law of England. When 
 Moses brought down from Mount Sinai the ten commandments em- 
 bodied in a written decree from God, will any man assert that this 
 was the first time for twenty-five centuries that men received the 
 commandments of God ? Certainly it was the first written decision 
 of God that men ever saw ; but will any man say that this was a new 
 faith or morality received under the Theoarchy, and that this was the 
 first time when God forbade the crimes of murder, adultery, rob- 
 bery, perjury and idolatry, etc. ? If, then, our doctrine of an infal- 
 lible tribunal be true, as it is, it follows that a general council, 
 directed by the Holy Ghost, stands in similar circumstances (as far 
 as Revelation goes) with this Theoarchy, and hence that these new 
 
82 TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 decisions, so far from being acts of faith, are, on the contrary, the 
 best evidence of the ab-eady universally received opinions on the 
 point decided. All the new decisions of the Church against Arian- 
 ism and Pelagianism, and the decisions on the consubstantiality of 
 the Son with the Father, and all the decrees on the nature and jier- 
 son of Christ, are all nearly expressed in one sentence of the creed : 
 — "I believe in Jesus Christ, His only Son, who was conceived by 
 the Holy Ghost, and born of the Virgin Mary, was crucified, dead 
 and buried, rose again on the third clay from the dead, and ascended 
 into heaven. I believe in the Holy Catholic Church," etc., etc. 
 This short sentence, with some few additional texts, form, if I may 
 so speak, the statute laws on the varied decisions alluded to. In 
 fact, all the new decisions such as your brethren allude to, and such 
 as you have referred to in the point at issue, are merely so many 
 legitimate deducibles from the record of Revelation subjected to this 
 competent authority, and settled and published by a decree founded 
 on the ancient truths of Christ's Gospel as taught by the Apostles. 
 
 The Catholic rule of fiiith, therefore, is the word of God inter- 
 preted and taught by this living authority, as it was from the begin- 
 ning ; and this rule is so clear, so obvious, so comprehensive, and 
 so easily attainable, that, with a penny catechism in your hand, and 
 in the society of a priest, the accredited officer, you can learn, to 
 your perfect satisfaction, our entire faith, in construction, plan, and 
 indefectible legislative guarantees, within the short space of one 
 hour ; and the authorized version of any portion of Holy Writ is to 
 be learned, not so much from its philosophical or philological con- 
 struction, as from its inferential adjustment, and its substantial 
 agreement with the known truths already believed and taught in 
 connection with the passages under the examination referred to. 
 We do not receive our faith from disputing, contentious school- 
 masters, but from ordained priests ; we are occupied with the 
 substance, not the names of things ; we take our faith from the 
 guaranteed inspiration of the Holy Ghost, not from the inflections 
 and rules of grammar ; and as the incarnation and the death of our 
 Lord are beyond our reason, we have no idea of consulting that 
 same reason in laws beyond its reach, no more than the mysteries 
 "which it cannot comprehend. 
 
 In conclusion, I beg to assure you that I have felt much compli- 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 83 
 
 meiited by your attendance at nay lectures on the Holy Sacrifice of 
 the Mass, and I have felt rather honored by the united note of the 
 five Protestant clergymen, transmitted to me through the courtesy 
 of the Protestant Archdeacon of Raphoe, and the brother-in-law of 
 our late Viceroy. I have not, I hope, in any words which escaped 
 me at that lecture, uttered any sentiment which could offend ; and I 
 here disclaim again intending to say one word in this note (beyond 
 my own professional duty) to give the smallest uneasiness to gentle- 
 men towards whom I feel much personal respect, and to whom I beg 
 unfeignedly to offer the expression of high and distinguished con- 
 sidex'atiou. 
 
 I have the honor to be, Rev. Sirs, your obedient servant, 
 
 D. W. Cahill, D. D. 
 
 P. S. — As you have gratuitously originated this cori'espondence, 
 you can have no claim on me for its continuance ; and, therefore, I 
 i-espectfuUy decline taking any further notice of any letters which 
 you may do me the honor to send me in future. 
 
84: TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Letter of the Rev. Dr, Cahill to the Right Hon, 
 The Earl of Derby, 
 
 New Brighton, Saturday, October 21, 1852. 
 
 ^^^^Y LOED EARL, — Some few months ago our gracious 
 l^jT^ Queen, in a speech from the throne, very emphatically an- 
 fe^^^ nounced her royal determination to uphold the principles of 
 "T the Protestant Church, and she called on her servants there 
 assembled, in her presence, to assist her in maintaining the liberties 
 of the Protestant Constitution. There must be, my Lord, in the 
 royal mind some hidden fear of this Church being in danger, in 
 order to account for the large space which this idea has taken up in 
 the royal oration. If this declaration had been made by your Lord- 
 ship, or by any one of the present Ministry, it would still command 
 an important attention ; but when it proceeds from the head of your 
 Church — from the ecumenical source of all Protestant truth, it 
 comes before the world invested with all the realities of Parliamen- 
 tary gravity and English history. For the first time in my life, I 
 do agree with the sentiments deduced from a roj'al speech ; and I 
 do, therefore, believe that your Church is in imminent danger at 
 the present moment ; and I believe, moreover, that neither her most 
 gracious Majesty, with all her royal power, my Lord John Russell, 
 with the base Whigs, nor your Lordship, with the most judicious 
 combination of Whig and Tory which your skill in Parliamentary 
 chemistry can produce, will be able to stay much longer the down- 
 fall of an institution which is a libel on God's Gospel, a fortress for 
 public injustice, and the scandalous disturber of our national peace. 
 The danger to be apprehended, however, will not proceed, in the 
 first instance, from an extei'ual enemy ; it will come from her long 
 
KEY. DR. CAIIILL. 85 
 
 internal rottenness ; and the public shame, and the public common 
 sense, and the public indignation will soon be seen struggling for 
 the mastery in levelling with the earth, and eradicating from the 
 soil, this anti-Christian monster, which has been reared on the plun- 
 dered food of the widow and the orphan, and which now makes its 
 enormous daily meals and annual feasts on the life-blood of the entire 
 nation. 
 
 The long silence of the Catholics under your shameful and shame- 
 less calumnies, and our superhuman endurance under savage Pai'lia- 
 mentary insults and lies, such as are actually unknown in any other 
 country in the whole woi'ld, have had the effect of encouraging our 
 insatiable enemies, in place of mitigating their fanatical ferocity. 
 The oblivion which our writers have cast in charity over the first 
 flagrant iniquities of your Church has been misunderstood by your 
 professional bigots, who, like a swarm of locusts, crowd every 
 thoroughfare in the Empire, enabling the passengers of all nations to 
 read, in the malignant domination of their brows, that the hatred of 
 Catholicity, the fury of unappeasable malignity, and not the mild 
 spirit of Christianity, is the predominant feeling of their hearts, and 
 the very mainspring of their entire conduct. The Catholic public, 
 too, have forgotten the early pedigree of the Reformation ; and 
 have, therefore, considerably relaxed in their watchfulness against 
 their deadly foes ; and hence the public mind must be again roused 
 to a universal resistance against a congregation of calumniators, 
 who, not content with living on the plunder of our ancestors, are 
 engaged, year after year, in maligning their victims, spreading 
 abroad uncharitableness, disturbing the public peace, and positively, 
 and without any doubt, disturbing the name and material interests 
 of England throughout the entire world. 
 
 As Lord John Russell and your Lordship have been the principal 
 promoters of this strange evangelism, I have decided on addressing 
 to you twelve letters on the subject just referred to. They shall be 
 divided into distinctions, in which I shall prove beyond all doubt — 
 Firstly, the unscriptural enormities and the theological incongruities 
 of these Protestant principles which you say are now endangered ; 
 Secondly, I shall demonstrate beyond all contradiction, that this 
 Protestant Constitution has committed the largest crime of plunder- 
 ing the poor ever recorded in history ; and. Thirdly, I shall enume- 
 
86 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 rate, to the satisfaction of every impartial man, the historical records 
 by which this Church is charged with spilling more blood of innocent, 
 and defenceless, and unofi'ending Catholics, than has ever been shed 
 by the most ruthless tyrant that ever crimsoned the page of human 
 woe. In the treatment of this subject, I wish to inform you that I 
 mean no offence to the present generation of generous-hearted, hon- 
 est Englishmen ; my charges are not against individuals, but against 
 the anti-Christian system of which they are made the wretched dupes. 
 Nor shall I found my observations upon exclusively Catholic 
 authority, or on hearsay, however respectable the testimony, or on 
 loose historical assertion. I shall quote all my proofs from your 
 own great historians, fi'om the Protestant Synods of Germany, 
 Switzerland, Holland and France ; and I shall complete my demon- 
 strations from the Acts of the English Parliament. I shall not con- 
 fine my views on the hoiTors of j'our evangelical system to Great 
 Britain and unfortunate Ireland. I shall trace them through 
 Northern and Central Eurojie ; and I shall place before the Christian 
 world the clear fact, viz., that in whatever country Protestantism has 
 been introduced in the room of Catholicity, there may be traced all 
 the maddening disorders which have almost ever accompanied and 
 followed it ; namely, ferocious bigotry, relentless persecution, san- 
 guinary atrocities, social disunion, and universal, wasting, jxiblic 
 brand of beggary and national distress, graven by the ruthless bigot 
 on the heart, and the bones, and the marrow of the wretched, sub- 
 dued Catholic. 
 
 And if I shall fulfil faithfully these my preliminary promises, there 
 is no honorable English or Irish Protestant (who will take the 
 trouble to read my pi-oofs) who can, as a scholar, a gentleman, and 
 a Christian, be reasonably angry with me for exposing to the public 
 indignation a system calling itself the Gospel of Christ, and which, 
 on examination, will be found an iniquitous aggregate of hypocrisy, 
 lies, rebellion, spoliation, murder and blasphemy. I own it requires 
 much deliberate reflection before these grave charges should be made 
 against your National Church, and addressed to so exalted a person 
 as the Earl of Derby. I feel this responsibility, and I fully conceive 
 my position ; but I again repeat my charges, and I shall forfeit all 
 claim to truth, if I do not perfectly substantiate every point I have 
 adduced. It is with feelinirs of tremulous confusion that the historian 
 
KEV. DR. CAHILL. 87 
 
 of the present day will even attempt to write details of the crimes of 
 this infamous band of anti-Christian monsters ; and hence, who can 
 describe what must have been the bewildering, the shocking, the 
 racking woes of the persecuted past generation, which witnessed and 
 bled under their terrific realities. 
 
 The first unparalleled imposture which the ." Reformation " invented 
 and which it has practised to this day, was the self-appointment and 
 self-conseci"ation of Henry VIII. to assume the title of " Head of the 
 Church." One might suppose that the man who robbed the convents 
 of Englishmen to the amount of millions of money, built and 
 secured by the ancient laws of the realm, would be ashamed to 
 appear before his countrymen, stained as his character was with this 
 public profanation ; one might believe that a monster who had 
 divorced three wives and beheaded two (one of them probably his 
 own daughter) would be afraid to let the eye of mortal see his hands 
 reeking with the blood of his innocent victims. Through all the 
 past history of mankind, if such a demon succeeded in escaping the 
 arm of public justice, or the hand of the avenging assassin, he fled 
 from human intercourse to bury his guilty head and racking con- 
 science in the lonely cell of perpetual penance, in order to expiate 
 the thrilling enormity of his black crimes. 
 
 But your apostle, the first head of your Church, seemed i-ather to 
 rise than sink by his iniquities ; they appear rather to qualify than 
 incapacitate your Gospel founder for his exalted siiiritual post ; and 
 hence, he stands before your tabernacle with his red hands lifted in 
 prayer to God ! Yes, in prayer to God, your accredited proto- 
 apostle, your appointed bishop, and your consecrated Pope ! the 
 guardian of innocence, the model of virtue, the terror of vice, the 
 teacher of Gospel truth, the ornament of religion, the standard of 
 evangelical perfection, the infallible guide to Heaven, the successor 
 ( of the Apostles, and the Vicegerent of Christ himself on earth ! He 
 appointed and consecrated himself (Act Par., 1538) Pope and Head 
 of the Church ; and he appointed Tom Cromwell (Act 1533) his 
 " Vicegerent in spirituals; " and he gave him, as his Vicar-General, 
 a commission, with nineteen sub-commissioners, named by his 
 "English Holiness," to report on the discipline and moral conduct 
 and faith of all the religious orders of England ! The only parallel 
 that could be devised to equal this incomprehensible farce on Chris- 
 
88 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tianity would be to see the Devil asceud the Mount where our Lord 
 delivered His first sermon, and to hear him address the multitude on 
 the Eight Beatitudes, in mimicry of our Saviour, without any attempt 
 during his discourse to either conceal " his cloven foot or tail " from 
 the congregation. 
 
 Do you wonder, sir, why we Catholics laugh and shudder at this, 
 your first hierarchy ? Can you be surprised why a learned Catholic 
 trembles at this blasphemy of the Holy Ghost, this mockery of 
 Christianity, this jesting with God, this sporting with the Gospel, 
 this jibing with damnation? There is nothing like this scene of 
 palpable mimicry of Christ and the Apostles to be found in the 
 entire record of the most insane infidelit}\ It surpasses in atrocious 
 and tragic infamy anything that has ever happened in the whole 
 world ; and it stands before all mankind as the first page in the 
 charter of your religion, the inauguration of your hierarchy, and the 
 undoubted source of the " Reformation." There were many faithful, 
 courageous Englishmen, who resisted this monstrous iniquity, and 
 if you wish to learn their names, go to the prisons of your Apostle, 
 where thousands of your countrymen died in confinement ; go to 
 glorious France, where hundreds of your relatives fled for safety ; 
 and, sir, go to the reeking block, where you can read in the mar- 
 tyred blood of the illustrious More, the venerable Fisher, and in the 
 shameful murder of the noble Countess of Salisbury. Read there 
 the origin of your creed, the law of your Gospel, the decalogue of 
 your ethics. 
 
 If these astounding scenes were enacted under the excitement of 
 mere popular or mere political fury, they should not find a place in 
 this letter to your Lordship, which is intended for the discussion of 
 the religious foundation of your Chiu-ch ; but they were the acts of 
 Henry, as your ecclesiastical superior (see Act), they wei-e executed 
 in the name and under the sanction of this new Church ; as such they 
 were agreed to by theDrummonds, and theRussells, and the Derby s 
 of that day of English infamy ; and in the preambles of the Acts of 
 Parliament, the Assemblj^ sat in delilieratiou " iu the Spirit of the 
 Holy Ghost," and hence, these acts of Ileury form, without contra- 
 diction, a record of your ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and not of j^our 
 political history. There is no generous, candid English Protestant, 
 at the present day, who, I believe, does not blush at the recital of 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 89, 
 
 these atrocities, and yet he lives contentedly and unconsciously under 
 the very same hierarchal law ; is governed by the reigning monarch 
 as the head of the Church ; pays religious obedience in faith and 
 morals to the persons called, appointed, and commissioned to lead 
 men's souls to heaven ; and all this by virtue of the royal prerogative, 
 as the supreme spiritual authority of the realm. Take away the 
 crimes of your first founder, and your present sj'stcm is perfectly 
 the same — namely, human commission, human jurisdiction in the 
 kingdom of Christ ! You might as well apply the laws of gravita- 
 tion to the soul, as to adopt a temporal rule to produce spiritual 
 results of grace. You might as well tell the world that original sin 
 is remitted in baptism according to the laws of hydrostatics, as to 
 assert that the queen or king of any country can give ex-officio a 
 commission to save the souls of their subjects. 
 
 It is the monarch alone of that spiritual kingdom who can frame 
 its laws, appoint his officers, give them authority, define their duties, 
 and decide rewards and punishments ; and this leads me to examine 
 this principle of supremacy iu the reigu of Edward VI. Mr. Cobbett 
 has already glanced at this subject ; but Mr. Cobbett was no theolo- 
 gian — I am ; and he confined his views to England : I shall extend 
 mine to every country in Europe whei'e your Gospel has been 
 preached ; and I hei'cby humbly request of the embassadors of the 
 Catholic Courts now resident in London (to each of whom I shall 
 send a copy of this letter) , that they will so far have mercy on 
 Ireland as to publish my proofs in each of their capitals, in order to 
 infoi'm their nations of the insatiable injustice exercised towards us 
 by the cruelty of the English Government, and to warn their coun- 
 trymen of the danger of pei-mitting English missionaries and English 
 spies to reside amongst them, calumniating their creed and revolu- 
 tionizing their laws. 
 
 One can scarcely avoid bursting out into a commingled torrent of 
 indignation, contempt, and horror, against a band of plunderei's, 
 infidels, and assassins, who, in the face of civilized Europe, could 
 set up a child of ten years of age as Pope the Second, thus placing 
 the nation in a position of spiritual ruin, and perpetuating the mad 
 apostacy of the last reign. This, my Lord, is a new practical- 
 spiritual phase of your Church. In the late reign, the King pro- 
 claimed himself Poj^e ; but here we have a born Pope, a born Bishop,. 
 
00 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 an Apostle in swaddling-clothes, coming into the world with a mitre 
 on his head, the inspiration of the Holy Ghost transmitted to him 
 from his father Henry, like freehold property ; the grace of God 
 running in the child's pure blood by virtue of the character and 
 ecumenical position of his father ; a born saint, like his father, and, 
 like a child born with a wooden leg, holding the crozier in his new- 
 born hand, and wearing the mitre on his apostolic hereditary head ! 
 Lord Derby, are you serious in belonging to a system of such dis- 
 gusting, incompi'ehensible folly? You might as well assert that a 
 hawk could beget a whale, as that a Bisbop could be naturally 
 elaborated from the blood of Henry VIII. But this is not all ; this 
 child-Pope made the " Book of Common Prayer," and almost entirely 
 drew up the Thirty-nine Articles of what is called your creed. 
 
 And what renders the thing so utterly shameful, is that this weak, 
 sickly boy never, perhaps, saw the book, or read one of the Articles 
 referred to ; so that this principle of the headship of the Church, 
 which, in itself, is so ludicrous, is, besides all this, a most monstrous, 
 notorious, palpable lie, as the baby-Pope, who is said to be head, 
 has actually, and in point of fact, no more part in this Reformation- 
 jugglery than the Gi'and Turk. The idea of a child making Articles 
 of Faith, and composing prayers, through an Act of Parliament, as 
 head of ChrisCs Church, is so palpably I'idiculous, that the Catholics 
 at once ask you, "What insanity has come over you, to leave a learned 
 old Pope and a Council of Bishops, in order to follow a child in a 
 cradle and a Senate of shopkeepers ? " You decide religion as you 
 decide the duty on j'our manufactures ; you settle the way to heaven 
 as you fix the dii'cction of a turnpike road — namely, by a majority 
 of votes ; and in the fiice of mankind you set up a baby in a cradle 
 as the expounder of the Gospel, although it cannot read ; as the 
 teacher of the Gospel, although it cannot speak ; and as the head of 
 your Church in all its duties, although it has not got one idea in its 
 head of any one thing in this world ! ! 
 
 But the principle has to be examined in a new, astounding, third 
 phase, viz. : — After the death of Edward, it is to be seen residing 
 in a young woman of six-and-twenty years of age ! of course, she, 
 too, is the sanctified descendant of the first head, Pope Henry. She, 
 too, it seems, inherits her father's sanctity ; but the inspiration of 
 the Holy Ghost does not fall upon her till the mature apostolic age 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 91 ■ 
 
 of twenty-six. Blessed family ! to have men, M'omen, and children 
 all born apostles — angels of grace. This lay Pope, this royal nun, 
 this consecrated virgin, was the person who completed the inspiration 
 of the far-famed Thirty-nine Articles of your Faith, not more than 
 ten of which any educated respectable Protestant can conscientiously 
 believe. Some of them are contradictory, others absurd, and two 
 or three of them impossible. You, my Lord, who are so deepty 
 read in canon-law as to see heresy in our cravats, and to read the 
 violation of your constitutional laws in our shoes and hosiery, will 
 you say how many of these articles do you believe ? I never knew 
 any Protestant who had such a capacious draught of sanctity. Lord 
 John Russell, although a Presbyterian, a Puseyitc, a Methodist, a 
 Protestant, and a Pagan (as he has expunged baptism), does not 
 perhaps believe from these five creeds of his so many of these Thirty- 
 nine Articles of Godliness. I believe it to be true, my Lord, that, 
 like razors made to sell, but not to shave, these Articles are made 
 more for show than devotion. Excuse me, my Lord, if I, at the 
 present moment, smile in your face, at seeing your name enrolled in 
 such an incongruous, insane system of absurdity, imposture, and 
 infidelity. 
 
 But, my Lord, I am not quite done with this young lady Pope. 
 There is a new feature in her apostolic reign, which we learn from 
 jict of Parliament, passed in the year 1571, and in the thirteenth 
 year of her reign, to which I refer you. In this Act, passed by her 
 Parliament of Englishmen (manufacturers of foith),aud subscribed, 
 of course, by her holy hand, as head of your Church, it was enacted 
 (Christ protect us !) that the crown of England should descend, if 
 she had no lawful heirs, to her "natural issue." Do you blush, Lord 
 Derby, to see the crown of Alfred and Edward given by your evan- 
 gelical Senate to such "an issue," by Act of Parliament! Do you 
 blush to see the head of your church subscribe a public law of her 
 own public shame ! signing her hand manual to an act that would 
 degrade the most infamous inmate of the lowest of your London 
 brothels — haunts of pollution ! I fancy it was this Act of Parlia- 
 ment which Mr. Drummond read, on the night when he spewed the 
 filth of his Reformation creed on the spotless consecrated Catholic 
 virgins of Europe. He mistook them for the virgin head of your 
 Church; ho did — the wretched old Reformer — he did mistake 
 
92 TIIEASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 them ; and in Iiis filthy language he was protected by the Speaker, 
 and thus applauded hy the whole Senate of England. I say, sir, he 
 was, and Catholic Europe should never forget the insult offered to 
 their honor, their morality, and to their creed. My Lord, what do 
 you now say, so far as I have gone as yet, to the early foundation of 
 your '" Reformed Church ? " 
 
 Amidst the records of the human race, there is a sense of shame 
 in the most abandoned, which prompts them to conceal their per- 
 sonal crimes — wretches who have lost every virtue and are immersed 
 in every vice, have still left in their black hearts one small remnant 
 of untainted nature ; namely, the inward feeling of condemnation of 
 their own guilt. It is so in the most degraded wretch that expiates 
 on the scaffold the enormities of a long obdurate life ; it is particu- 
 larly so in woman, whose fine nature can never be utterly trampled 
 out by vice but with her life ; and hence, when we find a Queen of 
 a most powerful Empire the head of a Church calling itself Chris- 
 tian, in the face of mankind, at the age of forty-nine, summon a 
 Parliament to make her prospective shame legal by English law ! 
 and when we behold herself in person sign the record of her own 
 crime — she stands before the world the vilest miscreant, the most 
 abandoned wretch, the most shameless monster, in woman form, 
 that has ever stained the profligate records of either ancient or mod- 
 ern infamy. We have borne your calumnies too long in charitable 
 forbearance — we have abstained these many past years from repeat- 
 ing the anti-Christian, the scandalous, incongruous tenets of your 
 abhorrent creed — we have carefully kept from the hands of the 
 rising generation of Ireland the records of your Church infamies — 
 we have actually robbed our Irish children of the history of their 
 fathers, in order to maintain peace with you ; but you have out- 
 raged our endurance ; you and your Church party, both Whig and 
 Tory, have aided in calumniating us, with an indecency of falsehood, 
 that makes even bigotry blush ; and you forced us to come forward 
 against our inclination to recommence the exposure of your blood- 
 stained creed, which will end, as sure as I am penning these lines, 
 in the overthrow of this iniquitous estal)lishment, and pei-haps in 
 the degradation of your country. We shall no longer be silent on 
 a system of religion where your piety is vice — where your Gospel 
 is imposture — and the charter of your creed is hypocrisy, shame. 
 
REV. DR. CAR ILL. 93 
 
 and s'm. In oi'der to meet the objection, "that these Acts of Par- 
 liament had reference to the political, not the religious, prerogative 
 of Elizabeth," 1 subjoin the words of the Synod of London : 
 
 " The sovereign government of all her subjects, lay and clerical, belongs to her in 
 all matters, without being subjected to any foreign power." 
 
 Having thus glanced at the principle of the supremacy of your 
 monarch, the next point in the regular order of your hierarchy is 
 the ludicrous variety of your confessions of faith. From the year 
 1530 to the year 1557, Protestantism has issued not less than 
 eighteen confessions of faith — all different, and varying not only in 
 general principles, but contradictory in most of the articles of faith, 
 and contrary on the same points of belief in not less than four essen- 
 tial dogmas of Christianity. Your confessions of faith are as fol- 
 lows : — Augsburg, 1530; Geneva, 1531; France, 1534; Melanc- 
 thon's Apology, 1535; Scotch confession, 1536; Smalcald, 1537 ; 
 Dort, 1541; Szenger, 1543; Sendomar, 1546; Saxonic, 1551; 
 Wurtemburg, 1552; Book of Concord, 1556; Explications repeat- 
 ed, 1557. 
 
 Now, my Lord, if any one of our theories in chemistry, in refer- 
 ence to the anal3'sis or the products of any chemical agents, under- 
 went eighteen diiferent, contradictory, and contrary demonstrations, 
 is there any scientific scholar in the whole world who would take his 
 oath that all these contrary theories were right ; and, moreover, 
 who would hang, behead, and quarter any one who should refuse to 
 take his oath in the same contrarieties? And if this doctrine in 
 science would make all mankind shudder, will you say in \vhat 
 language shall I attempt to explain your faith, which ascribes to the 
 inspiration of the Holy Ghost eighteen different systems of the 
 grossest lies, the most palpable contradictions, and absurd contra- 
 rieties ? If the meanest man in Great Britain were charged with 
 wilful prevarication on his oath, in his statement in eighteen differ- 
 ent assertions, he would be branded as a debased wretch, a public 
 perjurer ; and hence to ascribe this conduct to the Holy Ghost, in 
 your eighteen sworn confessions of faith, is a depth of blasphemy, a 
 hardihood of insane iniquity beyond the comprehension of the impar- 
 tial observer; but like an old juggler swallowing a dozen of razors 
 at a time, a feat which would kill twelve ordinary men, your long 
 
94 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 habit of unpunished infidelity has accustomed you to stand before 
 the gates of heaven and call God a liar to His face. Saint Paul, 
 endeavoring to express to us unity of Faith, could find no other 
 image by which he could convey his belief, except by likening it to 
 the unity of God, in that remarkable passage of Holy Writ, where 
 he writes to the Ephesians — "one Lord, one Faith, one Baptism." 
 As this language is so clear, it follows that there cannot exist in 
 true faith any change, contradiction, or contrariety, any more than 
 in the very being of God ; and it follows, moreover, from the clear- 
 logic of the text, that two or more faiths are just as absurd as two 
 or moi'e Gods. 
 
 But Avhat signifies the testimony of St. Paul in comparison with 
 that of Elizabeth, and what value can be attached to any scriptural 
 record when placed in juxtaposition with an English Act of Parlia- 
 ment ! When a Church has arrived so far in the mysteries of faith 
 as to place at the head of all spiritual power a monster who has dis- 
 carded three wives and murdered two ; when it can propose for the 
 salvation of the soul a creed said to be made by a child in a cradle ; 
 when a public sin against the sixth commandment by the head of a 
 Church is made legal by an Act of the English Parliament ; when 
 the Holy Ghost is publicly declared on oath to have published for 
 the guidance of the soul in sanctity eighteen avowed systems of pal- 
 pable lies in the short space of twenty-six years — I fearlessly say, 
 if these records cannot be disputed, there is no candid Protestant 
 who can complain if such a system of perjury, pollution, and blas- 
 phemy be vigorously denounced before the indignation and the hor- 
 ror of the entire Christian world. 
 
 Notwithstanding these synodical contrarieties, we learn the strange 
 doctrine from " the Synod of Charteron," that the entire varying 
 Protestant communities of Europe are still "the one society" of true 
 Christian believers ; that eighteen different "distinct things " are the 
 self-same "one thing," is a proposition so utterly incomprehensible, 
 as even to surpass the phenomenon of your supremacy. The only 
 thing I ever read which can at all approach this article of your faith 
 in point of absurdity, is the Dutch tragedy representing Adam about, 
 to he created; at a cei'tain part of the tragedy, when all eyes are 
 turned to the deep, solemn tragedian, who is about to perfoi'm the 
 act of creation, Adam himself, the first man (though not yet crea- 
 
REV. DR. CAHILL. 95 
 
 ted), comes out on the stage, with new doeskin breeches, boots, and 
 spurs, to be created ! With these palpable absurdities you call your 
 Church the spouse of Christ — a lie which makes the skin creep and 
 the blood run cold to hear you connect with the name of the Saviour 
 such an aggregate of obsceneness and imjiiety. From the first 3'ear 
 of your foundation, through the three hundred years of your exis- 
 tence, no three individuals of your co-religionists could agree in 
 doctrine ; and at this moment you present to the laughing world a, 
 congregation divided in all points, except the stereotype doctrine of 
 "hatred of Catholicity." 
 
 Lord John Russell, who can agree with almost any form of faith, 
 cannot admit Baptism ; the Archbishop of Canterbury, who is paid 
 £24,000 a year for the gigantic amount of his faith, will not admit 
 Holy Orders as necessary ; even in time of general English cholera, 
 our Dr. Whateley, in Dublin, the pre-anti-Catholic Archl)ishop of 
 Ireland, exempts unmarried clergymen from their attendance in 
 blue Asiatic cholera. In their Lordships' theological opinions, the 
 attendance of clergy is ouly necessary in fine weather, when new 
 kid gloves can be worn, when the tainted air does not blow from 
 the East, when the patient can receive these apostles on Turkey 
 carpets, and when there is no fear of the stench of the dying Chris- 
 tian coming " between the wind and their holy nobility." And more 
 strange than all, is the new change of the Bishop of Exeter, appi-ov- 
 ing the practice of " heai'ing confessions." What an edifjdng Church 
 you have ! What a veuei'ated Senate ! 
 
 You abuse, malign, and insult us, for the practice j^our good 
 Exeter now claims is the sure road to heaven. And this is what 
 you call the " enviable wisdom of the Euglish Parliament, and the 
 evangelical unity of the Reformation." And these are the laws 
 which you call on us to respect and obey ; this is the religion to 
 which you hope to convei't the Irish people ; and this is the creed 
 you offer to poor old Erin, in the fourteen-hundredth year of her 
 Christian age. The venerable old lady, I assure you, is not accus- 
 tomed to see her apostles dressed in diamond rings and London 
 boots. After her long tuition luider Saint Patrick, she is quite 
 surprised to receive religious instruction from your Voltaires and 
 Paines ; she cannot understand why the education of faith in Christ 
 must be preceded by the knowledge of potash and pyrites ; and she 
 
96 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 is utterly astounded to bear men assert that the temple of the science 
 of the saints must be approached through fields of Swedish turnips 
 and nicely-drilled mangel-wurzel. After her long intercourse with 
 Columkill and Saint Bridget, she has learned so completely the Irish 
 accent, that she can with difSculty comprehend your Lordship's 
 Saxon tongue ; and although she has often heard of the dialects of 
 Greek, and the vocalic varieties of the Eastern languages, she has 
 never understood, till she read your eighteen confessions of faith, 
 bow there could be such a thing possible as varieties and dialects in 
 the unchangeable professions of God's Gospel. 
 
 If you give me fair play, my Lord ; if you do not set your "Times," 
 and your "Globe," and your "Standard," and your "Punch," to 
 ridicule and to abuse me ; if you call on them to reply to me by 
 argument, and not by abuse, I undertake to rid this nation of your 
 Church Establishment, and thus to save for the Empire the eight 
 and a half millions annually, which it devours from the just revenues 
 of the naked widow and the starving orphan. Depend upon it, my 
 Lord, that I shall lay bare the apjialling foundation of your Church, 
 before I shall have concluded my next three letters on that subject. 
 And believe me, I shall conviiice j'ou that it is far wiser to make 
 Catholic Ireland your friend than to make all Europe your enemy ; 
 it is cheaper to secure the arms and hearts of one million of Catholic 
 Irishmen by the words of truth, honor, and justice, than to pay half 
 a million a year to an inefficient militia, by a useless, a pernicious, an 
 angry taxation. Rely upon it that your diplomacy will be more 
 respected and feared by foi'eign nations at seeing peace than divisions 
 in your own country ; and take the advice of an humble individual, 
 when I presume to tell you to commence the next Parliament (where 
 you will keep office precisely till the Christmas recess) , by retracing 
 your steps towards Ireland, and legislating for your country, not in 
 the burning records of persecution and insult, but in the imperishable 
 laws of eternal truth and public justice. And never forget the 
 remarkable words of the illustrious Louis Napoleon III. : " AVoe be 
 to him (that is to you) who gives the first signal of collision, the 
 consequences of which will be incalculable." 
 
 I have the honor to be, my Lord Earl, 3'our Lordship's obedient 
 servant, 
 
 D. AV. Cahill, D. D. 
 
SERMONS AND LECTURES. 
 
 / 
 
 Rev, Michael Bernard Buckley. 
 
 [97] 
 
REV. MICHAEL B. BUCKLEY 
 
Sermon. 
 
 Panegteio of Saint Finbar, Patron Saint of the Diocese of 
 Cork.* 
 
 [Rev. Micliael Bernard Buckley, the eloquent preacher, and graduate of Maynooth 
 College, Dublin, from whose numerous lectures in the United States, in 1870, and 
 elscwliere, we take the following, was born in Cork, March 9th, 1831, and died in 
 the same city, May 17lh, 1872.] 
 
 " The wise man shall seek out the wisdom of all the ancients, and will be occupied 
 in the prophets ... he will give his heart to resort early to the Lord that made 
 him, and he will pray in the sight of the Most High. Ue will pour f(>rtli the words 
 of his wisdom as showers, and in his prayer he will confess to the Lord. ... lie 
 shall shew forth the discipline he hath learned, and shall glory in the law of the 
 covenant of the Lord. Many shall praise his wisdom and it shall never be forgotten. 
 The memory of him shall not depart away, and his name shall be in request from 
 generation to generation. Nations shall declare his wisdom, and the Churcli shall 
 show forth his praise." — Ecclesiasticus, xxxix. 1, and following verses. 
 
 |p|.EARLY BELOVED BRETHREN, — We are as.semljlcd here 
 ^^ to-night to celebrate the memory of a great and glorious 
 '^ Saint of the Church of God, of whose character and history 
 i those words of divine wisdom appear to me to afford a most 
 
 perfect and apposite delineation. Throughout the entire course of 
 the narrative which I shall deliver to you of hi.s life, you cannot but 
 perceive the faithful aptitude of the description ; you cannot fail to 
 observe how diligently he sought out the wisdom of the ancients, 
 and how he was occupied in the prophets — how he gave his heart 
 to resort early to the Lord that made him, and how he prayed in the 
 sight of the Most High — how he poured forth the words of his 
 wisdom in showers — how he showed forth the discipline he had 
 
 * Preached in the f^hurch of St. Finbar, Cork, September 27, 18C.3. 
 
 (99) 
 
100 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 learned, and gloried in the law of tli^ covenant of the Lord. And 
 you will also see with what prophetic trnth the posthumous fame of 
 the Saint has been described by the Wise Man when he says, " Many 
 shall praise his wisdom, and it shall never be forgotten — the memory 
 of him shall not depart away, and his name shall be in request from 
 generation to generation. Nations shall declare his wisdom, and 
 the Church shall shew forth his praise." I come not to describe to 
 you to-night the life and actions of any great hero of this world. I 
 do not seek to awaken your admiration by describing the exploits of 
 some famous general, or the diplomatic tactics of some celebrated 
 statesman. Mine is no story of blood-red battlefields and glorious 
 victories ; my hero shone neither on the field nor in the cabinet ; he 
 was not the inventor of a new philosophy, but the obsequious disciple 
 of an old one. We have not heard that he was eloquent, nor does 
 it appear that he was distinguished as a writer ; he was not noble nor 
 was he wealthy ; his birth was probably obscure, and his life was 
 certainly secluded, and yet, strange as it may appear after the lapse 
 of twelve hundred years, his memory is green in the souls of his 
 posterity, as the grass that still blooms on the "lone little island" 
 which in early life his sainted footsteps trod. "The just man," says 
 the Sacred Scripture, "shall be in eternal remembrance," and so it 
 was with St. Finbar. His was the heroism of justice, of virtue, of 
 wisdom; his battles were those which he fought against the world, 
 the flesh, and the devil ; his victories were those which he gained 
 over that triple alliance of his enemies ; his philosophy was that of 
 Jesus the Son of God ; his eloquence was the simple but moving 
 eloquence of the Gospel, by which he exhorted to virtue and deterred 
 from vice ; his only writing was that by which he unconsciously 
 inscribed his name on the memories of men ; Christianity was his 
 most excellent patent of nobility ; and his only wealth and inheritance 
 were the grace of the Almighty during life, and after death that 
 glory which he now enjoys, and which was entailed on him from his 
 Eternal Father, who has said, "They who instruct others unto justice 
 shall sliine like stars for all eternity." We all desire to know some- 
 thing of the great men of olden times, and we are justified in praising 
 them by the example of the Sacred Scriptures ; but, to us citizens of 
 Cork, and much more to us members of this Parish, it must be 
 particularly interesting to know something of the life of the great 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. JQl 
 
 Saint to whose zeal for religicjn is justly attributed not only the 
 blessing of the Christian faith, whose holy light still warmly burns 
 in the breasts of the people, but also the origin and source of the 
 very city in which we dwell, and in which we from year to year 
 commemorate the virtues and glories of him who founded it by his 
 industry, and sanctified it by his teaching and example. 
 
 I will be candid enough to inform you that the materials from 
 which we gather the history of our Patron Saint are meagre and 
 scanty in the extreme. After twelve long centuries this is not un- 
 natural. Our Saint lived in the very infancy of a society to which 
 he himself gave birth, and an}' records that might have been pre- 
 served could scarcely have escaped, in subsequent centuries, the 
 ravaging hand of the destroyer — the very language in which his life 
 may have been written by some contemporary historian is well-nigh 
 forgotten, and as we can only trust for information to the vague 
 traditions of those who have gone before us, it is not too much to 
 say that we know but very little indeed of the life and actions of St. 
 Finbar. And even though every facility were afforded for perpet- 
 uating the memory of the Saint, such was the secrecy in which he 
 lived, and such the monotonous course of his monastic life, that only 
 few striking events could have elicited the eulogy of the biographer, 
 or enlist the interest of the reader. And in point of fact this steady 
 perseverance in the practice of monastic virtue in an exalted degree 
 was exactly what constituted Finbar a perfect hero. Si^eak not to 
 me of your heroes who conquer the world and cannot subdue their 
 own pettiest passions ; who, gifted by God with souls which might 
 grasp the higljest pinnacles of heaven, are content to gain an ascen- 
 dancy in this little world, and curtail their hopes of immortality to 
 the expectation of living, forsooth, in the memories of men. But 
 hold up to eternal admiration the man who, steeled against the en- 
 chantments of a cheating world, plunges into the depths of solitude 
 and there gives glory to his great Creat(jr, who with the passions of 
 the flesh holds a hard struggle, an unceasing wai-fare, and wins in 
 the end the victor's crown of eternal glory — who enters the arena 
 with Satan, the arch-enemy of man, and vanquishes him who deemed 
 himself not an unequal match to war against the very God who made 
 hfm. Praise the man who, like his great Master aud model is " meek 
 and humble of heart," and yet silently does more good for his fellow- 
 
102 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 creatures, and is remembered longer and more affectionately than the 
 proudest and most exalted monarchs, statesmen, philosophers, or 
 philanthropists that have ever been held up l^y worldings for the 
 love and veneration of mankind. Such was St. Finbar. 
 
 The period at which our Saint was born is the subject of one of 
 the brightest pages in all the history of Ireland. Through whole 
 wastes of misery — of degi'adation from within, and persecution from 
 without — it is the only bright spot on which memory loves to dwell 
 — the period when our native land so justly earned and won the 
 proud appellation of "Island of Saints and Sages." It was the 
 period when, with the fall of the Roman Empire, the arts and 
 sciences and civilization itself were well-nigh trampled out and ex- 
 tinguished from the face of Europe. The barbarous tribes of the 
 North and the savage marauders of the East, had passed, in furious 
 array, from countiy to country, effacing every vestige of refinement, 
 demolishing the edifices of learning and religion — a terror to the in- 
 habitants, whose only care was to learn the arts of war, by which 
 they might repel the invader, and rescue even the necessaries of life 
 from the grasp of the despoiler. Amidst the general wreck of 
 civilization and refinement, the Monastic institute alone, like the ark 
 amidst the waters of the deluge, became the depository of learning ; 
 but when even that sacred vehicle was threatened with destruction 
 by the waves of persecution, as the dove sallied forth , from the 
 window of the ark, so knowledge, quitting its precarious abode, 
 spread its wings over the waters, and, amidst the vast and billowy 
 waste, could find no spot on which to rest its weary limbs but Erin, 
 the emerald Isle of the West. And fondly was the sacred visitant 
 welcomed to the hospitable embraces of the Celtic race ; and many a 
 sacred shrine and many a holy fane was erected by the energy and 
 zeal of that glorious people, to cherish the heavenly essence and 
 render it "racy of the soil." St. Patrick had been gathered to the 
 dust a century and more — religion flourished in the land — suddenly 
 monasteries everywhere sprang, as by the hand of the enchanter, 
 from the earth — to every monastery a school was attached ; these 
 schools, in many instances, swelled to the dimensions of Colleges, 
 and many attained the magnificent proportions and characteristics 
 of Universities — the monastic schools of Kildare, Glendalough, 
 Tuam and Armagh, Derry and Lismore, might well compete with 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 103 
 
 the most distinguished academies of Athens or of Rome in their hey- 
 days of power, and could boast of a cultivation and refinement for 
 which the j^roverbial elegance of ancient Corinth might seek, but 
 would seek in vain, to supply a parallel. From all parts of Europe 
 — 'tis an oft-told tale, but, as so few honors remain to us now-a- 
 days, we may be pardoned for dwelling with lingering fondness on 
 the glories of the past — from all parts of Europe flocked the youth- 
 ful representatives of all that was left of nobility, of elegance, and 
 taste, to receive from the polished Celt the refinement they sought 
 for in vain at home. The Celt was not only scholarly and saintly — ■ 
 hospitality was with him a noble instinct. Not only was learning 
 gratuitously oflered to the Continental stranger, but the necessaries, 
 and probably the luxuries of life, were freely placed at his disposal. 
 Gaul and Frank, Angle and Saxon, mingled together on one com- 
 mon ground. They sought from their distant homes that happy isle 
 where piety and learning grew like twin sisters, lovingly together; 
 where peace and plenty smiled beneficently around ; where the soil 
 was ever fruitful, and the air for ever genial; where the footstep of 
 persecution had not yet left its bloody track ; where smiling faces 
 told of happy hearts, and every boyish dream of the lovely Innisfail 
 found a bright and glorious realization. 
 
 Ecmarkable above the rest of those great seminaries of learning 
 was the Monastery of Banchoir, now Bangor, whose ruins, on the 
 banks of Belfast Lough, still attest its ancient amplitude and splen- 
 dor. The great St. Bernard, writing of this celebrated school, 
 says that "In the sixth century, under Saint Congal, the Monastery 
 of Banchoir was a most noble one, containing many thousands of 
 monks, and itself the chief of many monasteries. So fruitful was it 
 of holy men, and multiplying so greatly to the Lord, that Luanes 
 alone, a subject of the house, founded no less than one hundred 
 monasteries. This I mention," says he, " that the reader may form 
 some notion of the number of religious that existed in those days in 
 Ireland." Amongst the students of this great university, towards 
 the close of the sixth century, under the presidency of St. Congal, 
 was a fair-haired, and probably a fair-faced, youth from Connaught, 
 named Lochan, whose zeal for learning was only second to that 
 which he evinced in the sacred cause of religion. From the com- 
 plexion of his hair, he was named by his fellow-students Finbarra, 
 
104 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCF 
 
 which literally means "fair-haired," and in which you will easily re- 
 cognize the Anglicised form of Finbar. He was sprung of a Celtic 
 sept, and was born on the shore of the Atlantic, not far from the 
 site at present occupied by the town of Galway. What position in 
 life his parents held, history does not inform us, nor is it a matter 
 of any importance to know. In the great academy of the North he 
 soon attracted, by his piety and genius, the marked attention of the 
 sainted Congal. 
 
 At this period of our history the ecclesiastics of Ireland mani- 
 fested as chivalric a spirit in the fulfilment of their ministry as 
 they do even at the present day. Not content to cherish the light 
 of faith at home, it was their glory to leave their native land, 
 and preach the religion of Christ to " nations who sat in darkness 
 and in the shadow of death." AYhile some on their own soil im- 
 parted the blessings of education and refinement to the stranger, 
 others went abroad over the face of Europe, and to the Pagan 
 and Barbarian communicated the inestimable advantages of civili- 
 zation and religion. Columba sought the shores of England and 
 Scotland — Coluuibanus traversed France and Italy and Germany 
 — Gall betook himself to Switzerland — Fiacrius to Meaux — the 
 learned Virgilius preached at Saltzburgh — Frigidian evangelized 
 Lucca — and Fridolin sanctified Lorraine — Finbar was fired with 
 the chivalric enthusiasm of the age, and longed to emulate the 
 labors and partake of the glories of his brethren. But the holy 
 Congal, restraining the impetuosity of the youth, instead of send- 
 ing him to foreign lands, sought out a spot in his own, where 
 the gifted Lochan might announce the Gospel of the Lord, and 
 preach the glories of the Cross. The South of Ireland — the County 
 of Cork — was the scene selected for the Apostolic labors of the 
 Saint, and thither accordingly he bent his way, accompanied by 
 some fellow-laborers from the academic halls and monastic cells 
 of the far-famed Banchoir. He had previously received the order 
 of priesthood, and was evidently determined to consecrate himself, 
 without reserve, to the service of his Maker. 
 
 It is evident to any one who contemplates with a curious eye 
 the ruins of religious edifices strewn throughout the country at the 
 present day, that the saints of old had a peculiarly elegant taste 
 in the selection of sites, distinguished for natural beauty, on 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 105 
 
 ivhich to erect their monasteries and churches. In this respect 
 our Patron Saint was singularly felicitous. He sought and dis- 
 covered, by whose assistance I know not, as a site for his first 
 monastery, one of the wildest, most secluded, and most enchant- 
 ing spots in all the south of Ireland — a spot which has been for 
 centuries the admiration of the tourist, the love of the painter, the 
 delight of the antiquarian — which derives its name from him, and 
 where still, after the lapse of twelve centuries, survive the ruins of 
 those narrow cells wherein he and his fellow-monks passed their 
 solitary lives, and poured forth in blessed unison to the Most High 
 their sighs of repentance and their hymns of praise — I allude to the 
 far-famed Gougane Barra. There, in the midst of an amphitheatre 
 of precipitous mountains, down whose rocky and naked sides rush 
 a thousand streamlets, is found a large and, betimes, a placid lake, 
 in the midst of which is a green island, blooming all the more beau- 
 tifully by contrast with the barren scenery around. Far away, as it 
 must have been, from the busy haunts of men, it was the beau-ideal 
 of a monastic solitude ; and, to the hermitical eye of St. Finbar, its 
 adaptability to his views was evident at a glance. A little monas- 
 tery was built on the island, and here he and his monks dwelt — we 
 know not how long. But, oh ! what a glorious spectacle was that 
 Island monastery in the midst of that mountain solitude ! From the 
 rising to the setting of the sun the incense of prayer ascended from 
 that lonely isle, and was wafted by angels over the mountains to the 
 throne of the Most High. The echoes of the hills were never re- 
 sponsive save to the thrilling chorus or the swelling psalm. On a 
 lofty altar, in the open air, many a time did the holy Finbar offer to 
 the Lord the adorable sacrifice of the Body and Blood of his Divine 
 Son, propitiating the wrath of heaven, and bringing down benedic- 
 tions which fructify amongst us to the present day. Sequestered 
 from all the world , those holy men conversed with God alone ! They 
 continually praised the Lord and his Avorks ; they gazed on the tall 
 mountains on whose misty tops the royal eagle found congenial ej'rie, 
 and praised the omnipotence of Him who had robed them in such 
 majestic grandeur ! The placid lake, glistening in the summer sun- 
 shine, reminded them of the heavenly Jerusalem whose streets are 
 paved with the purest gold ; and when the storm-winds rose, and the 
 tempest shrieked, and when the face of heaven grew black, and the 
 
106 TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE 
 
 thousand torrents rushed from the mountain-tops, in furious array, 
 jumping from crag to crag, and then foaming and seething in the 
 lake below ; when the forked lightnings flittered from hill to hill 
 with sublime but awful glare, and the booming thunders bellowed 
 forth from mountain to mountain in echoes interminable, the lonely 
 monks, though leading spotless lives, yet trembling for their sins, 
 bethought themselves of the day of doom, and fancied they heard 
 above the storm-clouds the trump of the archangel, and the denounc- 
 ing voice of Him who " maketh the clouds his chariot and walketh 
 upon the wings of the winds." 
 
 Great schemes are matured in solitude ; so it was with Christianity. 
 Our Divine Eedecmer spent thirty years iu the solitude of Nazareth 
 before he came forth to preach the wonders of the Gospel — so was 
 it also with St. Finbar. In the almost impervious recesses of Gou- 
 gane Barra, he conceived the idea of erecting in some other part of 
 the county a monastery, a church, and a school, by whose triple 
 influence religion and learning might be more widely extended, and 
 a greater measure of glory be awarded to his Creator. Leaving his 
 Island monastery to the care of some of his fellow-monks, he trav- 
 elled, accompanied by others, along the winding banks of the Lee, 
 and never ceased until he reached the shore of a large lake, formed 
 by the river, about fifteen miles from where it joins the ocean. This 
 lake, my brethren, was called Lough Eire, and spread its waters 
 over the very spot now occupied b}* the city of Cork. On the south- 
 ern bank of the lake, cm an elevated ground, he found an agreeable 
 site and a luxuriant soil, and there, so to speak, the pilgrim pitched 
 his tent. Having obtained, as some authors assure us, a grant of 
 land from a^local chieftain named Edo, he proceeded to build, and 
 soon a large monastery rose, overhanging the Lee, not far from the 
 site of the Queen's College. The grounds attached to tlie monasteiy 
 extended from the Lee on the north to the "Lough" on the south, 
 and to a considerable length from east to west. To the monastery a 
 large school or college was attached, and, for the use of the monks 
 and scholars, a church was also raised where the Protestant Cathedral 
 now stands. All things went on well. Eeligion and learning ad- 
 vanced hand in hand. One thing, however, was wanting to crown" 
 the work with complete success, and this was the benediction of the 
 Holy See. Accordingly, the good Saint took up his staff once more. 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY 107 
 
 and bi'aving the perils of the sea iind land, and what was more for- 
 midable than either, the fierce passions of men, proceeded on his 
 long and difficult pilgrimage to the Shrine of the Apostles. He was 
 accompanied by St. Maidoc of Ferns, and St. David, Bishop of 
 Menevia in Wales, whose friendship he had probably acquired within 
 the hallowed walls of the College of Banchoir. The Pontifl" at this 
 time was Gregory the Great. Before that Pontiff had reached the 
 purple he had a pupil named b}' classic writers Macrobius. This 
 Macrobius was tutor to Finliar, iu the monastery of Bangor ; and 
 if ever the holy man reached Rome again in the lifetime of Gregory, 
 he must have fully imbued the Pontiff with exalted notions of the 
 sanctity and learning of the fair-haired Lochan. However this may 
 be, Gregory the Great received Fiubar with all the respect a Saint 
 deserves, and which a sainted successor of Christ knows so well to 
 display. By that holy Pope Finbar was created first Bishop of Cork. 
 He returned to his beloved monastery full of grace and power, and 
 became the first of a long line of bishops, which lasts in unbroken 
 succession till the present day. The blessing imparted by the suc- 
 cessor of Peter to the nascent diocese invigorated the workmen with 
 renewed zeal, and enriched (heir labors with a golden harvest. The 
 school founded by Finbar soon acquired the proportions of a Uni- 
 versity, and its fame became so great, that it not only pervaded 
 Ireland, but found an echo on every shore in Europe, and scholars, 
 native and foreign, repaired in such numbers to its halls, that they 
 were soon counted by hundreds, whilst its monks so exerted them- 
 selves in manual labor, and gave by their iustruction and example 
 such an impetus to industry, that, in the words of Colgan, " a deso- 
 late waste was soon changed into a large city." Such was its fame, 
 and such the splendor of this great school, that it sent forth profes- 
 sors to many parts of Europe, from whom even the Eoman alumnus 
 was glad to learn the very language and literature of his forefathers. 
 Colgan makes mention of thirty-one of Finbar's disciples who founded 
 monasteries in other places, which they placed under the protection 
 of the parent house. St. Garvan, from whom Dungarvan is called, 
 was a pupil of St. Finbar, as was also his successor St. Nessan, 
 second Bishop of Cork — a man of great piety and learning — of 
 whom Pope Innocent IH., in a letter dated 1199, makes honorable 
 mention. 
 
108 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 After St. Finbar had spent seventeen years in the discharge of his 
 episcopal functions, he died at Cloyne on the 25th day of September, 
 about the year (530. St. Colman was then first Bishop of Cloyne, and 
 our Saint was probably on a visit with him when he died. His re- 
 mains were conveyed to Cork ; and such was the veneration in which 
 his person and his memory wel'c held, that his body was enshrined 
 in a silver case and preserved for more than 200 years in the Cathe- 
 dral Church. 
 
 Such is the sum and substance of all that we learn of St. Finbar 
 from the resources of history and tradition, and doul)tless, it is 
 sufficient to excite in us the liveliest sensations of gratitude and 
 admiration. We cannot but feel grateful to him for the sanctity and 
 zeal bj' which he established amongst us the holy religioji of Jesus 
 Christ, to which we all belong, and without Avhich there is no salva- 
 tion. We should also feel grateful to God, who, in consideration of 
 the merits of our holy patron, has showered his blessings in such 
 rich abundance on us all, giving us the grace after such a long lapse 
 of time, and after so many and such terrible ordeals, to preserve in 
 glorious entirety and with unilinching devotion the faith established 
 in our midst by the fair-haired pilgrim of the West. Nor should 
 our admiration be less ardent than our gratitude. In contemplating 
 the greatness of Finbar, we have no aristocratic birth, no distinguished 
 lineage to admire. As I have said, he was no great general or con- 
 queror, like CiBsar or Alexander — he has not earned immortality by 
 trampling out or erecting a new dynastj', like Napoleon, but oh ! to 
 those heroes whose deeds emblazon the pages of history — the 
 victims of passion — the slaves of ambition, who will compare the 
 humble cenobite, who sacrificed in the cause of God every impulse 
 of nature, every endearing tie of home and kindred, every ambition 
 of the heart, eveiy dictate of self-love — who, in the lone cloister of 
 that sequestered hermitage of Gougane Barra, where wilderness in 
 awful majesty sat enthroned, thoughtless of his own glory, sought 
 only the glory of Him l)y whose Almighty hand those solitaiy works 
 of wonder were created ? Who shall compare to the so-called great 
 men of this world, whose pathway was strewn with blood and in 
 whose wake followed wretchedness and ruin, the humble but great 
 recluse, the monuments of whose piety, wisdom, and genius survive 
 the wreck of centuries, and the blessings of whose sanctified zeal 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 109 
 
 are still visible in a city where commercial success entails temporal 
 prosperity, and the preservation of the faith ensures the well- 
 grounded expectation of eternal glory? The humility of Finhar was 
 the secret of his immortality, temporal and eternal — "he took up 
 his cross and followed Christ." Many have sought fame, and have 
 not found it. Finhar fled from the Imbbling tongues of men ; he held 
 converse only with the lofty mountains and the lonely lakes, which 
 though mute spoke trumpet-tongued to him of the glories of his 
 Maker ; he buried himself in the depths of solitude, but he little 
 knew that he was only thus making himself a shining light in the 
 Church of God. He little dreamed, when he read the words of 
 wisdom how applicable they were to him — "Many shall praise his 
 wisdom, and it shall never be forgotten — the memory of him who 
 shall not depart away, and his name shall be in request from genera- 
 tion to generation. Nations shall declare his wisdom, and the Church 
 shall show forth his praise." 
 
 The institutions founded by Finbar no longer exist, it is true ; they 
 have yielded to the slow but inevitable destructiveness of Time ; and 
 well was Time aided in his destroying prowess by the wicked pas- 
 sions of mankind. The old Abbey met its first affliction in the first 
 visit of the Danes to Cork in 820 ; for, according to the Four 
 Masters, in that year those Northern marauders invaded Cork, 
 plundered the Abbey, massacred the people, and burned the city to 
 the ground. The bloodthirsty ferocities of those barbarian sea- 
 rovers exceed the powers of language to describe. Virtue with them 
 was vice, and vice was worshipped as a deity. Homicide was noble 
 — piety was weakness — murder, rapine and ruin were their glory 
 and delight. They marched "escorted by fire and sword." The 
 local chieftains received them hospitably, striving to propitiate foes 
 whom they could not subdue ; but the wine-cup was only quaffed 
 when it was filled with the blood of their murdered host, and in 
 drunken glee they devoted to the flames the roof beneath which they 
 reposed in safety from the labors of spoliation. The blood of 
 priests and the gold of churches were the especial objects of their 
 two-fold greed ; they lodged their horses in the chapels of palaces, 
 and when they had wasted a Christian country they were wont to 
 cry out in vaunting chorus : " We have sung the mass of the lances, 
 it began at the rising of the sun." In one of those invasions they 
 
IIQ TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 stole away the sacred shrine in which were encased the holy relics of 
 St. Finbar. They often came again, and never came but to plunder 
 and destroy. Soon the old Al)bey began to lose its monastic char- 
 acter, and to present the appearance of a fortress, rather than the 
 peaceful dwelling of a religious brotherhood. The spirit of religioa 
 also declined. 
 
 The year 1140 was a very troublous year in Cork. A bishop 
 having died, a great division arose amongst the clergy and people 
 as to the choice of a successor. St. Malachy, the celebrated Bishop of 
 1 Armagh, and great fi-ieud of St. Bernard, was at this time apostolic 
 I delegate for all Ireland, having been appointed by Pope Innocent 
 11., and was on a visit with his friend the Bishop of Lismore. It 
 was reported to him that great discord pi-evailed in Cork, He 
 determined, in his sacred character of legate, to bring matters, if 
 possible, to an amicable settlement. Accordingly, having proceeded 
 to Cork, he set aside both candidates for the mitre, and elevated to 
 that dignity an humble Connaught monk — "a poor man, and a 
 stranger," who had nothing to recommend him but extraordinary 
 piety, modesty and leiu'iiing. This was Bishop Gilla Aedha 
 O'Muo-in. He is styled the " second founder " of the Abbey of 
 Cork. He rebuilt and extended it ; and to this day its site is, as 
 you are aware, called after him, " Gill Abbey." Ho introduced the 
 order of St. Augustine in Cork, which still flourishes in the heart of 
 your city. Some few centuries after his time, the members of .that 
 order built the Abbey called " the Eed Abbey," whose ruins still 
 exist iu our immediate neighborhood. Gilla Aedha died in the year 
 of the Norman invasion 1172, and was, to use the words of the Four 
 Masters, "full of the Grace of God, the tower of the Virginity, and 
 the wisdom of his time." Some centuries after the death of this 
 holy bishop there came a spoiler more ruthless even than the Dane, 
 for the Dane was content to rob the churches and abbeys of their 
 gold, and to destroy human life, but the blood-thirsty minions of 
 Henry and Elizabeth would ravish from the souls of the people that 
 faith which was more precious to them than gold, but which they 
 cherished with a tenacity and devotion that have excited, and will 
 forever excite, the wonder and admiration of mankind. Their 
 abbeys were rifled and ransacked — their churches demolished or 
 desecrated by the profane rites of the heretic — their monks and 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. m 
 
 priests were hunted like wolves throughout the land ; but the blood 
 of the martyrs was here indeed the seed of Christianity : it were as 
 easy to quench the .stars of heaven as to eradicate from the Irish their 
 love of learning and religion. Penal enactments strove for centuries 
 to extinguish the elements of Christian teacliing — to poison the 
 sources whence flowed the pure waters of the Gospel ; but the stream 
 was no sooner dammed up in one point than it gushed forth from 
 another: the tree was cut down, but it sprang up again from the 
 roots Avith a richer and more abundant foliage, till the arm of the 
 spoiler was wearied with his labor, and the exterminator discovered 
 that he but propagated the germs which he thought to eliminate from 
 the soil. Of the Jlonastery of Fiiibar there only remains one broken 
 wall — of his church there survives but one Gothic archway : his 
 University has altogether disappeared. What then ? — " Si 7nonu- 
 meitta quoBvis, civcumspice" — If you wish to behold the monuments 
 of his piety and faith, look around. In your " beautiful citie " what 
 - are more beautiful than your churches ? Behold them in the valley 
 — behold them on the hill-top. Have you not your monasteries 
 filled with holy men, the dispensers of learning and the models of 
 every virtue ? Behold your convents — those hallowed receptacles 
 of the devout female sex — shrines of all the beauty and all the 
 purity of womanhood. There was a time when, Avithin the walls of 
 Gill Abbey, there dwelt no fewer than seventeen prelates and seven 
 hundred monks and priests. Prelates and jiriests have passed away ; 
 but have j^ou not in your city at this moment a priesthood, whose 
 general character — Avhose unblemished lives — whose zeal for 
 religion — whose talents and learning are, perhaps, not paralleled in 
 any other city in the world? Finbar is gone — Gill Aedha is no 
 more ; but to-day the Cathedral Chair of Cork is filled, and the 
 crozier of Finbar is wielded by a Pontiff whose zeal for religion — 
 whose large and cultivated mind — whose piety and philanthropy 
 entitle him to rank amongst the most 'exalted prelates who have 
 ever adorned by their virtues and talents the time-honored hierarchy 
 of Ireland. 
 
 "All things shall pass away," says Christ, "but My words shall 
 not pass away." " Behold," said He to his apostles, " I am with you 
 all days, even to the consummation of the world." The gates of hell 
 shall not prevail against His Church. Persecution has done her 
 
112 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 worst against the church of Ireland, and yet she not only survives, 
 but blooms and flourishes M'ith all the beauty and freshness of virgin 
 youth. What a glory is it for us, my brethren, that our ancestors 
 fought out the good light so well ! If they had proved recreant to 
 the cause of God, how unhappy would be our lot at the present 
 moment ! Born and brought up in heresy or infidelity, we should 
 sit all our lives in " darkness and in the shadow of death." We 
 should never know the bliss akin to heavenly that ravishes the soul, 
 when by the words of God's minister the last stain of sin is blotted 
 away forever ! Weary and worn out with toil, we should never feel 
 the sweet refreshment of the soul conferred by the Bread of Life — 
 the adorable body and blood of our Divine Redeemer. We should 
 live on from day to day, grovelling upon the earth, little better than 
 the beasts of the field — thoughtless of the immortal souls witliin us, 
 made to the image of God, and destined for the eternal enjoyment 
 of Him in the kingdom of His glory. And when the dark hour of 
 death would warn us that our course was run, and that the awful 
 day of eternity was about to dawn, oh ! how sad, how bitter, how 
 desolate would be the sensations of our souls — Jesus would not 
 come as He comes to the dying Christian, to comfort and console by 
 His corporeal presence. The minister of God would not soothe our 
 dying pangs or turn into joy the sighs that would spring from our 
 lonely sorrow. Think of the solitary shipwi-ecked mariner, as he sits 
 at night upon a lonely rock where he must linger in agony till he 
 dies. Dark, desolate, despairing, he looks aboad over the black 
 bosom of the boundless sea, uncheered by one single star-ray of 
 heaven, and pauses in maddening suspense until the up-heaving 
 surge dashes him from his standing place, and sweeps him shrieking 
 into the waves forever. So should it be with us, but for the faith 
 of our forefathers. Stranded and shipwrecked in our dying hour, 
 we should look in gloomy horror over the dark ocean of eternity, 
 without a ray of hope to cheer us in our misery, and pause, despair- 
 ing, for the billows of death to dash us into the bottomless depths 
 of the abyss. Thank God, it is otherwise. The blessings of men 
 like Patrick and Finbar hover like sunbeams over the land, and 
 though we maybe the poorest people on the earth, we are the richest 
 in the possession of the priceless inheritance of Faith. It is, there- 
 fore, our duty, my brethren, and it ought to be our glory and our 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 113 
 
 pride, to cherish this inestimable boon, and to show forth in our 
 lives that we are worthy disciples in the school of faith established 
 here by our holy Patron. And, on this night, when the most adora- 
 ble Body and Blood of our Divine Redeemer are exposed for the 
 special veneration of the faithful, I think I cannot do better than ask 
 you to cherish in your hearts an ardent love for that most holy 
 sacrament as the best means of enlivening your faith and meriting 
 the patronage and inetrcession of the holy St. Finbar. " What is 
 man, O Lord : that thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that 
 thou shoiddst visit him ? " What have we done, O Lord ! that Thou 
 shouldst descend from Thy throne of glory and visit the poorest of 
 Thy servants? Thou art here in the midst of us, as Thou wert on the 
 night of the Last Supper amongst the Apostles — so near that we 
 may behold Thee^so condescending that we may converse with Thee 
 like friends — so generous that we may ask of Thee what we please, 
 4ind be sure to obtain it — so loving and tender that our bosoms 
 may melt in the contemplation of Thy sweetness — and yet so 
 exalted, so glorious, so powerful, that we may exhaust the language 
 of praise and adoration, and still be at loss for epithets worthy of 
 Thy greatness. There is the great Lord, my brethren, looking down 
 on us to-night — the same who, on the last day, will appear in the 
 clouds of heaven to judge us. Oh ! let us propitiate Him now in 
 the da}' of His mercy, for on that day His ju.stice alone shall prevail ; 
 and believe me there is no safer waj' to avert the teiTors of Jehoso- 
 phat than to keep the lamp of faith forever brightly burning in your 
 bosoms — not that cold faith by which we merely believe in God, but 
 that faith which worketh by charity, and which is so strongly recom- 
 mended by Christ and His Apostles. Grant us, therefore, O Lord, 
 the grace to believe in Thee, to hope in Thee, to love Thee, that when 
 that last hour of earthly existence shall have passed away, we may 
 experience in our souls the happy transition of faith into vision, and 
 of hope into possession, charity alone remaining. And do thou, O 
 holy St. Finbar, intercede, Ave beseech thee, to God for us, that as 
 it is to thy Apostolate our city is indebted for the blessings of Chris- 
 tian faith, we may so shape our conduct, and direct our lives, that 
 following faithfully the beacon of that faith enkindled by thee before 
 us, we may reach in safety the heaven of eternal bliss, to enjoy with 
 thee the blessed society of God and his angels, forever, and forever. 
 Amen. 
 
114 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Sermon on the Profession of a Nun, 
 
 ■ Hearken, O daughter, and see : and incline thine ear and forget thy people and thy 
 father's house, and the king shall greatly admire thy beauty, for he is the Lord 
 thy God." — Ps. xliv. 12. 
 
 g|;EAELY BELOVED SISTEE, — On this day, — certainly the 
 most important of yom' life, — when, after the most mature 
 fj deliberations, you have consecrated for the rest of your 
 #^: days your whole being to the service of God, it is of advan- 
 •^ tage to you that you should hear some words, under the 
 auspices of religion, that may strengthen you for the accomplish- 
 ment of the work you have so nobly begun. Into the retreat which 
 you have chosen for your future years you will carry all the infirmity 
 of your natui'e, and for you, as well as for us in the world, life Avill 
 be ever a warfare. It is well, then, that you should have ever 
 before your eyes a model which may show you not only the possi- 
 bility of proceeding in your adopted course, but which may also 
 illustrate the ease with which all its difficulties can be surmounted. 
 When we undertake some new and previously unattenipted task, we 
 are apt to lose courage, and sometimes to despair of success ; but 
 when we try what some other wayfarer on life's journey has ventured 
 and achieved, we are stimulated by his example, and go on bravely 
 to the end. Thus I would propose to you, dear sister, the life and 
 character of the Blessed Virgin Mary, as the great standard which 
 you should follow ; for she is the brightest model of innocence, self- 
 sacrifice, and religious consecration ever presented by God to an 
 admiring world. I do not wish you to imagine that in following this 
 standard you can ever att.iin to anything like the purity and holiness 
 of Mary, for none other, save her, ever was or will be " full of grace." 
 But by imitating her virtues you can arrive at a height of sanctity 
 
^ 
 
 REV. M B. BUCKLEY. H^ 
 
 corresponding to the capacity of your nature and the designs of 
 God ; and thus you can fulfil the end of your creation. She is 
 especially the model for those of her sex who have left the world 
 and devoted themselves entirely to the service of God ; for her life 
 was the type on which the Church founded the religious profession. 
 And there is an incident in her history that foreshadows^ with peculiar 
 aptness the ceremony of this daj^, in which you have been the prin- 
 cipal actress, — I allude to her presentation in the temple, one of the 
 most important events in that all-glorious life, when she made of her- 
 self a holocaust of love and adoration to the IMost High, and conse- 
 crated to His service every energy of her body, every faculty of her 
 mind, and every aspiration of her sinless soul. 
 
 To this remarkable event, then, dear sister, I would direct your 
 particular attention to-day, as in it you will find a perfect illustratioQ 
 of your own position, and ft-om it you will draw much consolation,, 
 hope, and encouragement for your future career. 
 
 Although there is not on record any scriptural evidence of the 
 presentation of Mary in the Temple, the fact of that presentation 
 having been duly and religiously made is placed beyond dispute by 
 a well-grounded tradition that has ever existed in the Church. 
 Joachim and Anna, the parents of the youthful virgin, were fast 
 declining into the vale of 3'ears, and naturally enjoyed the consoling 
 hope that their beloved child would be to them the sweetest solace 
 in the evening of their earthly pilgrimage. But Marj^ although very 
 young, had far different views. She conceived the idea of conse- 
 crating her virginity to God, and dwelling all her days in the holy 
 temple of the Lord. We may well suppose her crying out in the 
 words of the Psalmist, — "One thing I have asked of the Lord, this 
 will I seek after : that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the 
 days of my life, that I may see the delight of the Loi'd, and may 
 visit His temple." Nor was this a mere_ childish desire on the part 
 of Mary, for, although only in the first blush of childhood, little 
 advanced indeed beyond the age of merest infancj', yet the powers 
 of her mind far exceeded in vigor and maturity the scope allotted to 
 the generality of the children of men. Altogether free fi'om the 
 taint of original sin, which obscures the intellect and weakens the 
 will, her soul was gifted with the glorious endowment of the reason- 
 ing faculty at a very early age, and, even while the hearts of her fel- 
 
IIQ TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 low-children were but just budding into life, Mary's was already the 
 full-blown " Mystical Rose," blooming for God, and emitting the 
 sweet odor of sanctity for Him. A voice rang in her infant ears ; it 
 was the voice of God, saying, "Hearken, O daughter, and see : and 
 incline thine ear, and forget thy people, and thy father's house, and 
 the King shall greatly desire thy beauty, for He is the Lord thy 
 God." Quickly responsive to the celestial call, the beautiful child 
 arose, and imparted to her beloved parents the mandate of Heaven. 
 To worldly-minded parents this decree of separation might be a 
 source of bitterness and regret. Not so was it with the sainted 
 Joachim and Anna. Their nature indeed may have been tera[)ted to 
 repine, and some few human tears may have been shed at parting, 
 — for the parting came soon, very soon, just as the youthful virgin 
 had arrived at the most interesting period of existence, — the happy 
 days of innocent childhood, — the helpless period, too, when a 
 mother's love and a father's care were still needed to guide her tot- 
 tering footsteps and direct her in her first timid ilight from her 
 humble home. 
 
 Joyfully according with the will of Heaven, her parents accom- 
 panied the virgin to the temple to oifer, as it were, the precious vic- 
 tim before the throne of the Most High. Oh ! never since the days 
 of Abel, or of Abraham, was any nobler sacrifice ofleredto the Lord, 
 or one more worthy of His acceptance, than this. The sacrifice of 
 the youthful virgin was a sacritlce without a shadow of i-eserve. She 
 offers herself wholly and entirely and forever to her God. Before 
 the temptations of the world or the flesh have time to mar her 
 progress in virtue : before sin has a moment's opportunity to tarnish 
 her spotless soul, she consecrates herself for her whole life to her 
 Maker. If there be joy in Heaven for one sinner doing penance, 
 oh ! what must have been the joy and exultation of the whole court 
 of Heaven in contemplaticg, not the conversion of a sinner, but the 
 dedication to the Lord of a soul brighter, purer, and more privileged 
 than that of the most glorious angel that worshipped before His 
 eternal throne. With what complacency must God have looked 
 upon tiiat fair being as she knelt before His tabernacle in all the love- 
 liness, innocence and simplicity of childhood, and with what a rich 
 and abundant blessing must He have ratified His acceptance of this, 
 the most pleasing gift ever offered to His service. Mary sacrifices 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. IIJ 
 
 for God all her hopes and prospects of worldly prosperity, and by 
 her vow of virginity cuts herself off from the noblest and most cher- 
 ished ambition of the maidens of Judea, the ambition of becoming 
 the mother of the Messiah. On the day of her presentation she 
 places herself in a state of dependence and subjection to the minis- 
 ters of the temple for all the days of her life, in order to consecrate 
 her will and her heart to that Holy Spirit which was henceforward 
 to replenish her soul forever, and was to make her a subject for the 
 rarest and most ennobling operations of His grace. On that day 
 Mary laid the foundations of the order of virginity and religious con- 
 secration. On that day she exhibited to all the maidens of futurity 
 the model of a life altogether angelical ; so that those who follow in 
 her footsteps sanctify the earth, fill Heaven with souls, and become 
 victims consecrated to Jesus ; the spouse of virgins, under the aus- 
 pices of her, the incomparable patroness and queen of virginity. 
 Oh ! what grace, what sanctit}^, what religion inflamed the heart of 
 Mary at the moment of this consecration ; what a contempt of the 
 world and its pleasures, what love for God ; what humility ; what 
 obedience ; what purity ; what a hunger and thirst for the perfection 
 to which she was called by the voice of her Creator ! But oh ! what 
 joy, too, must have filled her loving heart at the moment of this 
 most close and happy union with her God, the author of every joy, 
 the dispenser of every consolation : her soul was to be henceforward 
 refreshed and exhilarated with delicious drafts of His holy grace, and 
 to overflow with delights of heavenly contemplation. Here, in the 
 depth of solitude, she was destined to feel more entrancing rapture 
 than all the so-called pleasures of the world could possil)ly confer, 
 for "Better, O Lord," says the Psalmist, "is one day in Thy courts 
 above thousands. I have chosen to be an abject in the house of my 
 God, than to dwell in the tabernacles of sinners." 
 
 But Mary's response to the Divine vocation was no less prompt 
 than her fidelity to grace was devoted and persevering. Illumined 
 by the light of Heaven, she constantly recognized in the temple the 
 Lord of the temple, and lived and moved in His holy presence, 
 enriched with all the purest grace of the soul in childhood, without 
 any of its weaknesses ; at that early age her piety far surpassed the 
 most exalted perfections ever attained by the greatest of the saints 
 of God. While devoting herself in those tender years to the ser- 
 
113 - TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 vice of God's material temple, she gradually grew in grace and 
 purity to be herself no unworthy temple for His Jlost Adorable 
 Divinity. In that sanctuary God alone filled her soul, and satisfied 
 every yearning of her tender heart ; her prayers forever ascended 
 like a sweet odor before His eternal Throne ; all her actions had Him 
 for their beginning and end ; elevated above the influence of sensi- 
 ble ceremonies, she adored Him with a devotion eminently spiritual ; 
 in worldly occupations and in the duties of charity, while using her 
 senses from necessity, and not for pleasure, her union with God was 
 never interrupted for an instant, — her soul, freed /I'om the tumults 
 of passion, listened in secret to the whispering voice of her Creator, 
 and imbibed the light of His holy grace, — she lived beneath the 
 ever-watchful eye of God's sovereign Majesty. Her very slumber 
 ■was a species of sacred repose, that suspended not for a moment the 
 application of her soul to heavenly contemplation, while creatures, 
 so far from dissipating her thoughts, only served to awaken her 
 spiritual recollections, as efi'ects remind us of the cause, and as the 
 portrait recalls the familiar features of the original. Such was 
 Mary from the moment of her presentation in the temple. 
 
 And now, my dear sister, the great question for j^ou to consider 
 on this day is, what lesson are you to learn from the consideration 
 of this remarkable event in the life of Mary? I answer that, since 
 you have, like Mary, consecrated all the futui-e days of your life to 
 the special love and service of God, you should, in imitation of 
 Mary, observe the terms of this consecration with the most ardent 
 devotion and the most unflinching perseverance. Like her, you 
 have offered yourself as a gift to God ; like her you have renounced 
 the world and all its pleasures — all its honors and all its vanities, 
 that "joii may see the delight of the Lord, and may visit His tem- 
 ple." Like her, j'ou have knelt before the altar of God in the 
 flower of your youth, and devoted to Him for ever all the energies 
 of your body, and all the fiiculties of your soul ; and God and His 
 holy angels have looked with complacency on the generosity of j'our 
 sacrifice, and your renunciation of earth has been accepted by Him 
 and recorded in the eternal archives of Heaven. 
 
 Oh ! see what and how great is j'our obligation to love and serve 
 God with all your heart and with all your soul. Yours must be no 
 ordinary piety, for yon are no ordinary Christian ; you have 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 119 
 
 renouueed the world ; take care that nothing of the world remains 
 in your heart or your affections. No longer " of earth, eaiihy," you 
 are now a child of God, and your thoughts and aspirations ought to 
 be of "Heaven, heavenly." Every fault of yours is seen magnified 
 in Heaven, as through a microscope ; but be not afraid, for, as you 
 have been generous with God, He, who will be in no one's debt, 
 M'ill be generous with you in return a thousandfold. He will never 
 forget the magnanimous spirit in which you have this day presented 
 yourself to Him ; and the unhesitating decisiveness with which you 
 deprived yourself of that liberty so cherished by the daughters of 
 man, in order that you may become the slave and the bondswoman 
 of Christ. Your virtues, no doubt, must be of a very exalted char- 
 acter ; but the amount of gi'ace allotted to you far exceeds that 
 meted out to the generality of Christians, and the rewards which 
 await you shall far surpass the glory that is reserved for the common 
 children of the Church; for, surely, those holy virgins who emulate 
 on earth the virtues of Mary cannot be far removed in Heaven from 
 the glory and majesty of the Queen of Virgins. Even in this world 
 all that man can attain — and much more than is attainable — you 
 can acquire and enjoy within these convent walls. The children of 
 men are unceasingly employed in the pursuit of pleasure; but as 
 they search for it only in the world, their pursuit, alas ! is vain : 
 their hopes are forever crossed, and their minds are forever mis- 
 erable. Sometimes in the race they come up, as they fancy, with 
 the delightful object of their pursuit, and fired with ecstasy by the 
 contemplation of its chai-ms, they quicken their pace ; they approach 
 nearer and nearer to the enchanting vision — they stretch out their 
 hands to seize it — but oh ! it is only a vision — a bodiless phantom, 
 an ignis-fatuus. It eludes their grasp, and leaves them weary and 
 sad, the victims of disappointment and disgust. Not so with you ; 
 you have found out the right road to happiness, and within your 
 sanctuary is found a peace and serenity of soul which all the wealth 
 of kingdoms could not purchase. Worldlings are wont to decry 
 conventual institutions as abodes of gloom and retreats where misery 
 and dejection dwell. With them the convent is a prison and the 
 recluse a miserable captive ever despondingly brooding over her 
 unhappy fate, and sighing for the freedom and gaiety of the glad- 
 some world without. But they know not that the soul of that cap- 
 
120 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tive soars beyond the cloister bars, and mounts to the very throne 
 of God, holding perpetual communion with Him and Ills holy 
 angels. They paint the world as a bright sea on which the sun is 
 ever shining, and the sparkling waves are ever dancing around the 
 smooth path of the merry voyager ; but, alas ! they tell you not that 
 the sun goes down, and that the storms arise, and that the sparkling 
 "waves become billows ; they speak not of the bristling rocks, and 
 the darksome caves, and the miserable wrecks — the struggle for 
 life and the death-shriek of the drowning mariner. They tell of 
 happy homes, and joyous faces — of social mirth and of merry even- 
 ings ; but oh ! not a word do they speak of the houies made desolate 
 by disease and death — not a word of the cheeks made pale by 
 care and by hunger — not a word of the breaking hearts and the 
 aching pulse — not a word of the scalding tears that flow when 
 friends are parting, never again to look on each other's faces. They 
 speak of wedded bliss and the joys of motherhood ; but, oh ! what 
 do they say of the sad vigils which the lonely wife must keep while 
 her wedded partner revels in the haunts of drunkenness and deprav- 
 ity — what do they say of the mother's anxiety for the welfare of her 
 children, and of the tender hearts broken by the ingratitude, by the 
 errors, or by the loss of those whom they loved more dearly than 
 their own lives ? Oh ! dear sister, you have done well, very well, 
 to renounce this sinful, sorrowful world. The children of the world 
 are the real captives, pining beneath the chains and manacles of sin 
 and passion, while you exult in all the "holy liberty of the children 
 of God." 
 
 Proceed, therefore, in your course, for you have chosen the 
 better part, and as sure as you are a faithful imitator of Mary, so 
 surely shall you be a sharer of her glory in Heaven, through all the 
 ages of eternity. 
 
 But it was not for the selfish pleasures of this holy retreat that 
 you have come hither ; it was not that you might be freed from the 
 evils of the world, and that you might revel in the ecstasies of reli- 
 gion ; it was not that you might escape the storms of life and anchor 
 here in the security of indolence and repose. No ; for this motive 
 might vitiate the sacrifice you have made, and God, who seeks the 
 heart alone, would reject it. You have come hither because you 
 love God ; because you feel that He has called j'ou hither ; because 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 121 
 
 you will do more for Him here than you would do abroad. You 
 have come, not to repose, but to labor; not to do your own will,, 
 but the will of Him who has this day made 3'ou especially His own. 
 You have heard His voice in your ear and in your heart, inviting 
 you to become His child, and you have not hesitated to come. You 
 have never once looked back. "Hearken, O daughter, and see, and 
 forget thy people and thy father's house, and the King shall greatly 
 desire thy beauty, for He is the Lord thy God." Oh ! the glory of 
 our religion, that every day presents to our eyes so many miracles 
 of grace, fortifying weak mortals with the strength of giants, clothing 
 tender woman in a panoply of might, so that her worth is estimated 
 by more than all the treasures of earth. "Who shall find a valiant 
 woman? Far and from the uttermost coasts is the price of her." 
 Proceed, then, dear sister, in your hallowed coui'se — follow the 
 blessed light of heaven that illumes your pathway. Mary is look- 
 ing down on 3'ou this moment from the heights of Heaven, and in 
 you she is well pleased. Could you but behold the gentle eyes of 
 that tenderest and sweetest of mothers, how much would the fervor 
 of your devotions be intensified, and the strength of your resolu- 
 tions increased ! May she be your powerful mediatrix before the 
 eternal Throne ; that acting all your life with the docility and inno- 
 cence of a child, you may adorn your soul with those beautifying 
 graces which may make you worthy to be eternally saved liy your 
 Eternal Father, the King who shall desire thy beauty, thy Lord 
 and thy God. 
 
122 TREASURY Or ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Sermon on the Blessed Virgin Mary, 
 
 " Comfortress of the afflicted, pray for us." 
 
 ^^.EAELY BELOVED BRETHREN, — There is no sorrow like 
 ^^P that which the heart endures in secret ; of which we our.lelves 
 ^ alone are conscious, and which oppresses us with gloom and 
 J> dejection, while the world thinks us light-hearted aud gay. 
 We mix amongst our friends, and, while they see the faint smile that 
 lights our cheek at the passing jest, they little dream of the misery, the 
 untold agony, that wrings our bosoms, and brings us M-ell nigh to 
 the confines of despair. Oh ! at such a moment how we long to find 
 some sympathizing friend — some tender-hearted bosom to which we 
 may freely disclose the sad story of our wrongs — the bitter catalogue 
 of our atHictions. Aud when, at length, the melancholy tale is told, 
 and the patient listener tm-ns to console us, how sweetly the words 
 of solace fall upon our ear ; how the heart expands with love, with 
 gratitude, with courage, and the tears, which, but a few moments 
 before, were the silent interpreters of unutterable woe, are suddenly 
 converted, by the magic touch of sympathy, into the exponents of 
 equally imalterable joy. But where shall we find this sweet consoler, 
 this gentle confidant, this tender heart, before which we may bare 
 our own, and to which we may impart the last secret of our sorrows? 
 Alas ! for the perversity of human nature, such friendship is rare, 
 very rare, iu this cold, heartless world. Self-love predominates 
 over every generous impulse of nature, and it has almost passed 
 into a proverb, that hearts which have confided most have been 
 most frequently betrayed. But there is at least one human being 
 to whom we are invited to recur in all our tribulations, into whose 
 sacred bosom no profane thought of self-love ever presumed to 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 123 
 
 seek a resting-place, whose ear is ever open to hear our complaints, 
 "whose heart is ever willing to redress our wrongs, whose lips are 
 ever ready to defend our cause ; who, though she reigns invisible in 
 heaven, regards with tenderest solicitude evciy child of Adam that 
 dwells even in the obscurest corners of the earth ; and whose joy 
 and delight is to infuse the lialm of sweetest consolation into bosoms 
 over-burthened with sorrow. She is by excellence the comfortress 
 of the afflicted, Mary, the Virgin Mother of God. 
 
 Oh ! what a delight is it for us, in this valley of tears, to have a 
 a comfortress ever at hand, so gentle, so sweet, so benign ! It matters 
 not what may be the nature or the intensity of our sorrow, she has 
 balm for all our wounds, and antidotes for all our afflictions. Who 
 is the most afflicted of God's creatures upon earth ? Is it the mother 
 from wfcom death has just snatched the only child of her bosom ? 
 Is it the victim of incurable disease, chained to the bed from which 
 he shall never rise, pining away from day to day, until he can pine 
 no more ? Is it the captive shut in from the blessed light of heaven, 
 without the cheering sight of a human face, and without a vestige of 
 hope that he shall be ever released from his miserable bondage? Is 
 it the poverty-stricken wretch, once the pampered child of fortune, 
 but whose ambition now is only that he ma}' be filled with pauper's 
 food, and whose body is to be cast into a pauper's grave ? It matters 
 not — Mary is a comforter to all. The cliildless mother may reflect 
 that Mary, too, was rendered childless, as mother never was before 
 or since — that her Divine Jesus hung naked, for three hours, before 
 her eyes, on a rough cross, until death delivered Him from agonies 
 which He alone could suffer. The victims of disease may remember 
 that, " Whom God loveth. He chastiseth ; " and that Mary suffered 
 tribulations of mind to which no sickness or disease could be well 
 compared. The captive may reflect that IMary was an exile for years 
 in the land of Egypt, far away from friends and home ; and those who 
 pine in poverty and humility may derive consolation from the thought 
 that Mary has said of herself, in her own delightful canticle : — 
 " Because he hath regarded the humility of his handmaid, therefore 
 shall all nations call me blessed." 
 
 The best comforters are those who have experienced sorrow : and 
 ■who shall number the sorrows of Mary, the Queen of Martyrs ? From 
 the cradle to the grave she was the victim of sorrow and affliction. 
 
124 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 She is beautifully styled by the (church the " Mystical Rose ; " for, 
 as the rose is the most beautiful of flowers, emitting the sweetest 
 perfume, and blooming in the midst of thorns, so Mary was the most 
 beautiful amongst women : "Thou art all fair, my blessed, and there 
 is no stain in thee." Her virtues were an odor of sanctity before 
 God : " Draw me, we will run after thee in the odor of thy oint- 
 ments ; " but her soul bloomed in the midst of the thoi'ns of tribula- 
 tion : "As the lily among the thorns, so is my love among the 
 daughters." (Cant, ii.) 
 
 Preserved by God from every stain of sin, she was yet a victim to 
 all the sufFei'ings entailed by sin upon the human race : proving to 
 us that sufferings are the condition of humanity, and when borne 
 with patience and resignation like hers, they are the sui'est passport 
 to our heavenly country. Who can describe the agony of h«r mind 
 when, the time of her delivery being come, she found there was no 
 room for her in the inn of Bethlehem? No room for the Queen of 
 Heaven and earth — no room for her whose pi'esence tills with joy 
 the very angels of heaven. On a cold winter's night, and under 
 circumstances so disti'essing, while the sinners of the earth recline 
 on beds of down and soft couches, the Mother of God retires to a 
 stable into which the cold wind blows, and the wintry rain-drops 
 fall — her only companion a dumb beast, her only couch some damp 
 straw, and there she is forced to give birth to Jesus, the mighty Lord 
 of all creation ! "She brought forth her first born," says the Sacred 
 Scripture, "and having wrapped him in swaddling-clothes laid him 
 in a manger." Oh ! how her mother's heart must have been pained 
 by this cruel necessity. Fancy it your own case, mothers, and 
 then think how much more sensitive than you was the Mother of 
 God, whose mind had none of the grossness engendered by sin, and 
 whose soul was enriched in the highest degree with all the graces 
 and attributes that adorn the soul of woman — the tenderness, the 
 softness, the delicacy, the modesty, and the deep self-sacrificing love 
 peculiar to motherhood. But what were those distresses to those 
 which were to follow? Eight days after the birth of Jesus, she 
 presents the infant in the temple, in compliance with the precept of 
 the law: and there Simeon, a holy man, inspired b}' God, appears, 
 and addresses the Virgin Mother. Does he congratulate her on the 
 immense dignity she has obtained by giving birth to the Lord of 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 125 
 
 Heaven? Does he foretell for her happiness and glory? No, his 
 propheti(j words convey no comfort, but foretell of suffering and woe 
 unspeakable. "A sword of grief," he says, "shall pierce thy soul;" 
 and full soon did that sword begin to pierce the virgin heart. An 
 edict is passed by Herod, that all the children of Judea under two 
 years of age shall be put to death. Mary hears of the edict, and 
 presses the infant Jesus more closely to her arms. She knows not 
 what to do, but being, as the pi'ophet described her, "the mother of 
 fair love, and of fear, and of knowledge, and of holy hope," her love 
 for her child, and her fear for His safety are not greater than her 
 knowledge, and her hope that God will rescue her from the terrible 
 danger ; and we are told by St. Matthew that an Angel of the Lord 
 appeared in a sleep to Joseph, saying, "Arise and take the child and 
 his mother, and fly into Egypt, and be there until I shall tell thee, 
 for it shall come to pass that Herod will seek the child to destroy 
 him.'' Oh ! what a long and wearisome journey for the young and 
 tender virgin ; what days of toil ; what agon}^ of mind ; what deep 
 solicitude for the precious burden in her arms ! No wonder the 
 grief of her soul should be compared to a sword cuttiug and piercing 
 her tender heart. 
 
 But passing over the other trials of Mary, which were each in- 
 tensely bitter of themselves, let us come to. that dreadful affliction, 
 in comparison to which all the others were as nothing ; the agony 
 she endured at the foot of the Cross while gazing on the wounds, 
 and the last expiring pangs of her only Son. No sufi'erings were at 
 all comparable to hers on that occasion, save those which rent the 
 heart of Jesus Himself. Oh ! mothers, think what would be your 
 feelings if you saw the child of j'^our bosom, innocent and good, 
 dying naked on a rude, rough cross before the gaze of cold and brutal 
 men, and then you may have some faint idea of this tender mother's 
 grief. Here indeed was the prophecy of Simeon well fulfilled, " A 
 sword of gi-ief shall pierce thy soul ; " for while the soldier's lance 
 pierced only the body of Jesus, it pierced the soul of Mary ; for, as 
 St. Bernard says, " After Jesus had given up the ghost, the cruel 
 lance which pierced His side did not reach His soul, but thine, O 
 blessed Mother ! for His soul had already fled, but from the spot 
 ■where His heart reposed thy heart could not be torn. A sword of 
 ^ief did pierce thy soul, and hence we style thee more than martyr; 
 
226 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 for the sufferings of thy body were as nothing in comparison to the 
 sufferings of thy mind. Was it not worse than a sword for thee to 
 hear from the lips of Jesus the bitter words, ' Mother, behold tliy 
 son ! ' Oh ! wliat an exchange ! John is given thee for Jesus ; the 
 servant for the Lord ; the disciple for the j\Iaster ; the sou of Zebedce 
 for the Sou of God ; a mere man for the Deity Himself. How could 
 thy soul have borne to hear those dreadful words, when the bare rec- 
 ollection of them is sufficient to rend even our hearts of stone?" 
 But the climax of Mary's sufferings was attained when she beheld her 
 Divine Son die. Had He died like other men, of some natural 
 disease, or by any ordinary infliction, fostered and cared for by Plis 
 tender mother, she might have not repined so much ; but to hang 
 like u malefactor from a cross, with cruel nails bored through His 
 sacred hands and feet, with a crown of thorns upon His head, from 
 which, as from His whole body, the blood flowed in copious streams, 
 and all this before the very eyes of that mother whose love was 
 purer and more intense than mortal ever felt ! Oh ! my Brethren, 
 we can form; no conception of the agony that wrung that tender 
 mother's heart ; and then, when His last sigh had fled, and His 
 Divine spirit .had winged its way from earth, who can paint the gloom 
 and desolation that brooded over the heart of Mary ? For if the love 
 with which He loved her was the sweetest solace to her soul during 
 life, how sad, how lonely must she have felt when she could now no 
 longer hear that gentle voice ; no longer gaze on that pale brow 
 where meekness loved to sit enthroned, or look into those mild eyes, 
 perpetually beaming with calm, serene, celestial love for her ! 
 
 But why dwell any longer on this mournful theme ? I have said 
 enough to show you that the life of Mary was from beginning to end 
 a life of humility, of poverty, of suffering — indeed how could it be 
 otherwise? Because unless she had suffered, she would not be a 
 faithful imitator of her Divine Son, who was, according to tlie 
 prophet, by excellence the "Man of Sorrows." But why have I 
 dwelt thus long on the sufferings of Mary? It is to show you 
 how jieculiarly she is called by the Church, the " Comfortress of 
 the Atflieted." Because as she suffered so much herself, she is 
 capable of appreciating the sufferings of others ; and as she is natu- 
 rally the tenderest and the most loving of God's creatures, she is 
 willing to impart to all the consolation which is due from a mother 
 
EEV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 227 
 
 to her children. Her very name implies consolation — "And the 
 name of the virgin was Mary " — for by i\Iary is meant, as you 
 are all aware, the " star of the sea ; " and what greater comfort 
 can we enjoy, journeying over the ocean of life, exposed to its 
 storms and its billows, than to behold through the clouds of sin 
 and temptations that bright star gleaming out from the broad ex- 
 panse of heaven, illumining the troubled waters around us, and 
 pointing out the way to the haven of everlasting salvation ? And 
 here again I must summon to my aid the delightful words of 
 Saint Bernard, who, jDerhaps of all God's Saints, loved Mary most, 
 and whose language in her praise is so sublimely beautiful that it 
 falls little short of inspiration : — " Mary," he says, " is most justly 
 compared to a star, for, as the star without losing any of Its effulgence 
 sends forth its rays upon the earth, so Mary, without tarnishing her 
 virginity, brought forward the Saviour of the world ; she is that 
 glorious star sprung from Jacob whose radiance illuminates the uni- 
 verse — whose splendor radiates through the heights of heaven, and 
 penetrates into the caverns of hell — shining abroad over the world, 
 and imparting its warming influence to the minds of men : it fosters 
 virtue and purges out vice. She is that glorious and exalted star, 
 raised high above this vast and mighty ocean of human life, gleam- 
 ing with merits, and brilliant with exemplars of virtue." " Oh ! if 
 there be any amongst you who feels that he is tossed about by the 
 billows and tempests of this miserable life, let him not turn his eyes 
 from this bright star, if he hopes to avoid being buried in the bosom 
 of the deep. If the winds of temptations arise, if you rush upon 
 the rocks of tribulations, behold the star, call out to Mary; if you 
 are buffeted by the waves of ambition, of detraction, of envy, behold 
 the star, call out to Mary ; if the vessel in which your soul is em- 
 barked be struck by the billows of anger, of avarice, of sensuality, 
 behold the star, call out to Mary ; if thou art shaken by crime, dis- 
 mantled by guilt, affrighted by the apprehension of judgment; if you 
 feel yourself sinking into the depths of sadness, into the abyss of 
 despair, think, oh ! think on Mary : in dangers, in difficulties, in 
 doubts, think on Mary, call on Mary. Let not her name depart 
 from thy mouth, nor from thy heart, and that thou mayest ex- 
 perience the efficacy of her prayer, be sure thou imitate the example 
 of her virtue. Mariner on the ocean of life, following her, the 'star 
 
128 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of the sea,' thou canst not Avander from thy pathway ; imploring her 
 aid, thou shalt never despair ; thinking on her, thou must escape 
 destruction ; protected by her, thou shalt know no fear ; guided by 
 her, thou shalt never feel fatigue ; when she is propitious thou shalt 
 arrive safely at the end of thy wearisome voyage, and then ex- 
 perience in thyself how justly it has been said: 'the name of the 
 virgin was Mary.' " 
 
 As our Divine Saviour did not come to call the just, but sinners, 
 to repentance — as there was no sinner exemjDt from His mercy — 
 as He died alike for all — as He was equally beneficent to the devout 
 Lazarus and the sinful Magdalen, so Mary affords her consolations 
 not only to the just, but to sinners, of every degree of M'ickedness, 
 who implore her aid and protection. God rains upon the just and 
 upon the unjust; the stars of heaven shine alike upon the good and 
 upon the bad — so does Mary, the star of the sea, shed the bright 
 rays of her mercy and compassion upon all the human race alike ; 
 she prays for the just that they may be strengthened in grace ; and 
 for the sinner that he may be converted from his evil ways ; she is 
 all to all ; to the wise and to the imwise she is equally generous ; 
 she opens to all the treasures of her mercy, that from their plenitude 
 all may receive ; that the captive may be able to rend his chains ; 
 that the sick may be aroused from the lethargy of sin ; that the sad- 
 dened bosom may be filled with the balm of consolation ; that the 
 sinner may i-eceive pardon, the just man grace, the angels joy, and 
 God Himself eternal glory. 
 
 Such, my Brethren, are the vast, the sublime privileges and pre- 
 rogatisres of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Now let us see what lessons 
 may we derive from the contemplation of her character in the point 
 of view which I have traced out for you ; we may learn from it two 
 great lessons: — first, that we ought, like her, to regard suflTering 
 and tribulation as coming from the hands of God, and bear them 
 with patience and resignation to His holy will ; and secondly, that 
 we ought to be ourselves comforters of the afiiictcd, dispensing 
 charity and consolation to our fellow-crcMtures, for the sake of that 
 God who has commanded us to love our neighbor as ourselves. It 
 was not for her own sins Mary suffered, for sin she had none ; it was 
 to give us in her own person an eximiple of the excellence of suffer- 
 ing, and to prove that, as she who was sinless suffered so much. 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 129 
 
 there is no other way to he.ivcn for those who have sinned, bnt the 
 way of sorrows and afflictions, in which she has walked before us. 
 
 It is needless for me, my Brethren, on this occasion, to expatiate 
 on the necessity and the excellence of suifcring and tribulations — 
 that subject would require a separnte discourse, for peHiaps there is 
 no subject on which the Scriptures are so diffuse, and which is so 
 well established by the examples of Christ, and His Saints, as well 
 as by the arguments of Christian reasoning. " The wages of sin is 
 death." We are all sinners ; we must satisfy God's justice for our 
 sins, either by self-imposed penance, or by punishment inflicted by 
 God Himself. St. Paul tells Timothy that all who will live godly 
 in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. The life of Jesus was a life 
 of uuexMnipled suffering. What did He sa}^ to His Apostles when 
 sending them abroad upon the world ? " They shall deliver you up 
 to be afflicted, and they shall put you to death, and you shall be 
 hated by all nations for My name's sake." Assisted by His grace, 
 they joyfully undertook the task, and true to the words of Christ, 
 they swam through their own bli)od to the ci'own of glory, which 
 now adorns, and shall forever adorn, their brows in the kingdom of 
 God's glory. For Christ had said, " Blessed are they who suffer 
 persecution for justice sake." He had told them that their sorrow 
 should he turned into jo}^ and therefore through many tribulations 
 they entered into the kingdom of God. " If these things are done 
 in the green wood, what shall be done in the dry? " If the just man 
 is tried in the furnace of tribulation, what shall become of us poor 
 sinners?. Oh ! then, my Brethren, let us accept our crosses as com- 
 ing from the hands of God, and bear them as Mary bore hers, with 
 patience and resignation, that Ave may be able to sing with her here- 
 after, " His mercy is from generation to genei'ation, unto those who 
 fear him ; he hath put down the mighty from their seat, and he hath 
 exalted the humble." 
 
 But we must also perform the offices of consolation to our fellow- 
 creatures if we wish to follow the footsteps of Mary ; we must visit 
 the sick, console the afflicted, and be kind to God's poor. We are 
 all members of one family, and God is our Father ; we should love 
 each other with fraternal love, for His sake. Have you ever been 
 sick ? How jealous you felt if you wei-e not visited by j-our friends, 
 and what comfort and delight you experienced when yon found that 
 
130 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 you were i-cmcnil)ered by those who, 3^011 funcied, had forgotten or 
 disliked you. But, oh ! what a charm would j'our visit have for the 
 humble, and the distressed. "Be not wanting," says the wise man, 
 "in comforting them that weep, and walk with them that mourn : be 
 not slow to visit the sick, for by these things thou shalt be confirmed 
 in love." "It is better," says the same inspired writer, "to go into 
 the house of mourning than to the house of feasting, for in that we 
 are put in mind of the end of all, and the living thinketh what is to 
 come." "Religion, clean and undefiled," says St. James, "before 
 God and the Father, is to visit the fatherless and widows in their 
 tribulations." Remember the reward that Christ has promised to the 
 just, and how that reward is to be earned. "Come," He shall say, 
 " ye blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you ; 
 for I was a stranger and you took me in, naked and j'ou clothed me, 
 sick and in prison and yon visited me." Then the just shall answer, 
 saying, "Lord, when did we see thee a stranger and take thee in, 
 naked and clothed thee, or when did we see thee sick and in prison 
 and visit thee ? " And answering, the Lord will say to them, " Amen, 
 I sa}'^ to you, as often as you did it to one of these my least brethren, 
 you did it unto me." Oh ! happy sentence ; and then He shall wipe 
 away the tears from the eyes of His saints, and wee2"»ing and sorrow 
 shall be no more, "because the former things were passed away." 
 
 Oh ! let us not leave the House of God this day, before we pray 
 to Mary that she may obtain for us the grace to bear our sufferings 
 with patience ; and learn from her, the comfortress of the afflicted, 
 to shed the sweetness of consolation on our afflicted fellow-creatures 
 — that we may d(>serve hereafter to hear that delightful sentence 
 passed upon us all by her Divine Son ; that the troul)les and tribu- 
 lations of this life being over, we may deserve to meet in that Eternal 
 Kingdom the Queen of Martyrs, no longer suffering, but radiant 
 with surpassing beauty, and encircled with a halo of everlasting 
 glory ; that, filled with love and gratitude for the thousands of graces 
 we have received upon earth, each one of us may raise his voice 
 before God's imperishable throne, and join with the adoi'able Queen 
 of Angels, in that canticle of praise once uttered by her on earth, 
 "My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in 
 God, my Saviour." Amen. 
 
KEY. M. B. BUCKLEY. 131 
 
 Lecture on the National Music of Ireland* 
 
 pN Ireland, from time immemorial, music and poetry have been so 
 much cultivated conjointly by the same class of men, and not, 
 as in other countries, each by a diflferent order of votaries, that, 
 as far as Ii'eland is concerned, the history of the one cannot 
 well be dissociated from the history of the other. The bards of the 
 most ancient times, and indeed the bards of times comparatively 
 modern, not only reached the highest excellence in the performance 
 of instrumental music, but their own genius supplied them with 
 words and ideas, and facility of musical composition, requisite for 
 attaining thorough perfection in the cultivation of the sister art. It 
 is, therefore, impossible for him who professes to trace the history 
 of Irish music not to interweave with his theme the history of Irish 
 poetry also. In the performance of this task, the historian or lec- 
 turer must expose himself to the ridicule of the unlearned sceptic, 
 and to the incredulity of many of his own un-Irish fellow-country- 
 men when he claims for the poetry and music of his native land an 
 antiquity scarcely attained by those arts in any region of the universal 
 world. But scepticism and unpatriotism must yield to the adaman- 
 tine sternness of truth ; and it is truth to say that the history of 
 Irish poetry and music can be traced back to the earliest dawnings of 
 the history of mankind. ]\Iusic is as old as the world, and the world 
 was yet j'oung when Ireland was colonized by wanderers from 
 Oriental climes, where poetry and music appear to have been coeval 
 with the very formation of society. Music is inherent in the very 
 nature of man — it is the language specially adapted for express- 
 ing the joyous affections of an innocent mind. As the whispering 
 of foi'cst leaves, the rippling of the mountain stream, and the roar 
 
 * Delivered before the Cork Literary and Scientific Society, December 12, 1868. 
 
132 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of the iingiy stonu, arc the homage-giving music of inanimate crea- 
 tion, so vocal melody is the prescribed music in which nature dictates 
 to man to sound the praises of his God. No tribe or nation has been 
 ever known that was not susceptible of the influence of music ; and 
 the more primitive the state of man, the more prevalent appears to 
 have been its cultivation. Hence the idea of pastoral life is always 
 associated with the idea of musical tastes. According to the fourth 
 chapter of Genesis, Julml, the seventh descendant of Adam, with 
 whom he was contemporary, was " the father of them that play upon 
 the harp and the organs," that is, of all stringed and wind or pulsa- 
 tile instruments ; and, appropriately enough, we find in the same 
 passage that he was the brother of Jabel, who was " the father of 
 such as dwell in tents and of herdsmen." Thus we find, at one of 
 the earliest periods of human history, that the nomad life was asso- 
 ciated in one family with the cultivation of the art of music — a 
 circumstance which is illustrated in heathen mythology by the pipes 
 of the sylvan Pan and the lyro of the pastoral Apollo. Juljal was 
 also a contemporaiy of Noah, and doubtless transmitted through 
 the saved of the ark the secrets of his art to his postdiluvian descend- 
 ants. The branches of the human family were soon after separated 
 from the parent stock, and migrating from the plain of Senaar, 
 brought with them their customs and traditions to every quarter ot 
 the globe on which they settled. All truthful history assures us 
 that the earliest colonists of Ireland came from the East — that land 
 where the genial warmth of the climate, the surpassing beauty of 
 Nature, and the vivacious temperament of the people, together with 
 that simplicity and impressibility characteristic of the infancy of 
 society, made almost every man a poet. From that pure and gene- 
 rous source the poetry and music of Ireland have flown, and, after 
 the lapse of ages, to this day close aflinity may be discerned between 
 the strains of several Oriental nations and the strains of our native 
 land. These similarities have been discovered in Persia and India. 
 Marsden, in his history of Sumatra, says that "the Sumatran tunes 
 much resemble to his car those of the native Irish, having usually, 
 like them, a flat third." Modern travellers, or residents in India, 
 will tell you that there is a marvellous resemlilance between the 
 Hindoo melodies and those of Ii-eland and Scotland. The same may 
 be said of the melodies of the Siamese. From these Eastern sources 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 133 
 
 our national melodies have been derived ; as, on the other hand, ia 
 this nineteenth century, may be discovered in the music of the AVest 
 Indians an infusion of Irish melod^s which can be traced to the 
 period when Cromwell and his myrmidons transported thousands of 
 our countrymen to those islands, where they were sold as slaves, and, 
 in those far off climes, left behind them vestiges of melancholy music 
 in which, like the children of Sion, they mourned their captivity and 
 denounced the cruelty of their conquerors. 
 
 The cultivation of music, indeed, appears associated with the 
 history of the Irish race from the very beginning; while in other 
 nations, the date of poetic invention and musical excellence forms 
 an era clear, well-defined, and prominent. The earliest Anglo- 
 Saxon poet, for example, of whom historians tell, was Ceedmon, a 
 monk of Whitby, who died in the year of our Lord 680, while 
 amongst the train of iMilesian invaders who had taken possession of 
 Ireland more than 2,000 j'ears before, fragments of poems written 
 by those ancient children of song have drifted down the stream of 
 time, and bear in their language and sentiment the veritable ring of 
 the days of old. The disjecta membra of Amergin, the son of Mile- 
 sius, are as well authenticated to-day as the melodies of Moore, and 
 of the two are certainly more Irish. 
 
 There is evidence to show that the earliest representative of an 
 Irish harp known to antiquarians is a fac-simile of that which was 
 used by the ancient Egyptians, a circumstance of considerable 
 moment in tracing the history of Irish music to the very remotest 
 antiquity. In the ancient constitution of this kingdom there were 
 five orders in the State, viz.: — The royal, the ai'istocratic, the 
 priestly, the poetical, and the mechanical ; and when the represen- 
 tatives of those five orders met at their yets, or great national assem- 
 blies at Tara, so great was the honor paid the representatives of 
 music and song, that they occupied the highest place next to Royal- 
 ty itself, and surpassed in the splendor of their attire tlie proudest 
 nobles that basked in the halo of the throne. Indeed, the very 
 name of the place where those great national assemblies were held 
 had its origin in the music-loving passion of the people ; for, as we 
 are assured by authentic historical records, Temur, which is the 
 Celtic name of Tara, means when interpreted, the "Wall of Music." 
 Thirteen hundred years before the coming of Christ, to quote the 
 
134 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Book of Biillymote, "the people deemed each other's voices sweeter 
 thau the warblings of a melodious harp ; such peace and concord 
 reigned amongst them that no music could delight them more than 
 the sound of each others voice. Temur (Tai'a) was so called from 
 its celebrity for melody above the palaces of the world, tea signifj^- 
 ing melody, or sweet music, and mur a wall." Alas ! both wall and 
 music have disappeared forever, and — 
 
 " The harp that once thro' Tara's halls, 
 The soul of music shed 
 Now hangs as mute on Tara's walls 
 As if that soul were dead." 
 
 But, indeed, even here is a wild poetic fiction ; for not only is 
 there no harp to hang on the walls, but there is no wall on which to 
 bang a harp, since, according to the calmer statement of our national 
 bard in his History of Ireland, even in the sixth century, "No trace 
 of the original palace still remained, while the hill itself had become 
 a desert overgrown with grass and weeds." (Vol. ii. p. 132.) In 
 Ireland the bards of old wei'e divided into three classes or orders, 
 viz.: — the Filea, the Seanachie, and the Brchon. They were, as 
 their names imply, the historians, the antiquarians, and the legisla- 
 tors of the country. Some enlightened and soothed kings and chiefs, 
 some roused their valor, while others emblazoned in immortal verse 
 their heroic achievements in the field. The Irish princes, like the 
 Arabians, kept a numerous band of bards, musicians, and story- 
 tellers in their train. The privileges and duties of the bardic body- 
 are defined in a poem written by one of themselves, the celebrated 
 Dubhthach, Archfilea or chief bard of Leogaire, King of Ireland. 
 "The leainied poets and antiquaries," he says, "are free from tribute 
 as long as they follow their own profession. They shall be ready to 
 direct the kings and nobles according to the laws, preserve the 
 records of the nation, and the genealogies of families, and instruct 
 youth in the arts and sciences known in the kingdom." On the 
 consecration of every new king it was usual for the royal bards to 
 stand before the throne in scarlet robes, and sing the inauguration 
 ode ; and this custom lasted as long as there were kings in Ireland. 
 From the earliest dawn of Irish history the bardic body were a 
 national institution ; they charmed the ears of their princes and 
 people, they enriched the literature of their native land ; and doubt- 
 
KEV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 135 
 
 less had Ireland been able to preserve her nationality, her language 
 and literature, like the other nations of Europe, those great and 
 gifted men of old, who, even to us their fellow-countrymen, are 
 either unknown or unregarded for their unpronounceable names and 
 unspeakable language, would rank with the proudest sons of song 
 whose names illumine the historical pages of more fortunate 
 nations. 
 
 So important an element in the government and adornment of the 
 kingdom was the bardic institution, that seminaries and colleges 
 were established for the education of those who aspired to the dig- 
 nity of hardship. The date of the fii'st erection of these schools is 
 ascribed to the reign of Ollamh Fodhla, or the learned professor. 
 King of Ireland, who flourished some three centuries before the 
 Christian era. In these seminaries the Druids instilled into the 
 minds of the bards the rudiments of history, oratory, and laws, 
 through the medium of poetry ; these instructions being conveyed 
 in verses set to music, which was always esteemed the most polite 
 tind of learning among them. The highest degree in these colleges 
 was that of Ollamh, or Professor ; and so eminent a place did these 
 men hold in the estimation of kings and people, that they were 
 admitted to the highest offices in the hier:irchy of Druidism. 
 
 Several kings of Ireland, so far from considering it a condescen- 
 sion, regarded it rather as a high honor to be enrolled amongst the 
 bards ; and, on the other hand, in the eleventh century we find an 
 instance of the chief bard of the time being raised during an inter- 
 regnum to the dignity of Regent in Ireland. In a word, there was 
 no honor of which the bards were not deemed worthy. They held 
 Tast landed possessions. For instance, the bai'ony of Carbcrry, a 
 territoiy of immense extent in the county of Cork, was a present 
 made to a bard of that name by one of the kings of Munster, in 
 admiration of his excellent professional cajDabilities. In banquets 
 and public festivals the highest place was assigned to them, after 
 royalty itself; and when sirnames came to be invented, the distin- 
 guishing article " the " was prefixed to their names, and the Mac 
 Eagans of Connaught and the O'Daly's of Desmond rivalled in the 
 splendor of nomenclature The O'Brien, Prince of Desmond, and The 
 O'Donoghue, Chieftain of the glens. 
 
 So sacred were their persons held that an eric, or compensation 
 
136 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 levied for killing a bard, was next in amount to that levied for kill- 
 ing a king : and from the Annals of the Four Masters we gather 
 that when Gregory O'lMaelconiy, one of the greatest Ollamhs of the 
 day, was even by accident killed, 126 cows were given as an e?v'c or 
 compensation for the loss sustained by his death. And justly were 
 they thus esteemed, if only for their high intellectual attainments, 
 at a pei'iocl when they outstripped with giant strides the civilization 
 of the age in which they lived. " The bards of Ireland," says 
 McPherson, " have displayed a genius worthy of any age or nation." 
 But they were as much distinguished for the profession of their 
 hospitality, as they were for the depth and variety of their learned 
 lore. They kejit open homes where all visitors were welcome, but 
 most of all, the votaries of science ; and we can well picture to our- 
 selves on those occasions of high festival, "the feast of reason and 
 the flow of soul " that shed an eclat round the bardic board, when 
 the severity of philosophical disputation was varied by the vocal 
 melody of educated minstrels and the clamorous voices of contro- 
 versy were hushed by the dulcet music of the harp. 
 
 Such was the bardic order, and sucli the high esteem in which 
 music and song were held in the olden days of Ireland, while yet 
 the Dnids performed their mystic rites ; while yet the annual fires 
 illumining every hill-top proclaimed that Bel Avas the god of the 
 Celt. 
 
 But a new era arrived, the herald of the brightest days that ever 
 shone on this fated land. Patrick, the Christian Apostle, set his 
 foot upon the shores, and, in the blaze of the Gospel light, the Bel 
 fires were extinguished forever. The haughty Leogaire and all his 
 court were converted to the faith, conspicuous amongst whom was 
 Dubhthach, already alluded to, the Archfilea or Prime Bard of 
 Ireland. Nor were the poetic flights of that bardic genius impeded 
 by the teachings of Christianity. On the contrary, the sublimating 
 influence of a Divine religion gave new wings to the poet's fancy, 
 and opened for him a new and boundless firmament of thought, 
 where he might soar in a serener atmosphere, in the purest sunliudit 
 of heaven. "The strains which he had sung," says the biographer 
 of St. Pati'ick, "in honor of the false divinities, he changed into a 
 more useful chant, and language of a purer flow, in celebration of 
 the praise of the Almighty." 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 137 
 
 The eloquence of Patrick met witli no resistance. The minds of 
 a people naturally poetic freely embraced a religion which was 
 poetry itself, and the bards were amongst the first Christian prose- 
 lytes. This is the more remarkable, as they had from the earliest 
 times monopolized the teaching pi-erogative in the State, and would, 
 therefore, be supposed reluctantly to have yielded to the novel doc- 
 trines of the Christian Apostle. But the wonders of grace surpass 
 the imaginings of men. Amongst the numerous bards who dedica- 
 ted their talents at this period to the sacred cause of religion, the 
 most distinguished are Feich, the Bishop of Sletty, a see in the 
 present country of Meath, whose poem, published for the first time 
 by the learned Colgan, is in the hands of every Irish scholar ; Amer- 
 gin, author of a celebrated work, well known and highly useful to 
 Irish antiquarians, entitled the "Dinn Seanchat ; " the famous Col- 
 umbkille, and others of equal note. Most of the poems of these 
 celebrated men afford internal evidence that their construction is 
 founded on the traditional rhythmical songs of the Pagan bards. 
 " Their note and their jingle are national ; they follow a long estab- 
 lished practice, well known to the bards of former times." So says 
 Hardiman, in his work of Irish Minstrelsy. 
 
 Sacred music was at this period cultivated with great success in 
 Ireland. Ambrosian chant was the first used in our churches. St. 
 Patrick, who was instructed in that system at Tours, introduced it 
 into the Emerald Isle within fifty j^ears after its first institution at 
 Milan ; while, at the hands of the Irish priesthood, the Gregorian 
 chant was cultivated, not only in their native land, but in every 
 country on the continent of Europe. From the "Acta Sanctorum" 
 of the Bollandists we learn that, in the year 650, St. Gertrude, 
 having procured books from Rome, invited over to her abbej' at 
 Nivelle, two Irishmen, St. Foillanus and St. Ultanus, brothers of the 
 more celebrated St. Fursey, to instruct her convent in psalmody ; 
 while from sources equally authentic we discover that St. Helias or 
 Hely, an Iiish monk, was the fii"st that introduced the Roman chant 
 at Cologne. At home, in the old land, according to the testimony 
 of Cambrensis, bishops and abbots and other holy men, were wont 
 to carry harps about with them, and soothe their minds in the hour 
 of trouljlc and care with the soft tones of sacred music. That harps 
 of this descri[)tiun wero in couunon use among Irish ecclesiastics 
 
^38 TUEASL'P.Y or ELOQUENCE. 
 
 from the vci\y introduction of Christianity into the country, is con- 
 firmed by tlie written lives of the most distinguished Irish Saints, as 
 well as by the fact that such harps are represented on the knees of 
 ecclesiastics, on several of our ancient stone crosses of the eighth, 
 ninth, and tenth centuries ; and also appear at some of our ancient 
 shrines and reliquaries of later date. This was at that period of our 
 history to which, after centuries of persecution and degradation, we 
 point with honest pride, and remembering which, we cherish an 
 inextinguishable hope that such blissful days may yet return to 
 Ireland — the period when she was recognized all over the civilized 
 world as the " Insula Sanctorum " — when sacred song ascended 
 from the early dawn of morning to the descending shades of night, 
 from the thousand monastic choirs on green hill-side, on sloping 
 lawn and verdant valley ; on the ocean shore and by the margin of 
 sunbright rivers ; from the sacred cloisters^ of Benchoir, that giant 
 university of old, whose very name implies choral magnificence ; 
 from the abbey of St. Mongrel, near Limerick, "where," saith the 
 historian, "there were together five hundred monks well skilled in 
 psalmody ; " fi'om the towering heights of the Lismorensian school 
 on the picturesque banks of the Blackwater ; from the far-iiimed 
 monastic halls of Armagh ; and let us add, from the long-demolished 
 choirs of the no less distinguished abbey of St. Finn Barr. This 
 was the time when the fame of Ireland travelled on the wings of 
 the wind through every known region of the world, and votaries of 
 learning flocked for instruction to her shores ; Avhen, with that high- 
 minded generosity peculiar to genius, she bore abroad some share 
 of the learning that abounded at home, and her children became the 
 teachers and professors of benighted Europe. At home and abroad, 
 music, sacred and profane, was cultivated and taught by Irishmen ; 
 and the green island in the bosom of the Atlantic, in whose diadem 
 sancity had become the brightest jewel, now claimed additional 
 admiration from mankind by the less honorable, but not less distin- 
 guishing, characteristic of the "Land of Song." 
 
 Yes, Ireland the sanctuary of religion, the nursery of poetry, 
 became the congenial dwelling-place of music, which, when chased 
 from other lands by the hostile genius of war, sought refuge and 
 found it in the bosom of Erin. In no other country Avere the sisters 
 poetry and music so hospitably welcomed, in no laud Avere their 
 
REV. jM. B. BUCKLEY. 139 
 
 votaries so honored, so enriched. The traveller could not wander 
 far through any part of the country without encountering the bard 
 and the harper ; and merry must have been those good old times, 
 when the hospitable doors of prince, and chieftain, and lord lay 
 invitingly open to the pilgrims of learning fi'om every shore of 
 Europe, and the rude but generous banquet was enlivened by the 
 stirring strains of the lyre, the tympan, and the lute. Our "Nation- 
 al Bard," as he is called, of modern times, makes graceful allusion to 
 those festive customs of the olden days, in one of his most popular 
 
 songs : — 
 
 " When the light of my song is o'er, 
 
 Oh ! take my harp to your ancient hall ; 
 Hang it up at that friendly door 
 
 Where weary travellers love to call : 
 Then, if some bard who roams forsaken 
 
 Revives its soft notes in passing along, 
 Oh ! let one thought of its master awaken 
 
 Your warmest smile for the child of song." 
 
 But the very splendor of bardic pomp well nigh occasioned the 
 utter extinction of the bardic order ; and this occurred as follows. 
 The bards, as we have seen, were the most honored men in the 
 kingdom. They enjoyed in abundance wealth and lands, and the 
 most splendid dignities which it was in the power of the monarch to 
 bestow. Masters of a sublime and soothing art, they won the 
 admiration and love of the learned, while for their knowledge of the 
 mysteries of nature and of the hidden harmony of the universe they 
 were almost adored by the ignorant and vulgar. With all these 
 varied and splendid tributes to their genius and skill, they remained 
 still human, and their humanity betrayed them into pride and self- 
 conceit. "Through pride the angels fell." How can men hope to 
 rise by it? The bards grew every day more haughty and arrogant. 
 They aspired to honors still higher than those which had been so 
 freely and so ungrudgingly lavished upon them ; they demanded 
 the distinction of wearing the golden " fibula " that bound the royal 
 robe on the breasts of kings for many generations ; the nobility they 
 despised, the vulgar they ignored. Their numbers swelled so pro- 
 digiously and the whole order became so wealthy, that the mechani- 
 cal arts were neglected, and agricultural pursuits were almost 
 entirely abandoned. The monarch Hugh, apprehensive for the 
 
140 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 stability of his throne and the welfare of the nation, convened, in 
 the j'ear 580, a general council of the whole kingdom, to consider 
 the best mtans for correctnig this gigantic grievance. He there 
 resolved that the whole bardic order should be abolished. The 
 monarch had little soul for music, or perhaps had got a satiety of it ; 
 but at the intervention of St. Cohimba, who had been specially sum- 
 moned from Scotland to attend the council, it was finally arranged 
 that each provincial prince and each lord of a cantred should be 
 allowed one registered bard or Ollamb, whom he was to endow with 
 a settled hereditary fortune ; that this bard should be sworn to- 
 employ his talents solely in the promotion of religion., in promoting 
 the glory of the nation, in defending female virtue, in sounding the 
 valor of heroes, and celebrating the munificence of his patron. The 
 monarch Hugh also established seminaries for the education of bards, 
 of which the prince bard of the kingdom, the monarch's own 
 Ollamh, should be president ; whose duty it was, moreover, to 
 appoint the Ollamhs for each provincial prince or loixl. Thus 
 clipped of its wings, but yet purified of much that was earthly, the 
 bardic order pursued its course until the period of the Danish 
 invasion. 
 
 The arduous and long-continued efforts of the nation to repel the 
 invaders from her shores retarded the j^rogress of music, for the 
 " piping-time of peace " gave way to the coarse clangor of war, and 
 the soft tones of the lute were exchanged for the clash of battle-axe 
 and spear. Yet the Muse had still a home in Ireland, and the 
 hoary monarch, who fell in his tent beneath the Danish falchion at 
 Clontarf was as celebrated for his skill in the music of the lyre as he 
 was distinguished for his valiant achievements in the field. Nation- 
 al records point to few favored sons of the Muse during this dark 
 age of tyranny and bloodshed ; but yet a few names do stand for- 
 ward "to show that still she lived." "These are not imaginary 
 persons," says Hardiman, " like many called into fabulous existence 
 by the zeal of some neighboring nations in asserting claims to early 
 civilization and literature, but men long celebrated in the authentic 
 annals of their country, whose works still extant survive the suc- 
 ceeding convulsions of centuries. Those works do not possess any 
 of the wild, barbarous fervor of the Scandinavian scalds, nor the 
 effeminate softness of the professors of the 'gay science,' the trouba- 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 141 
 
 dours, and lady bards of this period. The simplicitj^ of expression, 
 and dignity of thought which characterize the Greelc and lloman 
 writers of the purest period pervade the productions of our liards, 
 and at the present day they are particularly valuable for the impor- 
 tant aids they furnish towards elucidating tlie ancient state of this 
 early peopled and interesting island." ("Irish jNlinstrelsy," vol. i., 
 p. IG.) At this period Flanu M'Lonan, Ard-Ollamh, and Chief 
 Bard of all Ireland, was distinguished by the flattering epithet of 
 the " Virgil of Erin ; " and we are assured that the genius of music 
 was hereditary in this laureate, inasmuch as his mother was known 
 to all men as, by excellence, "the poetic." In this age, too, we 
 trace the distinguished name of Cormac, King of Munster, author of 
 the celebrated " Psalter of Cashel," whose versatile genius may be 
 conceived from the fact that he was at the same time prelate, king, 
 historian, and poet. We may also add, that he must have had a 
 highly cultivated architectural taste, as the magnificent ruins of the 
 edifice erected during Ids reign on the far-famed rock of Cashel 
 excite to this day tJie wonder and admiration of architectural con- 
 noisseurs. Chroniclers also love to dwell on the tact that, at this 
 time, Alfred the Great was sent by his father for instruction to 
 Ireland, and confided to the charge of a pious matron of high repu- 
 tation for Christian knowledge, named Modwenna. This I mention 
 because Alfred was an accomplished master of the harp, for which 
 be was most probably indebted to his Hibernian tutors, from whom 
 he may have also learned the cunning device Avhich history ascribes 
 to him of going in the disguise of a hai'per amongst the soldiers of 
 the hostile cauip, and, while charming their cars with his melody, 
 learning the secrets of their situation, strength, and intentions, and 
 availing himself of the knowledge thus acquired, for the purpose of 
 defeating their projects of attack. During this dark ago tlie harp 
 was introduced from Ireland into Wales by Gruffyth ap Conan, 
 Prince of North Whales, who brought with 'him at the same time a 
 large number of cunning musicians, well skilled in the music of 
 their own land. Into Scotland it had been long before introduced 
 by the itinerant bards of either couutiy, and had been employed, it 
 is supposed, in Divine worship simultaneously by the monks of 
 Bangor and lona. And here I may incidentally observe, on the 
 authority of Bunting, the well-known compiler of the "Ancient 
 
142 TREASURY OF KLOQUEXCE. 
 
 Music of Ireland," that, until a comparatively recent period, the 
 harp was the usual accompaniment of the mass in our rural districts. 
 We are assured by Dante that long before his time — and he lived 
 in the thirteenth century — the harj) was brought into Italy from 
 Ireland, "where," says the poet, "it had been in use for many and 
 many ages." Thus, during a period of the history of Europe which 
 appears to have been the saddest and gloomiest in her annals — a 
 period generally designated a night of ignorance and barbarism — 
 though Ireland partook of the general obscuration of the times, she 
 was 3'et sleepless in the cultivation of poetry and music, as she was 
 active in the repulsion of her invaders, and unwearying in the repar- 
 ation of her demolished sanctuaries of learning and religion. 
 
 A short interval of peace ensued between the expulsion of the 
 Northmen, and the invasion of the Anglo-Saxons ; for the Fine Arts 
 it was a period of revival marvellously rapid. On the arrival of 
 Strongbow, the Irish bards and harpers had attained a success unpar- 
 alleled in the history of the country. For proof of this fact we 
 need not appeal to any prejudiced national pen; but we wall find it 
 attested by the gall-ink records of the worthy priest-historian, Giral- 
 dus Cambrensis. "This people, however," he says, "deserve to be 
 praised for their successful cultivation of instrumental music, in which 
 their skill is beyond comparison superior to that of any nation we 
 have seen. For their modulation is not drawling or morose, like 
 our instrumental music in Britain ; but the strains, while they are 
 lively and rapid, are also sweet aud delightful. It is astonishing 
 how the proportionate time of the music is preserved, notwithstand- 
 icg such impetuous rapidity of the fingers, and how, without violating 
 a single rule of art, in running through shakes and slurs, and vari- 
 ously intertwined organizing or counterpoint, with so sweet a rapid- 
 ity, so unequal an equality of time, so apparently discordant concord 
 of sounds, the melody is harmonized and rendered perfect." He 
 goes on to admire the simultaneous sounding of different chords, the 
 attention to cadences, the soft swelling and diminution of the notes, 
 and thrilling delight produced by the tingling of the slender strings 
 sportively playing under the deep tones of the bass. This testi- 
 mony of Cambrensis is all the moi'e valuable as he had tra\elled all 
 Europe, and was able to compare the musical excellences of all civil- 
 ized nations. He studied for some years iu Paris, visited Rome 
 
KEV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 
 
 143 
 
 three times, and took his I'oute, at least once, through tlic Low 
 Countries and Germany. He adds, moreover, that Scothmd and 
 Wales endeavored to perfect themselves in the musical schools of 
 Ireland, and some were begiuning to think that Scotland had already 
 surpassed her instructress. 
 
 Such was the enchanting sweetness of Irish music, that the con- 
 querors^ of the country paused in their work of bloodshed and 
 enslavement, to be delighted with the strains of the captive land. 
 Fascinated by the unwonted spell, they frequently sacrificed their 
 lives to the charms of such soft oblivion ; for the minstrels, in whom, 
 the love of their native land was by far the most inspiring passion, 
 for the most part employed their art iu the sweet work of revenge, 
 besirening their tyrants into a fatal incautiousness, and immolating 
 them to the outraged genius of national freedom. And yet, to the 
 praise of victors and vanquished, be it stated that such was the music 
 of the Celt, and such the appreciation of the Saxon, that an Irish 
 minstrel became an indispensable appendage of baronial magnifi- 
 cence, while every wandering child of song found a cordial welcome 
 in the English camp, and a c.ead viille faiUhe in every Anglo-Irish 
 castle. But soon, when the chains had been well-nigh riveted, it was 
 found that many a link was becoming loosed by the insinuating 
 charm of music and song, and that the sj'mpathy of the conquerors 
 was becoming strangely awakened iu favor of the conquered. It 
 may have been to some extent by those soft arts of music that the 
 Saxons became iu many places "more Irish than the Irish them- 
 selves." Howbeit, the severity of the law had to be called into 
 operation to prevent the free mingling of the Irish harpers with the 
 English settlers. Proclamation followed proclamation preventing it. 
 The famous statute of Kilkenny, passed in the year 1367, made 
 it penal to give any entertainment to Irish minsti'els, of whom six 
 classes were specified, and forbade them to enter the English Pale, 
 under the penalty of forfeiting their instruments and suflering im- 
 prisonment. Those whom they failed to seduce they endeavored to 
 corrupt. One of them, whose name I will not even do him the 
 honor of mentioning, obtained a license to dwell within the precincts 
 of the Pale, for that " he not alone was faithful to the King, but was 
 also the cause of inflicting many evils on tlie Irish enemy ! " Oh ! 
 for a tongue to curse the slave ! In the reign of Henry VI. (we 
 
144 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 must hope the gentle monarch knew nothing ahout it), the bards, 
 coniiiining still to exercise their unwished for inllnenco over the col- 
 onists of the Pale, the Marshal of Ireland received orders to impris- 
 on the harpers, and was further empowered to conliscate to his own 
 use their gold and silver, their horses and harness, as well as their 
 instruments of minstrelsy. Need it be added that, in the sanguinary 
 reigns of Henry VIII. and Elizabeth, those laws against the Irish 
 bards, so far from being relaxed, were written in the reddest ink of 
 their blood-stained statute-books, and that, as the adage tells us, an 
 Irishman is ever found ready to turn the spit on which his fellow- 
 countryman is about to be roasted, the Virgin Queen found amongst 
 her officers in this country many ready ministers of her vengeful 
 enactments? The Lord Barrymore of the day was one of those who 
 courted the royal favor by accepting commissions under the great 
 seal, not only to destroy the instruments of the proscribed musicians, 
 but also (o hantj the harpers. But the policy of persecution was 
 frustrated by the enthusiasm it only tended to evoke. " The cliarms 
 of song," says Moore, " were ennobled Avith the glories of martyr- 
 dom, and the acts against minstrels in the reign of Henry VIII. and 
 Elizabeth were as successful, I doubt not, in making my countrymen 
 musicians as the penal laws have been in keeping them Catholics." 
 The bards survived and flourished, and the strains of national music, 
 though blended with the sadness of a persecuted race, lost nothing 
 of their enchanting sweetness. At this very period the accomplished 
 Sir Philip Sidney bears honorable testimony to the fact that, "in Ire- 
 land the poets were held in devout reverence," while that cruel 
 hater of the Irish, the author of the "Faery Queen," forgetful of the 
 sympathy that should exist between the children of genius, whilo 
 complimenting the bards on " the exquisite poetry of their songs,'' 
 denounces them as employing their iiielodious arts to the "gracing of 
 wickedness and vice," while the same acts "with good usage, might 
 serve to adorn and beautify virtue." The "wickedness and vice" of 
 the l)ards, which hurt the sensitive conscience of the gentle poet, 
 was tlie untiring exercise of their genius to foster and keep alive in 
 the l)rcasts of the people, the remembrance of ancient glcry, and 
 unforgetfulness of ancient wrong; such, for example, were the 
 " wickedness and vice " of the Bard O'Gnive, wlio formed one of the 
 attendant train of Shane O'Neil, Prince of Ulster, as he passed 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 145 
 
 through the streets of London, on his way to the palace of Elizabeth. 
 "The Londoners," we are told by Camden, "marvelled much" at the 
 rare spectacle that passed before their eyes. Much more would they 
 have marvelled had they been able to guess that the rough chieftain 
 who headed the procession, O'Neil himself, the descendant of Con of 
 the Hundred Battles, looked down with scorn upon the upstart 
 dynasty of the Tudors, and that the attendant O'Gnive, the poet of 
 the Ulster Prince, was Prime Bard of all Ireland, and that by the 
 charms of his verse and the magic of his lyre, like Tyrta?us of old, 
 he enkindled in the breasts of his subjugated fellow-countrymen a 
 fire that urged them on to many a bloody rencontre with the enemies 
 of their country. 
 
 But the period was ftxst approaching when the spirit of bardom 
 was to be extinguished in Ireland forever, for though, like religion, 
 poetry and music may for a while survive the rage of persecution, 
 yet, unlike her, they must ultimately perish before it. He who must 
 handle the sword has little taste for the warblings of the lute ; he 
 who is crushed and starving little heeds the dulcet melody of song. 
 The tyi'anny of Cromwell and the wars of William decimated the 
 gentry and nobility of the land, and left few jiatrons for the children 
 of the Muse. The minstrel's day was fast passing away. 
 
 " The bigots of the iron time 
 Had called his harmless art a crime ; 
 A wandering harper, scorned and poor, 
 He begged his bread from door to door, 
 And tmied, to please a peasant's ear, 
 The harp that Kings had loved to hear." 
 
 The voice of the muse was now seldom and but feebly heard through 
 the land. Its melancholy tunes were breathed almost for the last 
 time in the cause of the second James, to whom the country looked 
 with the faint hopes of an expiring nation ; but never was the Muse 
 of Ireland worse employed than in celebrating the praises of him 
 who, in addition to his own craven cowardice, had the meanness to 
 impute the same weakness to those who freely bled in his cause, and 
 whose valor was never, before or since, impugned even by the bit- 
 terest enemies of their country. 
 
 The gardeners of song had now passed away and the garden ran 
 wild, yet many a priceless flower bloomed wildly there. The 
 
146 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE 
 
 hereditary guardians of tliose flowers were no more, and strangers 
 came and stole them unbliishingl}' away. Many continental com- 
 posers of remarkable genius partook of the elegant spoil, and 
 enriched their own productions with the choicest cullings of the 
 Irish Muse. Thus Irish melody, like a fair bird of passage chased 
 by the harsh winds of persecution from its native soil, sought refuge 
 in the more congenial climes of the south, and taught the imitative 
 warblers of Germany and France to blend the banished music of the 
 west with their own enchanting strains. 
 
 In the last spasmodic throes of the Irish Muse she gave birth to 
 Carolan, the last genuine Irish bard, Avho, as a musical genius, is 
 allowed to rank With the foremost of modern times, and who, though 
 " no storied urn or animated bust " points out his final resting-place, 
 has yet, by his own deathless strains, secured for himself an immor- 
 tal dwelling in the afl'ectionate memories of his fcllow-country-men. 
 Nor even yet was the genius of music extinguished in Ireland, 
 though the last of her veritable bards had perished. A faint echo 
 of the melodious past was heard towards the close of the last cen- 
 tury, when, in the year 1792, ten rival harpers met to enter into a 
 musical contest on the national instrument at Belfast. These new 
 Pythian games were first conceived by an enlightened and patriotic 
 Irish gentleman living at Copenhagen, a certain Mr. James Dungan, 
 a native of Granard, in the county of Longford. By his zealous and 
 enterprising love of country, as well as by the generous aid of his 
 IJurse, a previous meeting of harpers had taken place at Granard in 
 the year 1781, when, in presence of a large and distinguished audi- 
 ence assembled at a ball, seven harpers, of whom one was a Avoman, 
 met to try by competition the respective • charms of their harps. 
 Charles Fanning got the first prize, ten guineas, for his performance 
 of the "Coolin," an air which has been always, and most justly, 
 admired by the lovers of Irish music. The third prize was awarded 
 to the Avoman, Rose Mooney, for her performance of "Planxty 
 Burke." Five hundred persons were present at the ball. 
 
 On the 2d of March, in the ensuing year, Mr. Dungan organized 
 another ball, at which he was himself present, and which was far 
 more numerously attended than the previous one. Only two new 
 harpers could be found to swell the ranks of former competitors, and 
 one of these was a woman. The premiums were adjudged as before, 
 
KKV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 147 
 
 but cTT'iio "■.' some private jealousies observable in their distribution, 
 Mr. Pungan was disgusted, and made no further attempt at the 
 revival of our national music. More than one thousand persons 
 were present at this ball. Lord and Lady Longford were among the 
 number. Persons of rank for forty miles all round assembled ; and 
 after the stables of the town were filled with horses, those that 
 ri-mained in the streets gave the town the appearance of a great 
 lorse fair. A large subscription was made up for the harpers, or 
 rather for such of them as had not received pi'izes ; and so gener- 
 iusly was money paid down for the purpose, that the proportions 
 awarded to the unprized exceeded the shares allotted to those who 
 had been rewarded. 
 
 Ten years passed away, aiad on the 11th of July, 1792, and the 
 two days succeeding, an immense assemblage of persons met at a 
 hall in Belfast to witness " the last scene in this strange, eventful 
 history "of Music in Ireland. Ten harpers only responded to the 
 call. The prize was awarded to Hempson, whose performance must 
 have been very wonderful in his best days, as on this occasion he 
 had reached the enormous age of ninety-seven, and was supposed, 
 for good reasons, to be much older. Hempson is the "mon wi' the 
 twa heads " alluded to by Lady Morgan in her "Wild Irish Girl," 
 this soubriquet being an allusion to a huge wen on his poll, which 
 gave him tiie appearance of a man with two heads. He was, since 
 the time of Cardan, by many degrees, the best perf<n-mer on the 
 harp. Carolan had more genius : he was a composer. Hempson 
 was only a player ; but, as a player, was not surpassed even by 
 Carolan himself. His harp, the only one he ever used, was made 
 for him in the jear 1707, and he kept it until the day of his death, 
 which occurred one hundred years after. It was called the " Queen 
 of Music," of which he was, doubtless, the king in his day. His 
 style of playing was diflerent from that of his contemporaries, inas- 
 much as he played with " long crooked nails," as ancient writers 
 describe the harp players of the early Irish, while the thrilling effect 
 of the small wires tinkling imder the deep tones of the bass fully 
 realized the picture of the harpers drawn by Cambrensis, and filled 
 with wonder and delight those who had the good fortune to hear him. 
 To his enchanting strains we are indebted for the finest collection 
 of ancient Irish music ever presented to the public. Mr. Edward 
 
148 TKEASUEY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Bunting, to whom I have already alluded, was always, as he describes 
 himself, " an enthusiast about everything Irish ; " but the harping of 
 Hempson inflamed him with a still more ardent love of his native 
 land, and nerved him to the collecting and publishing hundreds of 
 old Irish airs, which, but for his zeal, and talent, and patriotism, 
 would have been forever lost to the world. The attempt to pre- 
 serve Irish airs had been made three times before Bunting essayed it. 
 The first collection was published by Burke Thumoth in 1720 ; the 
 second by Neil, of Christ Churchyard ; the third by Carolan's son, 
 under the patronage of Dean Delany, in 1747. Ir^all these produc- 
 tions the arrangement was adapted to the flute or violin, rather than 
 a keyed instrument ; so that the tunes were, to a great extent, 
 deprived of their peculiar character, and as they were deficient in 
 arrangement, so they were meagre in extent. But Mr. Bunting's 
 publication may be called the first only genuine collection of Irish 
 harp music ever published, at least up to the year 1796. That the 
 publication of such a work should have been postponed until the 
 close of the last century may appear ascribable to the apathy of the 
 Irish on the subject of their national music ; but, on a closer exami- 
 nation, the cause will be found to exist elsewhere. It must be 
 attributed to the mixture of races in Ireland, and the spirit of hos- 
 tiUty that, up to the passing of Catholic Emancipation, was fostered 
 between them. The Milesian-Irish were debarred fi'om such a pub- 
 lication by the apprehension of the wrath of their rulers, which was 
 visited on every manifestation of national feeling ; and the Anglo- 
 Irish would not undertake it, because it would tend to excite in the 
 breasts of the people that dangerous enthusiasm which is ever aroused 
 in the victims of oppression by the national poetry and music of 
 ancient tunes. This apparent apathy extended not only to the 
 poetry and music, but also to the general literature of the country. 
 The Four Masters made a bold step in the right direction ; but even 
 their patriotic intentions were frustrated by the civil commotions of 
 1641. In modern times, Mr. Hardiman preserved from ruin many 
 of our most popular songs, and the Celtic and Ossianic Societies 
 extended their labors to the publication of other works of interest, 
 but were obliged to desist for want of a sufiiciently large reading or 
 appreciative public. Efi'orts have been made to preserve the ancient 
 melodies of Scotland with some success ; and when Owen Jones, a 
 
REV. M. B. BUCEXEY. 149 
 
 Welshman of humble rank, though entitled, from his literary heroism, 
 the "Cambrian Mecsenas," published, in 1774, his "Archaeology of 
 Wales " — a work comprising all the discoverable historical and 
 poetical remains of Cymric literature, — his work was hailed with 
 the warmest greetings of his countrymen, and sustained by the con- 
 tributions of a generous and enlightened public. Great praise, there- 
 fore, is due to the patriotic Edward Bunting, who has preserved to 
 posterity nearly three hundred Irish airs, almost all of which would 
 have been irretrievably lost but for his untiring zeal in the cause of 
 his«native land. At the contest of harpers at Belfast, the office was 
 assigned to him of writing down the music of the various airs played, 
 for it was manifest to all that, with the demise of those ten harpers, 
 the treasures of Irish music should perish forever, unless rescued 
 from oblivion by some timely interposition. The notes thus taken 
 he afterwards perfected in private sittings with Hempson and others ; 
 and obtained many more by travelling through the country and con- 
 versing with those who had any information to convey. Gathei'ing 
 thus the floating fragments of song, he gradually formed by an 
 atomic process of his own a new creation of Ii-ish music. His antici- 
 pations of the decay of Irish harpers, as a class, were sadly realized 
 some years after, for, in the year 1809, only two of the Belfast ten 
 survived ; and in a subsequent edition of his work, he states that, at 
 that time, even those two had meanwhile passed away. 
 
 Thus, after centuries of fading glory, another gem was snatched 
 from the diadem of Erin — the very voice in which she proclaimed 
 her woes, and appealed to the sympathy of nations, was hushed for- 
 ever. Truly, 
 
 " We are fallen upon gloomy days, 
 
 Star after star decays ; 
 
 Every bright name tliat shed 
 
 Light o'er the land is fled." 
 
 And yet, the name of him who penned those lines shall not be 
 soon forgotten, nor the light it shed o'er the land be fled. While 
 Irish Music holds a place in the history of the world, or wins the 
 admiralSon of mankind, the name of Thomas Moore shall be I'emem- 
 bered with gratitude and love for his splendid and successful attempts 
 to revive and perpetuate the melodies of Ireland. I shall not here 
 dwell on the point so often raised respecting the melodies of Moore 
 
250 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 in connection with the music to which they are set — how far the 
 ancient music has been distorted to meet his words, or how far his 
 words represent that genius of nationality tliat should beam through 
 the melodies of one's native land. Nor shall I stop to investigate 
 the grounds of his opinion, at onetime broadly expressed, at another 
 time carefully modified, respecting the antiquity of Irish music of a 
 "civilized description." Suffice it to say, that he has done a great 
 work — a work that reflects glory and honor on Ireland. He has 
 restored forever to the memories of mankind the joyous and the 
 melancholy music of Erin's song, long past ; the hymns of peace, 
 the marches of war, the poeans of triumph in which our ancestors 
 celebrated the varying fortunes of their names ; he has wed immortal 
 words to immortal music — he has photographed to posterity the 
 smiles and tears that blend like the rainbow in the eyes of Erin. 
 Riving asunder the lava-shroud in which the volcanic eruptions of 
 rebellion and tyranny had enveloped her poetry and song, he has 
 brought to light the wonders of a new city of the dead, where the 
 Muse walked long ago with the children of men ; and as the morning 
 sun awaked in Egypt the melody of Memnon's fabled lute, so tiie 
 sunl)eams of his genius radiating through the long obscured caverns 
 of buried music, aroused the slumbering harp of Erin, and made it 
 sound as of old to the enchanted cars of men. Truly then did he 
 sing of himself — 
 
 " Dear harp of ray country, in darkness I found tlioe, 
 The cokl chain of silence had hung o'er thee long, 
 When proudly, my own island harp, [ uubomid thee. 
 And gave all thy chords to light, freedom and song." 
 
 But he has done still more by his immortal strains, for they uphold 
 the ancient dignity of our country, and the ancient virtue and valor 
 of her sons, and hold out to the desponding generation of the present 
 day, by their seemingly inspired vaticinations, the consoling hope 
 that the star of oppressed and persecuted Erin, so long obscured, 
 may yet shine out in all its pristine splendor, when those which now 
 shed a dazzling brightness in the firmanent of nations shall be defaced 
 and extinguished forever ! 
 
 While the bards of Erin flourished, and the national harp nuisic 
 was cultivated, foreign music remained in Ireland disregarded or 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 151 
 
 unknown. It was only in the last century it was introdnced into the 
 country, when its own music was in the last stage of existence. 
 Many Italian masters who visited England made the tour of Ireland 
 before their return to the Continent, and some fixed their abode and 
 found a final and congenial resting-place in the "land of song." The 
 first of these was IMathew Dubourg, the friend of Handel, who fixed 
 his residence in Dublin in the j'ear 1728. Castriici, the pupil of 
 Corelli, died in the Irish metropolis in 1752. Geminiani, the great- 
 est violinist of his age, and Giordani, a scarcely less-distinguished 
 celebrity, left their bones in Ireland. The great Handel himself, 
 chased from England by an unapprecialive public, appealed success- 
 fully to Irish admiration. It is to his flight across the Channel on 
 this occasion that Pope alludes, when he addresses the goddess of 
 Dulness, as follows : — 
 
 " Strona: iu now arms — lo ! giant Handel stands 
 Like bold Briareus with his hundred bands; 
 To stir, to rouse, <o shake the soul he comes, 
 And .Jove's own tliunders follow Mars's drums. 
 Arrest him, Empress, or you sleep no more. 
 She heard, and cliasod him to th' ' Hibernian shore.'" 
 
 Dunciad, Book IV. 
 
 In the year 1741, his "Messiah" was first heard in Dublin, and 
 the applause it received more than compensated for the disregard he 
 had experienced in England. Music now became all the rage. 
 Italian singers were invited over, and the fair dames of Ireland 
 learned to expire at an opera. Concerts were the favorite amuse- 
 ments in the hoiTses of the nol)ility and gentrj% and Musical Societies 
 were formed in all the great towns of the kingdom. 
 
 But much as the Irish admired the performances of foreign artists, 
 they did not send forth into the arena of composition any of their 
 own countrymen until the j^ear 1782, when the Earl of Moriiington, 
 father of the Duke of Wellington, led the van in this new sphere of 
 national glory; a new mythology by the Avay — the Irish Apollo 
 begetting the Irish Mars ! By his own natural talents and studious 
 application he acquired such knowledge of his art that Germiniani 
 declared he could not add to his knowledge ; and he was one of the 
 few on whom the Dublin University conferred the degree of Doctor 
 of Music. He was followed by a numerous host, among whom rank 
 
152 TREASURY" OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 foremost Sir John Stevenson, Phelps, M'Donnell, Moore, Lee, Hef- 
 fernau, and others who deserve to be specially noticed. Henry Mad- 
 den, an Irishman of noble family, was at one time chapel-master to 
 the Cathedral of Tours, and subsequently master of the choir at the 
 chapel royal of Versailles, where his music was sung down to the 
 time of the first I'evolution. Thomas Carter was famous at Naples, 
 Bengal and in England. Rophino Lacey, born of Irish parents 
 at Bilboa, was regarded as a prodigy of music in Spain, Holland, 
 Frauce and England. "The young Spaniai-d," as he was called, 
 
 I received presents from Buonaparte and from Geoi'ge the Fourth, 
 
 j while Prince of Wales, as compliments to his rare and wonderful 
 genius. Andrew Ashe, of Lisburn, won by public competition 
 the dignity of "first flute" at "Brussels. But the fame of all prece- 
 ding musicians was eclipsed by that of Michael Kelly, whose musical 
 genius was of the very highest order. He won his laurels in every 
 metropolis of Europe, from Rome to London, and from Paris to 
 Vienua. He was the courted of kings, the adored of audiences, the 
 favorite of the Sovereign Pontifi^, at whose hands he received the 
 honor of being permitted to pei-form in St. Peter's during Holy 
 Week. In times more recent, Balfe preserves the honor of Ireland 
 in the field of music, while many humbler sons of genius constitute 
 a galaxy of undistiuguishable but brilliant luminaries in the firma- 
 nent of national music renown. And all this has taken place 
 while no Englishman has been known to compose a single piece for 
 any foreign audience, and Braham was the oul}^ Englishman that 
 appeared on the Continent as a singer and performer with an3'thing 
 like remarkable success. 
 
 We have seen that from the earliest dawn of Irish history the 
 harp was the national musical instrument of the country ; but it 
 must not be, therefore, supposed that our ancestors were unac- 
 'quaiuted with all other instruments of music. In very ancient times 
 the tympan was in use in Ireland. From all the evidences that can 
 be adduced on the subject, it would appear that the tympan was an 
 instrument shaped like a South-Sea islander's guitar, covered with 
 leather, supplied with strings, and played with the fingers. Did we 
 
 ' ever dream before that our ancestors were adepts at the banjo ? 
 
 '. This instrument could not have exercised any great influence on the 
 musical passions of a people amongst whom the noble harp existed. 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 153 
 
 and by whom all its powers of music were so effectually developed. 
 As the Wai-ds are the descendants of the bards, the Shanahans of 
 the Seanachies, the Brehous of the Brehons, the Curtins of the croit- 
 players or harpers, so the Tympanies, a family abounding in Con- 
 naught, are the descendants of the Tympanits of old, while all those 
 families taken together are the joint descendants of that poetical, 
 antiquarian, legislative, musical, and philosophical body who formed 
 an indispensable appendage of an Irish court in the "olden time." 
 
 The bag-pipe has also been justly regarded as a national instru- 
 ment of music in Ireland, from time immemorial. The pipes were 
 played at the head of an army on its way to battle, and by their wild 
 music stimulated the soldiery to deeds of valor and forgetfulness of 
 life. Bunting supplies remarkable evidences of the antiquity of the 
 bag-pipe in Ireland, and shows that it was generally used for martial 
 purposes, and was sometimes also employed in funeral processions, 
 moving by its plaintive tones all those who heard it to pity and tears. 
 The present representative of the bag-pipe in Ireland is not the up- 
 roarious instrument of the Scotch Highlanders, but the dulcet, 
 though it must be admitted, the often badly-tuned and worse played 
 instrument to whose music we have many a time at a country wed- 
 ding seen the " light fantastic toe " whirl in the dance, and from 
 whose melancholy crouing in the hands of some street performer we 
 have rushed out of ear-shot in mercy to our nerves. 
 
 That the organ Avas introduced into Ireland at a very early period 
 appears to be beyond dispute, though it is also certain that the in- 
 strument called by that name was altogether different in size and 
 power from the gigantic organs of the jiresent day. It is mentioned 
 in the annals of Ulster that in the year 814 the organs of a place 
 called Cluainacrema were burned, and there is reason to think that 
 these were not the first used in the country. The use of the organ 
 from so early a date would seem to imply that a knowledge of coun- 
 terpoint, or strictly polyphonic composition, was known in Ireland 
 since its introduction, or at least came to be known soon after. But 
 we must not flatter our national vanit}' by this surmise, as the best 
 antiquarians suppose it has no foundation. The Irish were too im- 
 pulsive a race to restrain their feelings within the obligations of har- 
 monic rules. Sentiment was the pervading genius of their song, 
 and impassioned sentiment knows no rules of art, or at least bends 
 
254 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to thom with difEciilty and reluctance. As simplicity of dress 
 heightens the effect of female beauty, so the unadornmcnt of Irish 
 melody is its sweetest charm ; it is lost and unadmircd in the cum- 
 brous apparel of complex harmonization. 
 
 And, indeed, to an Irishman what music sounds so sweetly as the 
 simple melodies of his native land? How often at a magnificent 
 concert, got up in one of our cities regardless of expense, where the 
 music was perfect, the performers unequalled, the singers the most 
 celebrated of their day, have we observed the apathy, or at least the 
 perfectly controllable enthusiasm of the audience, as each nicnsurc of 
 music and song was presented for admiration ! But when, amidst 
 the profusion of foreign Avondcrs of harmony, some solitary voice, like 
 that of the last feathered minstrel of day, stole forth and caroled a 
 lay of our native land, have we not observed with feelings perfectly 
 indescribable the sudden husiiing of every breath, the riveted gaze 
 of every ej'e, the rapt attention of every car, the almo.st audible 
 thi'obbing of every heart. The whole audience seemed melted al- 
 most to tears, and at the expii-alion of the singer's last note have we 
 not marked what a peal of applause burst wildly forth, wliat earnest, 
 fervid enthusiasm burned in every breast, andwliat a vigorous inex- 
 orable encore forced the singer back upon the stage, and elicited a 
 repetition of the air " so bewitchingly simple," yet so marvellously 
 ma<Tical in its effect ! On such an occasion enthusiasm heightens to 
 frenzy when the harper appears upon the stage, and calls forth the 
 thrillin"- wonders of his lyre. Then the memory of the Irishman 
 wanders back to the days of old, and the spirit of Ossian overshad- 
 ows him, for he feels that " Such were the words of the bards in tha 
 days of song, when the king heard the music of harps, the talcs of 
 other times. The chiefs gathered from all their hills, and heard the 
 lovely sound. They praised the voice of Cona, the first among a 
 thousand bards : but the sons of song are gone to rest. jMy voice 
 remains like a blast that roars lonely on a sea-surrounded rock after 
 the winds are laid ; the dark moss whistles there ; the mariner sees 
 the wavino" trees." If such be the effect of an Iri.sh melody on an 
 Irishman's heart at home, what must it be when in some place of dis- 
 tant exile " he hears the wild songs of his dear native plains ? " For 
 uo exile ever sighs more for his native land, or loves her more in- 
 tensely than the " exile of Erin " does his. Distance softens down 
 
RKV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 155 
 
 the less amiable traits with which bigotry and misrule have stained 
 her character ; her virtues and misfortunes alone are remembered, 
 and the exiled child thinks only with that love peculiar to the impul- 
 sive nature of Erin's sons of the sad, weeping motherland he has left 
 behhid, perhaps forever. 
 
 The melodies of Ireland breathe much of woe — they teem with 
 spells awakening the bitterest recollections ; but it must be remem- 
 bered that the Muse of Erin is not always sad, but often exults with 
 hope and joy, often mingling in the self-same song her mirth and 
 sorrow, her lights and shades of feeling. Her melodies typify her 
 chai-acter, and are the most eloquent commentaries on the vicissi- 
 tudes of her history. They paint the blending of her smiles and 
 tears — they tell the progress of her glory, and her gradual evan- 
 escence. " The tone of defiance," says JNIoore, " succeeded by the 
 languor of despondency —a l)urst of turbulence dj'ing away into soft- 
 ness — the sorrows of one moment lost in the levity of the next ; and 
 all that romantic mixture of mirth and sadness which is naturally 
 produced by the eflbrts of a lively temperament to shake otf or for- 
 get the wrongs that lie upon it." Such are the features of our his- 
 tory and character, which we find strongly and faithfully reflected in 
 our music; and there are many airs which, I think, it is difficult to 
 listen to without i-ecalling some period or event to which their ex- 
 pression seems peculiarly applicable. Sometimes, when the strain 
 is open and spirited, yet shaded here and there by a mournful recol- 
 lection, Ave can fancy that we behold the brave allies of Montrose 
 marching to the royal cause notwithstanding all the perfidy of Charles 
 and his ministers, and remembering just enough of past sufierings to 
 enhance the generosity of their present sacrifice. The plaintive 
 melodies of Carolan take us back to the times in which he lived, 
 when our poor countrymen were driven to worship their God in 
 caves, or to quit forever the land of their birth (liUe the bird which 
 abandons the nest which human touch has violated ) ; and in many a 
 song do we hear the last farewell of the exile, mingling regret for 
 the ties he leaves at home with sanguine expectations of the honors 
 that ^i wait him abroad — such honors as were won on the field of 
 Fontenoy, where the valor of Irish Catholics turned the fortune of 
 the day in favor of the French, and extorted from George II. the 
 memorable exclamation, "Cursed be the laws that deprived me of 
 such subjects ! " 
 
156 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Charming as are the strains of his national songs to the ears of the 
 Irishman, their effect is grievously marred by being sung in a foreign 
 tongue, like the hard, unmelodious English. This we can never un- 
 derstand, for while the English has become to us a mother tongue, 
 our own appears harsh, unmusical, nay to many, barbarous. And 
 yet the Celtic is admitted by all philologists to be one of the oldest, 
 the most prolific, the most musical, the most expressive languages 
 ever spoken by man. In the expression of pathos it is unsurpassed. 
 "If you plead for your life, plead in Irish," is a well-known adage. 
 There was a time when it was the language of the poet and peasant 
 alike — when it was the instrument of vigorous eloquence in the 
 mouths of high-born dames. The Anglo-Saxon invaders took to it 
 in preference to their own tongue. But its day is past. By the de- 
 struction of the Irish nobility the national language became entrusted 
 to the keeping of the poor and unlearned : the tongue that flourished 
 in the castle fell into decadence and barbarism in the cottage, and it 
 would be no more fair to judge of its ancient sweetness by the 
 samples that fall from the li^DS of a modern mountaineer, than it 
 would be to judge of the English by the jargon of Yorkshire. The 
 contempt with which Irishmen have ever been regarded by their 
 conquerors was visited to a great extent on the language of the sub- 
 jugated country. "And yet what is there, it may be asked, in the 
 Irish language to make worse men or worse subjects of those who 
 speak it than the Welsh or the Highlanders, whose native dialects 
 are cultivated and encouraged ? " Among the foremost to answer in 
 the negative would have been King George IV. The warmest re- 
 ception that monai'ch ever received from his numerous subjects was 
 expressed by an Irish " Cead-mille-failthe," and amongst the best 
 bulwarks of his throne were the bayonets of Ireland pushed through 
 the hearts of his enemies under the broad-voweled Celtic cry of 
 " Fag-a-ballagh ! " 
 
 The Celtic language is peculiarly adapted to musical composition. 
 Indeed, all candid critics admit that fact. In lyrical composition it 
 is considered superior even to the Italian. This was the decided 
 opinion of Michael Kelly, who knew both languages well, and .was 
 too ardent a lover of music to let national prejudice bias his judg- 
 ment. Irish worded music has been admired wherever its melting 
 strains have been heard. Handel was loud in its praise, and Handel 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 157 
 
 was a good judge of music. But, for us Irishmcu, it is enough to 
 know that amongst our fellow-countrymen who know the language 
 well, it is spoken of in terms of rapturous enthusiasm, as the noblest 
 vehicle of thought, and the most faithful interpreter of every human 
 passion. Poetic in its very prose, it is more than poetry when 
 wedded to song. We have marked in our rviral peregrinations the 
 deep emotions excited through the thronged chapel on a Sunday, 
 when the priest addressed the people in their native tongue I We 
 have seen the religious awe awakened by the description of the 
 enoi-mity of sin, or the terrors of judgment — the sad sigh of pity 
 evoked by some picture of human misery — the fervent, unanimous 
 burst of assent to a prayer for a friend departed. At evening, by 
 the merry fireside, we have heard the lay of some boyish unresisting 
 minstrel, or coy pressed damsel swelling in melodious volume, or 
 dwindling to a vocal thread, calling forth many a cordial "bravo," 
 arousing in turn every varying passion of the soul. The perform- 
 ance is generally poor, but there is a music in the words which com- 
 pensates for the deficiencies of the singer ; and there is a poetry in 
 the tale of national sutfering, and the fore-dawning of national hope, 
 that warms upon the heart like returning sunbeams upon Arctic 
 snows. 
 
 To revive the national language appears to be now impossible — 
 to perpetuate national music is an easy task. The tongue can soon 
 unlearn its native language, while a melody echoes through genera- 
 tions in the ears of men. There never was a more musical nation in 
 the world than Ireland. In joy or in sorrow she was still the " Land 
 of Song." The bards are gone, it is true, but the minstrels are more 
 numerous now than ever they were. Music is included in the pro- 
 gramme of all Irish education, and forms one of the most charming, 
 as it is, doubtless, one of the most innocent of all our social amuse- 
 ments. Had we been less poetical, less fanciful, we might have 
 been also a happier people ; but we are in the hands of an all-wise 
 and beneficent Power ; but let us hope for better things — not rashly 
 seize them " ere the hour be ripe." The melancholy tones of Irish 
 music may yet be changed into the exultant chords of jul)ilee. The 
 world is changing every day, and why should not she, who is now 
 abased, yet raise her head as of old, and attract by the magic of her 
 beauty the pilgrims of science and religion to do homage once more 
 
158 TKEASUEY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 at her feet? In such an era of general national revival, the Muse of 
 Ireland, too, may resume her lost niche in the temple of our house- 
 hold gods, and the harp — no longer the voiceless emblem of 
 vanished glory — become the resuscitated instrument of perpetual 
 nus'^al renown. 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. I59 
 
 Lecture on John Philpot Curran* 
 
 ^i HAVE chosen for the subject of this Lecture the life and char- 
 ^^ acter of John Philpot Curran, one of the purest patriots, and 
 vF most eloquent orators that Ireland, nay the world, has ever 
 4 produced. And why do we lecture on the lives of great men? 
 In the first place, in order that we may excite in the breasts of our 
 hearers those feelings of admiration which human greatness merits ; 
 for there is a tendency in our nature to admii'c all that is truly great 
 and noble ; and, though our voices may not pierce the silent caverns 
 of the dead, we cannot help paying, even to departed genius and 
 worth, the well-deserved tribute of our praise. Again, by studying 
 the lives and the actions of the truly great, we may learn to emulate 
 their virtues or achievements, and thus not only do good for our- 
 selves, but set a model, which others in their turn may copy, accoi'd- 
 ing to that of your poet, — 
 
 " Lives of great men all remind us 
 
 .We slioiild make our lives sublime; 
 And departing leave behind us 
 
 Footprints on the sands of time." 
 
 It would be quite possible for me (o propose for your considera- 
 tion the lives of many greater men than John Philpot Curran ; men 
 whose splendor of character did not, like his, radiate from only a few 
 points, such as his unselfish patriotism, his marvellous eloquence, 
 his wit and humor ; but men whoso whole souls, burning with a 
 Divine fire, of which the fabled flame of Prometheus was but a poetic 
 reflection, illumined the world by the lustre of their virtues, and 
 enkindled a congenial warmth in the breasts of mankind by the 
 
 * Delivered in New Yorlv, February, 1871. 
 
160 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE 
 
 fervor of their zeal. Thus, I could have selected for my panegyi'io 
 the life of that greatest philanthropist the world ever saw, the illus- 
 trious Vincent de Paul, by the magic of whose memory we are 
 assembled here to-night. But characters like these are too sacred, 
 too God-like, to be paraded outside the consecrated walls of His 
 temple whose servants they were ; and althougli the imitation of 
 their sublime virtues is commendable, with a view to man's eternal 
 welfare, we must remember that man has many duties to discharge 
 in the world which are not sacred, but yet important ; there are 
 many purely secular virtues and excellencies, of which he should 
 prove himself master, that he may combat successful!}' with the 
 difficulties of life, and attain that portion of merely temporal hap- 
 piness which is not denied to good men even upon this earth. 
 Consequently, as I am addressing you, not in my professional, but 
 in my secular character — since I sjjeak to you as man to his fellow- 
 men — I select for your admiration, and, as f;ir as possible, for your 
 imitation, the life of John Philpot Curran ; not in all its features, 
 for, alas ! in many things he was not a perfect model ; but under 
 that manifold aspect which he wears, of an ardent, strongly-tempted, 
 incorruptible patriot ; a lover of his country and his country's race, 
 without distinction of class or creed ; an able and generous advocate ; 
 an orator of surpassing power ; a wit and humorist the most enjoy- 
 able ; a companion the most social, exquisite, and enchanting. 
 
 I have thus thought it fit to dwell on the reasons why I place 
 before you the life of a great man ; for I am not of those who seem 
 to think that a lecture may be merely a thing to amuse — to pass an 
 idle hour. I always hold that lectures, and similar addresses, should 
 have in them something of a genuine utilitj'. We live in a hard, 
 practical world — life is real — life is earnest. We must not be con- 
 tent with amusement — with pleasure ; the enjoyment we derive 
 from the lessons of a teacher must be always secondary to the 
 instruction he conveys ; and few lessons are so instructive as the 
 lives of great men, such as Curran was ; for we shall not only Jje 
 struck by the prominent characteristics of his genius, but while 
 we admire the sterling integrity of the patriot — while we are swayed 
 by the impassioned vehemence of his oratory — while we are 
 charmed by the graces of his wit, we shall learn the means by which 
 that integrity was cultivated — by which that vehemence was 
 
KEV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 261 
 
 acquired, by which those graces were impai'tcd. Thus we shall feel 
 an impulse to go and do likewise ; and if we cannot rival the maj- 
 esty of Ciirran, we shall at least, reach that elevation, for the attain- 
 ment of which an all- wise Pi'ovidence has befitted us. 
 
 John Philpot Curran was born in the year 1750, and died in the 
 year 1817, in the 68th year of his age. His parents were not of 
 high degree ; and even if they were, his unprepossessing face and 
 .figure would not have betrayed an aristocratic lineage. Physically 
 he could boast only of a pair of black sparkling eyes, lit up with 
 intellectual fire ; but all the rest was plain as Nature could have 
 made it. "The only inheritance," he used to say, "that I could 
 boast of from my poor father was, the very scanty one of an imat- 
 tractive face and person, like his own ; and if the world has ever 
 attributed to me something more valuable than face or person, or 
 than earthly wealth, it was that another, and a dearer parent, gave 
 her child a portion from the treasures of her mind." He always 
 spoke with reverence and admiration of his mother — of her wise 
 councils, and pious example. She lived to see him attain the high- 
 est pinnacle of his fame ; and in his success, and her reward, we be- 
 hold a beautiful double picture — the blessing of maternal care, and 
 the triumph of filial affection. And here is at once a striking 
 illustration of what I have just been saying — the means, so con- 
 stantly visible in the lives of great men, by which their greatness is 
 acquired. Curran's first step to greatness was a sacred respect for 
 the admonitions of a prudent, clever, and virtuous mother. His 
 boyhood was spent at Newmarket, in the county of Cork, his native 
 town, where he was taken into the house of the Rev. Nathaniel Boyce, 
 Rector of the parish, who instructed him in the teachings suitable to 
 his age. He was subsequently educated in the Greek and Latin Clas- 
 sics at a Free School at Middleton, in the same county ; and, finally, 
 entei-ed Trinity College, Dublin, with a view to preparing himself 
 for entering the Church as a clergyman. Here he changed his 
 mind with regard to choosing a profession, and concluded to study 
 for the Bar. Having obtained his degree at Trinity College, he 
 passed over to England, and became a student of law in the Society 
 of the Middle Temple, London. So little did he seem to be adapted 
 by nature to be a great orator, that, what with timidity of disposi 
 tion, and a natural impediment, he was generally known as " stutter- 
 
162 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ing J:ick CiirKin ; " and, on the finst trial of his oratorical powers, at 
 a small debating club, formed of his fellow- students, he grew so 
 bashful, that he was not even able to stutter, but sank silent and 
 confounded into his chair. To his companions it seemed clear that 
 his aspirations to lame, as an advocate, were worse than vain ; but a 
 few evenings after, they had reason to change their minds ; for, 
 being nettled to the quick by a contemptuous epithet flung at him, 
 in the course of debate, he rose indignant, and burst forth with an 
 imi:)assioned invective against the sneerer, couched in eloquent 
 words, which only untutored nature can supply. This rival debater 
 had referred to Curran as " orator JNIum ; " but orator Mum observing 
 that his opponent's dress was remarkable for shabbiness and dii't, he 
 assailed him vigorously on this point, and brought down the cheers 
 and plaudits of the house. Curran whispered to a friend near him, 
 "I think my dirty antagonist did not get clean otf ! " " No ; " replied 
 his friend, "I never saw a man get such a dressing.'' 
 
 Curran was called to the Irish Bar at Michaelmas Term, 1775» 
 and, in his first essay as a lawyer, he evinced the same bashfulness 
 "which had characterized him as a student. The first brief he held 
 was in the Court of Chancery ; and he read the first sentences of his 
 instructions in so precipitate and inaudible a manner, that the Lord 
 Chancellor called on him to speak up. This so confused Curran, 
 that the brief dropped from his hands, and a brother barrister was 
 obliged to read the necessary passage. Four or five years elapsed 
 before Curran's rare abilities attracted any remarkable attention. It 
 was at the Cork Assizes, and his client was a priest. The circum- 
 stances of the case present a good picture of the times. Lord Don- 
 eraile had contracted an intimacy with a young woman, whose brother 
 ■was, no doubt, for good reasons, excommunicated by the parish 
 priest, Father Neale, by the authority of the bishop. The young 
 woman begged of Lord Doneraile to use his influence with the priest 
 for the removal of the ban. His lordship wilhngly undertook the 
 task. He pi-oceeded in his carriage to the house of the old priest, 
 whom he found engaged at pra^^er. He demanded a removal of the 
 excommunication from the brother of his paramour. The priest 
 replied, that he could not remove it without the sanction of the 
 bishop, which, however, he promised to apply for. The indignant 
 noljleman, unaccustomed to refusals, especially from one w'hom ho 
 
REV. M. B. BXJCKI.EY. 163 
 
 regarded witn supreme contempt, raised his iiaiid, and felled the 
 unofleoding clergyman to the earth. The latter brought an action 
 against the nobleman for assault and battery, and the case was 
 regarded with much speculation as to results ; for, in the state of 
 the law at the time, such a course on the part of a Catholic priest 
 was considered the height of impudence and folly, especially when 
 the cause was to be tried by a Protestant judge and jury, against a 
 Pi-otestant nobleman of overwhelming influence in the country. It 
 was doubtful whether any barrister would undertake so obnoxioiis 
 and hopeless a cause. But Curran's soul was made of sterner stuff 
 than men deemed ; and so successful was he in combating the preju- 
 dices of all his hearers, that he obtained a verdict of thirty guineas 
 damages against the noble defendant. This was a wonderful triumph 
 of eloquence, and inaugurated a new era for the Catholics of Ireland. 
 It afforded one proof that, by some possibility, they might not be 
 trampled on with impunity. One ray of liberty was permitted to 
 illumine an island shrouded for two centuries in the Egyptian dark- 
 ness of the penal laws. Bnt the undaunted advocate had to give a 
 further proof of his courage. He had indulged in a tierce attack 
 upon Mr. St. Leger, the brother of Lord Doneraile, v/ho had accom- 
 panied his noble brother to the priest's house, and aided in the 
 assault. Curran denounced him as a renegade soldier — a drum- 
 med out dragoon, who wanted the courage to meet the enemies of 
 his country in battle, but had the heroism to raise his arm against an 
 unoffending minister of religion. Duelling was the fashion of the 
 day, and St. Leger challenged Curran to mortal combat. Speaking 
 in a wordiy sense, it would have been ruin for Curran to decline this 
 challenge ; for had he declined it, he could never afterwards use his 
 privilege as an advocate of that freedom of speech so essential in 
 counts of law. He would be constantly challenged, and constantly 
 declining ; and he would thus incur the disgraceful stigmatism of a 
 coward. But, without reasoning thus, impelled rather by native 
 courage, he accepted the challenge, fought a bloodless battle, and 
 acquired the reputation of one as bold in the field as he was fearless 
 at the Bar. The oM priest, dying soon after, summoned Curran to 
 his bedside, and imparted to the young and daring advocate his last 
 blessing. It was the first of four duels that Curran had to fight 
 during his public career. After this he became a great t;ivorite with 
 
164 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the Catholic people, who began to regard him as one of themselves. 
 He was famiharl}^ termed the " counsellor," as O'Connell was subse- 
 quently. He knew the Irish language well, and was particularly 
 fond of chatting with the humbler classes of the people, whose 
 wants, and feelings and virtues he thoroughly understood and appre- 
 ciated. In his boyhood he had loved to attend weddings and wakes, 
 and he was wont to tell how his firsf ideas of poetry and eloquence 
 were inspired by the rhapsodies of professional mourners (cainors) 
 over the dead. From this frequent intercourse with the poor people 
 of the oppressed and persecuted country, his heart burned with the 
 purest patriotic fire, and in his whole career he was accustomed to 
 vindicate their character in public and private ; to descant upon their 
 virtues and their sufferings ; and, although at various periods of his 
 life, he could have accepted place and pension, by sacrificing their 
 interests, he preferred to hold an honorable independence by which 
 he could show up their calamities to the world, and battle for the 
 restoration of their rights. "At any time," said he " I might, to a 
 certain degree, as well as others, have tied up my countrymen in 
 bundles, and sold them at the filthy market of corruption, and have 
 raised myself to wealth and station, and remorse — to the envy of 
 the foolish, and the contempt of the wise ; but I thought it more 
 becoming to remain below among them — to mourn over and console 
 them ; or, where my duty called upon me, to reprimand and rebuke 
 them when they were acting against themselves." On his return to 
 his native town every vacation, the people all swarmed around him, 
 and offered their congratulations on his daily increasing honors ; and 
 to every one he was courteous, kind and friendly. O'Connor, the 
 roving bard, was never absent on these occasions. The moment the 
 "counsellor's" arrival at the Priory was announced, there was the 
 bard and his indefatigable muse, with the periodical tribute of high- 
 sounding, long-winded praise. A silver crown was the poet's 
 reward ; but, on some occasions, his demands became so frequent 
 and importunate, that Curran was obhged to signify his displeasure. 
 Instead of money he sent the bard a reply in verse ; but, if Curran's 
 verses displayed elegance and taste, the bard's brief response was 
 distinguished for point and force. He said : — 
 
 " If 5'ou're paid so much coin for all your law, 
 You'll ne'er be worth a single straw." 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 1(55 
 
 The solicitations of the laureate could no longer bo resisted. Cur- 
 ran was only seven years at the Bar when he became a member of 
 the Irish Parliament, which post he filled until the year 1797. It 
 was usual then, as now, for Government to desire that members of 
 the Bar should enter Parliament, where they could be tempted to 
 ■sacrifice principle, in defending a corrupt system of administration, 
 by the expectation of judicial' honours ; but all through his parlia- 
 mentary cai'eer, John Philpot Currau, famed for his eloquence, and 
 therefore a most desirable ally, resisted every temptation that could 
 be offered him — and they were many — and maintained his i^urity 
 ofhonor unsullied to the last. No consideration deterred him from 
 asserting the rights of his Roman Catholic fellow-countrymen to the 
 political privileges from which they were persistently excluded. He 
 showed up with a dauntless intrepidity, the bribery and corruption to 
 which the Government had recourse in the administration of the conn- 
 try. He bore with no enemy ; he tolerated no fraud ; he spared no 
 menace or warning ; he prophesied the still greater calamities in store 
 for his country ; but none would believe, until the bloody carnage and 
 diabolical atrocities of '98, and the gold-bought Union of 1800, re- 
 vealed the sagacity of the statesman, and the far-seeing vision of 
 the prophet. 
 
 Much as Curran's eloquence in Parliament is celebrated, it has 
 been always considered as far inferior to his oi'atorical efforts at the 
 Bar ; and in the year 1794 commenced that long array of State trials 
 for political offences, at which he displaj^ed his surpassing forensic 
 abilities. Then as now (it is the old, old story), a society started 
 into existence in Dublin called United Irishmen, having for its ob- 
 ject steadfast opposition to the corrupt Government of the country. 
 Of this society Archibald Hamilton Rowan was secretary. He issued 
 an address to the Irish Volunteers, reminding them of the dangers 
 to which the country was exposed from foreign and domestic enemies, 
 and inviting them to i-esume their arms for the preservation of the 
 general tranquility. This publication was prosecuted as a seditious 
 libel, and INIr. Curran was chosen to defend Rowan for his conduct. 
 In his speech on this occasion are some of the loftiest flights of elo- 
 quence ever presented to the world ; one passage particularly has 
 attained an extraordinarj^ celebrity. A part of the publication of 
 Mr. Rowan claimed universal emancipation for all Irish subjects, no 
 
166 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 matter of what religious persuasion. Mr. Curr.an replied on thia 
 point : — " Do you think it wise or humane, at this moment, to in- 
 sult them (the Catholics) , by sticking up in a pillory the man who 
 dared to stand forth as their advocate ? I put it to j'our oaths — 
 do you think that a blessing of that kind, that a victory obtained by 
 justice over bigotry and oppression should have a stigma cast upon 
 it, by an ignominious sentence upon men bold and honest enough to 
 propose that measure — to pi'opose the redeeming of religion from 
 the almses of the Church, the reclaiming of three millions of men 
 from bondage, and giving liberty to all who have a right to demand 
 it? — giving, I saj^ in the so-much-censured words of this paper — 
 giving universal emancipation ? I speak in the spirit of the British 
 law, which makes liberty commensurate with, and inseparable from, 
 British soil ; which proclaims, even to the stranger and the sojourner, 
 the moment he sets his foot upon the British earth, that the ground 
 on which he treads is holy, and consecrated by the genius of uni- 
 versal emancipation. No matter in wh.at language his doom may 
 have been pronounced — no matter in what complexion, incompatible 
 with freedom, an Indian or an African sun nm}^ have burned upon 
 him — no matter in what disastrous battle his liberty may have been 
 cloven down — no matter with what solemnities he may have been 
 devoted upon the altar of slavery — the first moment he touches the 
 sacred soil of Britain, the altar and the god sink together in the 
 dust ; his soul walks abroad in her own majesty ; his body swells 
 beyond the measure of his chains, that burst from around him ; and 
 he stands redeemed, regenei-ated, and disenthralled by the irresistible 
 genius of universal emancipation." 
 
 It is needless for me to particularize in detail the several trials in 
 ■which Curran figured ; but there was one, the circumstances of 
 ■which illustrate very forcibly the state of Ireland at this period. 
 It was the trial of the brothers John and Henry Sheares. These 
 gentlemen, members of the Irish Bar, had been deepl}' implicated in 
 the abortive rebellion of '98 ; and when it was crushed, and the 
 Executive had breathing time to look around, it was determined 
 that some of the ringleaders of the movement should be sacrificed 
 upon the scaffold, to deter others from renewing the ci'ime of insur- 
 rection. The Sheares Brothers were the first victims selected. Lord 
 Carlton was the judge, a humane and gentle functionary, a warm 
 
KEY. M. B. BUCKLEY. IQJ 
 
 and devoted friend of Curran, and once the bosom friend of the 
 Sheaves' fiither. The Attorney-General was the infamous Toler, 
 afterwards Lord Norbmy, the bloodthirsty and scoffing judge, who 
 could smile, and joke, and pun, while passing sentence of death 
 upon his victim. The trial began in the morning, and it was mid- 
 night when Curran rose to address the jury for the defence. Why 
 was not the ti'ial postponed until the following day ? Because the 
 sanguinary law, personified by the savage Toler, thirsted for its 
 prey, and would not be gainsayed. We can well imagine the wear- 
 iness of an advocate's brain, and the languor of his body, after the 
 labors of a whole day in a narrow court-house. He made an ap- 
 peal for postponement. " After a sitting of sixteen hours," said he, 
 "with only twenty minutes' interval in these times, I should hope it 
 ■would not be thought an obtrusive request, to hope for a few hours' 
 interval, for repose, or rather for recollection." But no, the minister 
 of the law was inexorable ; the trial must go on to the bitter end. 
 Then Curran rose. Behold the scene ! the ermined judge upon the 
 bench ; in the dock the patriot brothers, standing on the brink of 
 their yawning graves ; the faces of the spectators in the galleries and 
 in the body of the court, silent witnesses of the grim tragedy ; the 
 struggle between the darkness and the flickering flames of tallow 
 candles ; the solemn hour of midnight ; the nature of the cause, 
 namely, the wretched condition of Ireland, and the forging of new 
 links in the chain of persecution ; the throbbings of hatred and re- 
 sentment, and awe and anger, in the silent breasts of the people ; 
 and then, the insatiable, ghoul-like Attorney-General, lusting for 
 blood — for the young, fresh, pure blood — of the unhappy brothers, 
 who loved their country "not wisely but too well." Curran's ap- 
 peal for postponement was made in vain. "The counsel for the 
 prisoners," said Toler, "cannot be more exhausted than those for the 
 prosecution ; if they do not choose to speak to the evidence, we 
 shall give up our right to speak, and leave the matter to the court 
 altogether. They have had two speeches already, and leaving them 
 unreplied to is a great concession." Then, the wearied but indomit- 
 able Curran rose. " Gentlemen of the jury," said he, " it seems that 
 much has been conceded to us, God help us ! I do not know what 
 has been conceded to me — if so insignificant a person may have ex- 
 torted the remark. Perhaps it is a concession that I am allowed to 
 
IQg TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 arise in such a state of mind and body, of collapse and deprivation, 
 as to feel but a little spark of indignation i-aised by the remark that 
 much has been conceded to the counsel for the prisoners. Almighty 
 and merciful God ! who lookest down upon us, what are the times 
 to which we are reserved, when we are told that much has been con- 
 ceded to prisoners who are put upon their trial at a moment like 
 this, of more darkness and night of the human intellect than a dark- 
 ness of the natural period of twenty-four hours, that public con- 
 Tenience cannot spare a respite of a few hours to those who are 
 accused for their lives ; and that much has been conceded to the 
 advocate, almost exhausted, in the poor remarks which he has en- 
 deavored to make upon it ! " Curran went on with his mournful 
 and hopeless duty till the rays of the morning sun dispelled the 
 gloom of night. Between seven and eight o'clock that morning a 
 verdict of guilty was returned ; the brothers clasped each other in 
 their arms, the sentence was pronounced, and, after the lapse of 
 only twenty-four hours more, the brothers lay in their coffins, lifeless 
 and bloody trunks : two new names were added to the martyrology 
 of Irish patriots — two new names by which to swear eternal ven- 
 geance to British law. 
 
 Curran's frequent and zealous defence of men called in the lan- 
 guage of the law " rebellious " gave ofi'ence to those in power. They 
 could not understand why felons should have anything more than 
 the bare form of a trial, and, therefore, they were filled with indig- 
 nation when finding an advocate availing himself of such trials to 
 inveigh against the cruelties of the Government, the perversion of 
 law, the oppression of the people ; in fact, encouraging violence and 
 sedition. He was branded as a traitor, because he sought the protec- 
 tion of the law for those who had been accused of violating it ; on 
 his way into court he frequently i-eceived anonymous letters threat- 
 ening him with assassination. On one occasion, he had to defend 
 himself in the* House of Commons from the charge of having for- 
 feited the character of "a good subject," by the zeal with which he 
 defended his clients. But he i-emained steadfast and fearless in the 
 conscious pride of having fulfilled his duty. "I am heavily cen- 
 sured," said he, "for having acted for them in the late prosecutions ; 
 I feel no shame at such a charge, except that of its being made at 
 such a time as this, that to defend the people should be held up as 
 
KIOV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 1(59 
 
 an imputation upon the King's counsel, when the peoi^le are prose- 
 cuted by the State. I think every counsel is the property of his 
 fellow-suhjects. If, indeed, because I wore his Majesty's gown I 
 had declined my duty, or had done it weakly or treacherously — if I 
 had made that gown a mantle of hypocrisy, and had betrayed my 
 client, or sacrificed him to any personal view — I might, perhaps, 
 have been thought wiser by those who have blamed me, but I should 
 have thought myself the basest villain upon earth." 
 
 In CuiTan's character there was much of the grave and solemn^ 
 nay, there was a high tone of religion ; and it was no uncommon 
 thing for him, when appealing to a jury on behalf of a client whose life 
 ■was at stake, to bring before their minds the terrors of the judgment 
 that awaited themselves at the hour of death. And this he did not 
 in a spirit of rhetorical afl'ectation, much less in a spirit of hypocrisy, 
 but as one thoroughly imbued with the awful impressions which he 
 would fain impart to his hearers. Nevertheless, in private, and 
 sometimes in public, he displayed a wit and humor evincing a most 
 vivacious temperament : and as we always more willingly hear what 
 makes us smile rather than be sad, I shall relate for you some in- 
 stances of Curran's wit, to divert 3'ou for a while from the serious 
 contemplation of his character. 
 
 Many of you are, no doubt, familiar with the following : One day 
 Curran, on entering the court, observed one of the barristers whose 
 wig for some reason excited the attention and provoked the loud 
 laughter of his fellow-la W3fers. "Curran," he exclaimed, "do 
 you see anything ridiculous in this wig?" Curran replied, " No, my 
 dear fellow, nothing but the head." 
 
 A hot fool, plunged in distress, was playing at billiards, and hav- 
 ing wagered his only guinea on the success of the game, became 
 tremulously anxious on the last stroke of the ball, perceiving the 
 clock giving notice to strike one, as he hoped, and fearing some dis- 
 traction he paused for a moment ; another and another succeeded, 
 until the clock went on insensibly to twelve. Thus suspended, his 
 irritation increased, and he played and lost, and in his rage, seizing 
 the ball, drove it at the clock with such fury and force that he broke 
 it in pieces ; the owner sought compensation and obtained it. This 
 being related in presence of Curran, he oljserved that the damages- 
 should be small, as the clock struck Jivd. 
 
J 70 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Some time after the Union, Curran was walking by the Parliament 
 House with a certain member, a friend of his, who had supported that 
 measure. This gentleman observed that he never passed that House 
 without the deepest melancholy and regret. "I do not wonder at 
 it," said Curran, " I never knew a man who had committed murder 
 who was not haunted by the ghost of the murdered whenever he came 
 to the spot where the foul deed was done." 
 
 Such was the efiect of Curran's pleasantry, that, even on ordinary 
 occasions, servants in attending on the table often became suspended, 
 like the bucket in the well, and frequently started as if from a rev- 
 erie when called upon for ordinary attendance. Sometimes a wine- 
 glass could not be had, or, if asked for, a knife or fork was presented 
 in its place ; their faces turned away, you heard nothing Init sup- 
 pressed laughter. He had a favorite negro servant M'ho lived with 
 him many years, and to whom for his great fidelity Curran was very 
 much attached. This poor fellow was observed for a few days befoi-e 
 his departure to have been oppressed with gloom and sadness, the 
 cause of which was not directly inquired into. One morning, while 
 in this state, he came anxiously to his master, and with apparent 
 regret and an air of dejection requested to be discharged. Curran 
 told him that he was very much concerned to lose the services of so 
 ver}' faithful a person, that he had a strong regard for him, &c., and 
 on inquiring into the reason for leaving him, the black man replied, 
 " It is impossible for me to remain longer with you, massa." "Why, 
 my good fellow, we will see you well taken care of! " "No, massa, 
 I cannot live any longer with you, I am losing my health with you, 
 you make me laugh too much ! " 
 
 Curran was once engaged on behalf of a tradesman, a citizen of 
 Dublin, who had been ill-treated. Injury was added to insult, he 
 was horsewhipped, beaten down and falsely imprisoned. He com- 
 plained, through Curran, to a Court of Justice, and a jury listened 
 to his tale of woe and sufferings, which wanted not the coloring of 
 imagination ; it was most aff'ectingly told by his counsel ; he spared no 
 ornaments to dress out the victim who had already suffered so much. 
 His appeals were deeply affecting, because natural. He gave up to 
 the jury the case of an innocent and oppressed man, in terras which 
 were directed to the heart ; the jury and the audience were touched ; 
 but the client, who heard all, was so overwhelmed that he bur.st 
 
EEV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 171 
 
 forth from the silence he had so long maintained, with a sudden ex- 
 clamation accompanied by tears, "Oh! my lord and gentlemen," 
 said he, "all the counsel has told you is true, every word of it; but 
 until this moment I never knew that I was so cruelly ill-treated." 
 
 If Curran was ever wantonly attacked, he replied in a manner 
 which his adversary would not be likely to forget. When he was 
 quite a young member of the Bar, and therefore more exposed than 
 his maturer brethren to the shafts of his opponents, being one day 
 engaged in a case before Judge Robinson, he chanced to say, " My 
 lord, I have never met the law as laid down by your lordship in any 
 book in MT library." "That may be, sir," said the Judge, in an 
 acid, contemptuous tone ; " but I suspect that your library is very 
 small." Now his lordship, who was known to be a very bigoted 
 party zealot, was, like others of his day, the author of several 
 anonymous publications remarkable for their despotic principles and 
 violent excesses. The young barrister, roused by the sneer at his 
 circumstances, replied that true it was his library might be small, 
 but he tlianked heaven that amongst his books there were none of 
 the wretched productions of the frantic pamphleteers of the day. 
 "I find it more instructive, my lord, to study good woi'ks than to 
 compose bad ones. My books may be few, but the title-pages give 
 me the authors' names : my shelves are not disgi'aced by any of 
 such rank absurdity that their very authors are ashamed to own 
 them." He was here interrujjted by the Judge, who said, "Sir, yoa 
 are forgetting the respect which you owe to the dignity of the ju- 
 dicial character." " Dignity, my lord !" exclaimed Curran, " upon 
 that point I shall cite you a case from a book of some authority, 
 with which, jierhaps, you are not unacquainted. A poor Scotch- 
 man, upon his arrival in London, thinking himself insulted by a 
 stranger, and imagining that he was the stronger man, resolved to 
 resent the affront, and taking off his coat delivered it to a bystander 
 to hold ; but having lost the battle he turned to resume his garment, 
 when he unfortunately discovered that he had lost that also ; that 
 ■the trustee of his habiliments had decamped during the fvay. So, 
 my lord, when a person who is invested with the dignity of the 
 judgment seat lays it aside for a moment to enter into a disgraceful 
 l^ersonal contest, it is vain when he has been worsted in the encounter, 
 that he seeks to resume it — it is in vain that he seeks to shelter 
 
172 TREASUKY OF ELOIJUENCE. 
 
 himself behind tiie autiiority whicli he has abandoned." " If you 
 say another word, sir, I'll commit you,'" cried the Judge. "Then, 
 my lord," said Curran, " it will be the best thing you committed this 
 Term." The Judge did not commit him, but he made an attempt to 
 have Curi'an deprived of his gown. He received, however, so little 
 encouragement, that he deemed it prudent to forsake the attempt. 
 
 John Home Tooke, a philosopher living in England in Curran's 
 time, once asked an Irish gentleman what was thought of Curran's 
 talents at home, as compared with those of Sheridan. The gentle- 
 man replied that, in the opinion of his countrymen, no man living 
 was conceived to possess such brilliancy, richness, and variety as 
 Curran. Hornc Tooke replied, ''I know both these gentleman, and 
 I know them well, both in public and in private : Sheridan is labored 
 and polished : you alwaj-s see the marks of the chisel and hammer 
 about him ; Curran is a rich and glittering ore, wliich is raised from 
 the mine without effort, and in the most exuberant profusion." Byron 
 was a great admirer of John Philpot Curran. Despite the inex- 
 haustible resources of his own fancy, he did not disdain to borrow 
 some of liis imagery from the Irish orator. Speaking on a public 
 occasion, on the subject of the Union, Curran had said, "The Irish 
 Protestant was cajoled into the belief that if he concurred in the 
 surrender of his country, he would be placed on the neck of a hostile 
 faction ! Wretched dupe ! you might as well persuade (he gaoler 
 that he is less a prisoner than the captives he locks up, merely because 
 he carries the key in his pocket.^' Byron had copied this idea from 
 Curran, and admitted the fact, 
 
 " The nations are 
 
 In prison, — but tlie gaoler, what is lie.? 
 
 No lesser victim to the bolt and bar. 
 
 To the poor privilege to turn the key 
 
 Upon the captive, freedom ! He's as fiir 
 
 From the enjoyment of the earth and air 
 
 Who watches o'er the chains, as those who wear." 
 
 But this was not all of Byron's estimation of Curran. He M'roto of 
 him thus, "I have met Curran at Holland House; he beats every- 
 body, his imagination is beyond human, and his humour (it is 
 difficult to define what is wit) pei-fect. He has fifty faces, and twice 
 as manj"^ voices, Avhen he mimics. I never met his equal." Again, 
 " Curran ! Curran is the man who struck me most. Such im- 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 173 
 
 agination ! There was never anything like it. He was wonderful 
 even to me, who had seen many remarkable men of the time. The 
 riches of his Irish imagination were inexhaiistilile. I have heard 
 that man speak more poetr}' than I have ever seen written, though I 
 saw him seldom andjjut occasionally^" 
 
 Lord Erskine, a lawyer, and subsequently a Judge on the English 
 Bench, was a contemporary of Curran's, and one who had acquired 
 great fame as an orator of the first degree. His merits and those 
 of Curran frequently formed a subject of comparison. They were 
 both once dining at the table of George the Fourth, then Prince of 
 Wales. This royal personage, despite his voluptuous tendencies, 
 had the good taste to gather round his table the collective genius, 
 learning, and wit of the kingdom. On the occasion in question. His 
 Roj^al Highness, out of respect for his guests, directed the conver- 
 sation to the legal profession. Lord Erskine eloquently took the 
 lead : "No man in the land," said he, "need be ashamed to belong 
 to such a profession. For my part, of a noble family myself, I felt 
 no degradation in practising it — it has added not only to my wealth 
 but to my dignity." Curran was silent, which the host observing, 
 called on him for his opinion. "Lord Erskine," says Curran, "has 
 so eloquently described all the advantages to be derived from the 
 profession that I hardly thought my poor oiiinion was worth adding. 
 But perhaps it was that I am a better practical instance of it than 
 his lordship — he was ennobled by birth before he came to us, but it 
 has," said he making an obeisance to his royal host, "it has, in my 
 person raised the son of a peasant to the table of his prince ! " 
 
 Lord Byron has contrasted Erskine and Curran in one of his 
 poems, at a period ten years previous to the time when he wrote the 
 eulogy of Curran just quoted, and when his knowledge of the Irish 
 orator was only fresh. He designates Curran "Longbow," and 
 Erskine " Strongbow." Enumerating the guests at a dinner party, 
 lie says : — 
 
 "There also were two wits, by acclamation 
 
 Lougbow from Ireland, Strongbow from the Tweed, 
 Both lawyers, and both men of education ; 
 
 But Strongbow's wit was of more polished breed. 
 Longbow was rich in an imagination, 
 
 As beautiful and bounding as a steed, 
 But sometimes stumbling over a potato, 
 While Strongbow's best things might have come from Cato. 
 
274 Tr.EASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 " Strongbow was like a new tuner! harpsichord, 
 
 But Longbow wild as an ^olian harp, 
 With which the winds of Heaven can claim accord, 
 
 And make a music either flat or sharp. 
 Of Strongbow's talk you would not change a word; 
 
 At Longbow's phrases you would sometimes carp; 
 Both wits — one born so, and the other bred — 
 
 This by the heart, his rival by the head." 
 
 Curran's domestic happiness was shrouded by two melancholy 
 catastrophes, sufficient to break the spirits of a gayer and livelier 
 temperament than his. His daughter lost her heart to a young gen- 
 tleman named Robert Emmet, who was on visiting terms at Curran's 
 house. Surely never did maiden lay the treasures of her love at the 
 feet of one more worthy of them than this young Robert Emmet, 
 the purest patriot, and the grandest soul that ever loved a country — 
 that ever wooed a damsel — ever met a patriot martyr's death. His 
 fruitless insurrection cost him his liberty, but did not change his 
 heart; he could have fled, but his love would not permit him to go 
 far from the mistress of his affections. He was arrested, and his 
 blood stained the scaffold. 
 
 " He had lived for his love, for his country he died ; 
 They were all that to life had entwined him ; 
 Nor soon shall the tears of his country be dried, 
 Nor long shall his love stay behind him." 
 
 This was too much for Curran. His young and fair daughter doomed 
 to disappointment, melancholy, and a broken heart, the young friend 
 ■whom he loved " torn like a blasted oak sudden away ; " but what 
 was more vexatious than bitter, was the susjjicion that would arise 
 concerning his loyalty, from the fact that the young conspirator had 
 such close intimacy with himself, and had so frequently visited his 
 house. He knew that those suspicions would arise, and he de- 
 termined to anticipate any action on the part of the Government. 
 He went and delivered up all his papers to the Attorney-General, 
 who invited him into the presence of the Privy Council, where all 
 was made clear, and he was saved from further trouble. But a far 
 greater aifliction than this was in store for him. His wife, after a 
 quarter of a century from the date of their marriage, proved un- 
 faithful, and eloped with a dissipated clergyman, a Rev. Mr. Sandys. 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 175 
 
 She afterwards repented ; and though CuiTan never lived with her 
 after, she was supported by his bounty up to the time of her death. 
 In the year 1806, Curran was raised to the dignity of Master of the 
 Rolls in Ireland. His judicial decisions were as remarkable for their 
 justice, as his advocacy had been for its eloquence. I have ah-eady 
 sufficiently implied, if I have not broadly stated, that Curran was of 
 the Protestant religion ; but he knew not what bigotry was, and he 
 cherished the affections of his heart for the degraded Catholic, as 
 well as for his own co-religionists basking in the sunshine of patron- 
 age and power. I select one instance of his broad toleration, worthy 
 of the noblest mind. A will case came befoi-e him, and it was 
 alleged that the will was fraudulently obtained by " one John Power, 
 a Popish priest." "I see no semblance of the fact," says Curran, 
 " to sustain such a charge. Who does this ' one John Power, a Popish 
 priest', turn out to be? I find he is a Catholic clergyman, a Doctor 
 of Divinity, a Titular Bishop in the diocese of Waterford. And yet 
 I am now pressed to believe that this gentleman has obtained this 
 will by fraud. Every fact now appearing repels this charge. I 
 cannot but say that the personal character of the person accused 
 repels it still more strongly. Can I be brought, on grounds like 
 those now before me, to believe that a man having the education of 
 a scholar, the habits of a religious life, and vested with so high a 
 character in the ministry of the Gospel, could be capable of so de- 
 testable a profanation as is flung upon him ? Can I forget that he 
 is a Christian Bishop, clothed not in the mere authority of a sect, 
 but clothed in the indelible character of the Episcopal order ; suffer- 
 ing no diminution from his supposed heterodoxy, nor drawing any 
 increase or confirmation from the merits of his conformity, should 
 he think proper to renounce what we call the errors of his faith ? 
 Can I bring my mind, on so slight, or, rather, on no grounds, to 
 believe that he could so trample under his feet all the impressions 
 of that education, of those habits, and of that high rank in the 
 sacred ministry of the Gospel v,'hich he holds, as to sink to the odious 
 impiety which is imputed to him ? Can I bring myself to believe 
 that such a man, at the bedside of his dying fellow-creature, would 
 be capable, with one hand, of presenting the cross before her uplifted 
 eye, and with the other, of basely thieving from her the miserable 
 dregs of this woi'ld, of which his perfidious tongue was employed in 
 
176 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 teacbinsj hei* a Christian's estimate? I do not believe it; on the con- 
 trary, I am (as far as it belongs to me in this interlocntory way to 
 judge of the fact) as perfectly convinced that the conduct of Dr. 
 Power was what it ought to be, as I am that the testatrix is dead." 
 
 Curran died in London, on the 1 4th of October, 1817, in the 68th 
 j-ear of his age ; and it now becomes our duty to take a brief retro- 
 spect of his career ; and photograph, as it were to your mind's eye, 
 the character of the man, so that we may store it away into our in- 
 tellectual album, and cherish it for perpetual admiration. Curran's 
 life and character were the life and character of the orator and 
 the patriot, the advocate of his country's rights, the advocate of 
 justice to persecuted man. We cannot conceive him except as the 
 personification of eloquence and patriotism. All his battles, and 
 All his triumphs, were fought and achieved in the senate, or at the 
 bar; he was ever either seeking to benefit his fellow-countrymen 
 by the enaction of just laws, or striving to save them from the 
 pei'ils of laws already passed — passed in a spirit of diabolical 
 hatred, and enforced with a vindictiveness still more atrocious. 
 All the labors of his life, all the efforts of his genius, all the 
 treasures of his intellect, all the sacrifices of his fame and fortune, 
 were at the service of Ireland and the Irish. His silence could 
 have been bought, were he venal, and tiie advocate of Ireland's 
 rights could have been transformed into the approver and abettor 
 of Ireland's wrongs ; but thanks to his integrity of character, he 
 spurned the arts of corruption, and his name, instead of being a 
 bye-word of national shame and disgrace, stands forth as a beacon 
 light to guide and cheer posterity. 
 
 His eloquence was of the very highest order ; it was not the 
 eloquence of art, carefully studied and prepared, and delivered 
 with histrionic effort, and dramatic grace ; it was not eloquence 
 manufactured according to the inflexible rules of rhetoricians. No : 
 Curran sounded the depths of the human heart, not as it is in some 
 parts of the world, not as it is moulded and shaped under certain in- 
 fluences, not as it may be moved by any special or peculiar modes 
 of appeal, but as it is in every human l)reast, as it is made by God, 
 the seat of passion and sentiment, the soft wax on which God has 
 impressed those principles of rectitude which neither climate, nor 
 •education, nor any local influence can alter or erase ; hence Curran 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 177 
 
 is always stirring up the hearts and emotions of his hearers ; he is 
 ever awakening .slumbering conception, faded remembrances, early 
 impressions ; ever exciting tenderness, pity, remorse ; ever vindi- 
 cating the principle of God's eternal justice ; ever harping on the 
 sweet but melancholy chord of human conscience. This character- 
 istic of Curran's eloquence alone would be sufficient to stamp it as 
 sublime. I have already spoken of Curran's imagination. It was a 
 marvel of its kind. Tropes and figures, and images, sparkled 
 through his speech in such brightness and profusion that his elo- 
 quence was like a river with a bed of golden sands, illumined by 
 the bright sunshine of genius. "His imagination," says Byron, "is 
 beyond human." His wit and humor also were transcendent, and 
 under more favorable circumstances might have graced his oratory 
 more than they have done ; but he lived and spoke at a time when 
 wit, for the most part, would savor of levity, and humor would l^e 
 simpl}'' heartless. The events of his day were too grave for the 
 lighter efforts of oratory ; he loved his kind in a spirit of true 
 philanthropy, and his heart bled to witness the persecutions and 
 bloodshed to which they were victimized, and the cold calculatii g 
 baseness with which their lives and liberties Averc sold and purchased. 
 Hence his oratory frequently partakes of the scathing, and the sar- 
 castic, and the objurgative. He inveigliecl in tones of thunder 
 against the vices of his country's oppressors ; he told Judges and 
 juries to their faces that they were trampling on the sacred rights of 
 justice, and this he did with a boldness and courage worthy of a 
 cause so noble. "You may assassinate me," said he, on one occa- 
 sion, when the court-house was surrounded with militar}^ "j^ou may 
 assassinate me, ^ut you cannot intimidate me." Yes, in Curran's 
 eloquence there is scarcely a feature moi'e remarkable than his in- 
 domitable courage. No speaker ever needed that virtue more, and 
 few dispkiyed it to such perfection. Indeed it has been said of the 
 greatest speeches celebrated in history that they were spoken at 
 times when personal danger most threatened their deliverers. We 
 have seen and admired his courage in defending Father Neale, the 
 humble priest, against the pampered and cowardly lordling of Doncr- 
 aile. We have seen him challenged four times to mortal combat, 
 and four times accepting the challenge, for the courage with which 
 he pleaded the causes of his clients. Ireland was then suffering under 
 
178 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 a reign of terror. Trial by law was a contemptible farce, a wretched 
 mockery, a bare formality ; the number of persons executed by law 
 fell far short of those sacrificed in butcheries and burnings by a bar- 
 barous soldiery let loose upon an unoffending and defenceless people. 
 In times like these Curran stood alone. In pleading the cause of 
 the accused he had to run the danger of being supposed to sympa- 
 thize with their sentiments and conduct ; and in paying them the 
 humane tribute of his advocacy, he had to incur the rancorous hatred 
 of those who tortured and oppressed them. 
 
 Pathos was a remarkal)le feature of Curran's eloquence. He had 
 the soul of a true poet, and tenderness, and melancholy, and pity, 
 those soft, sweet, sad emotions, are the noblest treasures in the poet's 
 soul. They were essentially his ; he loved solitude, and often at- 
 tuned his soul to the solemn tones of his violoncello, when no one 
 else was nigh. He loved to play old Irish airs ; their sadness 
 pleased him, and their occasional loveliness gave to the sombre 
 clouds of his thoughts their silver lining. Those sad strains nurtured 
 within him the sympathies awakened by the actual contemplation of 
 his country's wrongs. He wept and sighed, and lamented over her 
 desolation; there was a music, a rhythm in his speech according 
 exquisitely with the jiassion of his thoughts, so that the whole might 
 seem to the rapt listener the wail of one of Sion's children attuned 
 to the melancholy music of his harp on the lonely rivers of Babylon. 
 "He was one of those," says a distinguished writer (Giles) "whose 
 thoughts make melody in conception, and which coming into words 
 are born into song. All his faculties were musical, his intellect, his 
 imagination, his emotions ; and these, all having spontaneous union 
 and utterance in his eloquence, made that eloquence the witchcraft 
 and magic that it was. This made it different from all other elo- 
 quence, not in power, but in kind ; it was not so much the eloquence 
 of logic as of enchantment, not so much like the sword of Goliath 
 as like the harp of David." 
 
 Cui-ran's humor was often such that one would not know whether 
 to say it was laughable or serious ; it became so severely sarcastic. 
 Thus, on one occasion, when contesting an election, he said to the 
 voters of the rival candidate, that "they might he seen coming like 
 the beasts of the field, in droves, from their pastures, presenting a 
 picture of human nature, in the state of degradation sneh as never 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY 179 
 
 had been witnessed since Nebuchadnezzar was at grass." Of an 
 Irish secretary, for whom he had a great contempt, he said, when 
 inveighing against him, that he would not imitate the Roman tyrant's 
 practice of " tortui'ing insects." He described an English ministry 
 as "a motley group, without virtue, or character, or talents; the 
 sort of Cabinet we have laughed at on the stage, where the 'potent, 
 grave, and reverend seignors ' were composed of scene-shifters and 
 candle-snufters, robed in old curtains, and wigged from the stores of 
 the theatre." On another occasion he spoke of " the princely virtues 
 and imperial qualifications, the consui^imate wisdom and sagacity of 
 our steadfast friend and ally, the Emperor of all the Russias — a 
 constellation of all virtue, compared with whose radiance the Ursa 
 Major but twinkles as the glowworm." 
 
 Curran is supposed by some to be one of those who established 
 "what has been called the school of Irish eloquence, that is, fervid, 
 impassioned oratory, appealing to the feelings, and careless of 
 impressing the intellect. This style of eloquence is spoken of with 
 contempt, and justly should it be so, if the speaker did not convince 
 the reason as well as move th« heart ; and, no doubt, our country 
 has produced many such speakers, gifted by nature with a wondrous 
 flow of words, sparkling with imagery, heated with passion, vivid 
 with Celtic fire. We meet them in private life, we meet them on 
 the public platform. The village pedagogue is peculiar to Ireland ; 
 the man who uses words of " learned length and thundering sound ;" 
 who mistakes paraphrases for oratory, and sound for sentiment ; the 
 village poet is no less I'acy of the Irish soil ; the dreamer who is 
 ever wandering in the bright morning of May, by the green banks of 
 some sparkling river, where he encounters a lovely damsel, who first 
 declines his amorous attentions, but finally consoles him with her 
 hand and heart. In no country in the world is a debate so warmly 
 and enthusiastically, and so eloquently, conducted as in Ireland. 
 There the oratory on both sides is so fairly balanced that victory is 
 often impossible without the intervention of the fists or tlie black- 
 thorn, which has an effect far more stunning than wordy arguments 
 on an adversary. Yes, there is an Irish school of oratory, and it 
 ■was about Curran's time it came into vogue. When, indeed, was 
 there such occasion for it? When the speaker's passions were 
 aroused by the contemplation of the cruelties with which his country 
 
180 TKEASUiiY OF KLOQUENCE. 
 
 was visited, and the sufferings his countrymen endured, the coldest 
 nature sliould be eloquent, when speaking of those atrocious deeds. 
 The grandest specimens of eloquence ever recorded in history were 
 delivered in times of great social strife, great national upheaving, 
 amid the ruins of a country, or over the cradle of a young revolution. 
 It was towards the close of the Hebrew nationality that their prophets 
 started up and proclaimed the ruin and captivity about to befal their 
 fellow-countrymen. What eloquence can compare with tliat of Isaiah, 
 sublime and impassioned? or with Jeremiah, wailing and despondent 
 over the calamities of their race? Demosthenes flourished — the 
 greatest orator the world ever saw — amid the crash of the Grecian 
 republics. Cicero was the last orator of Rome : standing on the 
 bridge that separated the prosperous Rome of the Consuls from the 
 effete and degenerate Rome of the CiBsars. Mirabeau's eloquence 
 flamed like a meteor amid the chaos of the French Revolution. So 
 it was with Curran ; he lived and spoke when his native land was 
 steeped to the very lips in woe ; when " 't was treason to love her, 
 and death to defend." Manifold were the thoughts that stirred his 
 brain and quickened his tongue ; the ancient glory of his country, 
 the virtues of her children, their courage and constancy, through 
 every peril and misfortune ; the gleam of sunshine, short and tran- 
 sient, beaming from the Irish Parliament, and its sudden extinction 
 in the Act of Union. Here was food for thought ; here was fuel for 
 the fire of eloquence, pride, passion, glory, hope, and, last of all, 
 despair ! Peace be with thy ashes, John Philpot Curran, as they 
 repose in the sacred soil of Glasnevin, and may th}' memory be ever 
 cherished with pride by the grateful descendants of those in fighting 
 whose battles thou didst display the sublimest valor of heroism, and 
 the purest chastity of honor 1 
 
BRIAN BOIRANHE KILLED BY THE V'K NG 
 
EEV. M. B. BUCKLEY. Jgl 
 
 Lecture.* 
 
 The Irish Character Ajstaltzed. 
 
 ^^OME weeks ago I had the honor to deliver a public lecture in this 
 1^1 city on the HQstory of Irish Music. The apjilause awarded 
 pf to me on that occasion was such as I fancied no eflbrts of 
 I, mine could have merited ; but my modesty was put to a still 
 
 severer test when some gentlemen informed me that it was the gen- 
 eral wish of the public — at least of the Irish portion of the public 
 — that I should lecture again before leaving Boston. So flattering 
 an invitation it was impossible for me to decline, I promised to com- 
 ply with the general desire, and I am here to I'edeem that promise. 
 I know full well the love that Irishmen cherish for their country, 
 and that no subject awakens their interest more keenly, or stirs their 
 hearts more sensitively, than the subject of their native land. And, 
 hence, there is scarcely a period of our history, a feature of our 
 national character, or a biography of any of our great men, Avhich 
 has not, in its turn, formed the subject of a lecture in this country, 
 as well as in the old land. One would think that Irish subjects 
 would pall even on Irish ears, by such frequent repetition ; but it is 
 with the children of the Emerald Isle, as it is with the children of the 
 Church. In the Church there has been but one short gospel for the 
 last eighteen hundred years, and yet we hear it expounded to-day, at 
 the hands of an able j^reacher, with all that freshness of interest 
 which only a novelty, as we fancy, could produce. So the history 
 of Ireland is but a plain record of constant persecution on the one 
 hand, and constant resistance on the other, — a perpetual resistance 
 against a superior and implacable power, — and yet we never grow 
 
 ♦Delivered in Boston, 1871. 
 
132 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 weary of the oft-told tiile ; we ever still find something new and 
 inspiring in this simple gospel of our fatherland. 
 
 I come to address you to-night on a subject of national interest, an 
 analysis of the character of my fellow-countrymen ; and, simply, 
 because the subject is national, I am confident that I shall touch your 
 hearts and enlist your sympathies. But I do not trust alone to the 
 nature of my subject ; I feel that I come before you as one thor- 
 oughly qualified to speak on any Irish subject, as far as one may be 
 qualified by a long and large experience. I am Irish, myself, to the 
 back-bone, — aye, and to the very marrow of that cunning piece of 
 mechanism. Born of Irish parents, on the banks of the Lee, within 
 sound of the Shandon Bells, I should like to know who would have 
 the courage to dispute the Hibernicism of my birth. Imbibing, 
 when a schoolboy, my first lessons of patriotism from the glorious 
 pages of the "Nation" newspaper, illumined then, as it was, by the 
 calm vigor of a Dufly, the immortal fire of a Davis, and the weird 
 majesty of a Clarence Mangan ; later on, dipping in the fervid foun- 
 tain of the young Ireland press : a fountain springing from a Parnas- 
 sus, where the muses were invoked by such men as John Mitchell, 
 Thomas D'Arcy Magee, and Thomas Francis Meagher, it is no won- 
 der that my Irish heart beat with the true pulses of the patriot. 
 During six years in Maynooth College, thi-own amongst five hundred 
 ardent young Irishmen, although we were endowed by the Govern- 
 ment (which endowment, by the way, was only a wretched instal- 
 ment of the millions they had stolen from us centuries before) , I 
 never forgot I was Irish. Ofiiciating for eight years in the rural 
 districts of the county, and for eight other years in the city of Cork, 
 it is highly probable that I understand the state of my country ; the 
 condition and character of the Irish race in every walk of life, our 
 virtues and our vices, our strength and our weakness ; and that I am 
 qualified to address my audience on that subject. 
 
 The great faith and hope of Irishmen at home and abroad is that 
 their country will yet be free. If they had not this hope, they would 
 despair of the justice of the Almighty, who surely will not permit 
 tyrants to prosper forever ; in the realization of this hope they see a 
 vindication of their country, a reparation for all she has endured 
 through long ages of persecution, a compensation for all she has lost, 
 a balm for her wounds, a consolation for the contempt and ignominy 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 183 
 
 to which she has been subjected. We look forward to that day, and 
 we believe in its coming as firmly as we believe that to-morrow's sun 
 will rise. But why is it so long postponed ? 
 
 " Why still in darkness cloth Erin lie sleeping, 
 Why doth the pure light its dawning delay .' " 
 
 It is not for us, short-sighted mortals, to tell_ what are the designs 
 of Providence in our regard. But it is easy for us to see how, by 
 our own conduct, those designs may be promoted on the one hand, 
 or frustrated on the other. We may not always perceive the reward 
 of our virtuous actions ; but we cannot fail to sec what obstacles we 
 sometimes cast in the waj' of Providence when it is kindly disposed 
 towards us, and how frequently our happiness in this world is 
 marred by our own fatuity and folly. I shall point out the great 
 and noble qualities of the Irish race, on which they may rely for the 
 future regeneration of their country ; but I shall also consider it my 
 duty to animadvert on the weaknesses in the national conduct and 
 character which impede our progress in the path to freedom. To 
 those weaknesses I should not think of alluding here, but that unhap- 
 pily I find them as strongly ingrained and as pernicious in the 
 breasts of Irishmen here as they arc in the old land. 
 
 The lessons addressed to Irishmen at home are equally applicable 
 to you ; for you are all of the same stock. You belong to a com- 
 mon fatherland — you have the same loves and antipathies — the 
 same passions, the same interests. You have an Ireland here which 
 you arc building up — you have a character to sustain, and a history 
 to respect ; and all that in the teeth of obstacles and difiiculties 
 which you understand much better than I do. It is said of religious 
 creeds, that one great cause of their clifierences is an ignorance on 
 both sides of the real state of the case. We know that to be true 
 with regard to our own religion, to which in all ages crimes and 
 iniquities have been credited, which it denounces with all the vehem- 
 ence of horror and disgust. So is it with the character of Irishmen ; 
 they are misunderstood by Englishmen at home, and by Americans 
 here. Their vices, and weaknesses, and shortcomings, are pro- 
 claimed to the world, as if the denouncers themselves were faultless, 
 while their good qualities are never for a moment thought of. Away 
 with this Pharisaism — with this contemptible hypocrisy ! Let the 
 
]84 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 world see the Irishman as he is, and I defy any nationahty under 
 heaven to rival him, with his weaknesses, his passions, and his 
 vices, no doubt, but with a casket of virtues and noble gifts of soul.. 
 With those rare qualities of heart and soul, the Irishman may safely 
 despise the contumely of his enemies, and look forwai'd with confi- 
 dence to the future freedom of his country as the reward of a long- 
 enduring patience, at the bauds of Him who tries even the just uiau 
 in the furnace of humiliation. 
 
 Foremost among the noble qualities of the Irish character — 
 amongst those qualities which not only entitle our country to the 
 respect of the world, but strongly appeal to the retributive justice of 
 heaven — is her steadfast attachment "through ages of bondage and 
 slaughter " to the Christian Faith since it was planted by Patrick in 
 the land. I have no desire, here or elsewhere, on an occasion like 
 the present, to depreciate any other religious creed by extolling my 
 own ; that is not my object ; I only demand for my fellow-country- 
 men that meed of admiration which they deserve for their faithful 
 adhesion to a religion in which they sincerely believe, for which 
 their ancestors have bled, and for which they would bleed them- 
 selves to-day if such a test of their fidelity were needed. In their 
 attachment to that religion they were not influenced bj' any worldly 
 motive, for all the inducements the world could offer them invited 
 them to forswear and abandon it ; in its defence they endured con- 
 tempt and ridicule, torture, spoliation, and martyrdom. They 
 simply believed, and they sealed their belief with their blood. 
 There are some who can see no great valor in all this ; who put it 
 down to wild fanaticism, or blind stupid obstinacy ; yet if those 
 sacrifices which Irishmen have made had been suffered in the cause 
 of any other religion than the Catholic, those woi-ldly philosophers 
 would extol their heroism to the skies. What I and is not the 
 Catholic religion, even in a worldly point of view, at least as 
 respectable as any other religious creed ever propounded to man- 
 kind? The question might well raise a smile on the lips of a very 
 novice in history, as if all that is great and glorious, not to say 
 respectable in the world, had not been preserved to us by the Catho- 
 lic Church — ^as if civilization had not been rocked by her in the 
 cradle, and nurtured by her up to the full vigor of maturity — as if, 
 when the barbarians swept over Europe, demolished the most glori- , 
 
REV. M. B. BUC^KLEY. Ig5 
 
 ous Avorks of art, extinguished the lamp of science, set aside lands 
 and subverted thrones, it were not she, who with the torch of the 
 gospel in her hands, startled Europe from her slumbers, re-fashioned 
 chaos into shape, regulated societj^ once more, and made science 
 and art more triumphant than ever. Has she not ever been the 
 true nurse of freedom ? What country enjoyed more freedom than 
 Italy previous to the Reformation, Avhen the fine arts were cultiva- 
 ted, under the patronage of the Pontifl", and literature flourished in 
 the midst of free political institutions? Florence was never so 
 magnificent as she was in the Middle Ages, when almost rank with 
 affluence, she shone before the world a glorious Catholic democracy. 
 Catholic Venice was her rival in those days — her rival in the splen- 
 dor of her opulence and the light of her liberty. When was Spain 
 so glorious as in the days of their Catholic, Majesties, Ferdinand and 
 Isabella — when, amongst that haughty race, the inheritance of the 
 Catholic religion was more prized than the purest blood of the 
 aristocracy? The respectability, forsooth, of the Catholic religion ! 
 Was it not up to the sixteenth century the only religion of the whole 
 civilized world? Is it not still the religion of one-third of the whole 
 human race ? Is it not to-day the religion of the greatest part of 
 Europe, of France and Spain, of Italy and Austria, of Belgium and 
 Bavaria, of Hungary and Poland? Is it not spread all over the 
 world, flourishing among the mountains of Abj-ssinia and Armenia, 
 as among the Alps and Appenines ; by the banks of the Tigris and 
 the Gauges, as by those of the St. Lawrence and the Mississippi; 
 on the shores of Australia, as on the shores of the Brazils ? Is it 
 not the religion of the greatest philosophers, poets, orators, humor- 
 ists, artists, civilizers, and benefactors of the human race that have 
 ever appeared in the world : the religion of the Tertullians, the 
 Augustines, the Cyrils, and the Chrysostoms ; the religion of a 
 Michael Angelo and a Leonardo da Vinci, of a Ea])hael and a Reu- 
 bens, of a Dante and a Petrarch, of a Galileo and a Copernicus, of a 
 Cervantes, a Le Sage, and a Rabellais, of a Sir Thomas More, a 
 Bossuet, and a Fenelon, of a Columbus, a Pizarro, and a Cortes? 
 Traverse the continent of Europe, and what do you see? What is 
 everywhere presented to your admiring senses? the old Gothic 
 cathedral, the quaint Hotel-de-Ville, the statues in public places, 
 the paintings and sculptures in public museums, the thrilling music 
 
186 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of cathedral choirs? — all called into existence from generation to 
 generation by the inspiring and indefectible genius of Catholicism. 
 Such is the worldly aspect of that religion which Ireland eml)raced 
 fourteen hundred years ago, to which she has ever since adhered 
 with unshaken fidelity, for which she has fought and bled through 
 ages of persecution unparalleled in the history of unjust legislation ; 
 to which she clings to-daj^ with all the tenacity of the olden time, 
 the historj' of which is inseparalily interwoven with the history of 
 her life, and which, like her own green fields, blooms with equal 
 freshness in the rains and storms of jjci'secution as in the pleasant 
 sunshine of prosperity and peace. 
 
 But Irishmen are not content to cherish their religion at home ; 
 they would extend its blessings as far as possible to the whole 
 human race. To what clime or region of the world will you turn 
 and not find an Irish priest, that indomitable propagandist of the 
 Christian faith ? Plant an Irish family in any region of the globe, 
 and you plant with them the seeds of Christianity. This vast con- 
 tinent affords the most striking proof of what I say. Within a few 
 generations a hierarchy, and clergy, and churches, and Catholic 
 communities have sprung up, as if by magic, all over the land. 
 But you are more familiar with these facts than I am. Irishmen in 
 America, poor and struggling, are never tired of contributing to the 
 purposes of religion. Many give their last dollar in the cause of 
 charity, and trust to Providence for themselves. They take more 
 pride in contemplating a noble structure raised to the glory of the 
 Almighty, than they would in regarding a dwelling-place construct- 
 ed for their own comfort by the genius of their industry and talent. 
 But why do I dwell on the Irishman's attachment to his faith? 
 Because you cannot conceive an Irishman without it, and because I 
 look upon it as his greatest strength and his most reliable hope for 
 the future. The God whom he honors will never abandon him. 
 
 Such unflinching devotion to the noblest cause for which man ever 
 suflered may be tested by long and bitter trials ; but in good time a 
 grateful God will reward with priceless blessings a fidelity to him 
 unparalleled in the history of the human race. 
 
 Another gi-and characteristic of the Irish race, and one surely 
 destined to triumi)h in the end, is their intense love of country — 
 a love, the like of which is experienced by no peo})le under heaven — 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 187 
 
 a love which is not a mere sentiment, but a cTeep-scated passion, 
 interweaving itself with all the businesses of their lives, running 
 like a silver thread through all the varied tissue of their thoughts, 
 growing with their growth, and strengthening with their strength. 
 The love of country is a noble passion ; it has inspired the most 
 glorious thoughts, words, and deeds that have ever appealed to the 
 admiration of mankind ; it has been the theme of poets and orators 
 from the earliest ages to the present day. lieligiou, which decries 
 most other human passions, applauds, stimulates, and glorifies this. 
 He wlio does not feel this generous throbbing in his breast is 
 regarded as a craven, a recreant, a poltroon ; but such are rare in 
 
 any country — 
 
 " Breathes there a man with soul so dead, 
 Who never to himself hath said — 
 This is my o^vn, my native land ? " 
 
 The Irishman has peculiar reasons for loving his country. First, 
 there is the physical aspect of the land, the " Emerald Isle," so called 
 from "the brightest of green" that bedecks its fields. Where in the 
 whole world are there such lakes and mountains, such sparkling rivers, 
 such smiling valleys, such genial sunshine, such gentle showers? 
 And then, each spot has its history — the history of a thousand, per- 
 haps two thousand years. Here is the Cromleach, standing still in the 
 open field, the altar of a pagan faith, which takes you back to the 
 time when the Druids performed their mystic rites, and when Bel 
 was the God of the Celt. Each mouldering stone is a chronicle of 
 the past ! Here is the Round Tower, whose origin and object are 
 lost in the twilight of fable." Here is the ruin of a once formidable 
 castle, wrapped in its mantle of ivy, like some " warrior taking his 
 rest, with liis martial cloak around him." Here is the still more 
 inspiring ruin of some great monastery or church, telling of a day 
 when the Christian religion, like a sweet incense, breathed its hal- 
 lowed aroma over the hearts and souls of the people, ere the rapa- 
 cious greed of a Heni-yhad robbed them of their sacred treasures, or 
 the withering hand of a Cromwell had smitten them with desolation 
 and decay. Tottering with age, and with the venerable hoar of time 
 upon their brows, Nestor-like, those grand old ruins now can only 
 tell of the splendor of a by-gone time : — 
 
 " Each ivied arch and turret lone, 
 Plead haughtily for glories gone." 
 
188 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Besides the physical aspect of the land, there is the long list of 
 traditions, descending from one generation to another — traditions in 
 •which truth and romance are strangely blended together, and affect 
 with pleasure the minds of a lively and imaginative people. There 
 are the Fairy tales, the delight of infancy and the superstitious faith 
 of maturer years. Tales of the Banshee and the Jack o' the Lantern, 
 the Pooka and the Lcprehaun ; and marvellous ghost stories of 
 haunted houses and underground caves, which, narrated some winter 
 night by the blazing hearth, by some venerable raconteur, make the 
 blood to tingle in the veins with terror, and call iij) before tlic exci- 
 ted vision the dread forms of troublous spirits that still walk the 
 earth. This love of country beats more warmly in the breast of the 
 exile than it does in the bosom of the resident ; for '' absence makes 
 the heart grow fonder," and imagination is the most deceptive of all 
 painters. The exile is ever picturing to his mind's eye those charms 
 from which he is separated, and in which he may never rejoice again. 
 Before his eyes beam, with ever-increasing brightness, those green 
 fields of his native land — the hill and vale — the wood and stream 
 — the roads and lanes ever familiar to his memory, through Avhich 
 he sported when a boy. He still hears in ftincy the wild song of the 
 thrush, and the blackbird, and the linnet; he stands beneath the 
 cromleach and the cabin, the shattered castle and the crumbling 
 church : nay more, he recalls, on the canvas of a glowing memory, 
 the festive scenes in which ho so often shared in that land of such 
 mysterious charms. He sees the joyous gatherings at the wedding 
 feast, the plentiful board, and the smiling faces of the "neighbors," 
 that have flocked to the scene from miles around, he hears the gay 
 music of the flute, the fiddle, and the bagpipe, and his feet beat sym- 
 pathetic to the boys and girls treading some lively measure — a jig 
 or a reel — on the resounding floor. He thinks of the fair and the 
 race-course ; of Donuybi-ook and Punchestown ; of the hurling match 
 between some rival parishes ; the wild " tally-ho " of the huntsmen, 
 as they flash, like a scarlet meteor, through the air, in full pursuit of 
 unhappy Keynard : he thinks of the hospitality and generosity of his 
 countrymen, which have passed into a proverb ; but what touches 
 him most of all, he thinks of the long centuries through which, by an 
 iniquitous code of laws, more base and barbarous than if they were 
 devised by demons, the heai-ts of a people so warm, so generous, and 
 
REV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 189 
 
 SO brave, so open to pleasure, so accessible to mirth, have been 
 crushed and ground down ; — by which he himself, and millions of 
 his race, have been forced to quit forever the land of their birth — 
 the land they loved so well, and to be content with the memories of 
 the Green Isle, whose enchanting realities they may never behold 
 again. Will such a love as this be frustrated forever of its noble 
 aspirations? Xo ; for, after the love of God, the holiest passion of 
 the soul is a love of country ; and the Power that nerved the arm of 
 David in his conflict with the Philistine, and that inspired the valor 
 of the, Machabees against the enemies of their country, will yet 
 restore to the yearnings of Irishmen the land whose freedom would 
 be to them the most priceless earthly boon that even Heaven could 
 bestow. 
 
 But are Irishmen capable of self-government ? Two things seem 
 necessary for this capability, namely, the head to govern, and the 
 strong arm to control — intellectual and physical vigor. And who 
 will deny those attributes to Irishmen ? Take intellect. In what 
 department of intellect have Irishmen not excelled ? In the Senate 
 we have had a Grattan, a Flood, a Burke, and a Sheridan. At the 
 Bar we have had a Curran, and a Plunket, an O'Connell, and a Shiel. 
 In the field we can boast of an Owen Roe O'lsTeill, a Sarsfield, and a 
 Duke of Wellington. AYere we able to disentomb the great men of 
 the buried past, how many sage Brehons, lawgivers of the land, 
 could we bring to light, as I showed you in my last Lecture? How 
 many bards and poets of the very first genius, before whom even our 
 boasted Swift, Goldsmith, and Moore would "pale their ineffectual 
 fires?" At the present day, all over the world, there appears to 
 prevail only a decent mediocrity of intellect in every department ; by 
 the wide diffusion of learning it does not seem to abound in any par- 
 ticular quarter ; few men of genius or talent stand prominently for- 
 ward anywhere, yet wherever intellect or genius flourishes, there is 
 the Irishman ever with his stout shoulder to the wheel, toiling in the 
 fields of literature, editing newspapers and periodicals, excelling in 
 the fine arts, in painting, music, and sculpture ; filling high offices 
 in the State, capable of holding and adorning any position with 
 which he may be entrusted. But, indeed, here I labor in vain, for 
 no one has ever disputed the intellectual calibre of Ireland as com- 
 pared with other nations ; and it is needless for me to proclaim it. 
 
190 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Equally unnecessary is it for me to dwell on the courage, the 
 bravery, the chivalry of my fellow-countrymen. Many a hard- 
 fought field on the Continent of Europe and the Continent of 
 America can testify to the valor and pluck of the Irish soldier, 
 There is something almost ludicrous in the eagerness with which an 
 Irishman longs to be in the thick of a fight. Like the war-horse in 
 Job, " he smclleth the battle afar ofi", and he crieth ha ! ha ! " 
 Wherever fighting is to be done there is the irrepressible Patrick. 
 Namur is familiar with his great war-cry. The Adige and Ci'cmona 
 have witnessed the strength of his arm. Blenheim remembers Lord 
 Clare's Dragoons : the deeds of the Irish Brigade at Ramillics and 
 Fontenoy we repeat like a pater-noster. The olive-groves of Spain 
 have drunk the young blood of the Irish soldier. In the republics 
 of Chili, Bolivia, and Venezuela, the praises of O'Brien, Dillon. 
 Devereux, and other Irish patriots, are j^et sung in the soft Castilian 
 tongue by the banks of the Orinoco and the mountain fastnesses of 
 the Andes. What shall I say to the exploits of my fellow-country- 
 men in your late civil war ! T^et Bull Run and the Rappa- 
 hannock speak. Let Gain's Hill and Malvern Hill, and An tietam, 
 and numerous other scenes of warfare speak, and tell if the children 
 of Hibernia turned their backs upon their foe. By the banks of the 
 Enxine and beneath the shadows of the Himalayas, in the Crimea 
 and in India, Irishmen have won the laurels of the brave. They 
 fought for the Father of their Church at Spoleto and Ancona. At 
 the present moment the proudest, the most unblemished, the most 
 martial name amongst the legions of Europe is Patrick IMacMahon, 
 inheritor of all the dignity and chivalry of a warlike ancestry, while 
 thousands of his race, animated by the same martial instincts as his 
 own, flock from the Green Isle to swell the ranks of struggling 
 France, and throw the balance of their strength and valor against the 
 cruel and rapacious Teuton. 
 
 I have mentioned the name of Richard Lalor Shiel. Once in the 
 House of Lords, Lord Lyndhurst had the audacity to say that the 
 Irish were not entitled to the same privileges as Englishmen, be- 
 cause they were "aliens;" "aliens," said he, "in race — aliens in 
 country — aliens in religion." "Aliens! " cried Shiel, in his place 
 in the House of Commons, "Good God, was Arthur, Duke of 
 Wellington, in the House of Lords, and did he not start up and 
 
REV. M B. BUCKLEY. 19^ 
 
 exclaim, 'Hold! I have seen the aliens do their duty.' The 
 Duke of Wellington is not a man of an excitable temperament. His 
 mind is of a cast too martial to be easily moved ; but, notwithstand- 
 ing his habitual inflexibility, I cannot help thinking that when he heard 
 his Eoman Catholic countrymen (for we are his countrymen) desig- 
 nated by a phrase as offensive as the abundant vocabulary of his 
 eloquent adversary could supply, — I cannot help thinking that he 
 ought to have recollected the many fields of fight in which we have 
 been contributors to his renown. The battles, fortunes, sieges, that 
 he has passed ought to have come back upon him. He ought to have 
 remembered that from the earliest achievement, in which he dis- 
 played that military genius which has placed him foremost in the 
 annals of modern warfare, down to that last and surpassing combat 
 which has made his name imprrishalile — from Assaye to Waterloo 
 — the Irish soldiers, with wiiom your armies are filled, were the in- 
 separable auxiliaries to the glory with which his unparalleled suc- 
 cesses have been crowned. Whose were the armies that drove your 
 bayonets at Vimiera through the phalanxes that never reeled in the 
 shock of war before ? What desperate valor climbed the steeps and 
 filled the moats at Badajos ? All his victories should have rushed 
 and crowded back ui^on his memory; — Vimiera, Badajos, Sala- 
 manca, Albuera, Toulouse, and last of all, the greatest ! Tell me, 
 for you were there — I appeal to the gallant soldier befoi'e me [Sir 
 Henry Hardinge], from whose opinions I difler, but who beai's, I 
 know, a generous heart in an intrepid breast ; tell me, for you must 
 needs remember, on that day when the destinies of mankind were 
 trembling in the balance — while death fell in showers — when the 
 artillery of France was levelled with the precision of the most deadly 
 science — when her legions, incited by the voice and inspired by the 
 example of her mighty leader, rushed again and again to the onset — 
 tell me, if for an instant, when to hesitate for an instant was to be 
 lost, the 'aliens ' blenched? And when at length the moment for 
 the last and decisive movement had arrived, and the valor which had 
 so long been wisely checked was at last let loose — when, with words 
 familiar, but immortal, the great ca[)tain commanded the great as- 
 sault — tell me if Catholic Ireland, with less heroic valor than the 
 natives of this your own glorious country, precipitated herself upon 
 the foe? The blood of England, Scotland, and Ireland flowed in 
 
192 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the same stream and drenched the same field. When the chill morn- 
 ing dawned — when the dead lay cold and stark together — in tlie 
 same deep pit their bodies were deposited ; the green corn of Spring 
 is now breaking from their commingled dust ; the dew falls from 
 Heaven upon their union in the grave. Partakers in every peril, in 
 the glory shall we not be permitted to participate, and shall we be 
 told as a requital that we are estranged from the noble country, for 
 whose salvation our life-blood has been poured out ? " 
 
 If ever the fi'eedom of Ireland must be won liy a disciplined Irish 
 soldiery, we, at least, need have no fear for the result. 
 
 The foults and weaknesses of the Irish character are less, perhaps, 
 thau those of any nation under the sun, and yet there are few people 
 anywhere who are so heartily aliused as the Irish. Thus we hear 
 of the dirty, lazy Irish, tlie landlord-shooting Irish, the drunken 
 Irish, and so on. Such is the hatred existing against our race in tlie 
 breasts of some strangers, that, as you are aware, the familiar 
 appendage, "No Irish need apply," is usually tacked on to the adver- 
 tisements concerning vacant situations. Now, how far are these 
 charges well founded? Are the Irish really dirtier, lazier, more 
 murderous, more' drunken than the people of other countries ? With 
 regard to the bad habits of the Irish, it must never be foi'gotten that 
 they were constantly debarred from the advantages which other 
 people have enjoyed. For centuries they were starved, oppressed, 
 persecuted, slain. To people living in perpetual serfdom and 
 dread, the decencies and refinements of life were of no considera- 
 tion. For other centuries, by a hellish code of laws, they were de- 
 prived of education ; they wei'c Ijrought up in stolid, blank ignorance. 
 How, I ask, could a people thus brought to the level of the brute, 
 be expected to keep up in the race with other nationalities, to whom 
 every educational privilege was freely and lavishly extended? 
 Things, no doubt, have changed, and the light of learning is again 
 permitted to dawn upon the land ; but a child is not educated in a 
 few years, nor a country in a few generations. The Irish are by^ 
 nature proud, sensitive, passionate, and these are dispositions which 
 by neglect of culture fructify in evil deeds, but in reality they are 
 noble instincts, which, tempered by a wise and careful training, lead 
 to the grandest, the noblest results. No nation in history has ever 
 won respect that was not sensitive to insult, proud in the conscious- 
 
REV. M B. BUCKLEY. ;193 
 
 ness of its own dignity, and passionate to avenge its wounded 
 honor. 
 
 But let us examine and hrietiy detail those charges against the 
 Irish. They are accused of dirt. Remeniher, I repeat, that for 
 centuries the Irish, especially in the rural districts, have been kept 
 in the most extreme poverty, barely able to subsist, while their toil 
 and their sweat went to support in indolence and ease the landlords 
 who ground their faces. It is hard for poverty and cleanliness to 
 abide together. The tine lady, whose person is a model of neatness, 
 and who has many servants to set her house in order, can preach 
 valuable lessons to the dirty poor, and modestly enforce her precept 
 by her own admirable example. But, after all, it is not very easy 
 to be clean when you live on a mud floor. It is, no doubt, desirable 
 that the poor should struggle against this bad habit of dirt, just as 
 it is desirable that we, who have got over it, should struggle against 
 other bad habits to which we are addicted. It is, to be sure, painful 
 to see poor people neglect the little means by which they may suc- 
 ceed in making their houses decent and comfortable. But let us not 
 judge harshly. Habits engendered through a long time are not got 
 rid of in an hour, probably not in a generation. Indeed, to the 
 poor and naked, dirt is a kind of protection against cold, and it 
 demands some resolution on the part of those who are chill and 
 hungry to get rid of it. When it comes to a question between soap 
 and bread, I fancy the stomach will carry the day. But remove the 
 Irish from home, give them fair play, set them an example of clean- 
 liness, and what is the result? Why, I should like to know, who 
 do all the cleanliness in American houses ? Is it not the girls of 
 Ireland? Who presents to your admiring vision the immaculate 
 door-step as you enter the house? The Irish girl, who makes the 
 brass-plate to shine and the bell-handle to glisten ! The Irish girl, 
 ■who has " fixed " the lovely drawing-i-oom, and swept from the mir- 
 ror the last atom of dust that could prevent you from admiring your 
 handsome features. Who has arranged the dinner-table so daintily, 
 and as you sit to dinner, who helps you with so much grace and 
 elegance of manner? The Irish girl, who, perhaps, last year, was 
 obliged by poverty's unconquerable necessity to move about without 
 shoe or stocking on the wet mud floor of her native cabin in op- 
 pressed, misgoverned Ireland. And are the Irish lazy ? I should 
 
194 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 like to know what a lazy Irishman would want in America. How 
 many dollars a day would he earn with his liiuid.sin his pocket? Are 
 thej' lazy Irishmen who carry on all the great works in this great 
 country, who work in your factories, who delve in your mines, who 
 build your cities? I have heard of your Erie Canal, an excavation 
 five hundred miles long, cut through rocks and mountains, opening 
 a passage for mighty waters, strewing a new path for the beneficent 
 progress of commerce. .It was designed by Irish brains and carried 
 by Irish hands. Who make your railways? Who, in the face of 
 relentless pestilence, cut through the Isthmus of Panama? Who, 
 surrounded by truculent savages, made the great Pacific Railroad 
 from the shores of the Atlantic to the distant California? The lazy 
 Irish. But this absurd charge need not be dwelt on seriously, as I 
 believe few are found to make it in a serious spirit. 
 
 The Irish are accused of being murderers, and no doubt a great 
 number of murders have been committed in Ireland, and in many 
 instances the perpetrators have escaped the vengeance of the law. 
 Now, no one can defend a murder, because it is a gross and direct 
 violation of one of God's most solemn commands. It is a terril)le 
 thing to take in cold blood the life of a fellow-man, and to send him 
 before his great Judge with all his imperfections on his head. But 
 is murder more common in Ireland than elsewhere? Surely not. 
 Per'haps there is no country in t!ie world whei'c murder is so common 
 as England. There we every day hear of a father murdering his wife 
 and children, and then destroying his own life, or it is the mother who 
 performs this unnatui'al and wholesale crime. Child-murder is com- 
 mitted so frequently, that, a few years ago. Dr. Lankester, one of 
 the coroners for the Middlesex district, stated that he held one in- 
 quest on a murdered child, on an average, every day in the year. In 
 every country, owing to the weakness of human nature and the 
 strength of human passion, a certain number of murders will be 
 committed. In Ireland the excess of this normal average consists 
 of agrarian murders, murders of landlords, and what is the cause of 
 this? Why are landlords more obnoxious than other members 
 of the community? I need scarcely tell you, for you know it ; but 
 I will remind you. In Ireland, since the passing of the penal laws, 
 the farmer was regarded as a serf, a slave, as one whose existence is 
 barely tolerated, who should work and toil all the days of his life. 
 
REV. M. B. IIUCKLEY. 195 
 
 and be content with the mere blessing of existence. Ills condition 
 improved since the passing of Catholic Emancipation. An ontrage 
 could not be committed upon him with quite so much impunity as 
 before ; but he was still a serf in the true sense of the word ; he 
 worked with the sweat of his brow on the farm whereon he was 
 born, and on which his fixther and grandfather had been born before 
 him. The landlord imposed whatever rent he pleased ; If the farm 
 was improved by the farmer's industry, up went the rent. At length 
 it grew so high that the farmer could not pay ; the times grew bad, 
 labor became too dear. Other evils conspired against the unfortu- 
 nate occupier. He was served with a notice to quit ; he borrowed, 
 begged, and paid, and procured a respite. But at length the day of 
 reckoning came again. He was not able to meet the demands of his 
 rapacious landlord. Then came the crow-bar ; the house was razed 
 to the ground, and the poor, struggling, honest, hard-working, 
 broken-hearted man was cast naked on the world. His famished 
 children walked before, his squalid wife clung to his side, and had 
 no word of consolation. They gazed their last on the old familiar 
 homestead, on the fields with which all the huml)le joys of their 
 lives were associated ; on the trees whose trembling leaves had so 
 often made sweet music to their ears. Now they are alone, homeless, 
 and friendless, and penniless, on the face of the bleak, cold world. 
 The law of the land, instead of protecting them, cries out to the 
 landlord, "You have done your duty." What? and may this 
 pampered minion trample on God's creatures, and no feeling of 
 ' resentment spring up in the breast of the outraged victim ? Is it no 
 murder for the purse-proud landlord to drive to starvation and death 
 hundreds of his fellow-beings, whose only crime is that they do not 
 labor more than that God has given them power to do ? Does he 
 not kill them as effectually as if he severed their throats from ear to 
 ear? And is he to escape the obloqu}^ of mankind and the penalty 
 of the law ? The unhappy being whom he has driven from his home 
 goes his way brooding over the wrong — the cruel wrong that has 
 been visited upon himself, and the wife and children of his bosom. 
 The crushed worm will turn on the heel th:it tramples it. Who can 
 be surprised that the demon of hatred and revenge takes possession 
 of his maddened brain ; that he seeks for an instrument of destruc- 
 tion, and wreaks upon the monster who provoked him, " the wild 
 
196 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 justice of revenge?" You, who live iu peace aud plenty, protected 
 by just and beneficent laws, free and independent, do not condemn 
 too rashly or too bitterly the wretch from whose mouth bread has 
 thus been wantonly snatched, and whose innocent children and 
 loving wife have thus been doomed to starve before his ej^es, nor 
 blame too severely those who consijire to defraud the law of its 
 revenge on the murderer. .The law in Ireland has never been the 
 friend of the peof)le. On the contrary, it has mui'dered them by 
 thousands and tens of thousands. I speak not of the legal murders 
 committed during the bloody sway of the penal code. I speak of 
 "what has happened in our own recollection. In the famine years, 
 when the poor starving peasants were not able to pay their rent, the 
 law permitted the landlords to drive them out of the country, to 
 crowd them on board fever ships, and banish them across the wide 
 Atlantic. The bones of those wretched exiles lie in myriads beneath 
 huge, shaj^eless mounds on the banks of the St. Lawrence, in Mon- 
 ti'eal, and Quebec, and on the shores of New Brunswick. This was 
 all done by law. And will any one turn round and say the Irish 
 should respect the law? "Philosophy is a very good horse in the 
 stable, but an arrant jade upon a journey." Put j'^ourself in the 
 place of the Irish peasant, whom his landlord has brought to ruin, 
 and tell me will you have more patience than he ? In this countr^s 
 if a man outrages your wife, and you shoot him dead in the public 
 streets, it will be hard to get a jury that will find you guilty of wilful 
 murder. And which is the less provocative crime ? To destroy the 
 character of a woman, or to put to a slow and painful death an 
 unoffending father and his offspring? The Irish peasants, therefore, 
 are no more murderers than the peasantry of any other country ; 
 they have committed murders in some districts, under pressure of 
 the most exciting provocation. As a rule, even in the much maligned 
 Tipperary, the Irish peasant possesses every virtue that could adorn 
 mankind, mingled with a softness akin to that for which the gentler 
 sex is distingished : — 
 
 " Tall is his form, his heart is warm, 
 His spirit light as any fairy, 
 Ilis wrath is fearful as the storm 
 That sweeps the hills of Tipperary. 
 
KEV. M. B. BUCKLEY. 197 
 
 " Lead him to fight for fatherland ; 
 His is no courage cold and wary. 
 The troops live not ou earth could stand 
 The headlong charge of Tipperary. 
 
 "But meet him in his cabin rude, 
 
 Or dancing with his dark-haired Mary, 
 You'd swear they knew no other mood 
 Than mirth and love in Tipperary." 
 
 We now come to that feature of the Irish character which has been 
 so seriously commented on all over the world — I mean a passion for 
 intoxicating drinks. And I must confess that here indeed is cause 
 of just complaint against us. I do not admit that the Irish are more 
 addicted to drunkenness than their neighbors ; I can produce no 
 statistics on the point. But it cannot be denied that our people are 
 deplorably prone to habits of iutoxication, and that, in fact, this vice 
 is the great bar to their prosperity in the world, and to the respect 
 which they would win amongst their fellow-men in foreign countries 
 where they dwell. We must stare the ugly foot in the face. Drunk- 
 enness is on the increase in Ireland, it is spreading amongst the 
 women as well as the men. To what extent it exists here you can 
 best judge. But of its sad effects no man can form a just estimate : 
 it debases the dignity of our nature, it paralyzes the intellect, it 
 extinguishes the reason, it unnerves the arm of labor, it brings 
 poverty, disgrace, disease and death, not only on the offender, but 
 on those who depend upon him for life and all its legitimate enjoy- 
 ments. I do lielicve that, if the Irish race were only sober, there 
 is no earth]}' difBculty they could not vanquish, there is no honor 
 they might not attain, no amount of respect they might not conciliate. 
 But as long as this blot exists on the national character, we must be 
 content to be pitied and despised by the more prudent and temperate 
 portion of mankind. 
 
 The only other serious weakness of the Irish character that I 
 can discern, and one which, though not so debasing as druulien- 
 ness, is yet equally disastrous to our national honor and progress, 
 is that spirit of dissensiou which exists among Irishmen. This 
 spirit is not of recent growth, it seems to have been at all times 
 inherent in the national character. It is said that every man is 
 born with the seeds of some disease in his system, which slowly 
 germinate, and finally produce his death, unless accident interpose 
 
198 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to efl'ect that o))ject. This niuhidy is said to be his congenital 
 disease. It ajipears to me that disunion is the congenital disease 
 of Irishmen. Ireland, no doubt, is composed of various and con- 
 flicting elements of population ; it has its Protestants and Catholics, 
 its Celts and Anglo-Saxons, the dominant and the subjugated races ; 
 and it is not unnatural that those conflicting elements should some- 
 times sound a discordant note. But what is really to be deplored 
 is that spirit of dissension that exists among parties whose inter- 
 ests are identical. On every public occasion where the interests 
 of the country are at stake, we find the popular party alwa3S 
 split up among themselves. Hence, the bitterest feelings are 
 aroused, life-long enmities are created, and the national cause re- 
 mains at the same eternal stand-still. Now, perhaps, what is 
 more extraordinary still is, that those seeds of congenital disease 
 in the national character appear to flourish and develop themselves 
 in a foreign clime even more vigorously than on their native soil, 
 although the class who emigrate are, for the most part, the mass 
 of the people who are Celtic, Catholic, and English-hating to the 
 back-boue. If Irishmen ever united, it surely ought to be in this 
 country, where they have only one great common interest — to es- 
 tablish a Celtic, Christian, free Ireland, which they are debarred 
 from establishing at home. And yet, what is the fact? I learned it 
 with surprise, I perceive it with shame, I denounce it with indigna- 
 tion, — even here, Irishmen have their dislikes, their prejudices, 
 their jealousies, their clannish antipathies, their vocabulary of abuse 
 against each other. I was not long in America when I became aware 
 of the existence of this feeling amongst my fellow-countrymen. I 
 refused to believe it, but I have now travelled, and mixed too much 
 amongst them to hoodwink the fact. It confounds, distresses, and 
 humiliates me. I found that amongst a section of my countrymen 
 who happen to be born in what is called the Xorth, — as if, at this 
 distance, the cardinal points of our little island were a matter of any 
 great importance, — the province, and particularly the county from 
 which I hail, were regarded with contempt. I should like to know 
 what the poor county of Cork has done that it should be regarded 
 with contempt. I believe our accent is remarkably Irish. Would 
 it be more respectable if it were English or Scotch ? And is it so 
 great a stiema on an Irishman to have an Irish accent? I wish some- 
 
REV. M. U. BUCKLEY. 299 
 
 body would tell me what is the contemptible point of a Corkman's 
 character, that I might honestly grapple with it, and see what it is 
 worth. Have we not produced as many great men as any other 
 Irish county? If I am not mistaken, we have added to the catalogue 
 of Irish greatness the name of Edmund Burke, one of the greatest 
 statesmen, philosophers, and orators the world has ever seen. We 
 claim the nativity of John P. Curran. William Penn, the founder 
 of Pennsylvania, was born in the county of Cork. The Sheares, 
 brothers, who perished on the scaffold for the cause of their country, 
 were born in the suburbs of Cork city. The celebrated Arthur 
 O'Leary was a Corkman ; so was James Barry, the painter ; so was 
 Maclise, one of the greatest painters of modern times. Thomas 
 Davis, the poet, was born in Mallow, in the county of Cork. Father 
 Prout was a native of Cork city. These names occur to me by ac- 
 cident. I could find many more, were I to search, but they are 
 sufficient to show that, in the ranks of intellect, we Corkmen have 
 noticing to be ashamed of. In any popular outburst of patriotism, 
 is Cork behind-hand ? What then is wrong with us ? Are we not 
 as good-looking as if we were raised in Sligo or Donegal ? Do we 
 not spend our money as freely as you do in xintrim or Tyrone ? 
 Are we not as well educated? But why do I dwell on this point? 
 To show you that, instead of tweaking your noses at any county, 
 you should be proud of them all, as part of that dear old land which 
 has produced so many great and noble men. I need not tell 3^ou 
 that these feelings of mutual antipathy are never dreamt of at home. 
 Let there be an end of them here, for surely they are not the in- 
 spiration of the Angel of Peace. 
 
 And now I have done. I have pointed out what I consider the 
 good and the weak points of our national character — what should 
 excite our pride, and what should suffuse our cheeks with shame. 
 In this latter part of my analysis, I have acted with a boldness for 
 which I entreat your indulgence. Men do not like to be reminded 
 of their faults, and we Irish have been treated too frequently to un- 
 qualified praise. For my part, I love the truth, and I should con- 
 sider myself the veriest coward and dissembler if I came here to 
 analyze your character, and did not point out your faults. Every 
 day's experience proves to me that you are a great and a noble people ; 
 that you are doing more for the promotion of Christianity, and con- 
 
200 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 sequent civilization, and for the dignity of manhood, than any nation 
 on the face of the earth : and one of the noblest fcatnres of your char- 
 acter, which I have not touclied (for I could not touch them all), is 
 the lofty indifference with which you treat the view with which other 
 nationalities regard you — you proceed in the proud consciousness 
 that you are doing what is just and right, and you must triumph in 
 the end. But, if you love the God who made you, and would secure 
 His blessing — if you value the approval of a good conscience — if 
 you prize the esteem of all good men — if you would secure success 
 in the race for the world's legitimate enjoyments, study the virtue of 
 temperance, and, instead of disparaging each other, pull together; 
 union is strength — your enemies will not help you in the road to 
 success — they rather rejoice in your discord as their best ally 
 against you. On j'oui'selves alone you must rely, whether toiling in 
 solitude or mingling in the hum and shock of men : — ■ 
 
 " Then flung alone, or hand in hand, 
 
 In mirthful hour, or spirit solemn, 
 In lowly toil, or high command, 
 
 In social hall, or charging column; 
 In tempting wealth and trying woe, 
 
 In struggling with a mob's dictation, 
 In bearing back a foreign foe. 
 
 In training up a troubled nation; 
 Still hold to truth, abound in love, 
 
 Refusing every base compliance, 
 Your praise within, your prize above, 
 
 And live and die in self-reliance." 
 
ANSWERS 
 
 TO FROUDE, THE ENGLISH HISTORIAN, 
 
 BY 
 
 Rev. Thomas N, Burke. 
 
 [ 201 ] 
 
FATHER BURKE. 
 
First Lecture, 
 
 Delivered est the Academy of Music, New York, Noveiviber 
 12, 1872. 
 
 ^ADIES AND GENTLEMEN, — It is a strange fact that the 
 ^^M old battle, which has been raging for seven hundred years, 
 1^ should continue so far away fi'om the old land. The question 
 ■L on which I am come to speak to you this evening is one that 
 
 has been disputed at many a council board, one that has been disputed 
 in many a parliament, one that has been disputed on many a well- 
 fought field, aud is not yet decided — the question between England 
 and Ireland. Amongst the visitors to America who came over this 
 year there was one gentleman distinguished in Europe for his style 
 of writing and for his historical knowledge, the author of several 
 works which have created a profound sensation, at least for their 
 originality. Mr. Froude has frankly stated that he came over to this 
 countrj' to deal with the English and with the Irish c|uestiou, viewing 
 it from the English standpoint ; that, like a true man, he came to 
 America to make the best case that he could for his own country ; 
 that he came to state that case to an American public as to a grand 
 jury, and to demand a verdict from them the most extraordinary that 
 was ever yet demanded from any people — namely, the declaration 
 that England was right in the manner in which she has treated my 
 native land for seven hundred years. It seems, according to this 
 learned gentleman, that we Irish have been badly treated ; that he 
 confesses, but he put in as a plea (hat we onhj got ivhat we deserved. 
 It is true, he says, that we have governed them badly; the reason is, 
 because it was impossible to govern them rightly. It is true that we 
 have robbed them ; the reason is, because it was a j^ity to leave them 
 
 (2a5) 
 
204 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tJieir own, they iwtdc such a bad use of it. It is true we have perse- 
 cuted them ; the reason is, persecution was a fashion of the time and 
 the order of the day. On those pleas there is not a criminal in prison 
 to-day in the United States that sliould not instantly get his freedom 
 by acknowledging his crime and pleading some extenuating circum- 
 stance. Our ideas about Ireland have been all wrong, it seems. 
 Seven hundred years ago the exigencies of the time demanded the 
 foundation of a strong British empire ; in order to do this, Ireland 
 had to be conquered, and Ireland was conquered. Since that time 
 the one ruling idea in the English mind has been to do all the good 
 that they could for the Irish. Their legislation and their action has 
 not alwaj's been tender, but it has been always beneficent. They 
 sometimes were severe ; 1)ut they were severe to us for our own 
 good, and the difficulty of England has been the Irish during these 
 long hundreds of years : they never understood their own interests or 
 knew what was for their own good. Now, the American mind is 
 enlightened, and henceforth no Irishman must complain of the past 
 in this new light in which IMr. Fronde puts it before us. Now, the 
 amiable gentlemen tells us, what has been our fate in the past he 
 greatly fcai"s we must reconcile ourselves to in the future. He comes 
 to tell us his version of the history of Ireland, and also to solve Ire- 
 land's difEculty, and to lead us out of all the miseries that have been 
 our lot for hundreds of years. When he came, many persons ques- 
 tioned what was the motive or the reason of his coming. I have 
 heard people speaking all round me, and assigning to the learned 
 gentleman this motive or that. Some people said he was an emis- 
 sary of the English government, that they sent him hei-e because they 
 were beginning to be afraid of the rising power of Ireland in this 
 great nation ; that they saw here eight millions of Irishmen by birth, 
 and i^erhaps fourteen millions by descent ; and that they knew 
 enough of the Irish to realize that the Almighty God blessed them 
 alwaj's with an extraordinary power, not only to preserve them- 
 selves, but to spread themselves, until in a few years not fourteen, 
 but fifty millions of descendants of Irish blood and of Irish race will 
 be in this land. According to those who thus surmise, England 
 wants to check the sympathy of the American people for their Irish 
 fellow-citizens ; and it was considered that the best way to effect this 
 was to send a learned man with a plausible story to this country, a 
 
FATHER BURKE. 205 
 
 man with a singular power of viewing facts in the light which he 
 wishes himself to view them and put them before others, a man with 
 the extraordinary power of so mixing np these facts that many 
 simple-minded people will look upon them as he puts them before 
 them as true, and whose mission it was to alienate the mind of 
 America from Ireland to-day by showing what an impracticable, 
 obstinate, accursed race we are. 
 
 Others, again, surmise that the learned gentleman came for another 
 purpose. They said, England is in the hour of her weakness ; she is 
 tottering fast and visibly to her ruin ; the disruption of that old 
 empire is visibly approaching ; she is to-day cast off without an ally 
 in Europe, her army a cipher, her fleet nothing — according to Mr. 
 Eeade, a great authority on this question — nothing to be compared 
 to the rival fleet of the great Russian power now growing up. When 
 France was pai'alyzed li}^ her late defeat, England lost her best ally. 
 The three emperors, in their meeting the other day, contemptuously 
 ignored her, and they settled the affairs of the world without as much 
 as mentioning the name of that kingdom, which was once so power- 
 ful. Her resources of coal and iron are fiiiling, her people are dis- 
 contented, and she is showing every sign of decay. Thus did some 
 people argue that England was anxious for an American alliance ; 
 for, they said, " What would be more natural than that the old tot- 
 tering emjiire should seek to lean on the strong, mighty, vigorous 
 young arm of America ? " 
 
 I have heard others say that the gentleman came over to this 
 country on the invitation of a little clique of sectarian bigots in this 
 country. Men who, feeling that the night of religious bigotry and 
 sectarian bitterness is fast coming to a close before the increasing 
 light of American intelligence and education, would fain prolong the 
 darkness for an hour or two by whatever help Mr. Froude could 
 lend them. 
 
 But I protest to you, gentlemen, here to-night that I have heard all 
 these motives assigned to this learned man without giving them the 
 least attention. I believe Mr. Froude's motives to be simple, 
 straightforward, honorable and patriotic. I am willing to give him 
 credit for the highest motives, and I consider him perfectly incapable 
 of lending himself to any base or soi'did proceedings from a base or 
 sordid motive. But as the learned gentleman's motives have been so 
 
206 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 freely canvassed and criticised, and, I believe, indeed, in many cases 
 misinterpreted, so my own motives in coming here to-night may be 
 perhaps also misinterpreted and misunderstood, unless I state them, 
 clearly and plainly. As he is said to come as an emissary of the 
 English Government, so I may be said, perhaps, to appear as an 
 emissary of rebellion or of revolution. As he is supposed by some to 
 have the sinister motive of alienating the American mind from the 
 Irish citizenship of the States, so I may be suspected of endeavoring 
 to excite religious or political hatred. 
 
 Now, I protest these are not my motives ; I come here to-night 
 simply to vindicate the honor of Ireland in her history. I come here 
 to-night lest any man should think that in this our da}'^, or in any 
 day, Ireland is to be left without a son, who will speak for the mother 
 that bore him. 
 
 And first of all I hold that Mr. Froude is unfit for the task he has 
 undertaken for three great reasons : First, because I find in the writings 
 of this learned gentleman that he solemnly and empiiatically declares 
 that he despairs of ever finding a remedy for Ireland, and he gives it 
 up as a bad job. Here are the words, written in one of his essays 
 a few years ago : " The present hope," he says, "is that by assiduous 
 justice " (that is to say, by conceding everything that the Irish please 
 to ask) " we shall disarm that enmity, and convince them of our 
 good will." It may be so ; there are persons sanguine enough to 
 hope that the Irish will be so moderate in what they demand, and 
 the English so liberal in what they grant, that at last we shall fling 
 ourselves into each other's arms in tears of mutual forgiveness. I do 
 not share that expectation ; it is more likely they will pxish their 
 importunities until at last we turn upon them and refuse to yield 
 further. And there will be a struggle once moi-e ; and either emi- 
 gration to America will increase in volume until it has carried the 
 entire race beyond our reach, or in some shape or other the}' will 
 again have to be coerced into submission. "Banish them or coerce 
 them" : there is the true English speech. "My only remedy," he 
 emphatically says, "my only hope, my only prospect for the future 
 for Ireland is, let them all go to America ; have done with the race ; 
 give to them a land at least that we have endeavored to make for 
 seven hundred years a deseil and a solitude ; or, if they remain at 
 home, they will have to be coerced into submission." I hold that 
 
FATHER BURKE. 207 
 
 that man has no right to come to America to tell the American people 
 and the Irish in America that he cannot describe the horoscope of 
 Ireland's future. He ought to be ashamed to attempt it after having 
 uttered such words. 
 
 The second reason why I say he is unfit for the task of describing 
 Irish history is because of his contempt for the Irish people. The 
 original sin of the Englishman has ever been his contempt for the 
 Irish. It lies deep, though dormant, in the heart of almost every 
 Englishman. The average Englishman despises the Irishman, looks 
 down upon him as a being almost inferior in nature. Now, I speak 
 not from prejudice, but from an intercourse of years, for I have 
 lived amongst them. I have known Englishmen, amiable and 
 generous themselves, charming characters, who would not for the 
 whole world nourish wilfully a feeling of contempt in their hearts 
 for any one, much less to express it in words ; yet I have seen them 
 manifest in a thousand forms that contempt for the Irish which 
 seems to be their very nature. I am sorry to say that I cannot 
 make any exception amongst the Protestants and Catholics of Eng- 
 land in this feeling. I mention this not to excite animositjs or to 
 create bad blood or bitter feeling — no, I protest this is not my 
 meaning ; but I mention this beeause I am convinced it lies at the 
 very root of this antipathy and of that hatred between the English 
 and Irish, which seems to be incurable, and I verily believe that 
 until that feeling is destro3'ed you never can have cordial union 
 between these two countries, and the only way to destroy it is by 
 so raising Ireland through justice and by home legislation that she 
 will attain such a position that she will command and enforce the 
 respect of her English fellow-subjects. Mr. Froude himself, who, 
 I am sure, is incapable of any ungenerous sentiment toward any 
 man or any people, is an actual living example of that feeling of 
 contempt of which I speak. In November, 1856, this leai'ned 
 gentleman addressed a Scottish assembly in Edinburgh. The sub- 
 ject of his address was, "The Etfect of the Protestant Eeformation 
 upon Scottish Character." According to him, it made the Scotch 
 the finest people on the face of the earth. Oi'iginally fine, they 
 never got their last touch that made them, as it wei'e, archangels 
 amongst men, until the holy hand of John Knox touched them. 
 On that occasion the learned srentlemau introduced himself to his 
 
208 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Scottish audience in the following words : " I have undertaken," he 
 says, " to speak this evening on the efi'ects of the Reformation in 
 Scotland, and I consider myself a very bold person to have come 
 here on any such undertaking. In the first place, the subject is one 
 with Avhich it is presumptuous for a stranger to meddle. Great 
 national movements can only be understood properly by the people 
 •whose disposition they represent. We see ourselves by our own 
 history that Englishmen only can properly comprehend it. It is 
 the same with every considerable nation that works out their own 
 political and spiritual lives through tempers, humors, and passions 
 peculiar to themselves, and the same disposition which produces the 
 result is required to interpret it afterwards." Did the learned 
 gentleman ofler any such apology for entering so boldly upon the 
 discussion of Irish aifairs ? Oh ! no ; there was no apology neces- 
 sary ; he was only going to speak of (he mere Irish. There was no 
 ■word to express his own fears that, periiaps, he did not understand 
 the Irish character or the subject upon which he was al)0ut to treat ; 
 there was no apology to the Irish in America — the fourteen mil- 
 lions — if he so boldly was to take up their history, endeavoring to 
 bold them up as a licentious, immoral, irreligious, contemptuous, 
 obstinate, unconquerable race; not at all! It was not necessary; 
 they were only Irish. If they were Scottish, then the learned 
 gentleman would have come with a thousand apologies for his own 
 presumption in venturing to approach such a delicate subject as the 
 delineation of the sweet Scottish character, or anything connected 
 with it. What, on the other hand, is his treatment of the Irish? I 
 have — in this book before me — I have words that came from his 
 pen, and I protest as I read them I feel every drop of my blood boil 
 in my veins when the gentleman said, "The Irish may be good at 
 the voting-booths, but they ai-e no good to handle a rifle." He 
 compares us in this essay to a "pack of hounds." He says: "To 
 deliver Ireland — to give Ireland any meed — would be the same as 
 if a gentleman, addressing his hounds, said, 'I give you your free- 
 dom ; now, go out to act for yourselves.'" That is, he means to 
 say, that, after worrying all the sheep in the neighborhood, they 
 ended by tearing each other to pieces. I deplore this feeling. The 
 man who is possessed of it can never understand the philosophy of 
 Irish history. 
 
FATHER BURKE. 209 
 
 Thirdl}^ Mr. Froude is utterly unfit for the task of deliueatiiig 
 and interpreting tlie history of the Irish people because of the more 
 than contempt and ])itter hatred and detestation in which he holds 
 the Catholic religion and the Catholic Church. In this book before 
 me he speaks of the Catholic Church as an old serpent whose pois- 
 onous fangs have been withdrawn from her, and she is uow as a 
 Witch of Endor, mumbling curses to-day because she cannot burn 
 at the stake and shed blood as of old. He most invariably charges 
 the Church and makes her responsible for the French massacre of 
 Saint Bartholomew's day ; for the persecutions of the Duke of Alva, 
 before those days, that originated from the revolution in the Nether- 
 lands against Philip the Second ; for every murder that has been 
 committed and fouler butchery. He says, from the virus of a most 
 intense prejudice, that the Catholic Church lies at the bottom of 
 them all, and is responsible for them. The ver}' gentlemen that 
 welcomed and surrounded him when he came to New York gave 
 him plainly to understand where the Catholic religion is involved, 
 where a favorite theory is to be worked out, where a iavorite view 
 is to be proved, that they did not consider him a reliable, trust- 
 worthy witness or, where his prejudices are concerned, historian. 
 Yet I again declare — not that I believe this gentleman to be capa- 
 ble of lying ; I believe he is incapable — but, wherever prejudice 
 comes in such as he has, he distorts the most well-known facts for 
 his own purposes. This gentleman wishes to exalt Queen Elizabeth 
 by blackening IMary, Queen of Scots. In doing this he has been 
 convicted by a citizen of Brooklyn of putting his owu words as if 
 they were the words of ancient chronicles and ancient laws, deeds 
 and documents, and the taunt has been flung at him, "that Mr. 
 Froude has never gra/tped the meaning of inverted commas." Henry 
 the Eighth, of blessed memory, has been painted by this historian 
 as a most estimable man, as chaste and as holy as a monk, bless 
 your soul ! A man that never robbed anybody, who every day was 
 burning with zeal for the public good. As to putting away his wife 
 and taking in the young and beautiful Anne Boleyn to his embrace, 
 that was from a chaste anxiety for the public good ! All the atroci- 
 ties of this monster in human form — all — melt away under Mr. 
 Fronde's eye, and Henry the Eighth rises before us in such a form 
 that even the Protestants in England, when they heard Mr. 
 
210 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Fronde's description of him, said : " Ohi ! you have mistaken your 
 man, sir." 
 
 One fact will show you liow this gentleman treats iiistor_y : When 
 King Henry the Eighth declared war against the Church, and when 
 all England was convulsed by this tyranny — one day hanging a 
 Catholic because he would not deny the supremacy of the Pope, 
 the next day hanging a Protestant because he denied the Real 
 Presence — anybody that differed from Henry was sure to be sent 
 to the scaffold. It was a sure and expeditious way of silencing all 
 argument. 
 
 During this time, w^hen the monasteries were beginning to be pil- 
 laged, the Catholic clergy of England, especially those who remain- 
 ed faithful to the Pope, were most odious to the tyrant, and such 
 was the slavish acquiescence of the English people that they began 
 to hate their clergy in order to please their king. Well, at this 
 time a certain man, whoso name was Hunn, was lodged a prisoner 
 in the Tower and hanged by the neck. There was a coroner's inquest 
 held upon him, and the twelve blackrjuards — I can call them nothing 
 else — in order to express their hatred for the Church and to please 
 the powers which were, found a verdict against the chancellor of 
 the Bishop of London, a most excellent priest, whom everybody 
 knew to be such. When the bishoi^ heard of this verdict, he 
 applied to the Prime Minister to have the verdict quashed. He 
 brought the matter before the House of Lords, in order that the 
 character of his chancellor might be fully vindicated. The king's 
 Attorney-General took cognizance of it by a solemn decree, and the 
 verdict of the coroner's inquest was set aside, and the twelve men 
 declared to be twelve perjurers. Now listen to Mr. Froude's ver- 
 sion of that story. He says : "The clergy of the time were reduced 
 to such a dreadful state that actually a coroner's inquest returned a 
 verdict of wilful murder against the chancellor of the Bishop of Lon- 
 don, and the bishop was obliged to apply to Cardinal Wolsey fo 
 have a special jury to try him, because if he took any twelve men in 
 London, they would have found him guilty." Leaving the reader 
 under the impression that this priest, this chancellor, was a monster 
 of iniquity, and the priests of the time were as bad as he — leaving 
 the impression that a man was guilty of the murder who was inno- 
 cent as Abel, and who, if put for trial before twelve of his country- 
 
FATHER BURKt:. 211 
 
 men, they would have found bim guilty on the evidence — this is 
 the version he jouts upon it, he knowing the facts as well as I know 
 them. 
 
 Well, now, my friends, I come to consider the subject of his first 
 lecture. Indeed, I must say I never practically experienced the 
 dilBculty of hunting a Avill-o'-the-wisp in a marsh until I came to 
 follow this learned gentleman in his first lecture. I say nothing 
 disrespectful of him at all, but simply say he covered so much 
 ground at such unequal distances that it was impossible to follow 
 him. He began by remarking how General Eufus King wrote such 
 a letter about certain Irishmen, and said that the Catholics of Ireland 
 sympathized with England, while the Protestants of Ireland wero 
 breast high for America in the old struggle between this country and 
 Great Britain. All these questions which belong to our day I will 
 leave aside for the close of these lectures. When I come to speak 
 of the men and things of our own day, then I shall have great 
 pleasure in taking up Mr. Fronde's assertions. But, coming home 
 to the great question of Ireland, what does this gentleman tell iis? 
 For seven hundred years Ireland was invaded by the Anglo-Nor- 
 mans. The first thing, apparently, that he wishes to do is to justify 
 this invasion, and establish this principle, that the Normans were 
 right in coming to Ireland. He began by drawing a terrible picture 
 of the state of Ireland before the invasion. " Thej^ were cnttin"' 
 each other's throats, the whole land was covered with bloodshed. 
 There Avas in Ireland neither religion, morality, nor government; 
 therefore the Pope found it necessary to send the Normans to Ire- 
 land, as you would send a policeman in a saloon where the people 
 were killing one another." This is his justification, that in Ireland, 
 seven hundred years ago, just before the Norman invasion, there 
 was neither religion, morality, or government. Let us see if he is 
 right. 
 
 The first proof that he gives that there was no government in Ire- 
 land is a most insidious statement. He says, "How could there be 
 any government in a countrj' where every family maintained itself 
 according to its own ideas of right and wrong, acknowledjring no 
 authority." Now, if this be trne in our sense of the word " family," 
 certainly Ireland was in a most deplorable state — every family irov- 
 erning itself according to its notions, and acknowledging no author- 
 
212 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE 
 
 ity. What does he mean by the words " every family"? Speaking 
 to Americans in the nineteenth century, it means every household in 
 the land. We speak of familj' as composed of fatiier, mother, and 
 thi-ee or four children gathered around the domestic hearth. This 
 is our idea of the word family. I freely admit if every family in 
 Ireland were governed by their own ideas, admitting of no authority 
 over them, he has established his case in one thing against Ireland. 
 But what is the meaning of the words " every family ? " As every 
 Irishman who hears me to-night knows, it meant the " sept," or the 
 tribe, that had the same name. They owned two or three counties 
 and a large extent of territory. The men of the same name were 
 called the men of the same family. The MacMurraghs of Leinster, 
 the O'Tooles of Wicklow, the O'Byrncs in Kildare, the O'Conors of 
 Connaught, the O'Neils and the O'Donnells of Ulster. The family 
 meant a nation. Two or three counties were governed by one 
 chieftain and represented by one man of the sept. It is quite true 
 that each family governed itself in its own independence, and ac- 
 knowledged no superior. There were five great fmiiiies in Ireland. 
 The O'Conors in Connaught, the O'Ncilt, in Ulster, the MacLaugh- 
 lins in Meath, the O'Brien's in Munster, and the MacMurraghs in 
 Leinster. And under these five great heads there wore minor septs 
 and smaller families, each counting from five or six hmidred to perhajis 
 a thousand fighting men, but all acknowledging in the different prov- 
 inces the sovereignt}' of the five great royal houses. These five 
 houses, again, elected their monarch, or supreme ruler, called the 
 Avd-righy who dwelt in Tara. Now, I ask you, if family meant 
 the whole sept or tribe, or army in the field, defending their families, 
 having their regular constituted authority and head, is it fair to s:iy 
 that the country was in anarchy because everj- famil}' governed them- 
 selves according to their own notions? Is it fair for this gentleman 
 to try to hoodwink and deceive the American jury, to which he has 
 made his appeal, by describing the Irish family, which meant a sept 
 or tribe, as a family of the nineteenth century, which means only 
 the head of the house with the mother and the children ? 
 
 Again he says : " In this deplorable state the people lived like 
 the New Zealanders of to-day — lived in underground caves." And 
 then he boldly says " that I myself opened up in Ireland one of these 
 underground houses of the Irish people." Now, mark. This gen- 
 
FATHER BURKE. ^|3 
 
 tleman lived in Ii-eland a few years ago, and he discovered a ralli in 
 Kerry. In it he found some remains of mussel-shells and bones. 
 At the time of the discovery ho had the most learned archjeologist 
 in Ireland with him, and they put together their heads about it. 
 Mr. Froude has written in this very book " that what these places 
 were intended for, or the uses they were applied to, baffled all con- 
 jecture ; no one could tell." Then if it baffled all conjecture, and 
 he did not know what to make of it — if it so puzzled him then that 
 no man could declare what they were for — what right has he to 
 come out to America and say they were the ordinary dwellings of 
 the people? 
 
 In order to understand the Norman invasion, I must ask you to 
 consider first, my friends, the ancient Irish constitution which gov- 
 erned the land. Ireland was governed by " septs," or families. The 
 land from time immemorial was in the possession of these families 
 or tribes ; each tribe elected its own chieftain, and to him they paid 
 the most devoted obedience and allegiance, so that the fidelity of the 
 Irish clansman to his chief was proverbial. The chief, during his 
 life-time, convoked an assembly of the tribe again, and they elected 
 from amongst the princes of his ftunily the best and the strongest 
 man to be his successor, and they called him the Tanist. The 
 object of this was that the successors of the king might be known, 
 and at tlie king's death or the prince's death there might be no riot 
 or bloodshed or contention for the right of succession to him. Was 
 this not a wise law? The elective monarchy has its advantages. 
 The best man comes to the front, because he is the choice of his 
 fellow-men ; for when they come to elect a successor to their prince, 
 they choose the best man, not the king's eldest son, who might be a 
 booby or a fool. And so they came together and Avisely selected the 
 best, the strongest, the bravest, and the wisest man ; and he was 
 acknowledged to have the right to the succession. He was the 
 Tanist, according to the ancient law of Ireland. Well, these fam- 
 ilies, as we said, in the various provinces of Ireland owed allegiance 
 and paid it to the king of the provinces. He was one of the five 
 great families called " The five great families of Ireland." Each 
 prince had his own judge or hrehon, who administered justice in the 
 court to the people. These 6;-e7<o)z judges were learned men. The 
 historians of the time tell us that they could speak Latin as fluently 
 
214 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 as tbey could speak Irish. Thoy had estal)lishcd a code of law, and 
 all their colleges studied that law ; and when they had graduated in 
 their studies, came home to their respective septsor tribes, and were 
 established as judges or brehons over the people. Nay, more ; 
 nowhere in the history of the island do we hear of an instance where 
 a man rebelled or protested against the decision of h'lsbrelion judge. 
 Then these tive monarchs in the provinces elected an Ard-righ, or 
 high-king. With him they sat in council on national matters within 
 the halls of imperial Tara. 
 
 There Patrick found them in the year 432, minstrel, bard, and 
 hrehon, prince, crowned monarch and king; there did he find them 
 discussing like lords and true men the alfairs of the nation, when he 
 preached to them the faith of Jesus Christ. And while this consti- 
 tution remained the clansmen paid no rent for their land. The land 
 of the tribe or fomily was held in common. It was the common 
 property of all, and the hrehon or judge divided it, and gave to each 
 man what was necessary for him, with free right to pasturage over 
 the whole. They had no idea of slavery or serfdom among them. 
 The Irish clansman was of the same blood with his chieftain. O'Brien, 
 who sat in the saddle at the head of his men, was (?) related to 
 ( !) Gallowglass O'Brien that was in the ranks. No such thing as 
 looking down l)y the chieftains upon their people. No such thing 
 as a cowed abject submission upon the part of the people to a tyran- 
 nical chieftain. In the ranks they stood as freemen, freemen per- 
 fectly equal one with the other. We are told by Gerald Barr}^ the 
 lying historian , who sometimes, though rarely, told the truth, that 
 when the English came to Ireland nothing astonished them more than 
 the free and bold manner in which the humblest man spoke to his 
 chieftain, and the condescending kindness and spirit of equality in 
 which the chieftain treated the humblest soldier in his tribe. 
 
 This was the ancient Irish constitution, my friends. And, now, 
 does this look anything like anarchy? Can it be said with truth of 
 a land where the laws were so well defined, where everything was 
 in its proper place, that there was anarchy? Mr. Fronde says, 
 " There was anarchy there, because the chieftains were fighting among 
 themselves." So they were, but he also adds, "There was fighting 
 everywhere in Europe after the l)reaking up of the Roman Empire." 
 Well, Mr. Fronde, fiwhtine: was goinjj on everywhere, the Saxons 
 
FATHER BURKE. 215 
 
 were fighting the Normans around them in England, and what right 
 have you to say that Ireland, beyond all other nations, was given up 
 to anarchy because chieftain drew the sword against chieftain from 
 time to time. 
 
 So much for the question of government. Now for the question 
 of religion. The Catholic religion flourished in Ireland for 600 
 years and more before the Anglo-Normans invaded her coasts. For 
 the first 300 years that religion was the glory of the world and the 
 pride of God's holy Church. Ireland for these 300 years was the 
 island-mother home of saints and of scholars. Men came from every 
 country in the then known world to light the lamps of knowledge 
 and of sanctity at the sacred fire upon the altars of Ireland. Then 
 came the Danes, and for 300 years our people were harrassed by 
 incessant war. The Danes, as Mr. Froude remarks, apparently with 
 a great deal of ai)proval, had no respect for Christ or for religion, 
 and the first thing they did was to set fire to the churches and mon- 
 asteries. The nuns and holy monks were scattered, and the people 
 left without instruction. Through a time of war men don't have 
 much time to think of religion or things of peace, and for 300 years 
 Ireland was subject to the incursions of the Danes. On Good 
 Friday morning, in the year 1014, Brian Boroihme defeated the 
 Danes at Clontarf ; but it was not until the 23d of August, 1103, in 
 the twelfth century, that the Danes were driven out of the land, by 
 the defeat of Magnus, their ( ?) king, at ( ?) Lochstransford, in the 
 (?) centre of Ireland. The consequence of these Danish wars was 
 that the Catholic religion, though it remained in all its vital strength, 
 in all the purity of its faith amongst the Irish people, yet it re- 
 mained sadly shorn of that sanctity which adorned for the first 300 
 years Irish Christianity. Vices sprung up amongst the people, for 
 they were accustomed to war ! war/ war ! night and day for three 
 centuries. Where is the people on the face of the earth that would 
 not be utterly demoralized by fifty years of war, much less by 300 ? 
 The Wars of the Roses in England did not last more than three 
 years, and they left the English people so demoralized that almost 
 without a struggle they changed their religion at the dictates of the 
 bloodthirsty and licentious tyrant, Henry VIII. 
 
 No sooner was the Dane gone than the Irish people summoned 
 ■their bishojis and their priests to council, and we find almost every 
 
216 TREASURY OP^ ELOQUENCE. 
 
 year after the final expulsion of the Dane a council held. Tliei-e 
 gathered the bishops, priests, the leaders, and the chieftains of the 
 land, the heads of the great septs or families. There they made 
 those laws by which they endeavored to repair all the evils of the 
 Danish invasion. Strict laws of Christian morality were enforced, 
 and again and again we find these councils assembled to receive a 
 Papal legate — Cardinal Papero in the year 11G4, five years before 
 the Norman invasion. They invited the Papal legate to the council, 
 and we find the Irish people every year after the Norman invasion 
 obeying the laws of the council without a murmur. "We find the 
 council of Irish bishops asseml)led, supported 1>3' the sword and 
 power of the chieftains, with the Pope's legate, who was received into 
 Ireland with open arms Avhenever his master sent him, without let 
 or hindrance. "When he arrived he was surrounded with all the 
 devotion and chivalrous affection which the Irish have always paid to 
 their representatives of religion in the country. 
 
 And, my friends, it is Morth our while to see what was the con- 
 sequence of all these councils, what was the result of this great 
 religious revival which was taking [)lace in Ireland during the few 
 years that elapsed between the last Danish invasion and the invasion 
 of the Normans. We find three Irish saints reigning together iu 
 the Church. Wo find St. Malachi, one of the greatest saints, 
 Primate of Armagh; we find him succeeded by St. Celsus, and' 
 again, by Gregorius, whose name is a name higii up in the martyr- 
 ology of the time. We find in Duljlin St. Lawrence O'TooIe, of 
 glorious memory. We find Felix and Chi'istian, Bishops of Lismoi'c ; 
 Catliolicus, of Down ; Augustin, of Waterford ; and every man of 
 them famed, not only in Ireland, but throughout the whole Church 
 of God, for the greatness of their learning and for the brightness of 
 their sanctity. We find at the same time Irish monks famous for 
 their learning as men of their class, and as fonious for their sanctity. 
 In the great Irish Benedictine Monastery of Eatisbon we find Law- 
 rence and twelve other Irish monks. We find, moreover, that the 
 very year before the Normans arrived in Ireland, iu 1168, a great 
 council was held at Athboy, thirteen thousand Irishmen representing 
 the nation. Thirteen thousand warriors on horseback attended the 
 council, and the bishops and priests with their chiefs, to take the 
 laws they made from them and hear whatever the Church commanded 
 
FATHER BURKE. 21T 
 
 them to obey. "What was the result of all this ? Ah ! my friends, 
 I am not speaking from any prejudiced point of view. It has been 
 said "that if Mr. Froude gives the liistor^^ of Ireland from an outside 
 view, of course Father Burke would have to give it from an inside 
 view." Now, I am not giving it from an inside view; I am only 
 quoting English authoi'ities. I find that in this very interval between 
 the Danish and Saxon invasion, Lanfranc, Archbishop of Canterbury, 
 writing to O'Brien, King of Munster, congratulates him on the reli- 
 gious spirit of his people. I find St. Anselm, one of the greatest 
 saints that ever lived, and Archbishop of Canterbury vmdcr AA'illiam 
 Eufus, writes to Murtagh, King of Munster: "I give thanks to 
 God," he says, " for the many good things we hear of jour highness, 
 and especially for the profound peace which the subjects of your 
 realm enjoy. All good men who hear this give thanks to God and 
 pray that he may grant you length of daj's." The man who wrote 
 that perhaps was thinking while he was ^vriting of the awful anarchy, 
 impiety, and darkness of the most dense and terrible kind xviiich 
 covered his own land of England in the reign of the Ked King 
 William Rufus. And yet we are told, indeed, by Mr. Froude — a 
 good judge he seems to be of religion; for he saj's in one of his 
 lectures : " Religion is a thing of which one man knows as much as 
 another, and none of us knows anything at all " — he tells us that 
 the Irish were without religion at the very time when the Irish Church 
 was forming itself into the model of sanctity which it was at the 
 time of the Danish invasion, when Roderic O'Conor, King of Con- 
 naught, was acknowledged by every prince and chieftain in the land 
 to be the high-king, or Ard-vigh. 
 
 Now, as far as regards what he says — " that Ireland was M'ithout 
 morality " — I have but little to say. I will answer that by one fact. 
 A king of Ireland stole another man's wife. His name — accursed ! 
 — was Dermot MacMurragh, King of Leinstcr. Every chieftain in 
 Ireland, every man, rose up and banisiied him from Irish soil as 
 unworthy to live on it. If these were the immoral people — if these 
 were the bestial, incestuous, depraved race which they are described 
 by leading Norman authorities to be — may I ask you miglit not 
 King Dermot turn round and say : " Why are you making war upon 
 me : is it not the order of the day? Have I not as good a right to 
 be a blackguard as anybody else?" Now comes Mr. Froude, and 
 
-218 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 says : " The Noi'mans were sent to Ireland to teach the Ten Com- 
 mandments to the Irish." In the hmguage of Shakspere, I would 
 say : "Oh ! Jew, I thank thee for that word." In these Ten Com- 
 mandments the three most important are, in their relation to human 
 society, " Thou shalt not steal ; thou shalt not kill ; thou shalt not 
 covet thy neighbor's wife." 
 
 The Normans, even in Mr. Fronde's view, had no right or title 
 tinder heaven to one square inch of the soil of Ireland. They came 
 to take what was not their own, what they had no right or title to ; 
 and they came as robbers and thieves to teach the Ten Command- 
 ments to the Irish people, amongst them the commandment, "Thou 
 shalt not steal." 
 
 Henry landed in Ireland in 1171. He was after murdering the 
 holy xVrohbishop of Canterbury, St. Thomas a Beeket. They scat- 
 tered his brains before the foot of the altar, before the Blessed 
 Sacrament at the Vesper hour. The blood of the saint and martyr 
 was upon his hands when he came to Ireland to teach the Irisii, 
 "Thou shalt not kill." What was the occasion of their coming? 
 When the adulterer was driven from the sacred soil of Erin as one 
 unworthy to proftme it by his tread, he went over to Henry, and 
 procured from him a letter permitting any of his subjects that chose 
 to embark for Ireland to do so, and there to reinstate the adulterous 
 tyrant King Dermot in his kingdom. They came there as protectors 
 and helpers of adultery to teach the Irish people, "Thou shalt not 
 covet thy neighbor's wife." 
 
 Mr. Froude tells us they were right, that they were the apostles 
 of purity, honesty, and clemency. Mr. Froude " is an honorable 
 man." Ah ! but he says, Kemember, my good Dominican friend, 
 " that if they came to Ireland , they came because the Pope sent 
 them." Henry, in the year 1174, produced a letter, which he said 
 he received from Pope Adrian IV., which commissioned himself to 
 Ireland, and permitted him there, accordhig to the terms of the letter, 
 to do whatever he thought right and fit to promote the glory of God 
 and the good of the people. The date that was on the letter was 
 1154, consequently it was twenty years old. During the twenty 
 years nobody ever heard of that letter, except Henry, who had it in 
 'his pocket, and an old man, called John of Salisbury, who wrote 
 tow he went to Rome and procured the letter in a hugger-mugger 
 
FATHER BURKE. 219 
 
 ■way from the Pope. Now, let iis examine this letter. It has been 
 examined by a better authority than me. It has been examined by 
 one who is here to-night, who has brought to bear upon it the acumen 
 of his great knowledge. It Avas dated, according to Kbymer, the 
 great English authority, 1154. Pope Adrian was elected Pope the 
 3d of December, 1154. No sooner was the news of his election 
 received in England than John of Salisbury was sent out to con- 
 gratulate him by King Henry, and to get this letter. It must have 
 been the 3d of January, 1155, before the news reached England; 
 for in those days no news could come to England from Rome in less 
 than a month. John of Salisbury set out, and it must have been 
 another month, the end of Februaiy or the beginning of March, 
 1155, before he arrived in Rome, and the letter was dated 1154. 
 This date of Rhymer's was found inconvenient, wherever he got it, 
 and the current date afterwards was 1155. "But there was a copy 
 of it kept in the archives of Rome, and how do you get over that?" 
 The copy had no date at all ! Now, this copy, according to Baronius, 
 had no date at all, and, according to the Roman laws, a rescript that 
 has no date is invalid, just so much waste-paper; so that even if 
 Pope Adrian gave it, it is worth nothing. Again, learned authors 
 tell us that the existence of a document in the archives of Rome 
 does not prove the authority of the document. It may be kept 
 there as a mere historical record. 
 
 Bat suppose that Pope Adrian had given the letter to Henry, and 
 Hemy had kept it so secret because his mother, the Empress Ma- 
 tilda, did not want him to act upon it. Well, when he did act ujion 
 it, why did he not produce it ? That was the only warrant on which 
 he came to Ii'eland, invaded the country, and he never breathed a 
 word to a human being about that letter. There is a lie on the face 
 of it ! Oh ! Mr. Froude reminded me " to remember that Alexander 
 HI. , his successor, mentions that rescript of Adrian's, and coufii'ms 
 it." I answer, with Dr. Lynch and the learned author. Dr. Moran, 
 of Ossory, and with many Irish scholars and historians, that Alex- 
 ander's letter is a forgery as well as Adrian's, 
 
 I grant that there are learned men who admit the Bull of Adrian 
 and Alexander's rescript ; but there are equally learned men who 
 deny that Bull, and I have as good reason to believe one as the other, 
 and / prefer to believe it ivas a forgery. Alexander's letter bears 
 
220 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the date 1172. Now, let us see whether it is likely for the Pope 
 Alexander to give Henry such a letter, recommending him to go to 
 Ireland, the beloved son of the Lord, to take care of the Church, 
 etc. Ecmcmber it is said that Adrian gave the rescript, and did not 
 know the man he gave it to. But Alexander knew him well ! Henry, 
 in 1159 and 1176, supported the Anti-Popes against Alexander, and, 
 accoi'diug to Matthew of Westminster, King Henry II., obliged 
 every one in England> from the boy of twelve years of age to the 
 old man, to renounce their allegiance to Alexander III., and go over 
 to the Anti-Popes. Now, is it likely that Alexander would give him 
 a rescript telling him to go to Ireland then and settle ecclesiastical 
 matters? Alexander himself wrote to Henry, and said to him: 
 "Instead of remedying the disorders caused by your predecessors, 
 3'ou have added prevarication to prevarication ; you have oppressed 
 the Cliurch, and endeavored to destroy the canons of apostolical 
 men." 
 
 Such is the man that Alexander sent to Ireland to make them good 
 people. According to Mr. Froude, " the Irish never loved the Pope 
 until the Normans taught them." What is the ftxct? Until the 
 accursed Norman came to Ireland the Papal legate always came to 
 the land at his pleasure. No king ever obstructed him ; no Irish 
 hand was ever raised against a bishop, priest of the land, or Papal 
 legate. After the first legate. Cardinal Vivian, passed over to Eng- 
 land, Henry took him by the throat and made him swear that when 
 he went to Ireland he would do nothing against the interests of the 
 king. It was an iinheard-of thing that archbishops and cardinals 
 should be persecuted until the Normans tauglit the world how to do 
 it witli their accursed feudal system, concentrating all power in the 
 king. 
 
 Ah ! bitterly did Lawrence O'Toole feel it, the great heroic saint 
 of Ireland, when he went to England on his last voyage. The 
 moment he arrived in England the king's officers made him prisoner. 
 The king left orders that he was never to set foot in Ireland again. 
 
 It was this man that was sent over as an apostle of morality to 
 Ireland ; he who was the man accused of violating the betrothed wife 
 of his own son, Richard I. ; a man whose crimes will not bear repe- 
 tition ; a man who was believed by Europe to be possessed of the 
 devil ; a man of whom it is written " that when he got into a fit of 
 
FATHER BURKE. 221 
 
 aiicer he tore off his clothes and sat naked, chcwhig straw like a 
 beast." Furthermore, is it likely that a Pope who knew hun so 
 well, who suffci'ed so much from him, would have sent him to Ire- 
 land — the murderer of bishojDs, the robber of churches, the destroyer 
 of ecclesiastical liberty, and every form of liberty that came before 
 him. No ! I never will believe that the Pope of Rome was so very 
 short-sighted, so unjust, as by a stroke of his pen to abolish and 
 destroy the lil)ertics of the most faithful people who ever bowed down 
 in allegiance to him. 
 
 But let us suppose that Pope Adrian gave the Bull. I hold still 
 it was of no account, because it was obtained under false pretences ; 
 for he told the Pope, "The Irish are in a state of miserable exist- 
 ence," which did not exist. Secondly, he told a lie, and according 
 to the Roman law, a Papal rescript obtained on a lie was null and 
 void. Again, when Henry told the Pope, when he gave him that 
 rescript and power to go to Ireland, that he would fix everything 
 right, and do everything for the glory of God and the good of the 
 people, he had no intention of doing it, and never did it ; conse- 
 quently tlie rescript was null and void. 
 
 But suppose the rescript was valid. Well, my friends, what power 
 did it give Henry? Did it give him the land of Ii-eland? Not a bit 
 of it. All it was that the Pope said was, " I give you power to enter 
 Ireland, there to do what is necessary for the glory of God and the 
 good of the people." At most, he said he wished of the Irish chief- 
 tains to acknowledge his high sovereignty over the land. Now, you 
 must know that in these early Middle Ages there were two kinds of 
 sovereignty. There was a sovereignty that ruled the people and the 
 land, the king governing these, as the kings and emperors do in 
 Europe to-day. Besides this, there was a sovereignty which required 
 the homage only of the chieftains of the land, but which left them in 
 perfect liberty and in perfect independence. The latter demanded a 
 nominal tribute of their homage and Avorship, and nothing more. 
 This was all evidently that the Pope of Rome claimed in Ireland, iJ 
 he permitted so much ; and the proof of it here lies, that when 
 Henry II. came to Ireland he did not claim of the Irish kings that 
 they should give up their sovereignty. He left Roderic O'Conor, 
 King of Connaught, acknowledging him as a fellow-king ; he 
 acknowledged his royalty, and confirmed him when he demanded 
 
222 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of him the allegiance and the homage of a feudal prince, a feudal sov- 
 ereign ,Jeaving him in jiei'fect independence. 
 
 Again, let us suppose that Henry intended to conquer Ireland and 
 bring it into slavery ; did he succeed ? Was there a conquest at all ? 
 Nothing like it. He came to Ireland, and the kings and princes of 
 the Irish people said to him : " Well, we are willing to acknowledge 
 your high sovereignty ; you are the Lord of Ireland, but we are the 
 owners of the land. It is simply acknowledging your title as Lord 
 of Ireland, nothing more." If he intended anything more, he never 
 carried out his intention ; he was able to conquer that portion which 
 was held before by the Danes, but not outside. It is a fact that 
 when the Irish had driven the Danes out of Ireland at Clontarf, as 
 the}' were always straightforward and generous in the hour of their 
 triumph, they permitted the Danes to remain in Dublin, Wexford, 
 Wicklow, and Waterford, and from the Hill of Howth to AVaterford. 
 The consequence was that the whole eastern shore of Ireland was iu 
 the possession of the Danes. The Normans came over, and were 
 regarded by the Irish as cousins to the Danes, and only took the 
 Danish territory, and nothing more ; and they were willing to share 
 with them. Therefore there was no cause now for INIr. Fronde's 
 second justification of these most iniquitous acts, that Ireland was a 
 prey to the Danes. He says the Danes came to the land and made 
 the Irish people ferocious, and leaves his hearers to infer that the 
 Danish wars in Ireland were only a succession of individual and fero- 
 cious contests between tribe and tribe, and between man and man; 
 whereas they were a magnificent trial of sti'ength between two of the 
 greatest and strongest nations that ever met foot to foot or hand to 
 hand on a battle-field. The Danes were unconquerable. 
 
 The Celt for 300 years fought with them, and disputed every inch 
 of the land with them, filled every valley in the land with their dead 
 bodies, and in the end drove them back into the North Sea and freed 
 his native land from their domination. This magnificent contest is 
 represented by this historian as a mere ferocious onslaught, daily 
 renewed, between man and man in Ireland. The Normans arrived, 
 and we have seen how they were received. The Butlers and Fitz- 
 geralds went down into Kildare, the De Berminghams and Burkes 
 Avent down into Connaught. The people oflered them very little 
 opposition, gave them a portion of their lands, and welcomed them 
 
FATHER BURKE. 223 
 
 amongst them ; they began to love them as if they were their owu 
 flesh and blood. But, my friends, these Normans, so haughty in 
 England, who despised the Saxons so bitterly that their name for the 
 Saxon was "villein," orchui'l, who would not allow a Saxon to sit at 
 the same table with them, who never thought of intermarrying with 
 the Saxons for many long years ; the j^roud Norman, ferocious in his 
 passions, brave as a lion, formed by his Crusades and Saracenic 
 wars the bravest warrior of his times, this steel-clad knight disdained 
 the Saxon. Even one of their followers, Gerald Barry, speaking of 
 the Saxons, says : "I am a Welshman. Who would think of com- 
 paring the Welsh with the Saxon boors, the basest race on the face 
 of the earth. They fought one battle, and when the Normans con- 
 quered them they consented to be slaves forevermore. Who would 
 compare them with the Welsh, the Celtic race," says this man, 
 "with the brave, intellectual, and magnanimous race of the Celts?" 
 Now, my friends, when these Normans went down into Ireland 
 amongst the Irish people, went out from the Danish portion of the 
 pale, what is the first thing that we see? They threw off their Nor- 
 man traits, forgot their Norman-French language, and took to the 
 Irish, took Irish wives, and were glad to get them, and adopted 
 Irish customs, until in 200 years after the Norman invasion we find 
 that these proud descendants of William Fitz Adhelm, the Earls of 
 Clanricarde, changed their names to Mac William Burkes oughter and 
 eeghter (or the upper and lower sons of William) in the time of 
 Lionel, Duke of Clarence ; and as they called themselves by the 
 name, so they adopted the language and customs of the country. 
 During the four hundred sad years that followed the Norman inva- 
 sion down to the accession of Henry VIII. , Mr. Froude has nothing 
 to say but that Ireland was in a constant state of anarchy and confu- 
 sion, and it is too true. It is perfectly true. Chieftain against 
 chieftain ! It was comparative peace before the invasion, but when 
 the Normans came in they drew them on by craft and cunning. The 
 ancient historian, Strabo, says : " The Gauls always march openly to 
 their end, and they are therefore easily circumvented." So when 
 the Normans came and the Saxons, they sowed dissensions among 
 the people, they stirred them up against each other, and the bold, 
 hot blood of the Celt was always ready to engage in contest and in 
 war. What was the secret of that incessant and desolating war? 
 
■224: TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 There is no history more puiiiful to read than the history of the Irish 
 people from the day that the Norman landed on their coast until the 
 day when the great issue of Protestantism was put before the nation, 
 and when Irishmen rallied in tliat great day as one man. My 
 friends, the true secret is that early and constant effort of the Eng- 
 lish to force upon Ireland the feudal sj'stcm, and consequently to 
 rob the Irish of every inch of their land and to exterminate the Celtic 
 race. I lay this down as the one secret, the one thread, by which 
 you may unravel the tangled skein of our history for the 400 years 
 that followed the Norman invasion. The Normans and the Saxons 
 •came with the express purpose and design of taking every foot of 
 land in Ireland and exterminating the Celtic race. It is an awful 
 thing to think of, but we have evidence for it. First of all, Henry 
 II., whilst he made his treaties with the Irish king, secretly divided 
 the whole of Ireland into ten portions, and allowed each of these 
 portions to one of his Norman knights. In a word, he robbed the 
 Irish people and the Irish chieftains of every single foot of land in 
 the Irish territorj^ It is true they were not able to take possession. 
 It is as if a master robber wci-c to divide tlic booty before it is taken. 
 It is far easier to assign propciiy not yet stolen than to put the 
 thieves in possession of it. There were Irish hands and Irish l);ittle- 
 bladcs in the way for many a long year, nor has it been accom- 
 plished to this day. In order to root out the Celtic race and to 
 destroy us, mark the measures of legislation w-hich followed. 
 
 First of all, my friends, whenever an Englishman was put in 
 possession of an acre of land he got the right to trespass upon 
 his Irish neighbors, and to take their land as far as he could, and 
 they had no action in a court of law to recover their land. If au 
 Irishman brought an action at law against an Englishman for taking 
 half of his tield or for trespassing upon his land, according to the law 
 from the very beginning, that Irishman was sent out of court, there 
 was no action, the Englishman was perfectly justified. Worse than 
 this, they made laws declaring that the killing of an Irishman was 
 no felony. Sir John Davis tells us how, upon a certain occasion at 
 the assizes of Waterford, in tiie 29th of Edward I., a certain Tiioinas 
 Butler brought an action against Robert de Almay to recover certain 
 goods that Robert had stolen from him. The case was brought into 
 court. Robert acknowledircd that he had stolen the goods, that ho 
 
FATHER BURKE. 225 
 
 was a thief. The defence that he put in was that Thomas, the man 
 he had plundered, was an Irisliman. The case was tried. Now, 
 my friends, just think of it ! The issue that was put before the jury 
 was whether Thomas, the plaintiff, was an Irishman or an English- 
 man? Eobert, the thief, was obliged to give back the goods, for 
 the jury found Thomas was an Englishman. But if the jury found 
 that Thomas was an Irishman, he might go without the goods ; there 
 was no action against him. AVe find tipon the same authority, Sir 
 John Davis, a description of a certain occasion at Waterford where a 
 man named Eobert Welsh killed an Irishman. He was arraigned 
 and tried for manslaughter, and he, without the slightest difficulty, 
 acknowledged it. " Yes, I did kill him ; you cannot try me for it, 
 for he was an Irishman." Instantly he was let out of the dock, on 
 condition, as the Irishman was in the service at the time of an Eng- 
 lish master, he should pay whatever he compelled him to pay for the 
 loss of his services, and the murderer might go scot free. "Not 
 only," says Sir John Davis, "were the Irish considered aliens, but 
 they were considered enemies, insomuch that though an Englishman 
 might settle upon an Irishman's land there was no redress, )iut if an 
 Irishman wished to buy an acre of land from an Englishman, he 
 could not do it. So they kept the land they had, and they were 
 always adding to it by plunder ; they could steal without ever buying 
 any. If any man made a will and left an acre of land to an Irish- 
 man, the moment it was proved that he was an Irishman the land 
 was forfeited to the Crown of England, even if it was only left in 
 trust to him, as we have two very striking examples. We read that 
 a certain James Butler left some lands in Meath in trust for charit- 
 able purposes, and he left them to his two chaplains. It was proved 
 that the two priests were Irishmen, and that it was left to them in 
 trust for charitable purposes ; yet the land was forfeited because the 
 two men were Irishmen. Later, on a certain occasion, Mrs. Catha- 
 rine Dowdall, a pious woman, made a will, leaving some land, also 
 for charitable pm-poses, to her chaplain, and the land was forfeited 
 because the priest was an Irishman. In the year 1367, Lionel, third 
 son of Edward III., Duke of Clarence, came to Ireland, held a par- 
 liament, and passed certain laws in Kilkenny. You will scarcely 
 believe what I am going to tell you. Some of them were as folIow^s : 
 "If any man speak the Irish language, or keep company with the 
 
226 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Irish, or adopt Irish customs, his lands shall be taken from him and 
 forfeited to the Crown of England." " If any Englishman married an 
 Irishwoman," what do you think was the penalty ? He was sentenced 
 to be half hanged, to have his heai-t cut out before he was dead, and 
 to have his head struck off, and every right to his land passed to the 
 Crown of England. " Thus," says Sir John Davis, " it is evident 
 that the constant design of English legislation in Ireland was to pos- 
 sess the best Irish lands and to extirpate and exterminate the Irish 
 people." 
 
 Citizens of America, Mr. Froude came here to appeal to you for 
 your verdict, and he asks you to sa}^ Was not England justified in 
 her treatment of Ireland because the Irish people would not submit? 
 Now, citizens of America, would not the Irish people be the vilest 
 dogs on the face of the earth if they submitted to such treatment as 
 this ? Would they be worthy of the name of men if they submitted 
 to be robbed, plundered, and degraded ? It is true that in all this 
 legislation we see this same spirit of contempt of which I spoke in 
 the beginning of my lecture. But, remember, it was these Saxon 
 churls that were thus despised, and ask yourselves what race they 
 treated with so much contumely, and attempted in every way to de- 
 grade, whilst they were ruining and robbing. Gerald Barry, the 
 liar, speaking of the Irish race, said: "The Irish came from the 
 grandest race that he knew of on this side of the world, and there are 
 no better people under the sun." By the word "better "he meant 
 more valiant and more intellectual. Those who came over fi'om 
 England were called Saxon " hogs," or churls, while the Irish called 
 them Buddaifh Sassenach. These were the men who showed in the 
 very system by which they were governed that they could not imder- 
 stand the nature of a people who refused to be slaves. They were 
 slaves themselves. Consider the history of the feudal system under 
 which they lived. According to the feudal system of government 
 the king of England was lord of every inch of land in England : 
 every foot of land in England was the king's, and the nobles wiio 
 had the land held it from the king, and held it under feudal con- 
 ditions the most degrading that can be imagined. For instance. 
 if a man died and left his heir, a son or daughter, under age, the 
 heir or heiress, together with the estate, went into the hands of 
 the king. He might, perhaps, leave a widow with ten children ; 
 
FATHER BURKE. 227 
 
 she would have to support all the children herself out of her dower, 
 but the estate and the eldest son or the eldest daughter went into the 
 hands of the king. Then, dining their minority, the king could spend 
 the revenues or could sell the castle and sell the estate without being 
 questioned by any one ; and when the son or daughter came of age, 
 ' he then sold them in marriage to the highest bidder. We have God- 
 frey of Mandeville bujdng for twenty thousand marks from King 
 John the hand of Isabella, Countess of Gloucester. We have Isa- 
 bella de Linjera, another heiress, offering two hundred marks lo 
 King John — for what ? — for liberty to marry whoever she liked, 
 and not to be obliged to marry the man he would give her. If 
 a widow lost her husband, the moment the breath was out of him 
 the lady and the estate were in the possession of the king, and he 
 might squander the estate or do whatever he liked with it, and 
 then he could sell the woman. We have a curious example of 
 this. We have Alice, Countess of Warwick, paying King John 
 one thousand pounds sterling in gold for leave to remain a widow 
 as long as she liked, and then to marry any one she liked. This 
 was the slavery called the feudal system, of which Mr. Froude is 
 so proud, and of which he says, "It lay at the root of all that 
 is noble and good in Europe." The Irish could not understand 
 it, small blame to them ! But when the Irish people found that 
 they were to be hunted down like wolves — found their lands were 
 to be taken from them, and that there was no redress — over and 
 over again the Irish people sent up petitions to the King of Eng- 
 land to give them the beuetit of the English law and they would be 
 amenable to it, but they were denied and told that they should re- 
 main as tlicy were — that is to say, England was determined to 
 extirpate them and get every foot of Irish soil. This is the one 
 leading idea or principle which animates England in her treatment 
 of Ireland throughout those four hundred years, and it is the only 
 clue you can find to that turmoil and misery and constant fighting 
 which was going on in Ireland during that time. Sir James Cusick, 
 the English commissioner sent over b}^ Hemy VIII., wrote to his 
 majesty these quaint words : " The Irish be of opinion amongst them- 
 selves that the English wish to get all their land and to root them 
 out completely." He just struck the nail on the head. Mr. Froude 
 himself acknowledges that the land question lies at the root of the 
 
228 TEEASUKT OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 whole business. Nay more, the feudal system would have handed 
 over every inch of land in Ireland to the Norman king and his Nor- 
 man nobles, and the O'Briens, the O'Tooles, the O'Donnells, and 
 the O'Conors were of more ancient and better blood than that of 
 William, the bastard Norman. 
 
 The Saxon might submit to feudal law and be crushed iuto a slave, 
 a clod of the earth; the Celt never would. England's great mistake 
 — in my soul I am convinced that the great mistake, of all others 
 the greatest — lay in this, that the English people never realized the 
 fact that in dealing with the Irish they had to deal with the pi'oudest 
 race upon the face of the earth. During these wars the Norman 
 carls, the Ormonds, the Desmonds, the Geraldines, the Dc Burghs, 
 were at the head and front of every rebellion : the English com- 
 plained of them, and said they were worse than the Irish rebels, con- 
 stantly stirring up disorders. Do you know the reason why ? Be- 
 cause they as Normans were under the feudal law, and therefore the 
 king's sheriff would come down on them at every turn with fines and 
 forfeitures of the land held from the king ; so by keeping the country 
 in disorder they were always able to be sheriffs, and they preferred 
 the Irish freedom to the English feudalism ; therefore they fomented 
 and kept up these discords. It was the boast of my kinsmen of 
 Clanricarde that, with the blessing of God, they would never allow 
 a king's writ to run iu Connaught. Dealing with this period in our 
 history, Mr. Froude says that the Irish chieftains and their septs, or 
 tribes, were doing this or that, the Geraldines, the Desmonds, and 
 the Ormonds. I say : "Slowly, Mr. Froude! that the Gei'aldines 
 and the Ormonds were not the Irish people ; so don't father their acts 
 upon the Irish ; the Irish chieftains have enough to answer for." 
 During these four hundred years I protest to you that, iu this most 
 melancholy period of our sad history, I have found but two cases, 
 two instances that cheer me, and both were the actions of Irish chief- 
 tains. In one we find that Turlough O'Conor put away his wife ; 
 she was one of the O'Briens. Theobald Burke, one of the Earls of 
 Clanricarde, lived with the woman. With the spirit of their heroic 
 ancestors, the Irish chieftains of Connaught came together, deposed 
 him and drove him out of the place. Later on we find another chief- 
 tain, Brian ]\IcM:ihon, who induced O'Donnell, chief of the Hebrides, 
 to put away his lawful wife and marry a daughter of his own. The 
 
FATHER BURKE. 229 
 
 fol lowing year they fell out, and McMahon drowned his own son-in-law. 
 The chiefs, O'Donnell and O'Neill, came together with their forces 
 and deposed McMahon in the cause of virtue, honor, and woman- 
 hood. I have looked in vain through these four hundred years for 
 one single trait of generosity or of the assertion of virtue amongst 
 the Anglo-Norman chiefs, and the dark picture is only velieved by 
 these two gleams of Irish patriotism and Irish zeal in the cause of 
 virtue, honor, and purity. 
 
 Now, my friends, Mr. Froudc opened another question in his first 
 lecture. He said that all this time, while the English monarchs 
 were engaged in trying to subjugate Scotland and subdue their 
 French provinces, the Irish were rapidly gaining ground, coming in 
 and entering the pale year by year ; the English power in Ireland 
 was in danger of annihilation, and the only thing that saved it was 
 the love of Ihc Irish for their own independent way of fighting, 
 Mhich, though favorable to freedom, was hostile to national unity. 
 He says, s[)eaking of that time, " Would it not have been better to 
 have allowed the Irish chieftains to govern their own people ? Free- 
 dom to whom? Freedom to the bad, to the violent — it is no free- 
 dom." I deny that the Irish chieftains, Avith all their faults, were, 
 as a class, bad men or violent. I deny that .they were engaged, as 
 Mr. Fronde says, in cutting their people's throats, that they were a 
 people who would never be satisfied. Mr. Froude tells us emphati- 
 cally and significantly that the "Irish people were satisfied witli their 
 chieftains ; " but the people are not satisfied under a system where 
 their throats are being cut. The Irish chieftains were the bane of 
 Ireland by their divisions ; the Irish chieftains were the ruin of their 
 country by their want of union and want of generous acijuiescence 
 to some gre;it and noble head that would save them bj'' uniting them ; 
 the Irish chieftains, even in the daj-s of the heroic Edward Bruce, 
 did not rally around him as they ought. In their divisions is the 
 secret of Ireland's slavery and ruin through those years. But, with 
 all that, history attests that they were still magnanimous enough to 
 be the fathers of their people, and to be the natural leaders, as God 
 intended them to be, of their septs, families and namesakes. And 
 they struck whatever blow they did strike in what they imagined to 
 be the cause of right, justice and principle, and the only blow that 
 
230 TREASUKiT OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 came in the cause of outraged honor and purity came from the hand 
 of the Irish chiefs in those dark and dreadful years. 
 
 I will endeavor to follow this learned gentleman in his subsequent 
 lectures. Now a darker cloud than that of mere invasion is lowering 
 over Ireland ; noAv comes the demon of religious discord, the sword 
 of religious persecution waving over the distracted and exhausted 
 land. And we shall see whether this historian has entered into the 
 spirit of the great contest that followed, and that in our day has 
 ended in a glorious victory for Ireland's Church and Ireland's nation- 
 ality, and which will be followed as assuredly by a still more glorious 
 future. 
 

 i' ' ^ r 
 
 MASSACRE AT DROGHEDA, 
 
FATHER BURKE. 231 
 
 ■Second Lecture, 
 
 Deliveeed in the Academy of IVIusic, New York, November 
 14, 1872. 
 
 IpiADIES AND GENTLEINIEN, — We come now to consider 
 ^J the second lecture of the eminent English historian who has 
 pf come among us. It covers one of the most interesting and 
 1 terrible passages in our history, and takes ia three reigns — 
 
 the reign of Henry VIII., the reign of Elizabeth, and the reign of 
 James I. I scarcely consider flie reign of Edward VI., or of Philip 
 and Mary, worth counting. Mr. Froude began his second lecture 
 with a rather startling paradox. He asserted that Henry VIII. was 
 a hater of disorder. Now, my friends, every man in this world has 
 his hero ; and, consciously or unconsciously, every man selects some 
 character out of history that he admires, until at length, by contin- 
 ually dwelling on the virtues and excellences of his hero, he comes 
 to almost worship him. From among the grand historic names 
 written in the world's annals every man is free to select whom he 
 likes best, and using this privilege, Mr. Froude has made the most 
 singular selection of which you or I ever heard. His hero is Henry 
 VIII. It speaks volumes for the integrity of Mr. Fronde's owu 
 mind. It is a strong argument that he possesses a charity most sub- 
 lime that he is enabled to discover virtues in the historical character 
 of one of the greatest monsters that ever cursed the earth. But he 
 has succeeded in this, to us, apparent impossibility, and discovered, 
 among other shining virtues, in the character of the English Nero a 
 greatlove for order and hatred of disorder. Well, we must stop at 
 the very first sentence of the learned gentlemen and enquire how 
 much truth there is in it, and how much only a figment of imagina- 
 
232 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tion. AH order in the state is based ou thi'ee grand principles, my 
 friends : first, the supremacy of the law ; second, respect for liberty 
 of conscience ; and, third, a tender regard for that which lies at the 
 foundation of all human society — namely, the sanctity of the mai-- 
 riage tie. 
 
 The first element of order in every state is the supremacy of the 
 law, for in this lies the very quintessence of human freedom and of 
 order. The law is supposed to be, according to the definition of 
 Aquinas, "the judgment pronounced by profound reason and intel- 
 lect, thinking and legislating for the public good." The law is 
 therefore the expression of reason — reason backed by authority, 
 reason influenced by the noble motive of the public good. This 
 being the nature of law, the very first thing that is demanded for the 
 law is that every man shall bow down to it and obey it. No man in 
 any community has any right to claim exemption from obedience to 
 the law, least of all the man at the head of tlie cfminiunity, because 
 he is supposed to represent the nation and nation's spirit, and to give 
 to the people an example of virtue and of obedience to the law. 
 Was Henry VIII. an upholder of the law ? was he obedient to Eng- 
 land's law? I deny it, and I have the evidence of history to back 
 me in that denial, and to prove that Henry VIII. was one of the 
 greatest enemies of freedom and law that ever lived in this world, 
 and cbnsequently one of the greatest tyrants. I shall only give one 
 example out of ten thousand whicli might be taken from the history 
 of the time. When Henry VIII. broke with the Pope, lie called 
 upon his subjects to acknowledge him (bless the mark !) as the 
 spiritual head of the Church. There were three abbots of three 
 Charter-houses in London — the Abbot of London, the Abbot of 
 Asciolum, and the Abbot Belaval. These three abbots refused to 
 acknowledge Henry as the supreme spiritual head of the Church. 
 They Avei-e arrested and held for trial, and a jury of twelve citizens 
 was impanelled to try them. The first pi-inciple of English law, 
 the grand palladium of English legislation and freedom, is the perfect 
 liberty of a jury. A jury must be free, not onl}'^ from coercion, but 
 from prejudice and picjudgment. A jury must be impartial, and 
 free to record the verdict at which their impartial judgment has 
 arrived. Those twelve men refused to convict the three abbots of 
 high treason. Their decision was grounded on this, it has never 
 
FATHER BURKE. 233 
 
 been known in England that it was Iiigh treason to deny the spiritual 
 supremacy of the king. Henry sent word to the jury that if they did 
 not find the accused guilty he M'ould visit upon the jury the penalties 
 which he had intenj:lcd for the abbots. Thus did he defy the rights 
 guaranteed to the English people in the charter of England's liber- 
 ties, the Magna Charta, and trample upon the first grand element of 
 English jurisprudence — the liberty of the jury. Citizens of Amer- 
 ica, would any of you like to be tried for treason by twelve men of 
 whom the President of the United States had said that they must 
 find yon guilty or the penalties of treason would be visited to them. 
 Where would be the liberty and law with which yon arc foi'tunately 
 blessed, if your trials by jury Avere conducted after the pattern of 
 Mr. Fronde's lover of order and hater of disorder, Ilenrv VIII? 
 When Henry prohibited the Catholic religion among his subjects, 
 what did he give them instead? Certainly not Protestantism, for to 
 the last day of his life if he could have laid hands on Luther, he 
 would have made a toast of him. lie heard Mass rip to his death, 
 and after his death a solemn High Mass teas celebrated over his 
 inflated corpse, that the Lord might have mercij on his soul. All ! my 
 friends, some other poor soul, I suppose, got the benefit of that 
 Mass. 
 
 The second grand element is respect for conscience. The con- 
 science of man, and consequently of a nation, is supposed to be the 
 great guide in all the relations that individuals or the people bear to 
 God. Conscience is so free that Almighty God himself respects it. 
 It is a theological axiom that if a man does wrong when he thinks 
 he is doing right, the wrong will not be attributed to him by Al- 
 mighty God. Was this m:ui Henry a respecter of conscience? Out 
 of teir thousand instances of his contempt for lil)erty of conscience 
 — let me select one. He ordered the people of England to change 
 their religion, and to give up that grand system of dogmatic teach- 
 ing which is in the Catholic Church, where every man knows what 
 to believe, what to do, and what to avoid. And what religion did 
 Henry offer to the people of England ? He simply said to them : 
 Every man in the land must agree with me in whatever I decide in 
 religion. More than this, his Parliament — a slavish Parliament — 
 every man afraid of his life — passed a law not only making it high 
 treason to disagi-ee with the king in anything that he believed, but 
 
234 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 that no man should dispute anything which the king should even 
 believe at any future time. No man was allowed to have a con- 
 science. " I am your conscience," he said to the nation ; " I am your 
 infallible guide in what you have to believe and what you have to do, 
 and any man who disputes my infallibility is guilty of high treason, 
 and I will stain my hands in his heart's blood." 
 
 The third great element of order is the great keystone of the arch 
 of society — the sanctity of the marriage vow. Whatever else is in- 
 terfered with, that mrst not be touched, for the Lord says, " Whom 
 God joins together let no man put asunder." No power in heaven 
 or in earth, much less in hell, can dissolve the tie of marriage. But 
 the hero, this "lover of order and hater of disorder," had so little 
 respect for the sanctity of marriage that he put away from him, 
 brutally, his lawful wife, agd took in her stead, while she was yet 
 living, a woman supposed to be his own daughter. He married six 
 wives. Two he repudiated, divorced ; two he beheaded ; one died in 
 childbirth ; the sixth and the last, Catherine Parr, fouud her name 
 among the list of destined victims in Henry's book, and would have 
 had her head cut oft' had the monster lived a few days longer. I 
 ask you if it is not too much in face of these facts, taken from his- 
 tory, for Mr. Froude to come before an enlightened and intelligent 
 American public and ask them to believe the absurd paradox that 
 Henry VIII. was an admirer of order and a hater of disorder. 
 
 But Mr. Froude may say this is not fair ; I said in my lecture that 
 I would have nothing to do with Henry VIII. 's matrimonial transac- 
 tions. Ah ! Mr. Froude, you were wise. But at least Mr. Froude 
 says. In his i-elations to Ireland "I claim that he was a hater of dis- 
 order," and the proofs he gives are as follows : 
 
 First, he saj^s that one of the curses of Ireland is absentee land- 
 lords, and he is right. Henry VIII., he says, put an end to that 
 absenteeism in the simplest way imaginable. He took the estates 
 from the alisentees aud gave them to other people who were willing 
 to live on them. That sounds very plausible. Let us anal3'ze it. 
 During the Wars of the Koses between Lancaster and York, which 
 preceded the Kefoimation in England, many old Anglo-Norman 
 families settled in Ireland crossed over to England and joined in the 
 fight. It was an English question aud an English war, and the con 
 sequence was that many English settlei's in Ireland abandoned their 
 
FATHER BURKE. 235 
 
 estates to take part in it. Others again left Ireland because they had 
 hu-o-e Eno'lish properties, and preferred to reside in England. 
 When Henry VIII. ascended the throne, the English pale consisted 
 of about one-half of the counties of Louth, Meath, Wicklow, Dub- 
 lin, and Wexford. According to Mr. Fronde, Henry did a great 
 act of justice in taking the estates of the English absentees and par- 
 celling them out among his own favorites and friends. It is a historic 
 fact that the Irish people, as soon as the English settlers retired, 
 came in and repossessed themselves of these estates, which were their 
 own property. And mark, my friends, that even had the Irish 
 people no title to that property as their ancient and God-given inher- 
 itance, they had the right which is everywhere recognized. Bona 
 derelicla mntprimi capientis — vi\i\ch., in plain English, means that 
 things abandoned belong to the man who is first to get hold of them. 
 But much more' just was the title of the Irish to the lands abandoned 
 by the English. The lands were their own. They had been un- 
 justly dispossessed of them, and they had the right to regain them. 
 They therefore had two titles. The land was theirs because they 
 found it untenanted, theirs because they had once owned it and 
 never lost the right of it. But Henry, being a lover of order, dis- 
 possessed the absentees of their estates and turned the property over 
 to other Englishmen, men who would live in Ireland and on the land, 
 and Mr. Fronde claims that in so doing he acted well for the Irish 
 people. But the doing of this involved the driving of the Irish 
 people a second time from their own property. Suppose that the 
 President of the United States should seize your property and give 
 it to a friend of his, and say to you, " Now, my friend and fellow- 
 citizen, remember I am a lover of order ; I have given you a resi- 
 dent landlord." Such was the benefit which Henry conferred on 
 Ireland in turning out the Irish owners to give place to English resi- 
 dent landloi-ds. 
 
 In 1520 Henry sent the Earl of Surrey to Ireland. Surrey was 
 a brave soldier, a stern, rigorous man. Henry thought that by send- 
 ing him over and backing him with an army he would be able to 
 reduce to order the disorderly elements of the Irish nation. That 
 disorder reigned in Ireland I readily admit. But in tracing that 
 disorder to its cause I claim that the cause is not to be found in any 
 inherent restlessness of the Irish character, though they are fond of 
 
236 TREA.SUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 a fight, I grant that ; Init the main cause was the unjnst and inhuman 
 legisUition of English rulers for four hundred years, and the pres- 
 ence in Ireland of the Anglo-Norman chieftains, who Avere anxious 
 to foment disturbance in order that they might escape the 2:)ayment 
 of their dues to the king. Surrey came over and found — brave, 
 accomplished general as he was — that the Irish were too much for 
 him. He said to Henry, " The only way to subdue this people is to 
 conquer them utterly ; to go in with fire and sword." This, Surrey 
 felt, could not be done, for the country was too extensive, the situa- 
 tion too unfavorable, and the population too determined to be sub- 
 jected. Then Henry took up a policy of conciliation. Mr. Fronde 
 gives the English monarch great credit for trying to conciliate the 
 Irish. He did it because he could not help it. There is a passage, 
 my friends, in the correspDndence between Surrey and Henry which 
 • speaks volumes. The earl says that when he arrived in Ireland he 
 found the peoi)le in the midst of war and confusion ; but the people 
 who were really the source of the confusion he declared to be not so 
 much the Irish as the Anglo-Norman lords in Ireland. Here is the 
 passage : 
 
 "The two Irish chieftains, McConnal Oge and McCarty Euah, or 
 Bed McCarty, are more favorable to order than some Englishmen 
 here." 
 
 In the letter of one of Ireland's bitter enemies is found the 
 answer to Mr. Froude's repeated assertion that the Irish are so dis- 
 orderly and so averse to good government that to reduce them to 
 order you have to sweep them away altogether. The next feature 
 of Surrey's policy was to set chieftain against chieftain. He M'rites : 
 
 "I am endeavoring to perpetuate the^mimosity between O'Donnell 
 and O'Niall in Ulster. It would be dangerful to have both agree 
 and join together." 
 
 Well may Mr. Froude say that when the Irish are a unit they will 
 be invincible, and no power on earth can keep us slaves. Surrey 
 says : 
 
 " It would be dangerful if both should agree and join together. 
 The longer they continue in war the better it shall be for your gra- 
 cious majesty's poor subjects here." 
 
 Mark the spirit of that letter, showing as it does the whole policy 
 of England's treatment of Ireland. He does not speak of the Irish 
 
FATHER BURKE. 237 
 
 as subjects of the King of Eiiglan'l. j.aere is. not the slightest con- 
 sideration for tlie uiifottuiiiitc Irisii who are being baited agtunst each 
 other. Let them contend the longer in war, the more will be swept 
 awaj', and "the better it will'be for your gracious majesty's poor 
 sulyects here." The whole object of Henry's policy and Henry's 
 legislation was to protect the settlers and exterminate the Irish. 
 
 Sir John Davidson, Attorney-General to James I., writing of 
 English legislation, said that for hundreds of years it had been 
 merciless to Ireland. 
 
 Then the Earl of Surrey having failed to reduce the Irish, Henry, 
 according to Sir. Froude, tried home rule in Ireland. Here Mr. 
 Froude tries to make a point for his hero. Irishmen, he says, ad- 
 mire this man who tried the experiment of home rule in your coun- 
 try, and finding you were not able to govern yourselves, he had to 
 take a whip and drive you. One would imagine that homo rule 
 means that Irishmen should have the management of their own 
 affairs and _ make their own laws. For home rule means this or 
 nothing. Home rule must be a delusion and a snai"e, or it means 
 that the Irish people have a right to assemble in parliament, govern 
 themselves, and make their own laws. But Henry's rule meant 
 first this : the appointment of tlie Earl of Kildare to be Lord Lieu- 
 tenant and Deputy. Henry did not say to the Irish nation, "Send 
 your representatives to national parliament and make your own 
 laws ; " he did not call on the Irish chieftains to govern the country, 
 on O'Brien, O'Neill, McCarty, or O'Donnell, ou the men who had 
 the right by inheritance and lineage to govern Ireland. He said to 
 the Anglo-No/man lords, the most quarrelsome, unnatural, and rest- 
 less class that I have ever read of in history, "Take the government 
 in your own hands." And see the consequences. The Norman 
 lords are no sooner left to govern than the}' malve war on Ireland. 
 The first thing that Kildare does is to summon an army and lay 
 waste the territories of his Irisli fellow-chieftains around him, and 
 after a time the Anglo-Normans fell out among themselves. The 
 great Anglo-Norman family of the Butlers were jealous of Kildare, 
 who was a Fitzgerald. They procured his imprisonment for treason, 
 and in truth Kildare did carry on a treasonable correspondence with 
 Francis I. of France and Cliarles V. of Germany. When Kildare 
 was lodged in the Tower of London, his son, Silken Thomas, re- 
 
238 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 volted, because he believed that his fatiier was al)out to be put to 
 death. King Henry deckrod war against him, and Thomas against 
 the king. The consequence of the war was tliat the whole province 
 of Munster and a part of Leinster were ravaged, people destroyed and 
 villages burned, until there was nothing left to feed man or beast ; 
 and this was the result of Henry's "home rule." Kildarc's appoint- 
 ment as Lord Deputy led to the almost utter ruin of the Irish 
 people. 
 
 Perhaps you will ask me. Did the Irish people take part in that 
 war so as to justify Henry VIII. ? I will answer by saying they 
 took no part, for it was an English business from the beginning to 
 the end. The Irish chieftains took no interest in that war. We 
 read that only O'Carroll, and O'Moore of Ossory, and another — 
 that these were the only Irish chieftains that took part in the matter 
 at all. These three chieftains of whom I speak were of very small 
 importance, and by no means represented the Irish people of Muns- 
 ter or any other Irish province. And yet from this veiy fact we are 
 made to believe that the Irish people joined and agreed with the 
 party of whom Henry VIII. was the head. 
 
 Mr. Froude goes on to say, '' The Irish people got to like Henry 
 VIII." If they did, I do not admire their taste. " He pleased (he 
 might have said blessed) them," said Mr. Froude, "and they got 
 fond of him." Then he goes on to show the reason why it was that 
 " Henry never showed any disposition to dispossess the Irish people 
 of their lands or to exterminate them." Honest Henry I I take 
 him up on that point. Is that true, or is it not? Fortunately for 
 the Irish historian, the state papers are open to us as well as to Mv. 
 Froude. What do the state papers of the reign of Henry VIII. tell 
 us ? They tell us that a project was formed during the reign of this 
 monarch to bring the whole Irish nation into Connaught, which 
 meant dispossession, or, in other words, extermination. Of this 
 fact there is no question. Henry VIII. had a ])roclamation issued 
 to that effect. The Council governing Ireland sanctioned it, and 
 the people of England desired it so much that the paper on this sub- 
 ject ends with these words : 
 
 "In consequence of certain promises brought to pass, there shall 
 no Irish be on this side of the waters of Shannon unprosecuted, 
 unsubdued, and unexikd. Then shall the English pale be well two 
 hundred miles in length and more." 
 
FATHER BURKE. 239 
 
 More than this, we have the evidence of the state papers of the 
 time of Henry VIII., meditating and contemplating the utter extir- 
 pation, the utter sweeping away and destroying, of the wliole Irish 
 race ; for we find the Lord Deputy of the Council of Dublin writing 
 to his majesty, and here are his words : 
 
 "They tell him that his project is impracticable. The land is 
 very large, by estimation as large as England; so that to inhabit . 
 the whole with new inhabitants the numbers would he so gi'eat that 
 there is no prince in Christendom that would conscientiously allow 
 so many subjects to depart out of his realms." 
 
 Not enough of English subjects to fill up the place of the Irish. 
 Humanity indeed ! Extirpate the whole race ! was the cry. But 
 this could not be done, considering the great difliculty the new 
 inhabitants would have to contend with. But then the document 
 goes on to say : 
 
 " This is a difficult process (this extermination) considering the 
 misery those Irishmen can endure — viz., both hunger, cold, and 
 thirst, and these a great deal more than the inhabitants of any other 
 land." 
 
 They sought utterly to Ixmish from Ireland the people of that land. 
 Great God ! This (Henry VIII.) is the man that Mr. Froude tells 
 us is the friend of Ii'eland. This is the man who is " the great 
 admirer of order and the hater of disorder." Certainly he was afeout 
 to create a magnificent order of things, for his idea was, if the 
 people are troublesome and you want to reduce them to quiet, "kill 
 them all." Just look at it. It is just like those nurses who do the 
 baby farming in England — on the principle of farming out children. 
 When the child is a little cross or disagreeably unmauage;il)le, they 
 give him a dose of poison and it quiets him. Do you know the 
 reason why Henry VIII. pleased them? for there is no doubt about 
 it they were greatly pleased with this great English monai'ch. 
 While he made an outward show of conciliating them, he was medi- 
 tating the utter ruin and destruction of the Irish race, and he had 
 the good sense to keep it to himself, and it only comes out in his 
 state papers. He treated the Irish with a certain amount of court- 
 esy and politeness. Henry was a man of learning, accomplished, 
 and of very elegant manners. A man with a bland smile, who could 
 give you a cordial shake hands. It is true the next day he might 
 
240 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 have your head cut ofl", hut still he had the manners of a gentleman. 
 It is a strange fact that the two most gentlemanly kings of England 
 were the two greatest seoundrels that ever lived on the earth — 
 namely, Henry VIII. and George IV. Accordingly, he dealt with 
 the Irish people with a certain amount of civility and courtesy. He 
 did not go on, like all his predecessors before him, saying: "You 
 are the king's enemies ; you are to be all put to death ; you are 
 without the pale of the law ; you are barbarians and savages and I 
 will have nothing to say to you." Henry said : " Let us see. Can't 
 we arrange all difficulties and live in peace and quietness ? " And 
 the Irish people were charmed with his kind manner. Ah ! my 
 friends, it is true there was a black heart beneath that smiling face, 
 and it is also true that the very fact that Mr. Froude acknowledges, 
 that Henry VIII. had a certain amount of popularity in the begin- 
 ning among the Irish people, proves that if England only knew how 
 to treat Ireland with respect and courtesy and kindness, it w-ould 
 long since have gained possession of the fidelity of that unhappy 
 country, instead of embittering it by the injustice, the tyranny, and 
 the cruelty of her laws. And that is what I meant when on last 
 Tuesday evening I said that the English contempt for Irishmen is a 
 real evil th;it lies at the root of all the bad spirit that exists be- 
 tween the two nations, for the simple reason that the Irish people 
 are4oo intellectual, too pure, too noble, too heroic to allow them- 
 selves to be humbled and enchained, and their pride to be despised. 
 And now, my friends, ]Mr. Froude went on to give us a proof of 
 the great love the Irish people have for Harry the Eighth. He says 
 they were so fond of this king that actually, at the king's request, 
 Ireland threw the Pope overboard. Why was it that they threw 
 the Pope overboard? We will see. Now, Mr. Fi'oude, fond as we 
 were of our glorious Harry the Eighth, we were not so enamored of 
 him as you think. We had not fallen so deeply in love with him as 
 to sive up the Pope for him. What are the facts of the case? 
 Henry about the year 1530, got into difBcullies with the Pope. He 
 commenced by asserting his own authority as head of the Catholic 
 Church, and picked out an apostate monk, who had neither a char- 
 acter for conscientiousness nor virtue, and had him consecrated the 
 first Archbishop of Dnl)lin — George Brown. He sent Brown to 
 Dublin with a commission to get the Irish nation to follow in the 
 
FATHER BURKE. 241 
 
 wake of the English, and to throw the Pope overboard and acknowl- 
 edge Henry's supremacy. Bi'own arrived in Dublin. He called the 
 bishops together and said : " I think you must change your alle- 
 giance. You must give up the Pope and t:ike Henry, King of 
 England, in his stead." Cramer, the Archbishop, said, "What 
 blasphemy is this that I hear? Ireland will never change her faith, 
 renounce her Catholicity ; and she would have to renounce it by 
 renouncing the head of the Catholic Church." And the bishops of 
 all Ireland followed the Primate, all the pastors of Ireland followed 
 the Primate, and George Brown wrote the most lugubrious letter to 
 Thomas Cromwell, and in it he said, among other things, " I would 
 return to EngLuid, only I am afraid the king would have my head 
 taken off. I am afraid to return to England." Three years later, 
 however, Brown and the Lord Deputy summoned a parliament, and 
 it was at this parliament of 1537, according to Mr. Froude, that 
 Ireland threw the Pope overboard. Now, what are the facts? A 
 parliament was assembled, and from time immemorial in Ireland 
 whenever a parliament was assembled there were three delegates, 
 called proctors, from every district in Ireland, who sat in the House 
 by virtue of their office. When the parliament was called, the first 
 thing they did was to banish the three proctors and deprive them 
 of their seats in the House. Without the slightest justice, without 
 the slightest show or pretence of either right, or law, or justice, the 
 proctors were excluded, and so the ecclesiastical element of Ireland 
 was precluded from the parliament of 1537. Then, partly by bribes 
 and threats, the Irish little boroughs that surrounded Dublin took 
 an oath that Henry was head of the Church, and Mr. Froude calls 
 this the apostasy of the Irish nation. With that strange want .of 
 knowledge, for I can call it nothing else, he imagines that the Irish 
 'remained Catholics, even though he asserts they gave up the Pope. 
 They took, he says, the oath — bishops and all — and thereby 
 acknowledged Henry VIII. 's supremacy. But, nevertheless, they 
 did not become Protestants, they still remained Catholic ; and the 
 reason why they didn't take to Elizabeth was because she wanted to 
 entail on them the Protestant I'eligion as well as the oath of supre- 
 macy. The Catholic Church and its doctrines they abided by, and 
 they believed then, as they do now, that there is no man a Catholic 
 who is not in communion with the Pope of Eome. Henry VIII. , 
 
242 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 who was a learned man, had too much logic and too much theology^ 
 and too much sense to become M'hat is called a Protestant. He 
 never embraced the doctrines of Luther, but held on to every idea 
 of Catholic doctrine to the very last day of his life, except that he 
 refused to acknf)wledgc the Pope, and on the day that Henry VIH. 
 refused to acknowledge the Pope he refused to be a Catholic. To 
 pretend that the Irish peeple were so ignorant as to imagine that 
 tliey could throw the Pope overboard and still remain Catholic is to 
 offer to the genius and intelligence of Ireland a gratuitous insult. 
 It is true that some of the bishops apostatized. They took the oath 
 of supremacy to Hemy VIII. Their names will ever be held in 
 contempt by the Irish people. 
 
 Five bishops only apostatized. The rest of Ireland's episcopacy 
 remained faithful. George Brown, the apostate Archbishop of Dub- 
 lin, acknowledged that of all the priests in the diocese of Dublin he 
 could only induce three to take the oath of spiritual allegiance to 
 Henry VIII. There was a priest in Connaught, Dominic Tirrell, 
 and he took the oath of allegiance simply because he was oli'ered the 
 diocese of Cork. Alexander Devereaux, Abbot of Dunbardy, was 
 given the diocese of Ferns, in the County of Wexford, in order ta 
 induce him to swear allegiance to the English king. These are all 
 the names that represent the national apostasy of Ireland. Out of 
 so many hundreds eight were found wanting, and still Mr. Froude 
 tells us the Irish bishops and priests threw the Pope overboard. He 
 (Mr. Froude) makes another assertion, and I regret he made it. I 
 refer to it because there is much in the learned gentleman to admire 
 and esteem. He asserts that the bishops of Ireland in those days 
 were immoral men ; that they had families ; that they were not like 
 the venerable men we see in the episcopacy of to-day. Now, I as- 
 sert there is not a shred of testimony to bear up Mr. Froude in this* 
 wild assertion. I have read the history of Ireland — national, civil, 
 ecclesiastical — as far as I could, and nowhere have I seen even an 
 allegation which lays a proof of immorality against the Irish clergy or 
 their bishops at the time of the Keformafion. But perhaps when 
 Mr. Froude said this he meant the apostate bishops. If so, I am 
 willing to grant him whatever he charges against them, and the 
 heavier it is the more pleased I am to see it going against them. 
 
 The next passage iu the relation of Henry VIII. to Ireland, goes 
 
FATHER BURKE. 243 
 
 to prove that Ireland did not throw the Pope overboard. My friends, 
 in the year 1541 a Parliament assembled in Dublin and declared that 
 Henry VIII. was King of Ireland. They had been four hundred 
 years and more fighting for the title, and at length it is conferred by 
 the Irish Parliament upon the English monarch. Two years later, 
 in gratitude to the Irish Parliament, Henry called the Irish chief- 
 tains together at Greenwich to a grand assembly, and on the first 
 day of July, 1543, he gave the Irish chieftains their English titles. 
 O'Neill of Ulster got the title of Earl of Tyrone ; the glorious O'Don- 
 nell the title of Earl of Tyrconuel ; Ulric McWilliams Burke, Earl 
 of Clanricarde ; Fitzpatrick received the name of Baron of Ossory, 
 and they returned to Ireland with their new titles. Henry, however, 
 open-handed, poor generous fellow — and he was really very generous- 
 — gave those chieftains not only the titles, but a vast amount of jH'op- 
 erty — only it happened to be stolen from the Catholic Church. He 
 "was an exceedingly generous man with other people's goods. He 
 had a good deal of that spirit of which Artemus Ward makes men- 
 tion. He (Artemus Ward) says he was " quite contented to see his 
 wife's first cousin go to the war." In order to eii'ect the refomiation 
 . in question in Ireland, Henry gave to these worthy earls with their 
 English titles all the abbey lands and convents and churches within 
 their possessions. The consequence was he enriched them, and to 
 the eternal shame of the O'Neill and O'Donnell, McWilliams Burke, 
 and the Fitzpatrick of Ossory, they had the cowardliness and weak- 
 ness to accept those things at his hands. They came home with the 
 spoil of the monasteries, but the Irish people were as true as they 
 were before the day when the Irish chieftains proved false to their 
 country. Nowhere in the previous history of Ireland do we find the 
 clans rising against their chieftain. Nowhere do we hear of the 
 O'Neill or O'Donnell dispossessed by his own people. But on this 
 occasion when they came home mark what followed. O'Brien, Earl 
 of Thomond, when he arrived in Munster, found half his dominions 
 in rebellion against him. With reference to McWilliams Burke, Earl 
 of Clanricarde, when his people heard that their leader had accepted 
 the abbey lands, the first thing they did was to set up against him 
 another man, with the title of McWilliam Ulric de Burgh. O'Neill, 
 Earl of Tyrone, was taken when he came home ))y his own son, and 
 put into confinement and died there, all his peoj^le abandoning him. 
 
244 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 O'Donnell of Tyrconnel came home, and his own son and all his 
 people rose against him and drove him out from the midst of them. 
 Now, I say in the face of all this Mr. Froude is not right in saying 
 that Ireland threw the Pope overboard. These people came home 
 not Protestants but schismatics, and very bad Catholics, and Ireland 
 wonld not stand it. 
 
 Ileury died in 1547, and I really believe that with all the badness 
 of his heart, had he lived a few years longer his life would not have 
 been a curse but a blessing to Ireland, for the reason that those who 
 came after him were worse than himself. He was succeeded by his 
 infant son, Edward VI., who was under the care or guardianship of 
 the Duke of Somerset. He was a thoroughgoing Protestant. Som- 
 erset didn't Ijclicve in the people's supremacy, and was opposed to 
 anything that favored the Catholic Church. He sent over his orders 
 to put his laws in force against the Church. Consequently the 
 churches were pillaged, the Catholic pi'iests were driven out, and, as 
 Mr. Froude puts it, "the implements of superstition were put down." 
 The implements of superstition, as Mr. Froude calls them, were 
 "Jesus Christ crucified," the statues of his Blessed Mother, and his 
 saints. All these things were pulled down and destroyed. The 
 ancient statue of Our Lady at Trim (County Meath) was broken. 
 The churches were burned, and torn down, and, as Mr. Froude puts 
 it, " Ireland was taught that she must yield to the new order of things 
 or stand by the Pope." " Her national ideas become for evermore 
 inseparably linked with the Catholic religion." Glory to you, Mr. 
 Froude ! He has not forgotten to mention the fact that from that 
 time to the present hour Ireland's independence and Ireland's reli- 
 gion became inseparably and irrevocably one. If the learned gentle- 
 man were present, I have no doubt that he would rise up and bow 
 his thanks to you for the hearty manner in which you have received 
 his sentiments. And I am sure that, as he is not here, he will not 
 take it ill of me when I thank you in his name. Bloody Mary was 
 a Catholic, without a doubt. She persecuted her Protestant subjects. 
 Speaking of her in his lecture, Mr. Froude says: "There was no 
 persecution of Protestants in Ireland, because there were no Protes- 
 tants to be persecuted." And he goes on to say : " Those who were 
 in Ireland when Mary came to the throne fled." I must take the 
 learned historian to task on this. The insinuation is, that if the 
 
FATHER BURKE. 245 
 
 Protestants had been in Ireland the Irish would have 2iersecuted 
 them. The impression he desires to leave on the mind is that we 
 Catholics would be only too glad to stain our hands in the blood of 
 our fellow-citizens on the question of i-eligion. But M'hat are the 
 facts? The facts are that during the reign of Edward VI., and 
 during all the years of his father's apostacy from the Catholic 
 Church, there were sent over to Ireland as bishops men whom even 
 English historians have convicted and condemned of almost eveiy 
 crime. As soon as Mary came to the throne these gentlemen did 
 not wait to be ordered out ; they went out of their own accord. 
 They thought it was the best of their play to clear out at once. But 
 so far as regards the Irish people, I claim for my native land that 
 she never persecuted on account of religion. I am proud, in ad- 
 dressing an American audience, to be able to lay this high claim for 
 Ireland. The genius of the Irish people is not a persecuting genius. 
 There is not a people on the face of the earth so attached to the 
 Christian religion as the Irish race. There is not a people on the 
 face of the earth so unwilling to persecute or shed blood in the cause 
 of x'cligion as the Irish. And here ai'e my proofs : Mr. Froude 
 says that the Protestants made off as soon as Queen Mary came to 
 the throne, but Sir James Ware in his annals tells us that the 
 Protestants were being persecuted in England under Mary, and that 
 they actually fled over to Ireland for protection. He gives even the 
 names of some of them. He tells us that John Harvey, Abel Ellis, 
 Joseph Edmunds, and Henry Hall, natives of Cheshire, in England, 
 came over to Ireland to avoid persecution in England, and they 
 brought with them a AVelsh Protestant minister named Thomas 
 Jones. These four gentlemen were received so cordially, were wel- 
 comed so hospitably, that they actually founded a highly respectable 
 mercantile family in Dublin. But we have another magnificent proof 
 that the Irish are not a persecuting race. When James II. assem- 
 bled his Catholic Parliament in Ireland in 1G89, after they had been 
 robbed and plundered, imprisoned and put to death for their adher- 
 ence to the Catholic faith, at last the wheel gave a turn, and in 
 1689 the Catholics wei-e up and the Protestants were down. That 
 Parliament assembled to the number of 228 members. The Celtic 
 or Catholic element had a sweeping majority. What was the first 
 
246 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 law that they made ? The very first law that the Catholic parlia- 
 ment passed was as follows : 
 
 " We hereby declare that it is the law of this land of Ireland that 
 neither now nor ever again shall any man be pei'secuted for his 
 religion." 
 
 That was the retaliation we took on them. Was it not magnifi- 
 cent? Was it not a grand, a magnificent specimen of that spirit of 
 Christianity, that spirit of forgiveness and charity withont which, if 
 it be not in a man, all the dogmatic truths that ever were revealed 
 won't save him? Now, coming to Good Queen Bess, as she is 
 called. I must say that Mr. Froude bears very heavil}^ upon her, 
 and speaks of her really" in language as terrific in its severity as any 
 that I could use, and far more, for I have not the learning nor the 
 eloquence of Mr. Froude. He says one little thing of her, how- 
 ever, that is worthy of remark : 
 
 "Elizabeth was reluctant to draw the sword, but when she did 
 draw it she never sheathed it until the star of freedom was fixed upon 
 her banner, never to pale." 
 
 That is a very eloquent passage ; but the soul of eloquence is 
 truth. Is it true strictly that Elizabeth was reluctant to draw the 
 sword? Answer it, 3'e Irish annals. Answer it, O history of Ire- 
 land ! Elizabeth came to reign in 1558. The following year, in 
 1559, there was a Parliament assembled by her order in Dublin. 
 What do you think of the laws of that Parliament? It was not a 
 Catholic Parliament, nor an Irish Parliament. It consisted of 76 
 members. Generally speaking, parliaments in Ireland used to have 
 from 220 to 230 members. This Parliament of Elizabeth consisted 
 of 76 picked men. The laws that that Parliament made were, 
 first : 
 
 Any clergyman not using the Book of Common Prayer [the Pro- 
 testant Prayer-Book] , or using any other form, either in public or 
 in private, the first time that he is discovered, shall be deprived of 
 his benefice for one year, and suffer imprisonment in jail for six 
 months ; for the second offence he shall be put in jail at the queen's 
 pleasure — to be let out whenever she thought proper. For the 
 third offence he was to be put in close confinement for life. This is 
 the lady that was unwilling to draw the sword, and this was the very 
 j^ear she was crowned queen — the very year. She scarcely waited 
 
FATHER BUEKE. 247 
 
 a year. This was the woman reluctant to draw the sword. So 
 much for the priests ; now for the laymen. 
 
 If a layman was discovered using any other prayer-book except 
 Queen Elizabeth's prayer-book, he was to be put in jail for one year ; 
 and if he was caught doing it a second time, he was to be put in prison 
 for the rest of his life. Every Sunday the people were obliged to go 
 to the Protestant church, and if any one refused to go, for every time 
 that he refused he was tined twelve pence — that would be about 
 twelve shillings of our present money — and besides the fine he was 
 to endure the censures of the church. " The star of freedom," says 
 Mr. Froude, " was never to pale. The queen drew the sword in the 
 cause of the star of freedom ! " But, my friends, freedom meant 
 whatever was in Elizabeth's mind. Freedom meant slavery tenfold 
 increased, with the addition of religious persecution to the unfortu- 
 nate Irish. If this be Mr. Fronde's ideal of the star of fi-eedom, all 
 I can say is, the sooner such stars fall from the canopy of heaven and 
 of the world's history the better. The condition of the Irish Church : 
 in what state was the Irish Church? Upon that subject we have the 
 authority of the Protestant historian, Leland. There were 220 pai'- 
 ish churches in Meath,.and after a few years' time there were only 105 
 of them left with the roofs on. "All over the kingdom," says Le- 
 land, " the people were left without any religious worship, and under 
 the pretence of obeying the orders of the state they seized all the 
 most valuable furniture of the churches, which was actually exposed 
 to sale without decency or reserve." A number of hungry adven- 
 turers were let loose upon the Irish churches and upon the Irish peo- 
 ple by Elizabeth. They not only robbed them and plundered their 
 churches, but they shed the blood of the bishops and priests and of 
 the people of Ireland in torrents, as Mr. Froude himself acknowl- 
 edges. He tells us that after the second rebellion of the Geraldines, 
 such was the state to which the fair province of Munster was reduced 
 that you might go through the land from the farmost point of Kerry 
 until you came into the "eastern plains of Tipperary, and you would 
 not as much as hear the whistle of a ploughboy or behold the face of 
 a living man. But the trenches and ditches were filled with the 
 corpses of the people, and the country was reduced to a desolate wil- 
 derness. The poet Spenser describes it most emphatically. Even 
 he, case-hardened as he was, — for he was one of the plunderers and 
 
248 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 persecutors himself, — acknowledo^ed that the state of Minister was 
 such that no man could look upon it with a dry eye. Sir Henry 
 Sidney, one of Elizabeth's deputies, speaks of the condition of the 
 country as follows : 
 
 "Such horrible spectacles are to be beheld as the burning of villa- 
 ges, the ruin of towns, yea, the view of the bones and skulls of the 
 dead, who, partly by murder and partly by famine, have died in the 
 fields. It is such that hardly any Christian can behold with a dry 
 eye." 
 
 Her own minister — I take his testimony of the state to which this 
 terrible woman reduced unhappy Ireland, Stratford, another Eng- 
 lish authority, says : 
 
 " I knew it was bad, and very bad, in Ireland, but that it was so 
 terrible I did not believe." 
 
 In the midst of all this persecution, what was still the reigning 
 idea in the mind of the English Government? To root out and to 
 extirpate the Irish from their own land, added to which was now the 
 element of religious discord and persecution. It is evident that this 
 was still in the minds of the English people. Elizabeth, who, Mr. 
 Froude sa3's, never dispossessed any Irishman of an acre of land, 
 during the war which she waged in the latter days of her reign against 
 O'Neill threw out such hints as these : 
 
 " The more slaughter there is the better it will be for my English 
 subjects, the more land they will get." 
 
 This is the woman whom Mr. Froude tells us never confiscated 
 and never listened to the idea of confiscation of property. This 
 woman, when the Gcraldines were destroyed, took the whole of the 
 vast estates of the Eai-1 of Desmond and gave them to her English 
 settlers. She confiscated millions of acres. And in the face of strict 
 truths, recorded and stamped by history, I cannot see how any man 
 can come forward and say of this atrocious woman that whatever she 
 did she intended it for the good of Ireland. 
 
 In 1G02 she died, after reigning forty-one years, leaving Ireland 
 at the hour of her death one vast slaughter-house. Munster was re- 
 duced to the state described by Spenser. Connaught was made a 
 wilderness after the rebellion of the Clanricardes, or the Burke fam- 
 ily. Ulster, through the agency of Lord Mountjoy, was left the very 
 jiicture of desolation. The glorious lied Hugh O'Donnell and the 
 
FATHER BUKKE. 249 
 
 magnificent Hugh O'Neill were crushed and defeated after fifteen 
 years of war, and the consequence was that when James I. succeeded 
 Elizal)eth he found Ireland almost a wilderness. 
 
 Mr. Froude, in his rapid historical sketch, says that all this fruit 
 brought revenge, and he tells us that in 1641 the Irish rose in rebel- 
 lion. So they did. Now, he makes one statement, and with the 
 refutation of that statement I will close this lecture. Mr. Froude 
 tells us that in the rising under SirPhelim O'Neill in 1642 there were 
 38,000 Protestants massacred by the Irish. This is a grave charge, 
 and if it be true, all I can say is that I blush for my fathers. But if 
 it be not true, why repeat it ? Why not wipe it out fi'om the records ? 
 It is true that Ireland rose under Sir Phelim O'Neill. At that time 
 there was a Protestant parson in Ireland who called himself a minis- 
 ter of the Word of God. He gives his account of tl:e whole trans- 
 action in a letter to the people of England, begging of them to help 
 their fcliow-Protestants of Ireland. Here are his words : 
 
 " It was the inten-tion of the Irish to massacre all the English. On 
 Saturday they were to disarm them, on Sunday to seize all their cat- 
 tle and goods, and on Monday they were to cut all the English 
 throats. The former they executed ; the third — that is, the massa- 
 cre — they failed in." 
 
 Pettit, another English authority, tells us that there Avere 30,000 
 Protestants massacred at that time. A man of the name of May foots 
 it up at 200,000. I suppose he thought, in for a penny in for a 
 pound. But there was an honest Protestant clergyman in Ireland 
 who examined minutely into the details of the whole conspiracy, and 
 of all the evils that came frcmi it. What does he tell us ? "I have 
 discovered," he said — and he gives proofs, state papers and authen- 
 tic records — " that the Irish Catholics in that rising massacred 2,100 
 Protestants ; that other Protestants said that there were 1,600 more ; 
 and that some Irish authorities themselves say there were 3,000, 
 making altogether 4,600." 
 
 This is the massacre Mr. Froude speaks of. He tosses off so 
 calml}', 38,000 Protestants were massacred; that is to say, he mul- 
 tiplies the original number by ten ; whereas Mv. Warner, the au- 
 thoi'ity in question, says that there were 2,100, and I am unwilling 
 to believe in the additional numbei's that have been sent in. 
 
 After all the sufierings and pei'sccutions which Ireland had endured 
 
250 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 at the hands of English Protestants, I ask you to set these two 
 authorities before your mind. Contrast them and give me a fair 
 verdict. 
 
 Is there anything recorded in history more terrible than the per- 
 sistent, undying resolution, so clearly manifested, of the English 
 Government to root out, to extirpate, and destroy the people of Ire- 
 land ? Is there anything recorded in history more unjust than this 
 systematic constitutional robbery of a people whom the Almighty 
 God created in that island, to whom he gave that island, and who 
 had the aboriginal right to every inch of Irish soil? On the other 
 handj can history bring forth a more magnificent spectacle than the 
 «alm, firm, united resolution with which Ireland stood in defence of 
 her religion, and gave up all things rather than sacrifice what she 
 conceived to be the cause of truth? Mr. Froude does not believe 
 that it is the cause of truth. I do not blame him ; every man has a 
 right to his religious opinions. But Ireland believed that it was the 
 cause of truth, and Ireland stood for it like one man. 
 
 I speak of all these things only historically. I do not believe in 
 animosity. I am no believer in liad blood. I do not believe with 
 Mr. Fronde that the question of Ireland's difiiculties must remair 
 without a solution ; I do not give it up in despair ; but this I do say, 
 that he has no riglit, nor has any other man the right, to come before 
 the audience of America tliat has never persecuted in the cause 
 of religion — of America, that respects the rights even of the mean- 
 est citizen upon her soil — and to ask that American j^eople to sanc- 
 tion by their verdict the robberies and persecutions of which Eng- 
 land is guilty ! 
 
FATHER BURKE. £51 
 
 Third Lecture. 
 
 Delivered in the Academy of Music, New York, November 
 19. 1872. 
 
 UpADIES AND GENTLEMEN, — I now approach, in answering 
 Pm Mr. Froude, some of the most awful periods of our history, 
 ^ and I confess that 1 approach this terrible ground with hesi- 
 i tancy, and with an extreme regret that Mr. Froude should 
 
 have opened up c^uestions which oblige an Irishman to undergo the 
 pain of heart and anguish of spirit which a revision of those periods 
 of our history must occasion. The learned gentleman began his 
 third lecture by reminding his audience that he had closed his second 
 lecture with a reference to the rise, progress, and collapse of a great 
 rebellion which took place in Ireland in 1641 — that is to say, some- 
 what more than two hundred years ago. He made but a passing 
 allusion to that great event in our history, and in that allusion — if 
 he has been reported correctly — he said simply that the Irish 
 rebelled in 1641. This was his first statement, that it was a rebel- 
 lion ; secondly, that this rebellion began in massacre and ended in 
 ruin ; thirdly, that for nine years the Irish leaders had the destinies 
 of their country in their hands ; and, fourthly, that those nine years 
 were years of anarchy and mutual slaughter. Nothing, therefore, 
 •can be imagined more me'-incholy than the picture drawn by that 
 learned gentleman of these nme sad years. And yet I will venture 
 to say, and I hope I shall be able to prove, that each of these four 
 statements is without sufficient historical foundatitm. My first posi- 
 tion is that the movement of 1641 was not a rebellion ; second, that 
 it did not begin with massacre, although it ended in ruin ; thirdly, 
 that the Irish leaders had not the destiny of their country in their 
 
252 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 hands during these years ; and, fourth, whether they had or not, 
 that these years were not a period of anarchy and mutual slaughter. 
 They were but the opening to a far moi-e terrific period. We must 
 discuss these questions, my friends, calmly and historically. We 
 must liiok upon them rather like the antiquarian prying into the 
 past than with the living, wai'm feelings of men whose blood boils up 
 with the burnings of so much injustice and so much bloodshed. 
 
 In order to understand this question fully and fiiirly, it is neces- 
 sary for us to go back to the historical events of the time. I find, 
 then, that James I., the man who planted Ulster — that is to say, 
 confiscated utterly and entirely six of the finest counties in Ireland, 
 an entire province, rooting out the aboriginal Irish and Catholic 
 inhabitants, even to a man, giving the whole country to Scotch and 
 English settlers of the Protestant religion, under the condition tliat 
 they were not to employ even as much as an Irish laborer on their 
 gi'ounds, that they were to banish them all — this man died in 1625 
 and was succeeded by his unfortunate son, Charles I. When Charles 
 came to the throne, bred up as he was in the traditions of a monarchy 
 which Henry VIII. had rendered almost absolute, as we know — 
 whose absolute power was still continued in Elizabeth under foi'ms 
 the most tyrannical, whose absolute power was continued by his own 
 father, James I. — Charles came to the throne with the most exag- 
 gerated ideas of royal privileges and supremacy. But during the 
 dajs of his father a new spirit had grown up in Scotland and in 
 England. The form which Protestantism took in Scotland was the 
 hard, uncompromising, and highly cruel form of Calvinism in its 
 most repellant aspect. The men who rose in Scotland in defence of 
 their Presbyterian religion rose not against Catholic people, but 
 against the Episcopalian Protestants of England. They defended 
 what tliey called the kirk or covenant. They fought bravely, I 
 acknowledge, for it, and they ended in establishing it as the religion 
 of Scotland. 
 
 Now, Charles I. was an Episcopalian Protestant of the most sincere 
 and devoted kind. The Parliament of England, in the very first 
 years of Charles, admitted persons who were strongly tinged with 
 Scottish Calvinism. The king demanded of them certain subsidies 
 and they i-efused him ; he asserted certain sovereign rights and they 
 denied them. While this was going on in England from 1630 to 
 
FATHER BURKE. 253 
 
 1641, what was the condition of affairs in Ireland? One fei'tilc pro- 
 vince of the land had been confiscated by James I. Charles I. was 
 in need of money for his own purposes, and his Parliament refused 
 to grant any. Then the poor, oppressed, and down-trodden Catho- 
 lics of Ii'eland imagined, naturally enough, that the king, being in 
 difficulties, would turn to them and extend a little countenance and 
 favor if they proclaimed their loyalty and stood by him. According- 
 ly, the Lord Lieutenant, Lord Falkland, desiring sincerely to aid 
 his royal master, hinted to the Catholics, who had been enduring 
 the most terrible penal laws from the days of Elizabeth ami James I., 
 that perhaps, if they should now petition the king, certain graces or 
 concessions might be granted them. These concessions simply 
 involved permission of riding over English land and to worship God 
 according to the dictates of their own consciences. They sought for 
 nothing more, and nothing more was promised them. When their 
 petition was laid before the king, his royal majesty issued a procla- 
 mation in which he declared that it was his intention, and that he had 
 plighted bis word, to grant to the Catholics and people of Ireland 
 certain concessions and indulgences, which he named "graces." No 
 sooner does the newly-founded Puritan element in England and the 
 Parliament that were in rebellion against their king — no sooner did 
 they hear that the slightest relaxation of the peual law Avas to be 
 granted to the Catholics of Ireland than they instantly rose and pro- 
 tested that it should not be ; and Charles, to his eternal disgrace, 
 broke his word with the Catholics of Ii-eland after they had sent him 
 £120,000 in acknowledgment of his promise. More than that, it 
 was suspected that Lord Falkland was too mild a man, too just a 
 man, to be allowed to remain as Lord Lieutenant of Ii'eland, and ho 
 was recalled, and after a short lapse Wentworth, who was Earl of 
 Strafford, was sent there as Lord Lieutenant. Wentworth on his 
 arrival summoned a Parliament, and they met in the year 1634. He 
 told them the difficulties that the king was in ; he told them how the 
 Parliament in England was rebelling against him, and how he looked 
 to his Irish subjects as loyal. He perhaps told them that amongst 
 Catholics loyalty was not a mere sentiment, that it was an unshaken 
 principle, resting on conscience and religion. And then he assured 
 them that Charles, the King of England, still intended to keep his 
 word, and to grant them their concessions. Next came the usual 
 
254 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 demand for money, and the Irish Parliament granted six subsidies of 
 £50,000 each. Strafford wrote to the king congratulating his 
 majesty that he had got so much money out of the Irish, for he said : 
 " You and I remember that your majesty expected only £30,000, and 
 they have granted £50,000." INIore than this, the Irish Parliament 
 voted the king 8,000 infantry and 1,000 horse to fight his rebellion* 
 enemies. The Parliament met the following year, 1635, and what 
 do you think was the fulfilment of the i-oyal promise to the Catholics 
 of Ireland? Strafford had got the money. He did not wish to 
 compromise his master the king, and he took upon himself to fix 
 upon his memory the indeliljle shame and disgrace of breaking his 
 word, which he had plighted, and disappoint the Catholics of Ireland. 
 Then, in 1G35, the real character of this man came out, and what do 
 you think was the measure he proposed ? He instituted a commis- 
 sion for the express purjiose of confiscating, in addition to Ulster — 
 that was already gone — the whole province of Connaught, so as not 
 to leave an Irishman or Catholic one square inch of ground in that 
 land. This he called the Commission of Defective Titles. The 
 members of the commission were to enquire into the title of pro- 
 perty, and to find a flaw in it if they could, in order that the land 
 might be confiscated to the Crown of England. Remember how 
 much of Ireland had already been seized, my friends. The whole 
 of Ulster had been confiscated by James I. The same king had 
 taken the County of Longford from the OTarrels, who had owned 
 it from time immemorial ; Wexford from the O'Tooles, and several 
 other counties from the Irish families who were the rightful pro- 
 prietors of the soil. And now, with the whole of Ulster and the 
 better part of Leinster in his hand, this minister instituted a com- 
 mission for the purpose of obtaining the whole of the province of 
 Connaught and of rooting out the native Irish ! He expelled every 
 man that owned a rod of land in the province and reduced them to 
 beggary, starvation, and to death. Here is the description of his 
 plan as given by Leland, a historian who was hostile to Ireland's 
 faith and Ireland's nationality. Leland thus describes this project : 
 " It was nothing less than to set aside the title of every estate in 
 every part of Connaught, a project which when proposed in the late 
 reign was received with horror and amazement, and which suited 
 the undismayed and enterprising genius of Lord Wentworth. 
 
FATHER BURKE. 255 
 
 Accordingly he began in the County of Eoscommon." He passed 
 thence to Sligo, thence to Mayo, and then to Gal\va3\ The only 
 way in which a title could be upset was to have a jury of twelve 
 men, and according to their verdict the title was valid or not. 
 Straflbrd began by picking his jury and packing them, the old 
 policy that has been continued down to our own time — the policy 
 of packing and the prejudging of a jury. He told the jury before 
 the trials began that he expected them to find a verdict for the king, 
 and finally, by bribing and overawing, he got juries to go for him, 
 until he came into my own county, Galway. And, to the honor of 
 old Galway be it said, as soon as the commission arrived in that 
 county they could not find twelve jurors there base enough or 
 wicked enough to confiscate the lands of their felhiw-subjects. 
 What was the result ? The County Galway jurors were called to 
 Dublin before the Castle Chamber. Every man of them was fined 
 £4,000, and put in prison to be kept until the fine was paid. Every 
 square inch of their property was taken from them, and the high, 
 sherifl' of Galway, being a man of moderate means, and l)aving been 
 fined £1,000, died in jail because he was not able to pay the unjust 
 imposition. More than this, not content with threatening the juries 
 and coercing them, my Lord Straflbrd went to the justices and told 
 them that they were to get four shillings on the pound for the value 
 of every single piece of property that they confiscated, and he 
 boasted publicly that he. had made the chief liaron and the judges 
 attend to this business as if it icere their ovm 'pricate concern! This 
 is the kind of rule the English historian comes to America to ask the 
 honest and upright citizens of this free country to endorse by their 
 verdict, and thereby to make themselves accomplices of English 
 robber3\ In the same way this Straflbrd instituted another tribunal 
 in Ireland which he called the Court of Wards, and do you know 
 what this was? It was found that the Irish people, gentle and 
 simple, failed to become Protestants. I have not a harsh word to 
 say to any of the Protestants, but I do say that every high-minded 
 Protestant in the world must admire the strength and fidelity with 
 which Ireland, because of her conscience, clings to her ancient faith, 
 believing it true. This tribunal was instituted in order to get the 
 heirs of Catholic gentry and to bring them up in the Protestant 
 religion, and it was to this court of awards that was owing the sig- 
 
25G TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 nificant fact that some of the most ancient and best names in Ireland 
 — the names of men whose ancestors fonght for faith and father- 
 land — are now Protestants and the enemies of their Catholic fellow- 
 subjects. It was by this, and such means as this, that the men of 
 my name became Protestants. There was no drop of Protestant 
 blood in the Red Earl or the Dun Earl of Clanricarde. There was 
 no drop of such blood in the heroic Burkes who fought in the long 
 500 years before this time. 
 
 There was no Protestant blood in the O'Briens of Munster or in 
 the glorious O'Donnells and O'Neills of Ulster ; yet they are Pro- 
 testants to-day. Let no Protestant American citizen imiigine that I 
 speak with disdain of his religion, but as a historian it is my duty to 
 point out the means, which every high-minded man must brand as 
 nefarious, by which the aristocracy of Ireland were led to change 
 their religion. The Irish meantime waited, and waited in vain, for 
 the fulfilment of the king's promise and the concession of "the 
 graces," as they were called. At length matters grew desperate 
 between Charles and his Parliament, and in the year 1G40 he again 
 gave his promise to the Irish jDCople, and he called a Parliament 
 ■which gave him four subsidies, 8,000 men and 1,000 horse, to fight 
 against the Scotch, who had rebelled against him. Straff"ord rejoiced 
 that ho had got those subsidies and this body of men, but no sooner 
 did he arrive in England than the Parliament, now in rebellion, took 
 him, and in the same year, 1640, Strafi"ord's head was cut off, and 
 he would be a strange Irishman that would regret it. 
 
 Meantime the people of Scotland rose in armed rebellion against 
 their king. They marched into England, and what do you think 
 they made by the movement? They secured full enjoyment of their 
 religion, which was not Protestant, but Presbyterian. They got 
 £300,000, and got for several months £850 a day to support their 
 army. Then they retired into their own country, after achieving the 
 purpose for which they revolted. Meantime the loyal Catholics of 
 Ireland were being ground in the very dust. What wonder, I ask 
 you, was it that they counselled together and said : "The king is 
 afraid of the Parliament, though personally inclined to grant graces 
 which he has plighted his royal word to grant. The evidence is that 
 if free he would grant these concessions he has promised. But the 
 king is not free," said the Irish, " for his Parliament has rebelled 
 
FATHER BUKKE. 257 
 
 against him. Let us rise in tiie king's name and assert our rights." 
 They rose in 1641 lilce one man — every Irishman and Catholic in 
 Ireland rose. On the 23d of October, 1641, they all rose, with the 
 exception of the Catholic lords of the pale. I will give you the 
 reason of their rising, as recorded in the "Memoirs of Lord Castle- 
 haven," a lord by no means prejudiced in fiivor of Ireland ; 
 
 " The Irish rose for six reasons ; first, because they are generally 
 looked down to as a conquered nation, seldom or never trusted after 
 the manner of free-born subjects." 
 
 Here, dear friends, is the first reason given by this English lord, 
 that the Irish people rose after the English people treated them con- 
 temptuously. When will England learn to treat her subjects or 
 friends with common respect? When will those proud, stubborn 
 Anglo-Saxons condescend to form and cherish an acquaintance with 
 those around them ? I said it in ray first, repeated it in my second 
 lecture, and say it in this, that it was the contempt as much as the 
 hatred of Englishmen for Irishmen that lies at the root of the bitter 
 spirit and antagonism that exists between those two nations. The 
 second reason given by my Lord Castlehaven is that the Irish saw 
 that six whole counties in Ulster were escheated to the crown and 
 never restored to the natives, but bestowed by James I. on his 
 countrymen, the Scotch. The third reason was that in Strafford's 
 time the crown laid claim to Eoscommon and Galway, and to some 
 parts of Tipperary, Wicldow and other portions of the land. The 
 fourth reason was that, according to the English accounts of the day, 
 war was declared against the Roman Catholics, a fact which to a 
 people so fond of their religion as the Irish was no small matter, no 
 small inducement to make them sober and quiet, for as a race the 
 Irish people are very fond of standing by their religious tenets and 
 adhering to their religious opinions. The fifth reason was that they 
 saw how the Scots, by making a show of pretended grievances and 
 taking up arms against their oppressors, in order to pi-ocure the 
 rights to which they were justly entitled, procured the rights which 
 they sought, secured the privileges and amenities due to a nation 
 anxious to assert its own cause, its own independence ; they secured 
 £500,000 by their visit to England. And the last reason, that they 
 saw such a misunderstanding exist between the king and the Parlia- 
 ment, and they consequently believed that the king would grant them 
 
258 TKEASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 anything that they could in reason demand, or at least as much as 
 they could expect. I ask you were not those sufficient grounds for 
 any claim which the Irish might have made at the time ? I appeal to 
 the people of America. I sjDeak to a generous people, who know 
 what civil and religious liberty means. I appeal here from this plat- 
 form to-night for a people whose spirit was never broken and never 
 will be. I appeal here to-night for a people not inferior to the 
 Saxon, or to any other i-ace on the face of the earth, either in gifts 
 of intellect or bodily energy. I appeal here to-night and I address 
 myself to the enlightened instincts of this great land for a people 
 who have been downtrodden and persecuted as our forefathers wei'e, 
 and I think it my duty, not as a minister, but as a historian, to stand 
 up and state my reasons, believing that I have sufficient justification 
 to do so, and considering the fact of the accumulated wrongs that 
 have been heaped upon Ireland, I don't think I would be doing jus- 
 tice to myself or to m}' country if I didn't take advantage of this 
 opportunity to reply to the wrongs that have been heaped upon her. 
 An English Protestant writer of the times, of that very year 1641, 
 says that they had sundry grievances and grounds of complaint touch- 
 ing their estates and consciences, which they pretended to be far 
 greater than those of the Scots, for they thouglit that if the Scotch 
 acted thus to save a new religion, it was a reason that they should 
 not be punished for the exercise of the old. 
 
 There was another reason for the revolt, my friends, and a very 
 potent one. It was this : Charles had the weakness and the folly — 
 I cannot call it anything else — to leave at the head of the Irish 
 Government two lord justices. Sir John Bernoe and Sir William 
 Parsons. These were both ardent Puritans and partisans of the Parlia- 
 ment. They thought that he would be embarrassed with the fight in 
 the Parliament and b}' the men in Ireland, so these men lent them- 
 selves to promote the resistance. Six months before this revolt broke 
 out Charles sent them M'ord that he had received notice that the Irish 
 were going to rise. They took no notice of the king's advertisement. 
 The lords of the pale, who refused to join the Irish in the uprising, 
 betook themselves to the justices in Dublin for protection, and it 
 was refused them. They were refused permission to go into the 
 city and escape the Irish rebellion, and the moment the Irish chief- 
 tains came near the settlers of the English kins their castles were 
 
FATHER BURKE. 259 
 
 declared forfeited as well as their estates, and so the Lords of Gor- 
 manstown and Trimbleton and others were forced to join hands with 
 the Irish, and draw their swords in the glorious cause they so 
 applauded and maintained. Tliey were forced to this. Moreover, 
 the Irish knew that (heir friends and fellow-countrymen were earning 
 distinction and honor and glory upon all the battle-fields of Europe, 
 in the service of Spain, France and Austria, and they held, uot 
 without reason, that these their countrymen would help them in the 
 hour of their need. Accordingly, on the 23d of October, 1G41, they 
 arose. What was the first thing they did, according to Mr. Froude? 
 The first thing was to massacre all the Protestants they could lay 
 hands on. Well, my friends, this, as I will endeavor to show, is 
 not the fact. The very first thing that their leader. Sir Phelim 
 O'Neill, did was to issue a proclamation, on the verj^ day of the 
 rising, in which he declares : 
 
 " We rise in the name of our lord the king ; we rise to assert the 
 power and jDrerogative of the king ; wo declare we do not wish to 
 make war on the king or any one of his subjects ; we declare, more- 
 ovei', that we do not intend to shed blood except in legitimate warfare, 
 and that any man of our tribes that robs, plunders or sheds blood 
 shall 1)6 severely punished." Did tliey keep this declaration of 
 theirs? Most inviolably. I assert in the name of history that there 
 was no massacre of the Protestants, and I will pi'ove it of Protest- 
 ant authority. We find a despatch from the Irish Government to 
 the Government in England, dated 25th of that same mouth, in which 
 they give an account of the rising of the Irish people. There was 
 complaint as to how the Irish dealt with their Protestant fellow- 
 citizens. They took their cattle, horses and property, but not one 
 single word or complaint about one drop of blood shed. And if they 
 took their cattle, horses and property, you must remember that they 
 were taking back what was their own. A very shoi-t time afterwaixls 
 the massacre began, but \vho began it? The Protestant Ulster set- 
 tlers fled from the Irish. They brought their lives with them at 
 least, and they entered the town of Carrickfergus, where they found 
 a garrison of Scotch Puritans. Now, in their terror the common 
 people fled to Carrickfergus, and upon a little island near b}^ they 
 took refuge. They congregated there for purposes of safetj' to the 
 number of more than three thousand. The very first thing this garri- 
 
260 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 son did, they sailed out of Carrickfergus in tiie night-time and fell in 
 among these innocent and unarmed people, and they slew man, 
 woman and child, until they left three thousand dead bodies. And 
 we have the authority of Leland, the Protestant historian, that this 
 was the first massacre committed in Ireland on either side. This 
 was the first massacre ! How, in the name of Heaven, can any man 
 be so leai'ned as Mr. Froude and make such untruthful assertions as 
 he has advanced? How can he, in the name of history, assei-t that 
 these (the Irish people) began by massacring thirty-eight thousand 
 of his fellow-countrymen, his fellow-religionists, when we have in 
 the month of December, four months after, a commission issued to 
 the Dean of Kilmore and seven other Protestant clergymen to make 
 sedulous enquiry about those who were murdered? Here are the 
 words of Castlehaven : 
 
 " The Catholics were urged into rebellion, and the lord justices 
 were often heard to say that the more in rebellion the more lands 
 would be derived (or pilfered) from them." 
 
 It was the old story, the old adage of James I: "Root out the 
 Catholics, root out the Irish, and give Ireland to English Protestants 
 and Puritans, and you will regenerate the land." But from such 
 regenei'ation of my own or any other land good Lord deliver us. 
 " This rebellion," says Mr. Froude, " began in massacre and ended 
 in ruin." It ended in ruin the most terrible, and if it began in mas- 
 sacre, Mr. Froude, you must acknowledge as a historical truth that 
 the massacre was on the part of your countrymen and your chief 
 justices. Thus the war began. It was a war between the Puritan 
 Protestants of Ulster and other parts of Ireland, aided by constant 
 supplies that came over to them from England. It was a war that 
 continued for eleven years, and it was a war in which the Irish chief- 
 tains had not the destinies of the nation in their own hands, but 
 were obliged to fight, and fight like men, in order to try to achieve 
 a better destiny and a better future for their people. Who can say 
 that the Irish chieftains did hold the destinies of Ireland in their 
 hands during those nine years or more, when they had to fight 
 against hostile forces, one after the other, that came successively 
 against them inflamed with religious bigotry, hatred and enmity that 
 the world has scarcely ever seen the like of? Then Mr. Froude 
 adds that these were years of anarchy and slaughter. Let us see 
 
FATHEU BURKE. 261 
 
 what evidence history has of the facts. No sooner had the English 
 lords of the pale — who were all Catholics — joined the Irish than 
 they turned to the Catholic bishops in the land. They called them 
 together in a synod, and on the 10th of May, 1642, the bishops of 
 Ireland, the lords of Ireland, and the gentry and commoners and 
 estated gentlemen of Ireland met together and founded what was 
 called the Confederation of Kilkenny. Amongst other members, 
 they selected for the Supreme Council three archbishops, two bish- 
 ops, four lords and fifteen commoners. These men were to meet 
 and remain in permanent session, watching over the country, making 
 laws, watching over the army, and, above all, preventing cruelty and 
 murder. A regular Government was formed. They actually estab- 
 lished a mint and coined their money for the Irish nation. They 
 established an army under Lord Mount cashcl, under Preston, and 
 under the glorious Owen Roe O'Neill. During the first month they 
 gained some successes. Most of the principal cities of Ireland 
 opened their gates to them. The garrisons Avere carefully saved 
 from slaughter, and the moment they laid down their arms their 
 lives were as sacred as any man's in the ranks of the Iri.sh armies. 
 Not a drop of unnecessary blood was shed by the Irish. In refer- 
 ence to that Supreme Council I defy any man to prove that there 
 was a single act of that Supreme Council fur the purpose of promo- 
 ting bloodshed or slaughter. Now, after a few months success 
 the armies of the confederation experienced some reverses. The 
 English armies came upon them, and the command was given to Sir 
 Charles Coote, and I want to read some of that gentleman's exploits 
 for you. Sir Charles Coote's exploits in Ireland are described by 
 Clarendon in these words: "Sir Charles, besides plundering and 
 burning the town of Clontarf at that time, did massacre sixteen of the 
 towns-people, men and women, besides suckling infants, and in that 
 very same week fifty-six men, women and children in the village of 
 Bullock, being frightened at what was done at Clontarf, went to sea 
 to shun the fury of a party of soldiers who came out from Dublin 
 under command of Col. Clifford. Being pursued by the soldiers in 
 boats, they were overtaken and thrown overlioard." An order 
 given out by the authorities then in power commanded to kill, slay 
 and destroy all belonging to the said rebels, their adherents and 
 relatives, and to destroy the towns and houses where the rebels had 
 
262 TREASURY OF ELOC^UENCE. 
 
 been harbored. This order was given out at tlie Castle of Dublin, 
 the 23d of February, and signed by six precious names. The Irish 
 were not only pursued on the land, but on the sea ; and there was a 
 law passed that if any Irishmen were found on the sea, the officers of 
 his majesty's cruisers were ordered to tic them back to back and 
 throw them into the sea, and the king, however much he might wish 
 to do so, had no power to interfere without being charged with 
 favoring the rebels of Ireland. 
 
 The captains that committed these acts of cruelty at sea, instead 
 of being punished for it, were actually rewarded, and in 1634 a 
 Captain Swanley was called into the English House of Commons, 
 and a vote of thanks was given him and a chain of gold worth £200 
 was presented to him. Another one, a Captain Smith, got one 
 worth £100. In fact, I am ashamed and afraid to mention all the 
 atrocities inflicted upon the Irish people at this time. Infants Avere 
 taken from their dead mothers' bosoms and impaled upon the bay- 
 onets of the soldiers, and Sir Charles Coote saw one of his soldiers 
 playing with a child, throwing it into the air and then spitting it 
 upon his bayonet as it fell, and he laughed and said he enjoyed such 
 frolic. They brought children into the world before their time by 
 the Caesarian operation of the sword, and the childrcii thus brought 
 forth in misery they sacriiiccd in the most cruel manner. Yes, 
 such are the facts, my friends. I am afraid — I say again I am 
 afraid — to tell you the hundredth part of the cruelties of those ter-' 
 rible men, put l)y them upon our race. Now, I ask you to compare 
 this with the manner in which the Irish troops and Irish people 
 behaved. A garrison of seven hundred English surrendered at Naas, 
 and the Irish commandant surrendered them up unharmed and un- 
 injured, on condition that under the like circumstances the English 
 would do the same with him. An Irish party capitulated a few days 
 afterward. The governor of the town and all the party were arrested 
 and put to death. Sir Charles Coote, coming down into Munster, 
 slaughtered every man, woman, and child he met on his march, and 
 among others was Philip K3^an, whom he put to death without the 
 slightest hesitation. This occurs in Cart's '' Life of Ormond." Great 
 numbers of the English, miraculously preserved in those days through 
 the instrumentality of the Irish, were sutl'ered to go into the County 
 of Cork by the courtesy and Idndness of the inhabitants of Cashel. 
 
FATHER BURKE. 263 
 
 In 1649 Cardinal Eenocini was sent over by the Pope to preside 
 over tlie Supreme Council of the Confederation of Killcenny, and 
 about the same time neft's came to Ireland that the iUustrious Owen. 
 Roe O'Neill had landed in Ireland on the coast of Ulster. This man 
 was one of the most distinguished officers of the Spanish service, and 
 he landed with an army with which he met tlie English general and 
 engaged in a battle which raged from the earl}^ morning until the 
 sunset, and the evening saw England's army flying in confusion, and 
 thousands of her best soldiers were stretched upon the field, while 
 the Irish chieftain stood victorious on the field which his genius and 
 valor had won. Shortly after this, partly through the treachery of 
 the Irish Protestants and partly through the agency of the English 
 lords, the confederation began to experience the most disastrous de- 
 feats, and the cause of Ireland again was all but lost. 
 
 In the year 1(540 Oliver Cromwell arrived in Ireland. Mr. Froude 
 says, and truly, that he did not come to make war with rose-water, 
 but with the thick, warm blood of the Irish people. And JMr. Froude 
 prefaces the introduction of Oliver Cromwell in Ireland by telling us 
 that the Lord Protector was a great friend of Ireland, that he was 
 a liberal-minded man and intended to interfere with no man's liberty 
 of conscience ; and he adds that if Cromwell's policy liad been car- 
 ried out in full, probably I would not be here speaking to you of 
 our difficulties with Ireland to-day. He adds, moreover, that Crom- 
 well had formed a design for the pacification of Ireland which would 
 have made futui'e troubles there impossible. What was this design? 
 Lord Macaulay tells us what this design was. Cromwell's avowed 
 purpose was to end all difiiculties in Ireland, whether they arose from 
 the land question or from the religious question, by putting a total 
 and entire end to the Irish race, by extirpating them off the face of 
 the earth. This was an admirable policy for the pacification of Ire- 
 land and the ci'eation of peace ; for the best way and the simplest 
 way to keep any man quiet is to cut his throat. The dead do not 
 speak ; the dead do not move ; the dead do not trouble any one ; and 
 Cromwell came to destroy the Irish race and the Irish Catholic faith, 
 and so put an end at once to all claims for land and to all disturb- 
 ances arising out of religious persecutions. But, I ask this learned 
 gentleman, does he imagine that the people of America are either so 
 ignorant or wicked as to accept the monstrous proposition that a mau 
 
264 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 who came into Ireland with such a purpose as this can be declared a 
 friend of the I'eal interests of the Irish people? Does he imagine 
 that there is no intelligence in America, that there is no manhood in 
 America, that there is no love of freedom in America, or love of 
 religion and of life in America ? And the man must be an enemy of 
 freedom, of religion, and of life itself, before such a man can sympa- 
 thize with the blood-stained Oliver Cromwell. These words of the 
 historian I regret, for they sound like bitter mockery in the ears of 
 the people whose fathers Cromwell came to destroy. But he says 
 the Lord Protector did not interfere .with any man's conscience. 
 (The Irish demanded libei-ty of conscience. "I inteifere with no 
 man's conscience, but if you Catholics mean having priests and the 
 Mass, 3'ou cannot have this, and you never will have it as long as 
 the English Parliament has power to prevent it." What did these 
 words mean? Grant Catholics liberty of conscience, their conscience 
 telling them that their first and great duty is to hear the Mass ; grant 
 them liberty of conscience, and then deny them priests to say Mass 
 for them. But Mr. Froude says, "You must go easy. I acknowl- 
 edge that the Mass is a very beautiful rite, but you must remember 
 that Cromwell thought it to mean a system that was shedding blood 
 all over Eui'ope, a system of a Church that never knew mercy, that 
 slaughtered people everywhere, and therefore he was resolved to 
 have none of it." Oh ! my friends, if the Mass was a symbol of 
 slaughter, Oliver Cromwell would have had more sympathy with the 
 Mass. And so the' historian seeks to justify cruelty in Ii'elaiid 
 against the Catholics by alleging cruelty on the part of Catholics 
 against their Protestant fellow-subjects in other lands- Now, this 
 he has repeated over and over again in many of his writings, and at 
 other times and in other places, and I may as well at once put an 
 end to this. Mr. Froude says : " I hold the Catholic Church ac- 
 countable for all the blood that the Duke of Alva shed in the Nether- 
 lands." But Alva fought in the Netherlands against an uprising 
 against the authority of the state, and the Catholic Church had 
 nothing to do with Alva shedding the blood of the rebels. If they 
 happened to he Protestants, that is no reason to father their blood 
 upon the Catholic Church. 
 
 Mr. Froude says that the Catholic Church is responsible for the 
 blood that was shed in the massacre of St. Bartholemew by Mary de 
 
FATHER BURKE. 265 
 
 Medicis in France. I deny it. Tlie woman that gave that order had 
 no S3'mpathy with the Catholic Church ; she saw France divided into 
 factions, and by intrigue and viliany she endeavored to stifle opposi- 
 tion among the people. Tidings were sent to Rome that the king's 
 life was in terrible danger and that that life had been preserved by 
 Heaven, and Rome sang a " To Deum " for the safety of the king 
 and not for the blood of the Huguenots. Amongst the Huguenots 
 there were Catholics that 'were slain because they were of the oppo- 
 site faction, and that alone proves that the Catholic Church was not 
 answerable for the shedding of that blood. The blood that was shed 
 in Ireland at this particular time was shed exclusively on account of 
 religion ; for when, in 1643, Charles made a treaty or a cessation of 
 hostilities with the Irish through the Confederation of Kilkenny, 
 the English Parliament, as soon as they heard that the king had 
 ceased hostilities for a time with his Irish Catholic subjects, at once 
 came in and said that the war must go on; we won't allow hostilities 
 to cease ; we must root out these Irish Papists, or else vi'e will incur 
 danger to our Protestant friends. The men of 1643, the members 
 of the Puritan Houses of Parliament in England, have fastened 
 iipon the Protestant religion even to this day the formal argument and 
 reason why Irish blood should flow in torrents — lest the Protestant 
 religion might sufler. In these days of ours, when we are endeav- 
 oring to put away all sectarian bigotry, we deplore the faults com- 
 mitted by our fathers on both sides. Mr. Froude deplores that blood 
 that was shed as well as I do ; but, my friends, it is a historical 
 question, arising upon historic facts and evidences, and I am bound 
 to appeal to history as well as my learned antagonist, and to dis- 
 criminate and put back the word which he puts out — that " tolera- 
 tion is the genius of Protestantism." All this I say with regret. I 
 am not only a Catholic, but a priest ; not only a priest, but a monk ; 
 not only a monk, but a Dominican monk, and from out the depths 
 of my soul I repel and repudiate the principle of religious persecu- 
 tion of any kind in any land. 
 
 Speaking of the Mass, Mr. Froude saj's that the Catholic Church 
 has learned to borrow one beautiful gem from the crown of her ad- 
 versary — she has learned to respect the rights of others. I wish 
 that the learned gentleman's statement would be more proved by his- 
 tory, and I much desire that in speaking those words he had spoken 
 
266 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 historic trutlis ; but I ask him, and I ask every Protestant, in what 
 laud has Protestantism ever been in the ascendant without persecut- 
 ing Catholics who were around them. I say it not in bitterness, but 
 I say it simply as a historic truth. I cannot find any record of history, 
 any time during these ages up to a few years ago — any time when 
 the Protestants in Enghmd, in Ireland, in Sweden, in Germany, or 
 anywhere else, gave the slightest toleration, or even permission to 
 live where they could take it from their Catholic fellow-subjects. 
 Even to-day Avherc is the strongest spirit of religious persecution? 
 Is it not in Protestant Sweden, Protestant Denmark? And Avho to- 
 day are persecuting? I ask, Is it Catliolics? No, but Protestant 
 Bismarck in Germany. Oliver Ci'omwell, the apostle of blessings 
 in Ireland, landed in 1649, and besieged Drogheda, defended by Sir 
 Arthur Aston and a brave garrison. Finding that their position was 
 no longer tenable, they asked in the military language for the honors 
 of war if they surrendered. Cromwell promised to grant them 
 quarter if they would lay down their arms. They did so, and the 
 promise was kept until the town was taken. When the town was in 
 his hands, Oliver Cromwell gave orders to his army for the indis- 
 criminate massacre of the garrison and every man, woman, and child 
 in that large city. The people, when they saw the soldiers slaying 
 around them on every side, when they saw the streets of Drogheda 
 flowing with blood for five days, flocked to the number of one thou- 
 sand aged men, women, and children, and took refuge in the great 
 church of St. Peter's in Drogheda. Oliver Cromwell drew his sol- 
 diers around that church, and out of that church he never let one of 
 those thousand innocent people escape alive. He then proceeded to 
 Wexford, where a certain connnander named Stratford delivered the 
 city over to him. He massaci'cd the people there also. Three hun- 
 dred of the women of Wexford with tlieir children gathered around the 
 great market cross in the public square of the city. They thought 
 in ^heir hearts, cruel as he was, he would respect the sign of man's 
 redemption and spare those Avho were collected around it. How 
 vain the thought ! Three hundred poor, defenceless women, scream- 
 ing for mercy under the cross of Jesus Christ, Cromwell and his 
 barl)arous demons slaughtered without permitting one to escape, 
 until they were ankle-deep in the blood of the women of Wexford. 
 Cromwell retired from Ireland after he had glutted himself with 
 
FATHER BURKE. 267 
 
 the blood of the people, winding up his work by taking 80,000, and 
 some say 100,000, of the men of Ireland and driving them down to 
 the south ports of Munster, where he shipped them — 80,000 at the 
 lowest calculation — to the sugar plantations of the Barbadoes, tiiere 
 to work as slaves ; and in six years from that time, such was the 
 treatment that they received, out of 80,000 there were only twenty 
 men left. He also collected six thousand Irish boys, fair and beau- 
 tiful stripling youths, put them on board ships and sent them otl'also 
 to the Barbadoes, there to languish and die before they came to man- 
 hood. Great God ! is this the man that has an apologist in the 
 learned, the frank, the courteous, and gentlemanly historian who 
 comes in oily words to tell the American people that Cromwell was 
 one of the bravest men that ever lived, and one of the best friends 
 to Ireland ? 
 
 Father Burke then reviewed at length the campaign conducted 
 by William of (^range in Ireland against his father-in-law, James 
 the Second. When William arrived in England with 15,000 men, 
 James fled. Mr. Froude asserts that he abdicated. I challenge him 
 to prove it. There is no historical evidence to show that King 
 James ever relinquished his title to the crown of England. But the 
 English people proved false to him, and he came to Ireland, where 
 the people I'ose to advocate his rights — fools that they were to es- 
 pouse again the cause of a Stuart king ! The opposing armies met 
 at the battle of the Boyne. Mr. Froude asserts that the Irish troops 
 made no stand there. I regret that he has so far forgotten truth 
 and candor as to say that the Irish race ever showed a taint of cow- 
 ardice. What are the facts ? We have full and definite historical 
 testimony to prove that William's army at the Boyne mustered .51,000 
 veteran troops, perfect in discipline, well equipped and well clothed, 
 with fifty pieces of artillery, besides mortars. The Irish army that 
 opposed them was composed of 23,000 raw Irish levies, hastily or- 
 ganized, imperfectly drilled, badly armed, and having only six pieces 
 of ordnance altogether. The English army was connnanded by a 
 lion, William of Orange, who led them on in person. The Irish 
 army was commanded by a stag, iShemns, with the historic name, 
 who stood on a hill two miles away from the scene of conflict, with 
 a guard of picked soldiers around him ! Mr. Froude says that the 
 Irish troops made no stand on that occasion. We have the testi- 
 
268 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 niony of nn English general who participated in the conflict, and he 
 tells us that these raw Irish troops ciiarged down ie?i distinct times 
 oa the overwhelming force that met them. Ten distinct times did 
 the}'' rush with fiery valor upon the ranks of the bravest soldiers in 
 Europe. And when compelled to retreat, they did so in good 
 order, commanded by their officers, and not like men who fled be- 
 fore they had struck a blow. 
 
 Father Burke then went on to paint a vivid picture of the sieges 
 of Limerick and Athloue, describing the heroism of Sarsfield and 
 his companions in arms ; the memorable destruction of the bridges 
 over the Shannon, twice torn down in the face of the artillery fire 
 of all the English batteries ; the famous defence of "the Breach " at 
 Limerick, where the women fought beside their husbands, sons and 
 fathers, and he paid a noble tribute to the high honor of Sarsfield, 
 who kept his plighted word in the treaty as inviolably as became an 
 Irishman, while the English tore the same treaty to shreds ere it 
 A\'as forty-eight hours signed. After presenting one more instance 
 of Protestant toleration in the person of the Protestant Archbishop 
 of Dublin, who on the Sunday succeeding the capitulation of Lim- 
 ei-ick preached that historic sermon " On the sin and sinfulness of 
 keeping an oath plighted to Catholics." 
 
 I feel, my friends, that I have detained you too long upon a sub- 
 ject so dreary, and so desolate a ground to travel over. I, for my 
 part, never would have invited you, citizens of America, or my fel- 
 low-countrymen, to enter upon such a desolate waste, to renew in 
 my heart and in yours this terrible story, if Mr. Fronde had not 
 compelled me to lift the veil and to show you the treatment that our 
 fathers received at the hands of the English. 1 do it not at all to 
 excite national animosity, and not at all to excite bad blood. I am 
 one of the first w^ho would say " Let bygones be bj-gones," " Let the 
 dead bury the dead ; " but if any man, I care not who he be, how 
 great his reputation, how grand his name in any walk of learning 
 — if any man dares to come, as long as I live, to say that England's 
 treatment of the Irish was just, was necessary, was such as can re- 
 ceive the verdict of the honest people of any land, or dares to say 
 that either at home or abroad Irishmen have ever shown the Avhite 
 feather — if I were on my death-bed, I would rise to contradict 
 him. 
 
FATHER BURKE. 269 
 
 Fourth Lecture. 
 
 Ijp ADZES AND GENTLEMEN, — I have perceived in the public 
 ^^1 newspapers that Mr. Fronde seems to be somewhat irritated 
 
 rby the remarks made as to his accuracy as a historian. Lest 
 any word of mine might hurt in the least degree the just sus- 
 ceptibilities ,of an honorable man, I beg beforehand to say that 
 nothing is further from my thoughts than the slightest word either 
 of personality or disrespect for one who has won for himself so high 
 a name as the English historian. Therefore I merely hope that it is 
 not any word which may have fallen from me, even in the heat of 
 our amicable controversy, tliat has given the least offence to that 
 gentleman. Just as I would expect to receive from him, or from 
 any other learned and educated man, the treatment which one gentle- 
 man is supposed to show to another, so do I also wish to give him 
 that treatment. 
 
 Now, my friends, we come to the matter in hand. The last thing 
 I did was to traverse a great portion of our previous history in 
 reviewing the statements of the English historian, and one portion I 
 was obliged to leave almost untouched. One portion of that sad 
 history is included in the reign of Queen Anne, that estimable lady 
 of whom history records the unwomanly vice of an overfonduess for 
 eating. Anne ascended the English throne in 1702, after the 
 demise of William of Orange, and she sat upon that throne until 
 1711. As I before remarlved, there was, perhaps, sufficient reason 
 that the Roman Catholics of Ireland, trodden as they were in the 
 very dust, siiould expect some quarter from the daughter of the man 
 for whom they had shed their blood, and the granddaughter of the 
 other Stuart king for whose cause they had fought with so much 
 bravery in 1649. But the Irish Catholics got from this good Lady 
 
270 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Anne a return quite of another kind from wheat they might with 
 reason have expected. Not content with the breach of tiie articles 
 of Limerick of which her royal brother-in-law, William, had been 
 guilty — not content with the atrocious penal laws which kept the 
 Catholics of Ireland in grovelling misery, Anne went further. She 
 appointed a new Lord Lieutenant, the Diikc of Orraond, and no 
 sooner did he assume his powers than the Irish Protestants fell on 
 their knees before him and begged him to save them from their foes, 
 the desperate Catholics. Great God ! A people who had been 
 robbed, persecuted, decimated, until there was harxlly a miserable 
 remnant left, without a vote in the election of the humblest board, 
 without a voice in the transaction of the humblest business, without 
 power, influence, or recognized existence — and of this people the 
 strong Protestant body in Ireland complained as being dangerous. 
 And so well M'ere these comi)laints heard, my friends, that we find 
 edict after edict coming out, declaring that no Papist shall be allowed 
 to inherit land or possess land, or even have it under a lease ; declar- 
 ing that if a Catholic child wished to become a Protestant, that 
 moment that child became the owner and the master of his father's 
 estate, and his fiither remained only a pensioner or tenant for life 
 upon the bounty of his own apostate son ; declaring that if a child, 
 however young, even an intiint, became a Protestant, that moment 
 that child was to be removed from the guardianship and custody of 
 the father, and was to be handed over to some Protestant relation. 
 Every enactment that the misguided ingenuity of the tyrannical 
 mind of man could suggest was put in force. "One might be 
 inclined," says Mr. Mitchell, "to suppose that Popery had already 
 been sutficiently discouraged, seeing that the clergy had been ban- 
 ished, the Catiiolics were excluded by law from all honorable and 
 lucrative employments, carefully disarmed and plundered of almost 
 every acre of their ancient inheritance. But enough was not already 
 done to make the Protestant interest feel secure. Consequently 
 laws were sanctioned by Her Majesty Queen Anne that no Catholic 
 could go near a walled town, especially Limerick or Galway. In 
 order that they might be sure not to go near a walled town, they 
 were to remain several miles away, as if they were lepers whose 
 presence would contaminate their select and pampered Protestant 
 fellow-citizens." 
 
FATHER BURKE. 271 
 
 All through Queen Anne's reign police and magistrates were 
 hounded on to persecute, and informers were tempted with ample 
 bribes. A price was paid for executing these atrocious laws, and 
 the Catholic people of Ireland were followed up as if they were 
 ferocious and untamable wolves. But, my friends, Mr. Froude 
 pretends to justify this persecution, and on two grounds. I may 
 not hope to change Mr. Fronde's opinion, but I hope to convince 
 the people of this country that there was no excuse for the shedding 
 of the Irish people's blood by unjust persecution, upheld by legal 
 enactment. Not a word of sympathy has he for the peojile thus 
 treated — not a word of manly protest against the shedding of that 
 people's blood — by unjust persecution and by the robbery of legal 
 enactment ; but he says there were two reasons for the ferocious 
 action of the British Government. The first is, he says, that after 
 all these were only retaliation for the terrible persecution that was 
 suffered by the Protestant •Huguenots in France. He says : "The 
 Protestants of Ireland were only following the example of Louis 
 XIV., who revoked the Edict of Nantes." Let me explain this 
 somewhat to J'ou. The Edict of Nantes was a law that gave relig- 
 ious liberty to the French Protestants as well as the French Catho- 
 lics. It was a law founded iu justice ; it was a law founded in the 
 sacred rights that belong to man ; but this law was revoked, and 
 consequently the Protestants of France were laid open to persecu- 
 tion. But there is this difference between the French Protestants 
 and the Catholics of Ireland — the former had not their liberty guar- 
 anteed to them by treaty ; the Irish Catholics had their liberty 
 guaranteed them by the Treaty of Limerick, a treaty which they 
 won by their own brave hands and swords. The Edict of Nantes 
 was unjustly revoked, but that revocation was no breach of any 
 royal word plighted to them. The Treaty of Limerick was broken 
 to the Catholics of Ireland, and in the breach of it the King of Eng- 
 land, the Parliament of England, the aristocracy of England, as well 
 as the miserable Irish Pi'otestaut faction at home, became perjurers 
 in the history of the world. Here are the words of the celebrated 
 Edmund Burke on the subject of the revocation of this very edict : 
 "This act of injustice," says the great Irish statesman, "which let 
 loose on the monarchy of Louis XIV. such a torrent of invective 
 and reproach, and which threw a dark cloud over the splendor of a 
 
272 . TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 most illustrious reigu, falls fiir short of the case of Ireland." Remem- 
 ber that he is an English statesman, of Irish birth, and a Protestant, 
 who speaks. But, my friends, the privileges which the Protestants 
 of France enjoyed and lost by the revocation were of a far wider 
 character than the Irish Catholics ever pi-etended to aspire to. The 
 Edict of Nantes condemned those who returned to Protestantism 
 having once renounced it. Its revocation did not subject the Pro- 
 testants to any such persecution as that visited on the Irish Catho- 
 lics. The estates of Protestants were only subject to confiscation 
 when they quitted the kingdom. There was none of the complicated 
 machinery I have referred to in my description of the Irish persecu- 
 tion. Then it should be remembered that the revocation of the 
 Edict of Nantes did not by any means afiect as large a body of 
 people as the penal laws in Ireland, when one portion of the popula- 
 tion was living on the spoils of a much more numerous portion. 
 Side by side with the Protestants of Franco compare the Irish 
 people, ruined, beggared, and hunted to the death ; and the English 
 historian says : " We have only served you as your coreligionists 
 in France served us." The other reason he gives to justify this 
 persecution was that the Irish Catholics were in favor of the Pre- 
 tender. Now, to that statement I can give and do give a most 
 emphatic denial. The Irish Catholics had had quite enough shed- 
 ding of their own blood. They had no interest whatever in the 
 succession, nor cared they one iota whether the Elector of Hanover 
 or the son of James II. succeeded to the throne of England, for they 
 kneAv whether it was a Hanoverian or a Stuart that ruled in England 
 the prejudice of the English people would make him, whoever he 
 was, a tyrant over them and over their nation. 
 
 Thns the persecution went on, law after law being passed to make 
 perfect beggary and ruin of the Irish people, until at length Ireland 
 was reduced to such a state of miserj^ that the very name of an Irish- 
 man was a reproach, and until at length a small number of the 
 glorious race had the weakness to change their faith and to deny the 
 religion of their fathers. The name of an Irishman was a reproach. 
 My friends. Dean Swift was born in Ireland, and he is looked upon 
 as a patriotic Irishman, yet he said : " I no more consider myself an 
 Irishman because I lin]:)peDed to be born in Ireland than an English- 
 man chancing to be born in Calcutta would consider himself a 
 
FATHER BURKE. 273 
 
 Hindoo." He went so far as to say that he would no more think of 
 taking the Irish into account than he would think of consulting 
 swine. Mucaulay gloats over the state of the Catholics in Ireland, 
 and even Mr. Froude views not without some complacency their 
 misery. Macaulay calls them "Pariahs." He said they had no 
 existence, no liberty, even to breathe in the land, and that land 
 their own ! and that even the Lord Chancellor in an English court 
 and in an Irish court, laying down the law of the kingdom coolly 
 and calmly, said that in the eye of the law no GatJiolic iras supposed 
 to exUl in Ireland. Chief Justice Eobinson made a similar declara- 
 tion : " It appears plain that the law does not suppose any such per- 
 son to exist as an Irish Koman Catholic ;" and yet at that very time 
 we lind that Irishmen proclaimed their loyalty, and said : " Look at 
 the Catholics of Ireland, how loyal they are !" Yet, according to 
 Mr. Froude, we were all at this very time for the Pretender. We 
 find at this very time an Irishman of the name of Phelim O'Neill, 
 one of the glorious old line of Tyrone, changed his I'eligion and 
 became a Protestant, but at the same time, seeing the strangeness 
 that any O'Neill should be a Protestant, changed his name also and 
 called himself Mr. Felix Neill. A good deal has been said and 
 written about names and their sounds. Felix made his name rhyme 
 with " slippery eel," and an old friar wrote some famous Latin verses 
 about him, calling him "Infelix Felix, who had forgotten the ship, 
 the salmon, and blood-red Hand, and blushed when called O'Neill 
 in his own land!" But, my friends, the English or Protestant 
 ascendancj' in Ireland, seeing how that they had got every penal 
 law they could ask for, seeing that the only thing that remained for 
 them was utterly to exterminate the Irish race — and they had 
 nearly accomplished it, and would have killed them all, only that 
 the work was too much, and that there was a certain something in 
 the old blood and in the old race that still terrified them when they 
 approached it — and seeing that there were so few Catholics, they 
 thought that now at least their hands were fi'ee, and nothing remain- 
 ed for them but to make Ireland, as Mr. Froude said, a "garden." 
 They set to work and had their own Parliament, and a Catholic could 
 not go near them. But they were greatly surprised to find that, 
 now that the Catholics were crushed into the very earth, England 
 Ijegiin to regard the very Cromwellians themselves as objects of 
 
274 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 hatred. What ! thpy, the sons of the Puritans ; they, the brave men 
 who had slaughtered so many of the Catholic religion ; is their trade, 
 commerce, and Parliament to be interfered with? Ah ! now indeed 
 Mr. Froude finds tears and weeps them over the injustice and folly 
 of England, because England interfered Avith the commerce and 
 trade of the Protestant ascendancy in Ireland. These Protestants 
 were first-class woolleu manufacturers, because the wool of the Irish 
 sheep was so fine. The English Parliament made laws that the 
 English traders were not to make any moi'c cloth to go into foreign 
 markets to rival their English fellow-workmen. Mr. Froude attri- 
 butes these laws, in his lecture, to the "accecZen^" that England at 
 that time happened to be under the dominion of a slavish set of 
 money-jobbers, and paltry, pitiful merchants — a mere accident 
 according to him — an action, he says (and with some truth), which 
 so discontented the Protestant faction in Ireland that many of them 
 emigrated to America, and there they carried their hatred with them, 
 which was one day to break up the British Empire. 
 
 I have another theory on this gi-eat question. I hold that it was 
 no accident of the hour at all that made Englaud place her restrictive 
 laws upon the Irish woollen trade. I hold that it was the settled 
 policy of England. These men who were now in the ascendancy 
 in Ireland, imagined that because they had ruined and beggared 
 the ancient race that they would, therefore, be regarded as friends 
 by England. I hold that it was at that time, and in a great measure 
 is to-day, the fixed policy of England to keejj Ireland poor, to keep 
 Ireland down, to be hostile to Ireland, no matter who lives in it, 
 whether Protestant, whether Norman, Cromwellian, or Celt. The 
 law restricting the trade on woollens was passed. The planters and 
 the sous of planters were beggared, simply because they had a part 
 in Ireland and an interest in the welfare of the country. The in- 
 imitable Swift, speaking on this very subject, quoted the fable of 
 Pallas and Arachne. Pallas heard that a certain young virgin 
 named Arachne could spin well. Pallas met her iu a trial of skill, 
 and finding herself surpassed, changed her to a spider, and sentenced 
 her to spin for ever from her own bowels and in a small compass. 
 " I always pitied poor Arachne," said Swift, "and could never love 
 the goddess for this cruel and unjust sentence. Ireland has been 
 treated worse than Arachne. She had permission to spin from her 
 
FATHER BURKE. 275 
 
 own bowels, which we have iTot." This sentence was full}- executed 
 upon us by England, but with greater severity. They left us no 
 chance foi' spinning and weaving. The Irish wool was famous. 
 The English were outbid for it by the French. So a law was passed 
 forbidding its exportation ; they took it themselves and paid their 
 own price for it. The dean goes on to say that oppression makes a 
 wise man mad, and that the reason wh}^ the men in Ireland are not 
 mad is that they are not wise. But oppression, in time, might teach 
 a little wisdom to even these. We call Swift a patriot. How little 
 did he think of the oppression that beggared and ruined our people, 
 that drove them from their lands, from every pleasure of life and 
 from their country, and all because they had Irish names and blood, 
 and would not give up the faith that their conscience told them was 
 right ! Now, my friends, Mr. Froude in his lecture comes at once 
 to consider the consequences of that Protestant emigration from 
 Ireland. He saj's the Protestant manufacturers of Ireland and the 
 workmen were discontented and came to America, and then he 
 begins to enlist the sympathies of America upon the side of the 
 Protestant men who came over from Ireland. If he stopped here, I 
 would not have a word to say to the learned historian. When the 
 Englishman claims the sympathj' of this or any other land for men 
 of his blood and of his religion, if they are deserving of that sym- 
 pathy, I, an Irishman, am always the first to grant it to them with 
 all my heart. And therefore I do not find the slightest fault with 
 this learned Englishmen when he challenges the sympathy of America 
 for the Orangemen of Ireland who came over here. If these men 
 deserve the sympathy of America, why not let them have it? But 
 Mr. Froude went on to say that while he claimed sympathj' for the 
 Protestant emigrants from Ireland, as lovers of American lil)erty, 
 the Catholics, on the other hand, were crawling to the foot of the 
 throne and telling King George III. that they would be only too happy 
 to go out at his command and shed American blood in his cause. Is 
 tliat statement true or not ? This learned historian quoted a petition 
 that was presented to the king in the year 1775 by Lord Fingal and 
 other noblemen. In that petition he states Lord Fingal and several 
 other Catholic noblemen spoke in the name of the Irish people, pro- 
 nouncing the Amei'ican Revolution an unnatural rebellion, and 
 expressing a willingness to go out for the suppression of American 
 
276 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 liberty. First I ask at wliat time were Lord Fingal, Lord Hope, 
 Lord Keniiiare, and the other Catholic lords of the pale authorized 
 to speak iu tlie name of the Irish people ? Their presence in Ireland, 
 although they kept the faith, was a cross, a hindrance, and a stumb- 
 ling-block to the Irish nation, and the Irish people know it well. I 
 do not doubt Mr. Fronde's word, but being onh^ anxious to satisfy 
 myself by strict I'esearch, I have looked for this petition. I find a 
 petition in Currey's collection signed by Lord Fingal and a number 
 of Catholic noblemen, and in which they protest their loyalty in 
 terms of the most slavish adulation . But I am not able to discover a 
 single word about the American llevolution, or expi'essing auj' desire 
 to destroy the liberation of America. Not one word. I have sought, 
 and my friend.s have sought, in every document that was at our 
 bands for this petition. I could not find it. There is a mistake 
 somewhere. It is strange that a petition of so much importance 
 should not have been published among the documents of the time. 
 The learned historian's resources are far more ample than mine ; 
 resources of time, talent, and opportunity. No doubt he will be 
 able to explain this. This petition must have passed through Sir 
 John Blackier's hands, then to the Lord Lieutenant, from him to 
 the Prime Minister, and from him to the king. We have an old 
 proverb which shows how we manage these things in Ireland : 
 " Speak to the maid to speak to the mistress to speak to the master." 
 Now we come to the j'ear 1775. The Catholics of Ireland had 
 no voice in the government ; they could not so much as vote for a 
 parish beadle, much less for a member of Parliament. And does 
 Mr. Fronde tell the American people that these unfortunate people 
 would not have welcomed the cry that came from across the Atlantic ? 
 It was the cry of a people who proclaimed the truest liberty of men 
 and of nations ; who proclaimed that no people upon the earth 
 should be taxed without representation, and who gave the first blow, 
 right across the face, to English tyranny that that tyrant had received 
 for many years — a blow before which England reeled, and which 
 brought her to her knees. Does he mean to tell J'ou, citizens of 
 America, that such an event as this would be distasteful to the poor 
 Irish Catholics in Ireland? It is true that they had crushed them as 
 far as they could, but they had not taken the manhood out of them. 
 Now, hei-e are the facts of this. Lord Howe, the English general. 
 
FATHER BURKE. 277 
 
 in thiit very 3'ear of 1775, writes home to his Government from 
 America, and says : " Send out German troops from England," 
 "which, in other words, meant Hessians. I don't make use of this 
 feeling Avith the slightest tincture of disrespect. I have the greatest 
 respect for the German element in this country. Certain it is, how- 
 ever, that in those days Hesse Cassel and Hesse Darmstadt — the 
 people of those States — were hired out by every other country to 
 fight their varied battles. " Send me out German troops," said Lord 
 Howe, "for in a war against America and the American people I 
 cannot depend on the Irish people, because a subjugated but unsub- 
 dued race are too much in unison — they have too much sympathy 
 for the people of America. The Irish," said he, "are not to be de- 
 pended iqion." They sent out four thousand troops from Ireland. 
 But listen, my friends, to this — but listen to this : Arthur Lee, the 
 agent of America in Europe, writes home to his Government in 1777, 
 and says that " the resources of our enemy are annihilated in Gei-- 
 many, and their last resort is to the Catholics of Ireland. They have 
 already experienced their unwillingness to go. Every man of a 
 regiment raised thei-e last year obliged them to ship him tied and 
 bound." Honor to the Irish Catholic soldiers' hearts that when they 
 were to be sent to America to cut the throats of and scalp the 
 American people they swore they would not do it, and they had to 
 tie them and carry them on board. But Lee gf^es on to say, "And 
 more certainly' they will desert more than any other troops." Low- 
 der tells us that the war against America was not over popular, even 
 in England. But in Ireland he says the jieople assumed the cause 
 of America from sympathy. Let us leave Ireland and come to 
 America. Let us see how the great man who was building up a 
 magnificent dynasty in this countrj^ regarded the Irish people. I 
 refer, my friends, to the immortal patriot and Father of his Country, 
 George Washington. In 1790 George Washington received an 
 address from the Catholics of America, signed by Bishop Carroll, of 
 Maryland, and a great many others. In reply to that address, the 
 response this magnificent man (Washington) makes, is in these 
 words : "I hope to see America free and ranked among the foremost 
 nations of the earth in examples of justice and liberality, and I 
 presume that you, fellow-citizens, will not forget the patriotic part 
 ■which you Irish took in the accomplishment of our rebellion and the 
 
278 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 establishment of our Government, and in the valuable assistance 
 which we received from a nation professing the Catholic religion." 
 In the month of December, 1781, the friendly Sons of St. Patrick 
 in Philadelphia elected Washington a member of their society. 
 These men were great friends of the great American Father of his 
 Countr3^ When his army lay at Valley Forge, twenty-seven mem- 
 bers of this society subscribed between them, in 1780, 103,500 
 pounds sterling of Pennsylvania currency for the American troops. 
 George Washington accepted the afBliation with their society. " I 
 accept with singular pleasure the ensign of so fiiendly a society as 
 that of the Sons of St. Patrick, a society distinguished for the 
 firmest adherence to our cause." During that time what greater 
 honor could be bestowed by Washington than he bestowed upon the 
 Irish? 
 
 When Arnold, whoso name is i)anded down for eternal execra- 
 tion, proved a traitor, Wasliington was obliged to choose the very 
 best soldiers in the army to send to West Point. From his whole 
 army they selected the celebrated Pennsylvania Line, as they were 
 called, and these troops were mainly made up of Irishmen. Nay, 
 more ; not merely of Protestant Irishmen, or of those who in that 
 day were called Scotch Irish, which designated Mr. Froude's friends 
 who emigrated from Ulster. Look over the muster-roll of this 
 regiment, and we find such names as Dufl'y, McGuire, and O'Brien. 
 These are names, not of Palatines, or the Scotch planters in Ireland, 
 but of thoroughbred Irishmen. They fought and bled for Washing- 
 ton, and be loved them. 
 
 And now, my friends, I want to give you a little incident in the 
 history of that celebrated corps (the Pennsylvania Line), to let you 
 see how their hearts and hands were in relation to America. Dur- 
 ing the American Revolution, as Mr. Carey informs us, these Irish- 
 American soldiers, who were avenging at the same time the wrongs 
 of the countr}^ of their birth and those of the country of their adop- 
 tion, became disheartened at what they conceived to be the neglect 
 of the Government towards them. Everywhere around they saw 
 the people in wealth, and comfort and afiluence, while they them- 
 selves were spilling their blood for the country which would relieve 
 neither their nakedness nor their hunger. On the frozen roads 
 they marked their march Avith the blood that trickled from their 
 
FATHER BURKE. 279 
 
 shoeless feet, and they were half naked in the midst of winter. 
 They petitioned ; they appealed to Congress ; they remonstrated ; 
 and at last, stung beyond endui-ance by their suffering, they muti- 
 nied. When the English commander heard this, he was overjoyed, 
 and he wrote home to England, saying that the i-ebellion (as he 
 called it) would soon be crushed. Lord Howe sent his agents to 
 cunfor with the mutinous Pennsylvania Line, giving them a free 
 card to make any terms whatever that could induce the starving 
 Irish soldiers to go over to the British side. The Pennsylvania 
 Line seized and bound the agents of the British general and sent 
 them to the tent of Washington ! 
 
 There was no Judas, no Arnold among them. They defied the 
 tempters while they trampled on their shining gold, and these mis- 
 erable wretches, the English spies, paid the forfeit of their lives 
 for attempting to seduce these illustrious heroes. About Irishmen 
 and Irish patriotism there was no falsehood. 
 
 Mr. Froude seems to think that the American people look upon 
 the Irish nation with a certain amount of disrespect and disesteem. 
 On this question, and in reference to our people, take the testimony 
 of George W. Parke Custis, the adopted son of Washington. He 
 says : " The Irishmen at that time and before, even though they 
 were themselves struggling for emancipation, lent all their support 
 to this country." This is what the great American gentleman says 
 of them in reference to an appeal which they made for aid : " And 
 why is this imposing appeal from poor Ireland, whose generous sons 
 in the days of our infancy, and during our struggle for independ- 
 ence, shai'ed in our glory and shared in our misfortunes, and shared 
 in our successes. They shared in all the storms of political strife 
 that beset this once unhappy but now happy land. Yes, the Irish 
 people, in the fervency of their enthusiasm, have always in their 
 heart cherished one great idea of respect for this country, and in 
 the magnificent outpouring of their hearts, their lips have never 
 ceased to utter in time of need the musical ejaculation, 'God save 
 America ! ' This is true, because we have always received from 
 Ireland more help and needed assistance than we ever received from 
 any European nation." Again he says : 
 
 "To-day the grass has grown green over the grave of many a 
 poor Irishman who died for America before any one here assembled 
 
280 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 was born. In the wai- of the Revolution in this country, Ireland 
 furnished one hundred men to any single man furnished by any for- 
 eign nation." 
 
 Tbe same high authority, the adopted son of "Washington, ever 
 entertained the heartiest sympathy and admiration for the veteran 
 Irish soldiers of the revolution. He was accustomed to welcome 
 them into his own house, there to treat them with kindness and 
 esteem ; and he tells us of one aged survivor whom he invited in, 
 and who, while holding the hospitable glass offered to him, said: 
 "Let me drink to General Washington, who is a saint in heaven 
 this day." On another memorable occasion the same eminent Ameri- 
 can pays the following tribute to Ireland : 
 
 "Recall to your minds the recollections of the heroic times when 
 Irishmen were our friends, and when they were throughout the 
 whole world, no matter where scattered, the friends of our interest, 
 the supporters of our independence. Look to the period that tried 
 the souls of men on this soil, and you will find that the sons of Erin 
 rushed to our ranks, and amongst the clash of steel there was many 
 a John Byrne who was not idle." He does not say Gibbs, or 
 Spragg, or any Croinwcllian name of the kind. Let me tell you 
 who this John Byrne was. A certain Irish prisoner was put on 
 board of a ship and there left in chains in the bow of a ship, pesti- 
 lence being on board; he was more than htilf starved, and was 
 scarcely alive when summoned on deck to have sentence pro- 
 nounced, in consequence of the cruelty inflicted on him. And then 
 the English commander ofi"cred him plenty of naoncy and lilicrt}- if 
 he would give up the cause which he had espoused, which cause was 
 the American cause, and join the British army. With a hand 
 scarcely able to lift up he opened his mouth and uttered vehemently 
 with all the force he could command, "Hurrah for America ! " In 
 the presence of such facts as these, testified to by no less eminent 
 men than George Washington and his son, Mr. Fronde might as 
 well speak to the hurricane above his head as to try to erase from 
 the Irish people the sympathy of America ! Dr. McNeven, in the 
 year 1809, speaking of the war with England, says in relation to 
 this circumstance : 
 
 "One of the matters charged on the Irish, and one of the many 
 pretexts for refusing redress to the Catholics of Ireland was that 
 
FATHER BURKE. 281 
 
 16,000 of them fought on the side of Amei-ica. Many more thou- 
 sands are ready to maintain the Declaration of American Indejsend- 
 ence." 
 
 Now, my friends, thei'C are other testimonies to justify our race. 
 We have the testimony of American literary gentlemen, such for 
 instance as that of Mr. Paulding, and here are his words : 
 
 "The history of Ii-eland exhibits from first to last a detail of 
 the most persevering, galling, grinding, insulting, and systematic 
 oppression found anywhei'e except among the helots of Sparta. 
 There is not a national feeling that has not been insulted, and not 
 a national right that has not been trodden imder foot. As Chris- 
 tians the people of Ireland have been denied the exercise of the 
 Catholic religion, venerable for its antiquity, admirable for its unity, 
 and the chord by which the people are bound together in harmony. 
 As men the Irish people have been deprived of the common rights 
 of British subjects, under the pretext that they were incapable of 
 enjoying them, which pretext had no other foundation except their 
 resistance to oppression. England has denied them the means of 
 improvement, and then insulted them with the imputation of bar- 
 barism." 
 
 Another distinguished American — Mr. Johnson, for instance — 
 says he has never observed such severity as that exercised over the 
 Catholics of Ireland. This is a gentleman whose name stands high 
 in the literary record of America. Take again the unanimous 
 address of the Legislature of Maryland. Those American legis- 
 lators say: "A dependency of Great Britain, Ireland, is lying 
 languishing under an oppression reprobated by humanity and dis- 
 countenanced by just policy. It would argue ignorance of human 
 rights to submit patiently to this oppression. The Senators have 
 witnessed the struggle of Ireland, but with only poor success. Re- 
 bellions and insurrections have gone on with but little instances of 
 tranquility. America has opened her arms to the oppressed of all 
 nations. No people have availed themselves of the asylum with 
 more alacrity or in greater numbers than the Irish. High is the 
 meed of praise which the Irish feel for the gratitude of America. 
 As heroes and statesmen they honor their adopted country." Until 
 such glorious words as these are wiped out of the record of Amei-i- 
 can histor}^ until the generous sentiments that have inspired them 
 
282 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 have ceased to be a portion of the American nature, then and not 
 before then, will Mr. Froude get the verdict which he seeks from 
 America. I have looked through the American archives, and I 
 find that the foundation of that sympathy lies in the simple fact 
 that the Catholics of Ireland were heart and soul with you in 
 that gloiious struggle. I find a letter from Ireland in Septem- 
 ber, 1775, to a friend in New York, in which the gentleman 
 writing says : " Most of the people here wish well to the cause in 
 which you are engaged. They are receiving recruits throughout 
 this kingdom, but the men are told that they are only going to 
 Edinburgh to learn military discipline and are then to return." 
 They had to tell them a lie first, well knowing that if they told 
 them the truth they would never enter the ranks of the British 
 army to fight against Americans. In 1775 the Duke of Riclmiond 
 makes this statement: "Attempts have been made to enlist Irish 
 Eoman Catholics, but the Ministry know well that these attempts 
 have been unsuccessful." A certain Major Eoche was sent down 
 to Cork to recruit, and he made a speech to them beginning, 
 "The glorious nationality to which they belonged, the splendid 
 monarcliy that governed them ; " in fact, almost the very words 
 that Mr. Froude alleges to have been used by Lord Fingall were 
 used by Major Eoche to these poor men, and he then held the 
 golden guinea and the pound before them, but none could be 
 induced to fight against their American bi'others. Writing to the 
 House of Commons in the year 1779, Mr. Johnson says : "I main- 
 tain that the sons of the best and wisest men in this country are on 
 the side of the American people, and that in Ireland there was a 
 largo majority on the side of the Americans." In the House of 
 Lords, in the same year, the Duke of Eichmond says : " Attempts 
 have been made to enlist the Irish Eoman Catholics. These attempts 
 have proved unsuccessful." We find again the American Congress, 
 in the memorable year 1775, taking action in the matter. Congress 
 sent over the Atlantic waves assistance to the down-trodden Catho- 
 lic Irish. 
 
 I now come to another honored name and find the testimony of 
 Verplanck. When the Catholic Emancipation was passed there was 
 a banquet in New York City to celebrate the event, and this distin- 
 guished American proposed a toast : " The Penal Laws : requiescat 
 
FATHER BURKE. 283 
 
 in pace — may they rest in peace. And now that they are gone, I 
 have a good word to say for them." What was that good word? 
 Here it is : " Both in that glorious struggle for independence and in 
 our more recent contest for American rights those laws gave to 
 America the support of hundreds and thousands of bi'ave hearts and 
 strong arms." Two of America's greatest statesmen, Henry Clay 
 and William H. Seward, have given substantial proof of their sym- 
 j)athy for Ii-eland, and have shown that Ireland always deserved it of 
 America. I now come to another important question in this discus- 
 sion — the volunteers of 1782. The cause of the formation of the 
 volunteers was the determination of the English Government to send 
 over to Ireland regiments of Hessians to take the place of the sol- 
 diers that had been sent from there to America, and the Protestant 
 Irish said that they would have none of them, and from this sprang 
 the volunteers of 1782. Jlr. Froude had had little to say of them, 
 and consequently in answering him he would restrict himself also in 
 that regard. In 177G Ireland began to arm, but the movement was 
 altogether Protestant. But we lind that the Catholics of Ireland, 
 ground as they were to the dust, no sooner did they hear that their 
 Protestant oppressors were anxious to do something for the old laud 
 than they came to them and said : " We foi-give everything you ever 
 did to us ; we leave you the land, our country, and our wealth and 
 our commerce ; all we ask of you is put a gun into our hands for one 
 hour of our lives." This they were refused, and, my friends, when 
 the Catholic Irish — when they found that they would not be allowed 
 to enter the ranks of the volunteers, they had the generosity out of 
 their poverty to collect money and hand it over to clothe and feed 
 the army of their Protestant fellow-citizens. Anything for Ireland. 
 Anything for the man that would lift his hand for Ireland, no matter 
 of what religion he was. The old generous spirit was there, the 
 love that never could be extinguished was there, self-sacrificing, 
 ample love for any man, no matter who he was, that was a friend to 
 their native land. But after a time our Protestant friends and volun- 
 teers began to think that these Catholics were capital fellows ; some- 
 how centuries of persecution could not knock the manhood out of 
 them, and accordingly we find in 1780 there were 50,000 Catholics 
 iimongst the volunteers, every man of them with arms in his hand. 
 Mr. Froude says that Grattan — the immortal Grattan, whilst he 
 
284z TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 wished well for Ireland, Avhilst he was irreproachable in every way, 
 public or private, at this time was guilty of a great mistake ; 
 that England had long ruled Ireland badly, but she had been taught 
 a lesson by America, and she was now anxious to govern Ireland 
 well, and no sooner was an abuse pointed out than it was immedi- 
 ately remedied : and the mistake Grattan made was, instead of 
 insisting on just legislation from England, he insisted on the indepen- 
 dence of Ireland, and that the Irish people should make their own 
 laws; that the energies of the nation, which were wasted in pohtical 
 faction, could have been husbanded, and England would have been 
 induced to grant just and fair laws ; but he goes on the assumption, 
 my dear American friends — the gentleman goes on the assumption 
 that England was willing to redress grievances, to repeal the bad 
 laM's and make good ones, and he makes this assertion by saying 
 that she struck off the wrists of the Irish nieix-hants the chains of 
 their commercial slavery and restored to Ireland her trade. You 
 remember that this trade was taken away from them. Now, I wish for 
 the honor of England that she was as generous, or even as just, as Mr. 
 Eroude represents her, and as he no doubt would wish her to be ; 
 but we have the fact before us that in 1779, when a motion was 
 made to repeal the laws restricting the commerce of Ireland, the 
 English Parliament, the English king and the English Lord Lieuten- 
 ant of Ireland opposed it to the very death. They would not have 
 it ; not a fetter would they strike off even of the chains of the Pro- 
 testants and planters of Ireland ; and it was only when Grattan rose 
 up in the Irish Parliament and insisted that Ireland should gi't back 
 her trade, it was only then that England consented to listen, because 
 there were 50,000 volunteers armed outside. The policy of trade 
 interference still continued, and serious as it was, it was but an iota 
 of the wrongs inflicted. No Irislimen were recognized but Protest- 
 ant Irishmen. All others were men excluded from the bench, the 
 bank, the exchange, the university, the College of Plu'sicians, and 
 so on. When, then, the English king and Parliament and aristocracy 
 were bound to have this thing go on, it was a righteous act for Grattan 
 to rise in the Senate and sweai- before heaven that it should cease. 
 As firmly Avas the oath that it should not cease retorted, and while 
 Grattan worked withiu he had 50,000 volunteers drawn up in the 
 streets of Dublin to give weight to his ariruments. Bitter then was 
 
FATHER BUEKE. 285 
 
 the sorrow of the English when a member whose position should 
 have taught him better — Hiissey cle Burgh — seconded G rattan's 
 motion, and Ireland's commercial and legislative freedom were 
 asserted. Protestant liigotr^^, the many-headed monstei", had now 
 begun to think it would bo proper to reform the state, but Henry 
 Grattan said : " I never will claim this while thousands of ray country- 
 men arc in chains ; give them the power to return members to Par- 
 liament, and put an end to the nomination boroughs ; let the members 
 represent the people, and you will have reformed your Parliament 
 and have established the liberties which the volunteers have won." 
 The English would not hear of reform, because they ^vanled to have 
 a, venal and corrupt Government. 
 
 It was to this fact and not to any misstatement that we owe the 
 collapse of that magnificent resurrection in the movement of 1800. 
 "When William Pitt came to office his first step was to put an end to 
 this difficulty and unite the two Parliaments into one. This being 
 the programme, how was it to be worked out? Mr. Fronde stated 
 that the rebelliou of 1798 was one of those outbursts of Irish un- 
 governable passion and of Irish inconstancy. Mr. Froude said that 
 rebellion rose out of the disturbance of men's minds created by the 
 French revolution, which set all the world ablaze, and the flames 
 spread no doubt to Ireland, and that the Irish Government was so 
 hampered by the free Parliament their hands were bound. The 
 rising of 1798 took place on the 23d of May, and on that day the 
 United Irishmen arose. As early as 1797 the country was beginning 
 to be disturbed, and during the months of February and March Lord 
 Moira said in the House of Lords : 
 
 "I have seen in Ireland the most absurd and disgusting tyranny 
 that any nation ever groaned under. I have myself seen it practised 
 and unchecked, and the effects that resulted were such as I have 
 stated to your lordship. I have seen in that country a marked dis- 
 tinction between the English and the Irish. I have seen troops full 
 of this prejudice, and eveiy inhabitant of that is, and is a rebel to 
 the British Government." 
 
 Their treatment of the Irish was cruel in the extreme. They 
 persecuted them until Irish blood ccmld stand no more, until Irish- 
 men would h;ive been poltroons and servile cowards to have yielded 
 ■without a determined and forcible assertion of their rights. (The 
 
286 . TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 lecturer continued his description of the outrages encouraged by- 
 English tyrann}' aud practised by the troops, and closed that portion 
 of the narrative with the remark, which brought great outcries of 
 enthusiasm from the audience) : Aud all this occurred before the 
 rising actually took place, and this course was pursued with the 
 view of provoking the great rebellion which followed. I ask you, in 
 all this goading of a people into rcbelliou, if the infamous Govern- 
 ment which then ruled Ireland was not to blame ? Were the Iris'.i 
 responsible when the myrmidons of England were let loose upon 
 them, violating every principle of honor aud decency? Did they not 
 goad them into the rebellion of 1798? Mr. Fronde says several 
 hot-headed priests put themselves at the head of the people. There 
 was Father John Murphy, who came home from his duties one day 
 and found his house burned, his chapel destroyed, and his unfortu- 
 nate parishioners huddled about the blackened walls of the chapel. 
 " Where are we to fly? " they cried. Father John Murphy got some 
 pikes, put them in their hands, and himself at their head. Here you 
 see, Mr. Froude, there arc two sides to every story. I have endeav- 
 ored to give you some portions of the Irish side of this story, resting 
 and bearing my testimony upon the records of Protestant and English 
 writers, and upon the testimony which I have been proud to put- 
 before you of the noble and generous American peoi^le. I have to 
 apologize for the dryness of the subject and the imperfect manner in 
 which I have treated it, and also for the unconscionable length of 
 time which I have tried j^our patience. On next Tuesday evening 
 we shall be approacliing ticklish ground — Ireland since the Union, 
 Ireland to-day, and Ireland as my heart and brain tells me that she 
 will be in some future time. 
 
FATHER BUEKE. 28T 
 
 Fifth Lecture. 
 
 ^ADIES AND GENTLEMEN, — On this day a paragraph in a 
 ^^K a newspaper, the "New York Tribune," was brought under my 
 ^ notice, and the reading of it caused me much pain and anguish 
 •i of mind. It recorded an act of discourtesy to my learned 
 
 antagonist, Mr. Froude, supposed to have been offered by Irishmen 
 in Boston. In the name of the Irishmen in America I tender to the 
 learned gentlemen my best apologies. I beg to assure him for my 
 Irish fellow-countrymen in this country that we are only too happy 
 to offer to him the courtesy and hospitality which Ireland has never 
 refused, even to her enemies. Mr. Froude does not come amongst 
 us as an enemy of Ireland, but he professes that he loves the Irish 
 people, and I believe him. When I read in the report of his last 
 lecture, which I am about to answer to-night, that he would jield to 
 no man in his love for the Irish jjeople, I was reminded of what 
 O'Connell said to Lord Derby on a similar occasion. When the 
 noble lord stated in the House of Lords that he would yield to no 
 man in his great love for Ireland, the " Tribune " arose and said: 
 "Anj' man that loves Ireland cannot be my enemy; let our hearts 
 shake hands." I am sure, thei'efore, that I speak the sentiments of 
 every true Irishman in America when I assure this leai-ned English 
 gentleman that as long as he is in this country he will receive from 
 the hands of the Irish citizens of America nothing but the same cour- 
 tesy, the same polite hospitality and attention which he boasts he has 
 received from the Irish people in their native land. We L'ishmen 
 in America know well that it is not by discourtesy, or anything ap- 
 proaching to rudeness or violence, that we expect to make our ap- 
 peal to this great nation. If ever the reign of intellect and of mind 
 was practically established in this world, it is in glorious America. 
 
288 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Every man who seeks the truth, every inaii who preaches the truth, 
 whether it be a religious or a historical truth, will find an audience 
 in America; and I hope that he never will find an Irishman to stand 
 up and offer him discourtesy or violence l)ccause he speaks what 
 he imagines to be the truth. 
 
 So much being said in reference to the paragraph to which I have 
 alluded, I come to the last of Mr. Fronde's lectures and to the last 
 of my own. First, the learned gentleman, in his fourth lecture, 
 told the people of America his views of the rebellion of 1782 and 
 the subsequent Irish rebellion of '08. According to Mr. Froude, 
 the Irish made a great mistake in 1782 by asserting the inde- 
 pendence of the Irish Parliament. " They abandoned," saj^s this 
 learned gentleman, "the paths of political reform, and they clamored 
 for political agitation." Now, political agitation is one thing and 
 political reform is another. Political reform, my friends, means the 
 correction of great abuses, the repealing of bad laws, and the pass- 
 ing of good measures for the welfare and well-being of a people. 
 According to this learned gentlemen, the English were taught by 
 their bitter American exiierience that coercion would not answer with 
 the people, and that it Avas impossible to thrust unjust laws upon a 
 people or nation. According to Mr. Froude, England Mas only too 
 willing, too happy, in the year 1780 to repeal all the bad laws that 
 had been passed in the blindness and bigotry of bygone ages, and to 
 grant to Ireland real redress of all her grievances. "But the Irish 
 people," says Mr. Froude, " instead of demanding from England a 
 redress for their grievances, insisted upon their national and parlia- 
 mentary independence. And they were fools in this," he says, "for 
 that very independence led to internal contention, from contention to 
 conspiracy, from conspiracy to rebellion, and from rebellion to 
 tyranny." Now, I am as great an enemy of political agitation as Mr. 
 Froude or any other man. I hold, and I hold it by experience, that 
 political agitation distracts men's minds from more serious and more 
 necessary avocations of life ; that political agitation distracts men's 
 minds away from their business and from the safer pursuits of in- 
 dustry, while it creates animosity and bad blood between citizens ; 
 that it affords an easy and profitable employment to worthless dem- 
 agogues, and that it brings very often to the surface the vilest and 
 meanest element of society. All this I grant. But at the same time 
 
FATHER BURKE. 289 
 
 I hold that political agitation is the only resource left to a people 
 who are endeavoring to exact good laws from an unwilling and ty- 
 rannical government. May I ask the learned historian what were 
 the wars of the seventeenth century in France, in Germany, and in 
 the Netherlands — the wars Mr. Fronde admires so much, and for 
 which he expresses so much sympathy? What were they but politi- 
 cal agitations, taking the form of armed rebellion, in order to extort 
 from the government of the time what the people believed to be just 
 measures of toleration and liberties of conscience? With these 
 wars that were waged hy tlie people in armed rebellion against 
 France, Spain, and in the Netherlands, against the Emperor Charles 
 the Fifth, Mr. Froude has the deepest sympathy, because they zoere 
 wars made bf/ Protestants against Catholic Governments. The men 
 who made these wars were innovators, and they were revolutionists 
 in every sense of the word. They wanted to overthrow and over- 
 turn not only the altar, but the established form of government. 
 But when the Irish, who alone stood in defence of their ancient re- 
 ligion, their altars, their lives, their property — not their freedom, 
 because that Avas long gone — though the Irish did this, the learned 
 gentleman has not a word to sny, except those which express the 
 gi'eatest disdain and disapprobation. And now, my friends, we come 
 to consider whether Mr. Froude is right when he says "that the 
 Irish only clamored for political agitation." 
 
 Now mark ! In 1780 the Irish people, and more especially the 
 Protestant portion of the Irish people, demanded of the English 
 Government the repeal of certain laws that restricted and almost 
 annihilated the trade and commerce of Ireland. These laws bad 
 been passed under William III. ; they were levelled at the Irish 
 woollen trade ; they forbid the exportation of manufactured cloth 
 from Ireland, except under a duty that was equivalent to a pi"o- 
 hibition tariif. They went so far as to prohibit the Irish people 
 from selling the very fleece — their wool — selling it to any foreign 
 power except England. England then fixed her price, and as Mr. 
 Froude himself said, " although the French might be off'ering for 
 Irish wool, the Irish merchant could not sell to them, but he was 
 obliged to sell to the English merchant at his own price." When the 
 Irish people demanded this just measure, I ask was England willing 
 to grant it? Was England, as Mr. Froude says, only anxious to 
 
290 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 discover unjust laws in order to repeal them, and to discover griev- 
 ances in order to redress them ? I answer, No ! England nailed 
 her colors to the mast. She said, "I never will grant a repeal of 
 restriction duties on Irish trade. Ireland is down, and I will keep 
 her down." 
 
 The proof lies here, that the English Government resisted Grat- 
 tan's demand for the emancipation of Irish industry until Henry 
 Grattan brought 50,000 volunteers, and the very day he rose in the 
 Irish Parliament to proclaim that she demanded her rights and no 
 more, the volunteers in College Green and Ste^Dhen's Green, in 
 Dublin, planted their cannon right before the English House of 
 Commons, and had written over the mouths of their cannon, "Free 
 
 trade for Ireland, or " If England was so willing to redi'oss 
 
 every Irish grievance — if the Irish people had only to say, " Look 
 here, there is this law in existence ; take it away, for it is strangling 
 and destroying the industry of the country " — if England was will- 
 ing to take away the thing — and this Mr. Froude says she was — 
 if she was willing to hear a defect only to remedy it, why, in the 
 name of God — why, in that day of 1780 — why did she hold out 
 until at the cannon's mouth she was compelled to yield the commer- 
 cial independence of Ireland? Is it any wonder that the Irish 
 people thought, with Henry Grattan, that if every measure of re- 
 form was to be fought for, the country would be kept in a perfect 
 state of revolution? If the Irish people would have to say, "What- 
 ever we are to get, we must be ready with our torches lighted and 
 cannons loaded," is it any wonder that they should have said, " It is 
 far better for us to leave our Parliament free and independent to take 
 up the making of our own laws, and consulting our interests, and in 
 peace, quietness, and harmony, to take thought for the needs of Ire- 
 land and legislate for them. And this is what Mr. Froude calls 
 clamoring for political agitation. Thus we see, my friends — and 
 remember this evening, fellow-countrymen, that I am moved to 
 especially appeal to America, for I expect my verdict this evening as 
 Mr. Froude got his, and it is not from Dr. Hitchcock. It is not the 
 puny crow of a barn-door fowl, but it is the scream of the American 
 eagle that I expect to hear. Thus Ave see that the action of 1782, 
 by which Grattan obtained and achieved the independence of the 
 Irish Parliament, did not show any innate love of Irishmen for po- 
 
FATHER BURKE. 291 
 
 litical agitation ; but in tlie action of the British Government, that 
 forced them on, they gave tliem only two alternatives : remain sub- 
 ject to my Parliament and I will never grant you anything except 
 at the cannon's mouth ; or take your own liberty and legislate for 
 yourselves. Ob, Henry Grattan, you were not a Catholic, and yet 
 I, a Catholic priest, here to-night call down ten thousand blessings 
 on your name. It is true that that emancipated Parliament of 1782 
 failed to realize the hopes of the Irish nation. Perfectly true. The 
 Parliament of 1782 was a failure, I grant it. Mr. Froude says that 
 that Parliament was a foilure because the Irish are incapable of self- 
 legislation. It is a serious charge to make now against any people, 
 my friends. I who am not supposed to be a philosopher, and be- 
 cause of the habit that I wear am supposed not to be a man of very 
 large mind — I stand up here to-night and I assert my conviction 
 that there is not a nation or a race under the sun that is not capable 
 of self-legislation, and that has not a right to the inheritance of free- 
 dom. But if the learned gentleman wishes to know what was the 
 real cause of that failure, I will tell him. The emancipated Parlia- 
 ment of 1782, although it enclosed within its walls such honored 
 names as Grattan and Flood, yet did not represent the Irish nation. 
 Thei'6 were nearly three millions and a half of Irishmen in Ireland 
 at that day. Three millions were Catholics and half a million 
 Protestants, and the Parliament of 1782 only represented the half- 
 million. Nay, more ; examine the constitution of that Parliament 
 and see who they were, see how they were elected, and you will find 
 that not even the half-million of Protestants were fairly represented 
 in that Parliament. 
 
 For the House of Commons held three hundred members, and of 
 these three hundred there were only seventy-two elected by the peo- 
 jDle ; the rest were nominees of certain great lords and certain large 
 landed proprietors. A man happened to have an estate the size of a 
 county, and each town sent a man to Parliament. The landlord said, 
 You elect such and such a man, naming him. These places were called 
 rotten boroughs, nomination boroughs, pocket boroughs, because my 
 lord had them in his pocket. Have any of you Irishmen here present 
 ever travelled from Dublin to Drogheda? There is a miserable vil- 
 lage, a half a dozen wretched huts, the dirtiest, filthiest place I ever 
 saw — and that miserable village returned a member for the Irish 
 
292 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Parliament. Did tliat Parliament of 1782 represent the Irish peo- 
 ple? The 3,000,000 of Catholics had not so much as a vote. The 
 best, the most intellectual Catholic in Ireland had not even a vote 
 for a member of Parliament. Had the Parliament represented the 
 Irish nation, they would have solved the problem of Home Kule in a 
 sense favorable to Ireland and very unfavorable to the theories of 
 Mr. Fronde. 
 
 The Irish people knew this well, and the moment that the Parlia- 
 ment of 1782 was declared independent of the Parliament of Eng- 
 land, was declared to have the power of originating its own acts of 
 legislation, and to be responsible to no one but the king, that 
 moment the Irish clamored for reform. They said : '' Reform your- 
 selves." Let the people represent them fiiirly, and you will make a 
 great success of our independence. The volunteers, to their honor, 
 cried out for reform. In their first meeting at Dungarvan, where 
 they were 95,000 strong, the only thing they demanded was reform. 
 The United Irishmen — who, in the beginning, were not a secret 
 society or a treasonable society, but open, free, loyal men, embrac- 
 ing the first names and the first characters in Ireland — the United 
 Irishmen originated as a society embracing the first intellect in Ire- 
 land for the purpose of forcing reform on the Parliament. It may 
 be interesting to the citizens of America who have honored me with 
 their presence this evening, it may be interesting to my Irish fellow- 
 countrymen, to know what were the three precepts on which the 
 United Irishmen were founded. Here they are : The first resolution 
 of that society was that "the weight of English influence in the 
 government of this country is so great as to require cordial union 
 among all the people of Ireland to maintain that balance which is 
 essential to the preservation of our liberties and to the extension of 
 our commerce." 
 
 Resolution No. 2 : "That the only constitutional means by which 
 this influence of England can be opposed is by complete, cordial, 
 and radical reform of the representation of the people in Parlia- 
 ment." Resolution No. 3 : " That no reform is just which does 
 nt)t include every Irishman of every religious persuasion." There 
 you have the whole programme of the formidable Society of 
 United Irishmen. I ask the people of America if there is any- 
 thing treasonable, anything reprehensible, anything deserving 
 
FATHER BURKE. 093 
 
 imprisonment, punislimont, or death, in such resolution? But 
 England opposed and hindered the reform. England .said the 
 Parliament must remain representatives of a faction and not of 
 the nation — the corrupt and venal representatives of only a small 
 portion of the Protestant faction. On tlio 29th of November, 1793, 
 Flood introduced into the Irish Parliament a l)ill of reform. The 
 moment it was read a member rose to o])pose it. That member 
 was Barry Yelverton, afterward Lord Avonmore, the Attorney- 
 General of Ireland, who gave to the bill an official and Ciovcru- 
 ment opposition. The bill was defeated by 159 to 77. Every 
 one of the 159 voted with the bribe in their pockets. Then At- 
 torney-General Yelverton rose and made a motion that it be de- 
 clared that this House maintain its just rights and privileges against 
 all encroachments whatsoever, the just rights and privileges being 
 the representation of five-sixths of the Irish people. But, says 
 Mr. Froude, from confusion grew conspiracy, and from conspiracy 
 grew rebellion. By conspiracy he means the Society of United 
 Irishmen and by rebellion the rising of '98. In my last lecture I 
 showed by the evidcuice of such illustrious men as Sir Ralph Aber- 
 crombie and Sir John Moore, the hero of Corunna, that the ris- 
 ing of '98 was caused by the British Government, which goaded 
 the Irish into rebellion. I think I have to-night shown that the 
 Society of United Irishmen was not a conspiracy, but a union of 
 the best intellects and best men in Ireland for a splendid and 
 patriotic purpose, which they aimed to attain by loyal and legiti- 
 mate means. But the United Irishmen were formed to eflcct a 
 union among all Irishmen, and this was enough to excite the sus- 
 picions of England, whose policy for centuries has been to main- 
 tain divisions in Ireland. Well did Mr. Froude say that on the 
 day when Irislimon were united they will be invincible. The 
 Prime Minister of England, William Pitt, resolved on three things : 
 First, to disarm the volunteers ; second, to drive the United Ii-ishmen 
 into conspiracy ; and third, to force Ireland into a rebellion and have 
 it at his feet. I am reviewing this historically, calmly, and with- 
 out expression of feeling. But I tliink a philosopher is the last man 
 in the world who ought to write history. Mr. Froude ought not to 
 write history. A historian's duty is to detail dry facts, and the less 
 he has to do with theories the better. I believe the learned gentle- 
 
294: TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 man is too much of a philosoplier to be a good historian, and too 
 much of a histoi'ian to be a good philosopher. The first of Pitt's 
 thi-ee designs was accomplished in 1785. His next move was to 
 send to Irehxnd a standing army of 15,000 men, and to obtain from 
 the Irish Parliament a grant of £20,000 to enable him to organize a 
 regular militia. Between the army and the militia he caught the 
 volunteers in the centre and disarmed them. On the day when the 
 last volunteer laid down his arms the hopes of Ireland were for 
 the time laid down with him. In 1793 the Parliament passed two 
 bills, the Gunpowder Bill and the Committee Bill. A public meet- 
 ing of United Irishmen was held in Dublin to protest against the 
 outrageous course pursued by certain agents of the Govei-nment in 
 entering houses, and penetrating into private chambers, under pre- 
 tence of searching for gunpowder, alleged to be concealed there. 
 The Hon. Simon Butler, president, and Oliver Bond, secretary, of 
 the meeting, were imprisoned five months and fined £300 for their 
 part in the demonstration. The United Irishmen were obliged to 
 seek refuge from persecution in secresy, and were thus forced to be- 
 come conspirators. 
 
 But the first really treasonable project in which they took part 
 was in 1794, when the Rev. William Jackson, a Protestant clergy- 
 man, came over to Ireland, commissioned by the French Convention. 
 Mr. Jackson was a true man, but he was accompanied by a certain 
 John Cocquaine, an English lawyer of London, and the agent of 
 Pitt, Prime Minister of England. Thus did the Society of United 
 Irishmen become the seat of conspiracy, and this was the action of 
 the English Government. Before that it was perfectly legitimate 
 and constitutional. Ah ! but it had an object which was far more 
 formidable to the English Government than any action of treason. 
 The English Government is not afraid of Irish treason, but the Eng- 
 lish Government trembles with fear at the idea of Irish union. The 
 United Irishmen Avere founded to promote union among Irishmen 
 of every religion, and the Englishman has said in his own mind, 
 " Treason is better than union ; " it will force them to become trea- 
 sonable conspirators in their projects, and union will be broken up. 
 It is well that you should hear, ni}' American friends, what was the 
 oath that was demanded of the United Irishman. Let us suppose I 
 was going to be sworn in : "I, Thomas Burke, in the presence of 
 
FATHER BURKE. 295 
 
 God, do pledge myself to my country that I will use all my abilities 
 and influence in the attainment of an imperial and adequate repre- 
 sentation of the Irish nation in Parliament ; and as a most absolute 
 and immediate necessity for the attainment of this chief good of Ire- 
 land, I will endeavor as much as lies in my ability to forward and 
 perpetuate the identity of interests, the union of rights, and the 
 union of power among Irishmen of all religious persuasions." I pro- 
 test before high Heaven to-night that, priest as I am, if I were asked 
 in 1779 to take that oath, I would have taken it and tried to keep it. 
 Remember, my friends, that it was no secret oath ; remember that 
 it was an oath that no man could refuse to take unless he was a dis- 
 honorable man and a traitor to his country. The founder of this 
 society was Theobald Wolfe Tone. I admit that Mr. Tone was im- 
 bued with French revolutionary ideas, but he certainly never en- 
 deavored to impress these views upon the society until Mr. William 
 Pitt's, the Prime Minister, influence forced that society to become a 
 secret organization. The third object of the Premier of the Govern- 
 ment, namely, to create an Irish rebellion — was accomplished by 
 the cruelties and abominations of the soldiers, who were quartered 
 upon the people and destroyed them. They violated the sanctity of 
 Irish maidenhood and womanhood, burned their villages, plundered 
 their farms, demolished their houses, until they made life even more 
 intolerable than death itself, and compelled the people to rise in the 
 rebellion of 1798. Now, you may ask what advantage was this to 
 William Pitt, the Premier, to have conspiracy and rebellion in Ire- 
 land ? I answer you that William Pitt was a great English states- 
 man, and that meant in those days a great enemy of Ireland. He 
 saw Ireland with her Parliament, free and independent, making 
 her own laws, consulting her own interests, and he said to himself: 
 "Ah ! this will never do. This country will grow happy and pros- 
 perous ; this country will be powerful, and that won't subserve my 
 purposes, my imperial designs. AVhat do I care for Ireland? I 
 care for the British Empire." And he made up his mind to destroy 
 the Irish Parliament and to carry the Act of Union. He knew well 
 as long as Ireland was happy, peaceful, and prosperous he never 
 could effect that. He knew well that it was only through the humi- 
 liation and destruction of Ireland that he could doit; and, cruel 
 man as he was, he resolved to plunge the kingdom into rebellion 
 
296 TREASUKy OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 and blc odshed in ordei' to cany out bis infernal English state policy. 
 And yet, dear friends, especially my American friends, my grand 
 jury — fori feel as if I were a lawyer pleading the case of a poor de- 
 fendant, that has been defendant in many a court for many a long 
 century ; the plaintifl' is a great, rich, powerful woman ; the poor 
 defendant has nothing to commend her but a heart that has never 
 yet despaired, a spirit that never yet was broken, and a loyalty to 
 God and to man that never yet was violated by any act of treason — 
 I ask you, O grand jury of America ! to consider how easy it was to 
 conciliate this poor mother Ireland of mine, and to make her peace- 
 ( ful and happy. Pitt himself bad a proof of it in that very year of 
 1794. 
 
 Suddenly the imperious and magnificent Premier seemed to have 
 changed his mind and to have adopted a policy of conciliation. He 
 recalled the Irish Lord Lieutenant Westmoreland, and he sent to 
 Ireland Earl Fitzwilliam, who arrived on the 4th of January, 1795. 
 Lord Fitzwilliam was a gentleman of liberal mind, and a most esti- 
 mable character. He felt kindly to the Irish people, and before he 
 left England he made an express compact with William Pitt that if 
 he were made Lord Lieutenant of Ireland he would govern the 
 country with principles of conciliation and kindness. He came. He 
 found in Dublin Castle a certain Secretary Cooke, a petty tyrant, 
 and he found the great f unily of Beresfords, who for years and 
 years had monopolized all the public ofEces and emoluments, and 
 held uncontrolled sway over the destinies of Ireland. He dismissed 
 them all, sent them all to the right about, and he surrounded himself 
 with men of liberal minds and large, statesman-like views. He 
 began by telling the Catholics of Ireland that he would labor for 
 their emancipation. A sudden peace and joy spread throughout 
 the nation. Every vestige of insubordination and rebellion seemed 
 to vanish out of the Irish mind ; the people were content to wait ; 
 every law was observed ; peace, happiness, and joy was for the time 
 being the portion of the Irish people. Mow long did it last? In an 
 evil hour Pitt returned to his old designs ; Earl Fitzwilliam was 
 recalled on the 25th of March, and Ireland enjoyed her hopes only 
 for two short months. When it was ascertained that Lord Fitz- 
 william was about to be recalled, there was scarcely a parish in 
 Ireland that did not send in petitions, resolutions, and prayers to 
 
P^ATHER BURKE. 297 
 
 tlie English Government to leave them their Lord Lieutenant. All 
 to no purpose ; the policy was changed ; Pitt had made up his mind 
 to carry the Union. On the day that Lord Fitzwilliam left Dul)lia 
 the principal citizens of Dublin took the horses from his carriage, 
 and they drew the carriage themselves down to the water's side. 
 All Ireland was in tears. "The scene," says an historian of the 
 time, " was heartrending ; the whole country was in mourning." 
 How easy it was, my American friends, to conciliate these people 
 whom two short mouths of kindness could so have changed. Oh ! 
 if only the English Government, the English Parliament, the English 
 people — if they could only realize this for ever so short a time, the 
 mine of affection, the glorious heart, the splendid gratitude that lies 
 there in Ireland, but to which they have never appealed and never 
 touched ! They have turned the very honey of human nature into 
 the gall and bitterness of hate. The rebellion broke out, and it was 
 defeated, and, as Mr. Fronde truly says, " the victors took away ail 
 the old privileges and made the yoke heavier." By the old privi- 
 leges, people of America, Mr. Fronde means the Irish Parliament, 
 which was taken away. I hope, citizens of America, that this 
 English gentleman Avho has come hei-e to get a verdict from you will 
 be taught by that verdict that the right of human legislation is not a 
 privilege, but the right of every nation on earth. Then, in the 
 course of his lecture, going back to strengthen his argument, he 
 says : " You must not blame England for being so hard on you 
 Irishmen. She took away your Parliament, and inflicted on you a 
 heavier yoke than you before bore. She could not help it, it was 
 your own fault ; what made you rebel?" 
 
 This is the argument which the learned gentleman uses. He sa3's 
 the penal laws never would have been carried out only for the revo- 
 lution in Ii'eland in 1600. Now, the revolution of 1600 meant the 
 war that Hugh O'Neill made in Ulster against Queen Elizabeth. 
 According to this learned historian, the penal laws were the result, 
 effect, and consequence of that revolution. Kemcmber he fixes the 
 date himself, 1600. Now, my friends, what is the record of history ? 
 The penal laws began to operate in Ireland in 1534. In 1537 the 
 Archbishop of Armagh and Primate of Ireland, who was an English- 
 man, was put into jail, and left there for denying the supremacy of 
 Harry VIII. over the Church of Rome. Passing over the succeeding 
 
298 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 years of Harry VIII., passing over the enactments of Somerset, we 
 come to Elizabeth's reign. And we find that she assembled a Par- 
 liament in 1560, forty years before Mr. Fronde's revolution. Here 
 is one of the laws of the Parliament: "All officers and ministers 
 ecclesiastical" (that took ^ls in) "werebonnd to take the oath of 
 supremacy, and bound to swear that Queen Elizabeth was Popess ; 
 that she was the head of the Church ; that she was the successor of 
 the Apostles ; that she was the representative of St. Peter, and 
 through him of the Eternal Son of God." Queen Elizabeth ! My 
 friends, all were obliged to take this oath under pain of forfeiture 
 and total incapacity. Any one who maintained the spiritual su- 
 premacy of the Pope was to forfeit for the first offence all his estates, 
 real and personal ; and if he had no estate, and if he was not worth 
 twenty pounds, he was to be put for one year in jail. For the 
 second offence he was liable to the penalty of premunire, and for 
 the third ofience guilty of high treason and put to death. These 
 laws were made, and commissioners appointed to enforce them. Mr. 
 Froude says they were not enforced. But wc actually have the acts 
 of Elizabeth's Parliament, appointing magistrates and ofiicers to go 
 out and enforce these laws. And these were made forty years before 
 the revolution which Mr. Froude alludes to as the revolution of 1600. 
 How, then, can the gentleman ask us to regard the penal laws as the 
 effects of the revolution? In my philosophy, and I believe in that 
 of the citizens of America, the effect generally follows the cause. 
 But the English philosophical historian puts the effects forty years 
 ahead of the cause, or, as we say in Ireland, he put "the car before 
 the horse." But, my friends, Mr. Froude tells us, if j'ou remember, 
 in his second lecture, that the penal laws of Elizabeth were occasioned 
 by the political necessity of her situation. Here is his argument, as 
 he gives it. He says : " Elizabeth could not afford to let Ireland be 
 Catholic, because if Ireland were Catholic, Ireland must be hostile 
 to Elizabeth." I may tell you now, and I hope the ladies here will 
 pardon me for mentioning it, that Queen Elizabeth was not a legiti- 
 mate child. Her name in common parlance is too vile for me to 
 utter, or for the ladies here to hear. Sufiice it to say that Elizabeth's 
 mother was not Elizabeth's father's wife. The Queen of England 
 knew the ancient abhorrence that Ireland had for such a vice. He 
 knew that abhorrence grew out of Ireland's Catholicity, and there- 
 
FATHER BURKE. 299 
 
 fore she could not allow Ireland to remain Catholic, because Ireland 
 would be hostile to her if Ireland remained Catholic. The only way 
 the amiable queen could root out Catholics in Ireland was by penal 
 laws — making it a felony for any Irishman to remain in Ireland a 
 Catholic. Therefore the English historian says that she passed these 
 laws because she could not help herself, and that she was coerced 
 by the necessity of her situation. Now, I ask you, if Elizabeth, as 
 he states in his second lecture, was obliged to pass these penal laws 
 whether she would or not, why does he say that those penal laws 
 were the effects of Hugh O'Neill's revolution? If they were the 
 result of Elizabeth's necessity, then they were not the result of the 
 immortal Hugh O'Neill's brave efforts. 
 
 His next assertion is that after the American war England was 
 only too well disposed to do justice to Ireland ; and the proof lies 
 here : He says that " the laws against the Catholics were almost all 
 repealed before 1798." Very well ; now I ask you, dear friends, to 
 reflect upon what these large measures of indulgence to the Catholics 
 were of which Mr. Froude speaks. Here they are : In the year 
 1771 Parliament passed an act to enable Catholics to take a long lease 
 on fifty acres of bog. My American friends, you may not under- 
 stand this word bog. We in Ireland do. It means a marsh; it is 
 almost irreclaimable ; it means a marsh which you may be draining 
 until doomsday, still it will remain the original marsh. You may 
 sink a fortune in it in arterial drainage, in top dressing, as we call it 
 in Ireland. Let it alone for a couple of years, then come back and 
 look at it, and it has asserted itself and it is a bog once moi'e. How- 
 ever, the Parliament was kinder than you imagine. For while they 
 granted to the Catholic the power to take a long lease of fifty acres 
 of bog, they also stipulated that if the bog was too deep for a 
 foundation, he might take half an acre of arable land and build a 
 house. Half an acre I Not more than a half an acre. This holding, 
 such as it was, should not be within a mile of any city or town. Oh ! 
 no; and mark this: if half the bog was not reclaimed, that is five 
 and twenty acres, within twenty-one years, the lease was forfeited ! 
 Dear friends, the Scriptures tell us that King Pharaoh of Egypt was 
 very cruel to the Hebrews because he ordered them to make bricks 
 without straw. But here is a law that ordered unfortunate Irishmen 
 to reclaim twenty-five acres of bog in twenty-one years, or else lose 
 
300 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 his land. Beggnrly as this concession was, you will be astonished to 
 hear that the very Parliament that passed it was so much afraid of 
 the Protestant ascendancy in Ireland that, in order to. conciliate 
 them for this slight concession, they passed another bill granting £10 
 additional to £30 already offered for every Papist priest duly con- 
 verted to the Protestant religion. In October, 1777, the news 
 reached England that General Burgoyne had surrendered to General 
 Gates. The moment that the news reached Lord North, who was 
 Prime Minister of England, he immediately expressed an ardent 
 desire to relax the penal laws on Catholics. In January, the follow- 
 ing year, 1778, the independence of America was acknowledged by 
 glorious France. And the moment that piece of news reached Eng- 
 land the English Parliament passed a bill for the relaxation of the 
 laws on Catholics. In May of the same year the Irish Parliament 
 passed a bill — now mark ! — to enable Catholics to lease land — to 
 take a lease for nine hundred and ninety-nine years. So it seems 
 we were to get out of the bog at last. 
 
 They also in that year repealed the unnatural penal law which 
 altered the succession in favor of the child who became a Protestant 
 and gave him the father's property. They also repealed the law for 
 the persecution of priests and the imprisonment of Popish school- 
 masters. In the year 1793 they gave back to the Catholics the 
 power to elect a member of Parliament, to vote, and they also gave 
 them the right to certain comnn'ssions in army. That is, positively, 
 all that we got. And this is what Mr. Fronde calls " almost a total 
 repeal of the laws against Catholics." Wc could not go into Parlia- 
 ment ; we could not go on the bench ; we ctiuld not be magistrates ; 
 we were still the hewers of wood and drawers of water. And this 
 loyal and benign Englishman comes and says : " Why, you fools, you 
 were almost free ! " Well, people of America, if these be Mr. 
 Fronde's notions of civil and religious freedom, I appeal to you for 
 Ireland not to give him the verdict. "The insurrection of 1798," 
 continues the learned gentleman, "threw Ireland back into confusion 
 and misery, from which she was partially delivered by the Act of 
 Union." The first part of that proposition I admit ; the second I 
 emphatically deny. I admit that the unsuccessful rebellion of 1798 
 threw Ireland back into a state of misery. Unsuccessful rebellion 
 is one of the greatest calamities that can befall a nation, and the 
 
FATHER BURKE. 3Q1 
 
 sooner Irishmen and Irish patriots understaud this the better it will 
 be for them and their country. I emphatically deny that by the Act 
 of Union there was any remedy for these miseries ; that it had any 
 healing remedy whatever for the wrongs of Ireland ; that it had any- 
 thing in the shape of a benefit or blessing. 1 assert that the Union 
 of _l600, by which Ireland lost her Parliament, was a jiure curse for 
 Ireland from that day, and uotliing else, and it is an evil that must 
 be remedied if the grievances of Ireland are ever to be redressed. 
 I need not dwell upon the wholesale bribery and corruption by which 
 the infernal Castlereagh, that political apostate, carried that detest- 
 able Act of Union. Mr. Fronde has had the good sense to pass by 
 tliat dirty subject without touching him, and i can do nothing better. 
 He says: "It was expected that whatever grievances Ireland com- 
 plained of would be removed by legislation after the Act of Union." 
 It M'as expected, it is quite true. Even Catholics expected some- 
 thing. They were promised in wi-iting by Lord Cornwallis that 
 Catholic emancipation would be given them if they only accepted the 
 Union. Pitt himself assured them that he would not administer the 
 Government unless Catholic emancipation was made a Cabinet meas- 
 ure. The honor of Pitt, the honor of England, was engaged; the 
 honor of the brave though unfortunate Lord Cornwallis was engaged ; 
 but the Irish were left to meditate in bitterness of spirit upon the 
 nature of English faith. Now let me introduce an honored name 
 that I shall return to by and by. At that time the Parliament of 
 Ireland was bribed with money and titles, and the Catholic people of 
 Ireland were bribed by the promises of emancipation if they would 
 consent to the Union. Then it was that a young man appeared in 
 Dublin and spoke for the first time against the Union and in the 
 name of the Catholics of Ireland, and that man was the glorious 
 Daniel O'Connell. Two or three of the bishops gave a kind of tacit 
 negative consent to the measure, in the hope of getting Catholic 
 emancipation. I need hardly tell you, my friends, that the Catholic 
 lords of the pale were only too willing to pass any measure the Eng- 
 lish Government would require. O'Connell appeared before the 
 Catholic Committee of Dublin. Here are his words : Remember 
 they are the words of the Catholics of Ii-eland : 
 
 " Sir, — It is my sentiment, and I am satisfied it is the sentiment 
 not only of every gentleman that hears me, but of the Catholic people 
 
302 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of Ireland, that if our opposition to this injurious, insulting and 
 hated measure of Union were to draw upon us the renewal of 
 the penal laws, we would sooner boldly meet the persecution and 
 oppression, which would be testimony of our virtue, and throw our- 
 selves once more under the mercy of our Protestant brethren, than 
 give our assent to the political murder of our country. I do know 
 that although exclusive advantages may be ambiguously held forth 
 to the Irish Catholic to seduce him from the sacred duty which he 
 owes to his country, I know that the Catholics of Ireland still 
 remember that they have a country, and that they will never accept 
 of any advantage as a sect which would debase and destroy them as 
 a people." 
 
 Shade of the great departed, you never uttered truer words ! 
 Shade of the great O'Connell, every true Irishman, priest and law- 
 man, subscribes to these glorious sentiments, wherever that Irishman 
 is this night ! 
 
 Now, Mr. Froude goes on in an innocent sort of a way : " It is a 
 strange thing after the Union was passed that the people of Ireland 
 were still grumbling and complaining. They were not treated 
 unjustly hard." These are his words. Good God ! People ot 
 America, what idea can this gentleman have of justice? What loss 
 did this Union, which he admired so much — what loss did it inflict 
 on Ireland? He seems to think that it did absolutely nothing, and 
 I ask you to consider two or three of the losses. First of all you 
 remember, my dear friends, that Ireland before the Union had her 
 own national debt, as she had her own military. She was a nation, 
 And the national debt of Ireland in the year 1793 did not amount 
 to three millions of money. In the year 1800, the year of the 
 Union, the national debt of Ireland amounted to twenty-eight mil- 
 lions of money. They increased it ninefold in six years. How? I 
 will tell you. England had in Ireland, for her own purpose, at the 
 time of the Union 126,500 soldiers. 
 
 Pretty tough business that of keeping Ireland down in those days ! 
 She didn't pay a penny of her own money for them. In order to 
 carry the Union, England spent enormous sums of money on spies, 
 informers, members of Parliament, etc. She took every penny of 
 this out of the Irish treasury. There were eighty-four rotten bor- 
 oughs disfranchised at the time of the Union, and England paid to 
 
FATIIEK BURKE. 303 
 
 those who owned those boroughs — who had the nomination of them 
 — one million two hundred thousand pounds sterling. O'Connell, 
 sj^eaking on this subject, says it was really strange that Ireland was 
 not asked to pay for the knife with which, twenty-two years later, 
 Castlereagh cut his throat. If the debt of Ireland was swollen in 
 these few years from three million to twent^'^-six million, I ask you 
 to consider what followed. In January, 1801, the year of the 
 Union, four hundred and fifty and one-half million was the debt of 
 England, and to pay the interest on that it required seventeen mil- 
 lion seven hundred and eight thousand and eight hundred pounds. 
 They had to raise eighteen millions to pay the interest on four hun- 
 dred and fifty millions in that year. Such was the condition of 
 England. 
 
 In the year 1817, sixteen years after, the same debt of England 
 had lisen from four hundred and fifty millions to seven hundred and 
 thirty-five millions, nearly double, and they had an annual debt of 
 twenty-eight millions. You see they doubled their, national debt in 
 sixteen years, during which Pitt waged war with Napoleon, for they 
 had to pay Germans, Hessians, and all sorts of people to fight 
 against France. At one time William Pitt was supporting the whole 
 Austrian army. The Austrians had men, but no money. In Ire- 
 land the debt in 1801 was twenty-eight and one-half millions ; con- 
 sequently the annual taxation was one million two hundred and fifty 
 thousand pounds. That was in 1801. In 1817 the same Irish debt, 
 which sixteen years before was only twenty-eight millions, had risen 
 to one hundred and twelve millions seven hundred and four thousand 
 pounds, and the taxation amounted to four millions one hundred and 
 five thousand pounds sterling. In other words, in sixteen years the 
 debt of England was doubled, but the debt of Ireland was made four 
 times as much as it was in the year that the Union passed. You 
 will ask me how did that happen. It happened from the fact that 
 being united to England, having lost our Parliament, the Chancellor 
 of the Exchequer took and kept the money, and the Irishmen kept 
 the bogs. Ireland lost the privilege of keeping her money and 
 accounts, and that is the way the debt accumulated against us in 
 sixteen years. Ireland was so little burdened with debt at the time 
 of the Union, compared with England, that the English had the pre- 
 sumption to ask us to take share and shai'e alike of the taxation. 
 
304 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 We owed only twenty millions, and they owed four hundred and 
 fifty millions. Why should we be asked to pay the interest of that 
 debt? They were rich and could bear the taxation. Ireland was 
 jjoor and she could not bear it. It is easier to pay interest on 
 twenty pounds than on four hundred. Castlereagh, in the British 
 Parliament, said that Ireland should pay one-seventh of the taxes of 
 England. " We will," he said, "tax them share and share alike, so 
 as to bring this (Irish) debt within one-seventh of the English 
 debt." We Irish were obliged to pay interest on the four hundred 
 and fifty millions that they had incurred before the Union had taken 
 place. "But," says Mr. Froude, "consider the advantages to the 
 nation of having this Union ; 3'ou have the same commercial privi- 
 leges that the English had." To this I answer in the words of the 
 illustrious, of the honest, of the high-minded John Mitchell : "It is 
 true that the laws regulating trade are the same in the two islands. 
 Ireland may export flax and woollen clothing to England ; she may 
 import her own tea from China and sugar from Barbadoes ; the laws 
 which make these penal oflences no longer exist : and why? Because 
 they are no longer needed. England, by the operation of these old 
 laws, has secured Ii'eland's ruin in this respect. England has a 
 commercial marine ; Ireland has it to create. England hag manu- 
 facturing skill, which in Ireland has been destroyed. To create or 
 recover at this day these great industrial and commercial resources, 
 and that in the face of wealthy rivals, is manifestly impossible with- 
 out one or the other of these conditions — an immense command of 
 capital, or effective duties by Government. Capital has been 
 drained to England from Ireland, and she is deprived of the power 
 to impose protective duties." It was these things the Union 
 imposed on Ireland. "Don't unite with us, sir," says Dr. Samuel 
 Johnson, when addressed ujion the subject in his day ; " we shall 
 rob you." 
 
 In the very first year this Union was fixed Mr. Forster stated in 
 the English house of Parliament there was a falling ofi" of 5,000,000 
 yards in the export of linen. The same gentleman, three years 
 later, said that, in 1800, the net produce of the Irish revenue was 
 £2,000,800, while the debt was £25,000,000. Three years later, 
 after three years' experience of the condition of things, the debt had 
 increased to £53,000,000, while the revenue had diminished by 
 
FATHER BUEKE. 305 
 
 £11,000. Ireland was deserted; that absenteeism which was the 
 curse of IreUuid in the days of Swift had so increased by that time 
 that Dublin had the appearance of a deserted city, and all the cities 
 of Ireland became as places in a wilderness. At this very day, in 
 Dublin, the Duke of Leinster's city palace is turned into a museum 
 of Irish industry. Another large palace has become a draper's shop. 
 Tyrone House is a school-house, and the house of the Earl of Bec- 
 tive was pulled down there a few years ago, and was rebuilt as a 
 Scotch Presbyterian house for the people, and six months ago, when 
 I made a visit to the place, I .was surprised to see the marvellous 
 change in contrasting the present condition of the city with her 
 former state. Her fashion and trade, her commercial activity and 
 intellect, her enterprise and political superiority over England, are 
 gone, and Ireland may fold her hands and sigh over the ruin which 
 is left to her. And all this is the result of the Union. The crumb- 
 ling of her liberty and the ruin of the trade of Ireland, the destruc- 
 tion of her commerce, the utter uselessness of the harbors of 
 Limerick and Galway, the ruin of the palaces of Dublin, announce 
 to us the ascendanc}' of England and the transfer of Ireland's intellect 
 elsewhere. What do we get in return for all this? Absolutely 
 nothing. Every Irish question that comes now into the House at 
 London is defeated ; and the moment the Irish member steps up in 
 the House to present anything he is to be coughed down, and sneer- 
 ed down, and crowed down, unless, indeed, he has the lungs of an 
 O'Connell and turns on his opponents like an African lion, with a 
 I'oar putting down their beastly bellowing. Pitt promised emanci- 
 pation, and six months after the Union was passed he retired from 
 office under the pretence that the king would not grant emancipa- 
 tion ; but the true reason why Pitt retired was that his Continental 
 policy had failed. The people of England were tired of his wars 
 and were clamoring for peace. He was too proud to sign even a 
 temporary peace with France ; and when he retired it was under the 
 pretext that he would not be allowed to carry Catholic emancipation. 
 Some time later, with the Addington administration, he returned to 
 'office a second time, when he pi'oved that he was as great an enemy 
 .o the Catholics of Ireland as ever poor old, fleshy, mad George IV. 
 was. It was only after twenty-nine years of heroic effort that the 
 great O'Connell rallied the Irish nation, and he succeeded for a time 
 
306 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 in uniting all the Catholics as one man, as well as a great number of 
 our noble-hearted Protestant fellow-Irish. When O'Connell came 
 knocking at the doors of the British Parliament with the hand of a 
 united Irish people, when he sjaoke with the voice of eight millions 
 of people, then, and only then, even as the walls of Jericho crum- 
 bled to the sound of Josiie's trumpet, did the old bigoted British 
 House of Commons treml^le, while its doors burst open to let in the 
 gigantic Irishman that represented the Catholics of Ii'cland. The 
 English historian caimot say that England granted Catholic emanci- 
 pation willingly ; she granted it as a man would yield up a bad tooth 
 to a dentist. O'Connell put the forceps into that false old mouth, 
 and the old tyrant wriggled and groaned. The bigoted pi'ofligate 
 who then disgraced England's ci'own shed his crocodile teai's upon 
 the bill. The face that was never known to change color in the 
 jjresence of any vicious deed or accusation of vice, that face grew 
 pale, and George IV. wept for sorrow when he had to sign that. 
 The man who beat the great Napoleon on the field of Waterloo, tlie 
 man who was declared to be the invincible victor and the greatest 
 of warriors, stood there with that bill in his hand, and said to the 
 King of England, " I wouldn't grant it, your majesty, any more than 
 you ; it is forced from you and me. You must sign this paper, or 
 prepare for civil war and revolution in Ireland." I regret to be 
 obliged to say it, but really, my friends, England never granted 
 anything from love, from a sense of justice, or from any other 
 motive than from a craven fear of civil war and serious inconvenience 
 to herself. 
 
 Now, having arrived at this point, Mr. Froude glances, in a 
 masterly manner, over the great questions that have taken place 
 since the day that emancipation was demanded. He speaks words 
 the most eloquent and compassionate over the terrible period of '4& 
 and'47 — words reading which brought tears to my eyes, words of 
 compassion that he gave to the people who sufiered, for which I pray 
 God to bless him and to reward him. He speaks words of generous, 
 enlightened, statesman-like sympathy for the peasantiy of Irehmd, 
 and for these words, Mr. Froude, if you were an Englishman ten 
 thousand times over, I love you. He does not attempt to speak of 
 the future of Ireland. Perhaps it is a dangerous thing for me too ; 
 jet I suppose that all we have been discussing in the past must have 
 
FATHER BURKE. 307 
 
 some reference to the future, fur surely the verdict that Mr. Froude 
 looks for is not a mere verdict of absohition for past iniquities. He 
 has come here, though he is not a Catholic — he has come to Amer- 
 ica like a man going to a confession. He has cried out loudly and 
 generously, "We have sinned," and the verdict which he calls for 
 must surely regard the future more than the past. For how, in the 
 name of common sense, can any man ask for a verdict justifying the 
 rule of iniquity, the heartrending record of murder, injustice, fraud, 
 robbery, bloodshed, and wrong, which we have been contemplating 
 in company with Mr. Froude? It must be for the future. What 
 is the future? Well, my friends, and first of all my American 
 grand jury, you must remember that I am only a monk, not a maa 
 of the world, and do not understand much about these things. 
 There are wiser heads than mine, and I will give you their opinions- 
 There is a particular class of men who love Ireland — love Ireland] 
 tmly and love her sincerely. There is a particular class of men whoi 
 love Ireland, and think in their love for Ireland that if ever she is. 
 to be freed it is by insurrection, by rising in arms — men who hold 
 that Ireland is enslaved, if you will. 
 
 Well, if the history which Mr. Froude has given, and which I 
 have attempted to review, if it teaches us anything it teaches us, as 
 Irishmen, that there is no use appealing to the sword or to armed 
 insurrection in Ii'cland. Mr. Froude says that to succeed there are 
 two things necessaiy — namely, union as one man and a determination 
 not to sheathe that sword until the work is done. I know that 
 I would earn louder plaudits, citizens of America, and speak a more 
 popular language in the ears of my auditors, if I were to declare my 
 adhesion to this class of Irishmen. But .there is not a living man that 
 loves Ireland more dearly than I do. There are those who may love 
 her more fervently, and some love her with greater distinction. 
 But there is no man living that loves Ireland more tenderly or more 
 sincerely than I do. I prize, citizens of America, the good-will of 
 my fellow-Irishmen ; I prize it next to the grace of God. I also 
 prize the popularity which, however unworthy, I possess with them. 
 But I tell you, American citizens, for all that popularity, for all that 
 good-will, I would not compi'omise one iota of mv convictions, nor 
 "would I state what I do not believe to be true ; and I say that I do 
 not believe in insurrectionary movements in a country so divided as 
 
308 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Ireland. There is another class of Irishmen who hold that Ireland 
 has a future, a glorious future, and that that future is to be wrought 
 out in this way. They say, and I think with justice and right, that 
 wealth acquired by industry brings with it power and influence. 
 They say, therefore, to the Irish at home, "Try to accumulate 
 wealth, lay hold of the industries and develop the resources of your 
 country. Try in the meantime and labor to effect that blessed union 
 without which there never can be a future for Ireland. That union 
 can only be eflected by largeness of mind, by generosity and urban- 
 ity amongst fellow-citizens, by rising aliove the miserable bigotry 
 that carries religious differences and hatred into the I'clations of life 
 that do not belong to religion." Meanwhile, they say to the men of 
 Ireland, Try and acquire property and wealth. This can only be 
 done by developing assiduous industry, and that industry can only 
 be exercised as long as there is a truce to violent political agitation. 
 Then these men — I am giving you the opinions of others, not my 
 own — these men say in America, Men of Irish birth, and of Amer- 
 ican birth but of Irish blood, wc believe that God has largely en- 
 trusted the destinies of Ireland to you. America demands of her 
 citizens only industiy, temperance, truthfulness, obedience 'to the 
 law; and any man that has these, with the brains that God has given 
 to every Irishman, is sure in this land to secure a fortune and grand 
 hopes. If you are faithful to America in these respects, America 
 will be faithful to you. And in proportion as the great Irish ele- 
 ment in America rises in wealth, it will rise in political influence and 
 power — the political influence and power which in a few years is 
 destined to overshadow the whole world, and to bring about, through 
 peace and justice, far greater revolutions in the cause of honor iind 
 humanity than have ever been eff'ectcd by the sword. This is the 
 programme of the better class of Irishmen. I tell you candidly to 
 this programme I give my heart and soul. You will ask me about 
 the separation from the Crown of England. Well, that is a ticklish 
 question, gentlemen. I dare say yun remember that when 
 Charles Edward was pretender to the crown of England during the 
 first years of the House of Hanover, there was a verse which Jar 
 cobite gentlemen used to give : 
 
 " God bless the king, our noble faith's cU-fender, 
 
 Long may he live, and down with tlie Pretender; 
 
 But which be Pretender and which be the king, 
 
 God bless us all, that's quite another thing! " 
 
FATHER BURKE. 309 
 
 And yet, with the courage of an old monk, I'll tell you my mind 
 upon this very question. History tells us that empires, like men, 
 run the cycle of the j^ears of their life, and then die. No matter 
 how extended their power, no matter how mighty their influence, 
 no matter how great their wealth, no matter how invincible their 
 army, the day will come, inevitable day, that lirings with it decay 
 and disruption. It was thus with the empii-e of the Medes and 
 Persians. It was thus with the empire of the Assyrians, thus with 
 the Egyptians, thus with the Greeks, thus with Rome. Who would 
 ever have imagined, for instance 1,500 years ago, before the Goths 
 first came to the walls of Rome — who would have imagined that the 
 greatest power that was to sway the whole Roman Empire would be 
 the little unknown island lying out in the Western Ocean, known 
 only by having been conquered by the Romans — the JJUima ThuJe, 
 the Tin Island in the far ocean. This was England. Well, the 
 cycle of time has come to pass. Now, my friends, England has 
 been a long time at the top of the wheel. Do you imagine she will 
 always remain there ? I do not want to be one bit more disloyal than 
 Lord jNIacaulay ; and he descriljes a day when a traveller from New 
 Zealand "will take his stand on a broken arch of London bridge and 
 sketch the ruins of St. Paul's." Is the wheel of England rising, or 
 is it falling? Is England to-day what she was twenty years ago? 
 England twentj' years ago, in her first alliance with Napoleon, had 
 a finger in every pie in Europe. Lord John Russell and Lord 
 Palmerston were busy bodies of the first order. England to-day 
 has no more to say to the affairs of Europe than the Emperor of 
 China has. You see it in the fact — I am only talking philosoph- 
 ically — you see it in the fact that a few months ago the three great 
 Emperors of Germany, Austria £ind Russia came together in Berlin 
 to fix the map of Europe, and they did not even have the courtesy 
 to ask England in to know what she had to say about it. The army 
 of England to-day is nothing — a mere cipher. The German Em- 
 peror can bring his 1,000,000 men into the field. England can 
 scarcely muster 200,000. An English citizen, a loyal Englishman, 
 wrote a book called "The Battle of Dorking," in which he describes 
 a German army marching on London. This Englishman was loyal ; 
 and why should I be more loj'al than he ? England's navy is noth- 
 ing. Mr. Reed, chief constructor of the British army, has written 
 
310 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 an article in a London paper, in whicli he declares and proves that 
 at this moment the British fleet would be afraid to go into Russian 
 waters, not being able to meet the Russians. Why should I be more 
 loyal than Mr. Reed ? 
 
 An empire begins to totter and decay when it abandons its out- 
 lying provinces, as in the case of the Roman Empire when it aban- 
 doned Britain. England to-day says to Canada and Australia : " Oh I 
 take your Government into your own hands ; I don't M'ant to be 
 bothered with it any more." England that eighty years ago fought 
 for the United States bitterly, as long as she could put a man into 
 the field. How changed it is ! Secondl}^ an empire is crumbling 
 to decay when she begins to buy off her enemies, as in the case of 
 the Roman Empire when she began to buy off the Scythians, the 
 Dacians, and other barbaric forces that were rising upon her. Eng- 
 land a few days ago was presented with a little bill by America. 
 John Bull said : " Jonathan, I owe you nothing " ; and he buttoned 
 up his pocket and swore he wouldn't pay a cent. But America 
 said; "Well, John, if you don't like to pay, you can take one of 
 these," presenting a pair of swords, and putting the hilt of one of 
 them into Johnny Bull's hand. "Take whichever you like, John." 
 John Bull paid the bill. My friends, it looks very like as if the day 
 of Lord Macaulay's New Zealander was rapidly approaching. In 
 that day my position is, Ireland will be mistress of her own desti- 
 nies, with. the liberty that will come to her, not from man, but from 
 God, whom she never deserted. There is another nation that under- 
 stands Ireland, whose statesmen have always spoken words of brave 
 encouragement, of tender sympathy, and of manly hope for Ireland 
 in her dark daj^s, and that nation is the United States of America — 
 the mighty land placed by the Omnipotent hand between the far 
 East on the one side, to which she stretches out her glorious arms 
 over the broad Pacific, while on the other side she sweeps with up- 
 lifted hand over the Atlantic and touches Europe. A mighty land, 
 including in her ample bosom untold resources of every form of com- 
 mercial and mineral wealth ; a mighty land, with room for three hun- 
 dred millions of men. The oppressed of all the world over are 
 flying to her more than imperial bosom, there to find liberty and the 
 sacred right of civil and religious freedom. Is there not reason to 
 suppose that in that future which we cannot see to-da}^ but which 
 
FATHER BURKE. 311 
 
 lies before us, that America will be to the -whole world what Rome 
 was in the ancient days, what England was a few years ago, the 
 great storehouse of the world, the great ruler — pacific ruler by jus- 
 tice of the whole world, her manufacturing power dispensing from 
 out her mighty bosom all the necessaries and all the luxuries of life 
 to the whole world around her? She maybe destined, and I believe 
 she is, to rise rapidly into that gigantic power that will overshadow 
 all other nations. 
 
 When that conclusion does come to pass, what is more natural 
 than that Ireland — now I suppose mistress of her destinies — should 
 turn and stretch all the arms of her sympathy and love across the 
 intervening waves of the Atlantic and be received an independent 
 State into the mighty confederation of America? Mind, I am not 
 speaking treason. Remember I said distinctly that all this is to 
 come to pass after Macaulay's New Zealander has arrived. Amer- 
 ica will require an emporium for her European trade, and Ireland 
 lies there right between her and Europe with her ample rivers and 
 vast harbors, able to shelter the vessels and fleets. America may 
 require a great European storehouse, a great European hive for her 
 manufactures. Ireland has enormous water-power, now flowing 
 idly to the sea, but which will in the future be used in turning the 
 wheels set to these streams by American-Irish capital and Irish in- 
 dustry. If ever that day comes, if ever that union comes, it will 
 be no degradation to Ireland to join hands with America, because 
 America does not enslave her States ; she accepts them on terms of 
 glorious equality ; she respects their rights, and blesses all who cast 
 their lot with her. Now I have done with this subject and with Mr. 
 Froude. I have one word to say before I retire, and that is, if dur- 
 ing the course of these five lectures one single word personally 
 ofl"ensive to that distinguished gentleman has escaped my lips, I take 
 this word back now ; I apologize to him before he asks me, and I 
 beg to assure him that such a word never came wilfully from ray 
 mind or from my heart. He says he loves Ireland, and I believe 
 according to his lights he does love Ireland ; but our lights are veiy 
 diflerent from his. But still the Almighty God will judge every 
 man according to his lights. 
 
SPEECHES. 
 
 " / 
 
 John Philpot Curran, 
 
 [313] 
 
On Attachments, 
 
 February 24, 1785. 
 
 Eenewed efforts were made lu 17S4 for Reform. In consequence of a requisi- 
 tion, Henry Reilly, Esq., Sheriff of the county of Dublin, summoned his bailiwick 
 to the court-house of Kilmainham, for the 15th of October, 1784, to elect member.s 
 to a national congress. For this Mr. Reilly was attached by the King's Bench, on 
 a crown motion, and, on the 24th of February, 1785, the Right Hon. "William 
 Browulow moved a vote of ceusure on the judges of that court for the attachment. 
 
 f'vl HOPE I may say a few words on this great subject, without 
 g^ disturbing the sleep of any right honorable member [the Attor- 
 X torney-General * had fallen asleep on his seat] : and yet per- 
 i haps, I ought rather to envy than blame the tranquility of the 
 right honorable gentleman. I do not feel myself so happily tem- 
 pered, us to be lulled to repose by the storms that shake the land. 
 If they invite rest to any, that rest ought not to be lavished on the 
 guilty spirit. I never more strongly felt the necessity of a perfect 
 union with Britain, of standing or failing with her in fortune and 
 constitution, than on this occasion. She is the parent, the arche- 
 type of Irish liberty, which she has preserved inviolate in its grand 
 points, while among us it has been violated and debased. I now 
 call upon the house to consider the trust reposed in them as the 
 Great Inquest of the people. 
 
 I respect judges highly ; they ought to be respected, and feel 
 their dignity and freedom from reprehension, while they do what 
 judges ought to do ; but their stations should not screen them, 
 when they pass the limit of their duty. Whether they did or not, 
 
 * John Fitzgibbon. He was made Solicitor-General on the 9th of November, 
 1783, and on the 20th of December, 1783, succeeded Yelverton as Attorney-General. 
 This latter office he retained till he was raised to the Chancellorship, on the 12th of 
 August, 1789, thus making way for Arthur Wolfe, afterwards Lord Kilwardeu. 
 
31(3 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 is the quostion. This house is the judge of those judges ; and it 
 would betray the people to tyrauny, and abdicate their representa- 
 tion, if it do not act with probity and firmness. 
 
 In their proceedings against Eeilly, I think they have trans- 
 gressed the law, and made a precedent, which while it remains, is 
 subversive of the trial l)y jury, and, of course, of liberty. I regard 
 the constitution, I regard the judges, three of that court at least ; 
 and, for their sakes, I shall endeavor to undo what they have done. 
 
 The question is whether the court has really punished its own 
 officer for a real contempt ; or whether it has abused that power, for 
 the illegal end of punishing a supposed offence against the state, by 
 a summary proceeding, without a trial by jury. 
 
 The question is plain, whether as a point of constitution, or as of 
 law ; but I shall first consider it in the former view. When I feel 
 the constitution rocking over my head, my first anxiety is to 
 explore the foundation, to see if the great arches that support the 
 fabric have fallen in ; but I find them firm, on the solid and massy 
 principle of Common Law. The principle of legal liberty is, that 
 offence, and trial, and punishment, should be fixed ; it is sense, it is 
 Magna Charta — a trial by jur}', as to fact, an appeal to judges as 
 to law. 
 
 I admit Attachment an exception to the general rule, as founded 
 in necessity, for the support of courts, in administering justice, by 
 a summary control over their officers acting under them ; but the 
 necessity that gave rise to it is also the limit. If it were extended 
 farther, it would reach to all criminal cases not capital ; and in the 
 room of a jury, crimes would be created by a judge, the party 
 accused by him, found guilty by him, punished by the utter loss of 
 his liberty and property for life, by indefinite fine and imprison- 
 ment without remedy or appeal. If he did not answer he was 
 guilty ; even if he did, the court might think or say it thought, the 
 answer evasive, and so convict him for imputed prevarication. 
 
 The power of Attachment is wisely confined by the British laws, 
 and practised within that limit. The crown lawyers have not pro- 
 duced a single case where the King's Bench in England have gone 
 beyond it. They have ranged through the annals of history; 
 through every reign of folly and of blood ; through the proud domi- 
 
JOHN r. CURRAN. 317 
 
 nation of the Tudors, and the blockhead despotism of the Stuarts, 
 without finding a single case to support their doctrine. 
 
 I consider the office of sheriff as judicial and ministerial. Reilly's 
 offence did not fall within any summary control, in cither capacity. 
 It was not a judicial act, it was not colore officii. An act colore 
 officii must either be an act done by the actual exercise of an abused 
 or of an usurped authority — neither of which can it be called ; for 
 where the sheriff summons his county, he does it by command, by 
 authority, under pain of fine and imprisonment to those who dis- 
 obey. 
 
 Was the appointment of a meeting any such active exertion of 
 authority ? Does any man suppose he was obliged to attend ? that 
 he would be fined if he refused to attend? No. Did the sheriff 
 hold out any such colorable authority? Clearly not. The con- 
 trary : he explained the purpose of the intended meeting ; he stated 
 at whose instance he appointed such meeting ; and thereby showed 
 to every man in his senses that he was not affecting to convene 
 them by color of any compulsive authority. 
 
 If, then, there was any guilt in the sheriff's conduct it was not 
 punishable by Attachment. They who argue from its enormity, are 
 guilty of a shabby attempt to mislead men from the question, which 
 is not whether he ought to be punished at all, but whether he had 
 been punished according to law. 
 
 You have heard no man adduce a single case to support their 
 assertion ; but we have the uniform practice of the King's Bench in 
 England in our favor, the uniform pi'actice, both there and here, 
 dui'ing these last years. Had they not meetings there and here? 
 Did not the crown receive petitions and addresses from such assem- 
 blies? Why, during that time, was there no motion for an Attach- 
 ment in either kingdom. 
 
 If an English Attorney-General had attempted such a daring out- 
 rage on public liberty and law, he must have found some friend to 
 warn him not to debase the court, and make it appear to all man- 
 kind as the odious engine of arbitrary power ; not to put it into so 
 unnatural a situation, as that of standing between the people and the 
 crown, or between the people and their representatives. 
 
 I warn him not to bring public hatred on the government, by the 
 -adoption of au illegal prosecution. If he show himself afraid of 
 
318 TREASURY OF PXOQUENCE. 
 
 proceeding against offenders b}^ the oi'dinary mode, then offenders 
 will be exalted by arbitrary persecution of them ; they will become 
 suffering patriots, from being mere j^etty offenders ; their cries will 
 T)ecome jiopular. Let him be warned how he leads the court into 
 an illegality, which the commons can never endure. No honest 
 representative can sacrifice his fame and his duty, by voting in sup- 
 port of a proceeding subversive of liberty. I should shrink from 
 the reproach of the most insignificant of my constituents, if that 
 constituent could say to me — "When thou sawest the thief of the 
 constitution, thou consentedst unto him." 
 
 Such would be the ciuition suggested to an English Attorney- 
 General ; and, accordingly, we find no instance of his ever ventur- 
 ing on such a measure. 
 
 Without case then, or precedent, or principle, what is the support 
 of such a conduct here ? — the distinction of a judge ? And what is 
 that distinction ? It is different in different men ; it is different in 
 the same man at different times ; it is the folly of a fool and the fear 
 of a coward ; it is the infiimy of the young, and the dotage of age : 
 in the best man it is very weakness that human nature is subject to ; 
 and in the worst, it is very vice. Will you then tell the people that 
 you have chosen this glorious distinction in the place of fixed laws^ 
 fixed offences, and fixed punishments, and in the place of that great 
 barrier between the prerogative and the people — -Trial by Jur\'? 
 
 But it is objected that the resolution is a censure on the judges 
 and a charge of corruption : — I deny it, and I appeal to j'our own 
 acts. 
 
 Mr. Curran then called to the clerk, who read from the journals a vote of censure 
 passed upon Mr. Justice Robinson, for imposing a fine illegally in a county, when 
 on circuit, without view or evidence. 
 
 Was your resolution founded on any corruption of that judge? 
 No : you would, if so, have addressed to remove him. I called for 
 the resolution, therefore, not to charge him with guilt — I am per- 
 suaded he acted merely through error ; but to vindicate him, to 
 vindicate you, and to exhort you to be consistent. You thought a 
 much smaller violation of the law was deserving your reprob;ition. 
 Do not abandon yourselves and your country to slavery, by suffer- 
 iuir so much a grosser and more dansjerous trans2:ression of the con- 
 
JOHN P. CURRA2^. 319 
 
 stitution, to become a precedent for ever. In tenderness even to 
 the judges, interpose. Their regret, which I am sure they now feel, 
 on reflection, cannot undo what they have done : their hands cauuot 
 wash away what is written in their records ; but you may repair 
 whatever has been injured : — if your friend had unwillingly plunged 
 a dagger iuto the breast of a stranger, would you prove his inno- 
 cence by letting the victim bleed to death? The constitution has 
 been wounded deeply, but, I am persuaded, innocently ; it is 30U 
 only, who, by neglecting to interpose, can make the consequences 
 fatal, and the wound ripen into murder. 
 
 I would wish, I own, that the liberty of Ireland should be sup- 
 ported by her own children ; but if she is scoi'ned and rejected by 
 them, wheu her all is at stake, I will implore the assistance even of 
 two strangers ; I will call on the right honorable Secretary to sup- 
 port the principles of the British constitution. Let him not render 
 his administration odious to the people of Ireland, by applying his 
 influence in this house, to the ruin of their personal freedom. Let 
 him not give a pretence to the enemies of his friend in a sister 
 country, to say that the son of the illustrious Chatham is disgracing 
 the memory of his great father ; that the trophies of his Irish ad- 
 ministration are the introduction of an inquisition among us, and the 
 extinction of a trial by jury ; let them not say that the pulse of the 
 constitution beats only in the heart of the empire, but that it is dead 
 in the extremities. 
 
 Mr. Curran concluded with declaring his hearty concurrence in the 
 resolution proposed. 
 
 The Attorney-General (Fitzgibbon), in a speech of much personality, opposed 
 Curran's motion. 
 
 Mr. Curran in reply — I thank the right honorable gentleman for 
 restoring me to my good humor, and for having, with great liberality 
 and parliamentary decency, answered ray arguments with personality. 
 Some expressions cannot heat me, wheu coming from persons of a 
 certain distinction. I shall not interrupt the right honorable gentle- 
 man in the fifth repetition of his speech. I shall prevent his argu- 
 ments by telling him that he has not in one instance alluded to Mr. 
 Eeilly. The right honorable gentleman said I had declared the judges 
 guilty ; but I said no such thing. I said, if any judge was to act in 
 
320 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the manner I mentioned, it would be an aggravation of his guilt. 
 The right honorable gentleman has said, that the house of commons 
 had no right to investigate the conduct of judges ; if so, I ask the 
 learned Sergeant why he sits in that chair ? I ask why the resolution 
 has been just read from the journals ? The gentleman has called mo 
 a babbler ; I cannot think that was meant as a disgrace, because, ia 
 another Parliament, before I had the honor of a seat in this house, 
 but when I was in the gallery, I heard a young lawyer named Babbler. 
 I do not recollect that there were sponsors at the baptismal font ; nor 
 was there any occasion, as the infant had promised and vowed so 
 many things in his own name. Indeed I tind it difficult to reply, for 
 I am not accustomed to pronounce panegyrics on myself; I do not 
 know well how to do it ; but since I cannot tell you what I am, I 
 shall tell you what I am not : — I am not a man whose respect in 
 person and character depends upon the importance of his office ; I 
 am not a young man who thrusts himself into the foreground of a 
 picture, which ought to be occupied by a better figure ; I am not a 
 man who replies with invective, when sinking under the weight of 
 argument ; I am not a man who denied the necessity of a parliamentary 
 reform, at the time he proved the expediency of it, by reviling his 
 own constituents, the parish clerk, the sexton, and the grave-digger ; 
 and if there be any man who can apply what I am not to himself, I 
 leave him to think of it in the committee, and to contemplate it when 
 he goes home. — Debates, Vol. IV., pp. 402-10. 
 
 The resolution was negatived by 143 to 71. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 321 
 
 Orde's Commercial Propositions. 
 
 June 30th, 1785. 
 
 Was the interest of Ireland to be subordinate to England, when her parliament had 
 ceased to be so? Tliis Mr. Pitt tried to adjudicate against, by deceit, in 1785, and 
 failing, he resolved to reach the same end by abolishing our parliament, and this he 
 "unhappily accomplished in 1800. 
 
 There is no political event from 1782 to the Union, of greater importance than the 
 •discussion of Orde's Propositions. In Grattan's Memoirs, vol. iii., and in Seward's 
 Collectanes Politica, valuable elements of a judgment on this matter will be found. 
 I tried to sum up the history of the transaction ia the " Citizen " Magazine for Sep- 
 tember, 1841, in reviewing Grattan's Memoirs. On looking over that paper, I find 
 I cannot condense the description of the propositions and their fate, given there, so 
 I shall simply copy it : — 
 
 " Partly from a belief that protection alone would secure a beginning to trade, and 
 partly out of retribution on England, an attempt was made in April, 1784, to impose 
 severe import duties on manufactures. Mr. Gardiner's motion for that purpose was 
 negatived in parliament by nearly four to one; not that the Commons were the ene- 
 mies of protection, but the creatures of England. 
 
 "In May in the same year, 1784, a proposal of Mr. Griffith's, for inquiru on the 
 •commercial intercourse between Britain and Ireland, was talcen out of his liauds by 
 government. He desired to show that Irish trade should be protected from English 
 ■competition : the opposite was the direction given to the inquiry by the adopting 
 parents; he sought to inquire how Ireland might be served even at the expense of 
 England ; they, how England might be pampered on the spoil of Ireland. Accord- 
 ingly, they solved it in their own way, and on the 7th of February, 1783, Mr. Orde, 
 the Chief Secretary, announced, and on the 11th, moved the eleven propositions on 
 trade, commonly called the Irish propositions, to distinguish them from the twenty 
 proposed as amendments thereon by Pitt, a few mouths after, called the English 
 propositions, though, in fact, both were English in contrivance and purport. There 
 were four principles established in the Irish propositions : — 1st, that the taxes upon 
 all goods, foreign and domestic, passing between the two countries, should be equal. 
 Secondly, that taxes on foreign goods should be always higher than on the same 
 jirticles produced in either island. Thirdly, that these regulations should be unal- 
 terable. Fourthly, that the surplus of the hereditary revenue (hearth tax, and 
 certain customs and excises, over £050,000 a year) should he paid over to the English 
 treasury, for the support of the Imperial (English?) navy. The first principle went 
 to place a country with immense capital, great skill, and old trade on the same foot- 
 
322 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ing with one without any of these, and therefore went to ruin the latter, unless 
 private enterprise came forward, as before, and, supplying the defects of the law, 
 rescued the country from the alien, the aristocrat, and the placeman. The second 
 article sacrificed tlie realities of French, Spanish and American trade, tlien increas- 
 ing, to (the profits?) of English competition. The third and fourth were assump- 
 tions of a power beyond law-making ; they abdicated legislation. The last, espe- 
 cially, paid for English strength — that is, Irisli misery; and purchased piotection, 
 that is, slavery, at a price, which, as Grattau afterwards said, might amount to any 
 share of the national revenue, to which a tricking financier wished to raise it. To 
 pay black mail was to lay Ireland at the mercy of England, yet not secure her 
 against other foreign states by any lasting or efl'ectual means. An old treaty, or the 
 convenience of a couqueror, are no substitutes for the safety, of which national 
 and home passions and interests are the true guardiaus. Your own sword Is a 
 better protection than another's shield; for if he be endangered, you are left un- 
 armed and undefended. Besides, between nations, guardianship means plunder; 
 and the ward is an impoverished drudge. Yet this plan was proflered as a boon, 
 and, what is stranger still, it was paid for as such — £140,000 of new taxes were 
 asked for, and voted in return for the prospective favors of tlie minister. Flood 
 almost alone opposed it; he asked for time to let himself ^ to let the nation reflect 
 on the propositions; he exposed some of the propositions; he expressed confi- 
 dence in only a few. . . ." 
 
 " On tlie 22nd of February, Pitt, in a speech full of hopes for this country, moved 
 the resoUitiou wliich declared that Ireland should be allowed the advantages (i. e., 
 competition) of British commerce as soon as she had 'irrevocably' granted to 
 England an 'aid' (i. e., tribute) for general defence. Thus we were promised an 
 equivocal boon at tlic cost of independence. Such was the generosity of Pitt, and 
 it was too much for the opposition, too much for North and the Tories, too much 
 for Fox and tlio wiiigs. They were in opposition, and they saw in English jealousy 
 to Ireland a sure resource against the ' heaven-born minister.' He, to be sure, had 
 not done good to Ireland, but he gravely promised to serve her, and this was sus- 
 picious, at least, especially when coming from one who still had a character. None 
 of the leaders cared for Ireland, nor were they bigoted against her; but they flung 
 her in each other's faces. . . ." 
 
 "Fox obtained adjournments; and all England ' spoke out,' from Lancashire to 
 London, from Gloucester to York. During the twenty years of Pitt's supremacy, 
 the liberal opposition had his apostacy from principle, his suppression of opinion in 
 England, his hostility to freedom all over the globe. Ills b'oody and constant wars, 
 — all these had they, and what came nearer still to the soul (stomacli) of Eugiaud, 
 they had his exiiausting taxation to bring against him; yet lie repelled them witliout 
 difficulty, even led liy Fox, wlien armed witli these grievances. In 1785 the opposi- 
 tion united under a more exciting banner-cry, 'Jealousy of Ireland,' and England 
 rallied benealh their flag. Pitt was borne back, but he was skilful and unscrupulous ; 
 he saw his danger, and sounded a parley; he submitted to some of their terms; he 
 succeeded in retaining all that was adverse to the Irish constitution, sufi'ered the loss 
 of all that could be by any ingenuity supposed serviceable to Irish trade, and returned 
 the act approved of by him in this form. The opposition kept up a little clamor about 
 the invasion of Irish rights ; it served for declamation, but England was now con- 
 tent ; there being no fear of benefit to Ireland, the intended wrongs were soon for- 
 gotten in England. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 323 
 
 *' We have before us the Report of the Committee of Trade and Plantations on 
 the equalization of duties. That report includes the examinations of the chief man- 
 ufacturers of England, and a more valuable evidence could not be got of English 
 dread aud jealousy, and assumption; fearing that free trade may make Ireland able 
 to compete with them, they deprecate her prosperity, and assume a right to control 
 her improvement. They all assert the success of the Irish non importation agree- 
 ment." 
 
 " The eleven propositions had been increased in England to twenty, each addition 
 a fresh injury. Half the globe, namely, all between Magellan and Good Hope, was 
 (by articles 3 and 9) interdicted to Ireland's ships ; interdicts were also laid on 
 certain goods. The whole customs legislation of Ireland was taken away by clauses 
 which forced her (by article 4) to enact (register) all navigation laws passed or to 
 i)c passed by England ; (by articles 5 aud 8) to impose all colonial duties that Eng- 
 land did ; (by G and 7) to adopt the same system in custom houses that England did ; 
 aud finally, (by 17 and 18) to recognize all patents and copyrights grauted to Eng- 
 land." 
 
 The propositions were returned thus changed, aud on Thursday, the 30th of June, 
 1785, the Right Honorable Thomas Orde moved the adjournment of the house till 
 Tuesday fortnight. Against this Cnrrau spoke as follows : — 
 
 ^^ CAN easily excuse some inconsistencies in the conduct of the 
 ^^ right honorable Secretary [Orde] ; for some accidents have 
 X hefiiUen him. When we met last, he desired us to adjourn 
 I for three weeks ; we did so ; and now he wants above a fort- 
 night more ; but will that help forward the business before the 
 house? Will it expedite the progress of the bill, to say, "Let us 
 wait till the packet comes in from England, and perhaps we shall 
 have some news about the propositions?" Did the British minister 
 act in this manner? Xo : when he postponed, from time to time, 
 the consideration of the propositions, he did not postpone the other 
 business of the house; he did not say, let it wait till the packet 
 comes from Duljlin. This the Irish minister is forced to do : I say 
 forced, for I am sure it is not his inclination ; it must distress him 
 greatly, and I sincerely feel for, and pity his distres.s. 
 
 When we had the eleven propositions before us, we were charmed 
 with them. Why? — because we did not understand them ! Yes, 
 the endearing word reciprocity rang at every corner of the streets. 
 We then thought that the right honorable gentleman laid the propo- 
 sitions before us by authority ; but the English minister reprobates 
 them as soon as they get to England, and the whole nation repro- 
 bates them. Thus, on one hand we must conclude, that the English 
 minister tells the Irish minister to propose an adjustment, and, 
 
324 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 when it goes back, alters every part ; or, that the Irish minister 
 proposed it without any authority at all.' I am inclined to believe 
 the latter ; for it would add to the gentleman's distress to suppose 
 the former. 
 
 Now let us mark another inconsistency into which the i-ight hon 
 orable gentleman is driven, no doubt against his will. Time to 
 deliberate was refused us, when we had something to deliberate 
 upon ; and now, when we are told we have nothing before us to 
 consider, we are to have a fortnight's recess, to enable us to think 
 about nothing. And time, indeed, it will take, before we can tliink 
 to any purpose. It will take time for the propositions to go through, 
 and, perhaps, to be again altered in the house of lords. It will take 
 time for them to be reconsidered in the British commons. It will 
 take time for them to come over here. It will take time for us to 
 consider them, though that time is likely to be very short. It will 
 take time to send them back to England. It will take time for them 
 to be returned to us again ; and then time will be required to carry 
 them into execution. 
 
 But a rumor hath gone abroad, of a studied design to delay the 
 discussion of this business until there shall be no members in town. 
 Away with such a suspicion ; I think too honorably of the right 
 honorable gentleman ; though I should be glad to hear him say 
 there is not even an idea of the base design of forcing them down 
 our throats. 
 
 July 23, 1785. 
 
 Mr. Secretary Orde having tliia day moved that the house do adjourn to Tuesday 
 se'nniglit, with a proviso that the further delay of a week or more might be needed, 
 Mr. Curran rose and spoke to the following effect : — 
 
 Sir, the adjournment proposed is disgraceful to parliament, and 
 disgraceful to the nation. I must explain myself by stating a few 
 facts, though they relate to a subject that I own I cannot approach 
 but with reluctance. The right honorable gentleman, early in the 
 session, produced a set of propositions, which he said he was 
 authorized to present to us, as a system of final and permanent com- 
 mercial adjustment between the two kingdoms. As a compensation 
 for the expected advantages of this system, we were called upou to 
 impose £140,000 a year on this exhausted country. Unequal to our 
 strength, and enormous as the burden was, we submitted ; we were 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 325 
 
 ■willing to strain every nerve in the common cause, and to stand or 
 fall with the fate of the British empire. But what is the event? I 
 feel how much beneath us it would be to attend to the unauthentica- 
 ted rumors of what may be said or done in another kingdom ; but it 
 would be a ridiculous affectation in us not to know that the right 
 honorable gentleman's system has been reprobated b^^ those under 
 whose authority he was supposed to act, and that he himself has 
 been deserted and disavowed. 
 
 I cannot, for my own part, but pity the calamity of a man who is 
 exposed to the contempt of the two countries as an egregious dupe, 
 or to their indignation as a gross impostor ; for even he himself now 
 abandons every hope of those propositions returning to this house in 
 the form they left it. On the contrary, he now only hopes that he 
 may be able to bring something forward that may deserve our appro- 
 bation on some future day. He requests an adjournment for ten 
 days, and he promises that he will give a week's notice when the yet 
 undiscovered something is to be proposed, which something he prom- 
 ises shall be agreeable to this nation, and authorized by the Eng- 
 lish minister. 
 
 On what his confidence of this is founded I know not ; unless he 
 argues, that because he has been disavowed and exposed in his past 
 conduct by his employers, he may rely on their supporting him in 
 future. But however the right honorable gentleman may fail in 
 drawing instruction from experience or calamity, we ought to be 
 more wise ; we should learn caution from disappointment. 
 
 "We relied on the right honorable gentleman's assurances — we 
 found them fallacious ; we have oppressed the people with a load of 
 taxes, as a compensation for a commercial adjustment; — we have 
 not got that adjustment; we confided in our skill in negotiation, 
 and we are rendered ridiculous by that confideuce. We looked 
 abroad for the resoui'ces of Irish commerce, and we find that they 
 are to be sought for only at home, in the industry of the people, in 
 the honesty of parliament, and in our learning that negotiation must 
 inevitably bring derision on ourselves and ruin on our constituents. 
 But you are asked to depend on the right honorable gentleman's 
 regard for his own reputation. When the interest of the people is 
 at stake, can we be honest in reposing on so despicable a security ? 
 Suppose this great pledge of the right honorable gentleman's charac- 
 
326 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ter should chance to become forfeited, where will you look for it? 
 When he sails for England, is it too large to carry with hiiu? Or, 
 if you would discover in what parish of Great Britain it may be 
 found, will the sacrifice be an atonement to a people who have al- 
 ready been betrayed by trusting to so contemptible a pledge ? 
 
 See, then, what we do by consenting to this short adjournment ; 
 we have been abused already and we neglect every other duty, in 
 order to solicit a repetition of that abuse. If this something should 
 arrive at all, it will be proposed when the business of the country 
 will engage every county member at the assizes ; for, as to his 
 week's notice, it either cannot reach him in time, or, if it should, he 
 cannot possibly obey it. Is it, then, our wish to have a new sub- 
 ject, of such moment as a contract that is to liind us forever, con- 
 cluded in half a house, and without even a single representative for 
 a county in the number? Is it wise to trust to half the house, in a 
 negotiation in which the wisdom of the whole has been already 
 defeated ? 
 
 But what is the necessity that induces us to acquiesce in a measure 
 of so much danger and disgrace ? Is this nation brought to so abject 
 a condition by her representatives, as to have no refuge from ruin 
 but in the immediate assistance of Great Britain ? 
 
 Sir, I do not so far despair of the public weal ; oppressed as we 
 were, we found a resource for our constitution in the spirit of the 
 people ; abused as we now find ourselves, our commerce cannot fail 
 of a resource in our virtue and industry, if we do not sufler oui'- 
 selves to be diverted from those great and infallible resources, by a 
 silly hope from negotiation, for which we are not adapted, and in 
 which we can never succeed. And if this great hope still is left, 
 why fill the public mind with alarm and dismay ? Shall we teach 
 the people to think, that something instantly must be done to save 
 them from destruction? Suppose that something should not, can- 
 not be done, may not the attempt, instead of uniting the two coun- 
 tries, involve them as its consequence in discord and dissension ? 
 
 If your compliance with the right honorable gentleman's requisi- 
 tion do not sink the people into despair of their own situation, does 
 it not expose the honor and integrity of this house to suspicion and 
 distrust? For, what can they suppose we intend by this delay? 
 The right honorable gentleman may find it worth his while to secure 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 327 
 
 his continuance in office by an expedient, however temporaiy and 
 iueffectiKil ; but, sir, if we are supposed to concur in such a design, 
 our character is gone witli the people ; for, if we are honest, it can 
 be of no moment to us whether this secretary or that minister shall 
 continue in office or not. 
 
 I know it has been rumored that the right honorable gentleman 
 may take advantage of a thin house to impose upon this country the 
 new set of resolutions that have passed the commons of Great Bri- 
 tain. I do not suspect any such thing, nor would I encourage such 
 a groundless apprehension. I do not think it would be easy to find 
 a man who would stand within the low-water mark of our shore, and 
 read some of those resolutions above his breath, without feeling some 
 uneasiness for his personal safet}' ; neither can I think if a foi-eign 
 usurpation should come crested to our bar, and demand from the 
 treachery of this house a surrender of that constitution which has 
 been established by the virtue of the nation, that we would answer 
 such a requisition by words. 
 
 But, sir, though the people should not apprehend such extreme 
 
 perfidy from us, they will be justly alarmed, if they see us act with 
 
 • needless precipitation ; after what is past, we cannot be surprised 
 
 at not meeting with the most favorable interpretations of our 
 
 conduct. 
 
 On great objects, the magnitude of the ideas to be compared may 
 •cause some confusion in the minds of ordinary men ; they will there- 
 fore examine our conduct by analogy to the more frequent occurren- 
 ces of common life ; such cases happen every day. Will you permit 
 me to suppose a very familiar one, by which our present situation 
 may be illustrated to a common mind. 
 
 I will suppose then, sir, that an old friend that you loved, just 
 recovering from a disease, in which he had been wasted almost to 
 death, should prevail upon you to take the trouble of buying him a 
 horse for the establishment of his health ; and I the more freely pre- 
 sume to represent you for a moment in an office so little correspond- 
 ing with the dignity of your station, from a consciousness that my 
 fancy cannot put you in any place, to which you will not be followed 
 by my utmost respect. I will, therefore, suppose that you send for 
 a horse-jockey, who does not come himself, but sends his foreman. 
 Says the foreman. Sir, I know what you want ; my master has a 
 
328 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 horse that will exactly match your friend ; he is descended from 
 Rabelias' famous Johannes Caballus, that got a doctor of physic's 
 degree from the College of Rheims ; but your friend must pay his 
 price. My master knows he has no money at present, and will 
 therefore accept his note for the amount of what he shall be able to 
 earn while he lives ; allowing him, however, such moderate subsist- 
 ence as may prevent him from perishing. If you are satisfied, I 
 will step for the horse and bring him instantly, with the bridle and 
 s;iddle, which you shall have into the bargain. But, friend, say 
 you, arc you sure that you are authorized to make this bargain? 
 What, sir, cries the foreman, would you doubt my honor? Sir, I 
 can find three hundred gentlemen who never saw me before, and yet 
 have gone bail for me at the first view of my face. Besides, sir, 
 you have a great pledge ; my honor, sir, my renown is at stake. 
 Well, sir, you agree — the note is passed; the foreman leaves you, 
 and returns without the horse. What, sir, where is the horse? 
 Why, in truth, sir, answers he, I am sorry for this little disappoint- 
 ment, but my mistress has taken a fancy to the horse so j^our friend 
 cannot have him. But we have a nice little mare that will match him 
 better ; as to the saddle he must do without that, for little master 
 insists on keeping it : however, your friend has been so poor a fel- 
 low, that he must have too thick a skin to be much fretted by riding 
 barebacked ; besides the mare is so low that his feet will reach the 
 ground when he rides her ; and still further to accommodate him, 
 my master insists on having a chain locked to her feet, of which lock 
 my muster is to have a key, to lock or unlock, as he pleases ; and 
 your friend shall also have a key, so formed that he cannot unlock 
 the chain, hut with which he may double-lock it, if he thinks fit. 
 What, sirrah ! do yor, think I'll betray my old friend to such a fraud ? 
 Why really, sir, you ai"c impertinent, and your friend is too peevish j 
 it was only the other day that he charged my master with having: 
 stolen his cloak, and grew angry, and got a ferrule and spike to his 
 statf. Why, sir, you see how good-humoredly my master gave back, 
 the cloak. Sir, my master scorns to break his word, and so do I r 
 sir, my character is your security. Now, as to the mare, you are- 
 too hasty in objecting to her, for I am not sure that you can get her t 
 all I ask of you now is, to wait a few hours in the street, that I may 
 try if something may not be done ; but let me say one word to you itt 
 
JOHN P. CLTRRAN. 329 
 
 confidence — I am to get two guineas if I can bring your friend to be 
 satisfied with wliat we can do for him, now, if you assist me in this, 
 you shall have half the money ; for, to tell you the truth, if I ftiil in 
 my undertaking, I shall either be discharged entirely, or degraded to 
 my former place of helper in the stable. 
 
 Now, Mr. Speaker, as I do not presume to judge of your feelings 
 by my own, I cannot be sure that you would beat the foreman, or 
 abuse him as an impudent, lying impostor; I rather think you would 
 for a moment be lost in reflecting, and not without a pang, how the 
 recitude of your heart, and the tenderness of your head, had exposed 
 you to be the dupe of improbity and folly. But, sir, I know you 
 would leave the wretch who had deceived you, or the fool who was 
 deceived by his master, and you would return to your friend. And 
 methinks you would say to him, we Iiave been deceived in the course 
 we have adopted ; for, my good friend, you must look to the exei- 
 tions of your own strength for the establishment of your health. 
 You have great stamina still remaining — rely upon them, and they 
 will support you. Let no man persuade you to take the ferrule or 
 spike from your staflF. It will guard your cloak. Neither quarrel 
 with the jockey, for he cannot recover the contents of the note, a& 
 you have not the horse ; and he may yet see the policy of using you 
 honestly, and deserving to be your friend. If so, embrace him, and 
 let your staif be lifted in defence of your common safety, and in the 
 meantime, let it be always in readiness to defend yourself. 
 
 Such, sir, is the advice you would offer to your friend, and which 
 I would now off"er to this house. There is no ground for despairing ; 
 let us not, therefore, alarm the people. If a closer connection with 
 Great Britain is not nowpracticaljle, it maybe practicalile hereafter ; 
 but we shall ruin every hope of that kind by precipitation. I do 
 therefore conjure gentlemen not to run the risk of forcing us, at a 
 week's notice, to enter on a sul)ject on which every man in the nation 
 ought to be allowed the most unlimited time for deliberation. I dO' 
 conjure them not to assent to a measure that can serve nobody but 
 the proposer of it ; that must expose the members of this house to 
 the distrust of their constituents, and which may, in its consequen- 
 ces, endanger the harmony of two kingdoms, whose interests and 
 fortunes ought never to be separated — Debates, Vol. V., pp. 299— 
 304. 
 
 The adjournment was, however, carried. 
 
330 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 August 11th, 1785. 
 
 Mr. Curran entered the house late, and spoke to the following effect : — 
 
 He demanded of the secretary what was become of the eleven pi-o- 
 positions of the Irish Parliament, as of them only that Parliament 
 could treat. He had no fear, he said, that the house would be so 
 base, or the nation so supine, as to suffer any others to be the 
 grounds of a treaty ; and as to the fouilh resolution of the British 
 Parliament, he understood too well what the conduct of the house 
 would be, was anything to be founded on it, to fear from that quar- 
 ter. But he again desired to know what was become of the eleven 
 propositions, as it was impossible to negotiate, until the fote of tliem 
 was known. He said, though it seemed to be the present fashion 
 to urge the house forward, without giving the least time for reflec- 
 tion or consideration, yet he would not suppose the house Avould, in 
 this instance, precipitate itself into the absurdities of an address, 
 without knowing upou what ground ; much less could he fear that it 
 would fall into the greatest of all absurdities, the negotiating by a bill 
 — binding themselves, and leaving the otherparties at liberty. How- 
 ever, as to-morrow was so near, he would listen to what the Right Hon- 
 orable Secretary had to offer, convinced that no man would dare to 
 bring forward anything founded on the British resolutions. — Debates, 
 Vol. v., p. 328. 
 
 August 12th, 1785. 
 
 On this day Orde moved his bill, and was opposed by Grattan and Flood, in 
 speeches of eminent force and briUiaucy. Curran's speech is short, and his exhaus- 
 tion seems to have beeu excessive : — 
 
 I am too much exhausted to say much at this hour [six o'clock] on 
 the subject. My zeal has survived my strength. I wish my present 
 state of mind and body may not be ominous of the condition to which 
 Ireland would be reduced, if this bill should become a law. I can- 
 not therefore, yield even to my weakness — it is a suliject which 
 might animate the dead. [He then took a view of the progress of 
 the arrangement, and arraigned the insidious conduct of the admin- 
 istration.*] In Ireland it was proposed by the minister; in Eng- 
 land it was reprobated by the same minister. I have known 
 
 * So in the original report. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 331 
 
 children learn to play at canls, by playing the riglit hand against 
 the left ; I never before heard of a negotiation being carried on in 
 that way. A bill is not a mode of negotiating ; onr law speaks only 
 to ourselves — binds only ourselves ; it is absurd, therefore, to let 
 the bill proceed. The commercial part is out of the question ; for 
 this bill portends a surrender of the constitution and liberty of Ire- 
 land. If we should attempt so base an act, it would be void, as to 
 the people. We may abdicate our representation, but the right re- 
 mains with the people, and can be surrendered only by them. We 
 may ratify our own infamy ; we cannot ratify their slavery. I fear 
 the British minister is mistaken in the temper of Ireland, and judges 
 of it by former times. Formerly the business here was carried on by 
 purchase of majorities. There was a time when the most infamous 
 measure was sure of being supported by as infamous a majority, but 
 things have changed. The people are enlightened and strong, they 
 ■will not bear a surrender of their rights, which would be the con- 
 sequence, if they submitted to this bill. It contains a covenant to 
 enact such laws as England should think proper ; that would anni- 
 hilate the Parliament of Ireland. The people here must go to the 
 bar of the English house of commons for relief; and for a circuit- 
 ous trade to England we are accepting a circuitous constitution. 
 
 It is different totally from the cases to which it has been com- 
 pared, the settlement of 1779, or the Methuen treaty; there all was 
 specific and defined, here all is future and uncertain. A power to 
 bind externally, would involve a power also of binding internally. 
 This law gives the power to Great Britain, of judging what would 
 be a breach of the compact, of construing it; in fact, of taxing us 
 as she pleased ; while it gives her new strength to enforce our obe- 
 dience. In such an event, we must either sink into utter slavery, or 
 the people must wade to a re-assumption of their rights through 
 blood, or be obliged to take refuge in a union, which loould be the an- 
 nihilation of Ireland, and lahat, I suspect, the minister is driving at. 
 Even the Irish minister no longer pretends to use his former 
 language on this subject ; formerly we were lost in a foolish ad- 
 miration on the long impedimented march of oratoric pomp, with 
 which the Secretary displayed the magnanimity of Great Britain. 
 That kind of eloquence, I suppose, was formed upon some model, 
 but I suspect that the light of political wisdom is more easilv rp 
 
332 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 fleeted than the heat of eloquence ; yet we were in raptures even 
 with the oratoiy of the honorable gentleman. However, he now 
 has descended to an humble style ; he talks no more of reciprocity, 
 no more of emporium. 
 
 [He then went into general observations, to show that this 
 treaty would give no solid advantages to Ireland, but was a revoca- 
 tion of the grant of 1779.] He said — I love the libert}^ of Ireland, 
 and shall therefore vote against the bill, as subversive of that liberty. 
 I shall also vote against it as leading to a schism between the two 
 nations, that must terminate in a civil war, or in a union at best. I 
 am sorry that I have troubled you so long, but I feared it might be 
 the last time I siiould ever have an opportunity of addressing a free 
 parliament; and, if the period is approaching, when the boasted con- 
 stitution of Ireland will be no more, I own I feel a melancholy am- 
 bition to deserve that my name be enrolled with those who endeavored 
 to save it in its last moment. Posterity will be grateful for the last 
 efiort, though it should have failed of success. — Debates Vol. Y.^ 
 pp. 421, 2, 3. 
 
 The introduction of the bill was carried by 127 to 108. 
 
 August 15th, 1785. 
 
 Mr. Orde, on presenting the bill, abandoned it for the session, and for ever. 
 Thereon, Flood moved the following resolution ; — 
 
 " Resolved — -That we hold ourselves bound not to enter into any cng.igement to 
 give up the sole and exclusive right of tlie parliament of Irehmd to legislate for 
 Ireland in all cases whatsoever, as well externally as commercially and internally." 
 
 Curran supported him : — 
 
 I shall support the resolution proposed by the honorable member, 
 because I think it necessary to declare to the people, that their 
 rights have not been solely supported by one hundred and ten 
 independent gentlemen, but that, if eight or ten of them had been 
 absent, those who had countenanced the measure, would have 
 abandoned every idea of prosecuting it further. 
 
 It has ever been the custom of our ancestors, when the constitu- 
 tion has been attacked, to take some spirited step for its support. 
 Why was Magna Charta passed? It was passed not to give freedom 
 to the people, l)ut because the people were already free. Why was 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 333 
 
 the repeal of the 6th of George I.? Not to give independence to 
 the men of Ireland, but because Ireland was in itself an independent 
 nation. This i-esolution does not go to give rights, but to declare 
 that we will preserve our rights. We are told to be cautious how 
 we commit ourselves with the Parliament of Gi'eat Britain ; whether 
 this threat carry with it more of prudence or timidity, I leave gentle- 
 men to determine. I rejoice that the cloud which had lowered over 
 us has passed away. I have no intention to wound the feelings of 
 the minister, by triumphing in his defeat ; on the contrary, I may be 
 said to rise with some degree of self-denial, when I give to others an 
 opportunity of exulting in the victory. 
 
 The opposition in England has thrown man}' impediments in the 
 way, but I shall remember, with gratitude, that the opposition there 
 has supported the liberties of Ireland. When I see them reprobat- 
 ing the attacks made upon the trial by jury, when I see them sup- 
 porting the legislative rights of Ireland, I cannot refrain from giving 
 them my applause. They well know that an invasion of the liberty 
 of Ireland would tend to an attack upon their own. 
 
 The principle of lilicrty, thank heaven ! still continues in those 
 countries : that principle M'hich stained the fields of Marathon, stood 
 in the pass of Thermopylae, and gave to America independence. 
 Happy it is for Ireland, that she has recovered her rights by a vic- 
 tory unstained by blood — not a victory bathed in the tears of a 
 mother, a sister, or a wife — not a victory hanging over t!ie grave 
 of a Warren or a Montgomery, and uncertain whether to triumph in 
 what she had gained, or to mourn over what she had lost ! 
 
 As to the majority, who have voted for bringing in the bill, the 
 only way they can justify themselves to their constituents, is by 
 voting for the resolution. As to the minority, who have saved the 
 countr}^ they need no vindication ; but those who voted for tiic iu- 
 trodiiction of the bill must have waited for the committee, to show 
 the nation that they would never assent to the foui'th proposition. 
 That opportunity can never arrive — the bill is at an end. The 
 cloud that had been collecting so long, and threatening to break in 
 tempest and ruin on our heads, has passed harmlessly away. The 
 siege that was drawn round the constitution has been raised and the 
 enemy is gone — " Juvat ire, et Dorica castra, desertosque videre 
 locos;" and they might now go abroad without fear, and trace the 
 
334 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 dangers they had escaped : here was drawn the line of circumvalla- 
 tion, that cut them off forever from the eastern world ; and there 
 the corresponding one, that inclosed them from the west. 
 
 Nor let us forget, in our exultation, to whom we are indebted for 
 the deliverance. Here stood the trusty mariner [Mr. Conolly] on 
 his old station, the mast-head, and gave the signal. Here [Mr. 
 Flood] all the wisdom of the state was collected, exploring your 
 weakness and your strength, detecting every ambuscade, and point- 
 ing to the hidden battery, that was brought to bear on the shrine of 
 freedom. And there [Mr. Grattan] was exerting an eloquence more 
 than human, inspiring, forming, directing, animating, to the great 
 pui'poses of your salvation. 
 
 Bat I feel that I am leaving the question, and the bounds of mode- 
 ration ; but there is an ebullition in great excesses of joy, that almost 
 borders on insanity. I own I feel something like it in the p\-ofuse- 
 ness with which I share in the general triumph. 
 
 It is not, however, a triumph which I wish to enjoy at the expense 
 of the honorable gentleman who brought in the bill, I am willing to 
 believe with the best intention. Whatever I may have thought be- 
 fore, I now feel no trace of resentment to the honorable gentlemen. 
 On the contrary, I wish that this day's intercourse, which will pro- 
 bably be our last, may be marked, on our part, with kindness and 
 respect. I am for letting the right honorable gentleman easily down ; 
 I am not for depressing him with the triumph, but I am for calling- 
 him to share in the exultation. 
 
 Upon what principle can the gentlemen who supported the pre- 
 vious question defend their conduct, unless it was in contradiction to 
 the general rule of adhering to measures, not to the man? Here it 
 is plain they were adhering to the man, not to the measure ; the 
 measure had sunk, but the man was still afloat. Perhaps they think 
 it decent to pay a funeral compliment to his departure ; yet I warn 
 them how they press too eagerly forward ; for, as there cannot be 
 many bearers, some of them might be disappointed of the scarf or 
 the cypress. I beseech them now to let all end in good humor, and, 
 like sailors who have pursued different objects, when they get into 
 port, shake hands with harmony. — Debates, Vol. V., pp. 453, 4, 5. 
 
 Flood withdrew his motion, the House adjourned, and Orde's Propositions merged 
 in a secret design for a Union. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 335 
 
 Pensions. 
 
 March 13th, 1786. 
 
 The endeavour to regain by corruption what was surrendered to force, began in 
 1783, and increased greatly after the defeat of Orde's Propositions. To restrain 
 this, Mr. Forbes, on the 13th of March, 1786, moved for leave to bring in a bill to 
 limit the amount of pensions. It was read a fir.st time, and he then moved that it 
 " be read a second time to-morrow." Sir Hercules Langrishe moved the adjourn- 
 ment of the question to August (i. e. altogether), in a speech full of Hanoverian 
 doctrines, and was supported by (amongst others) Sir Boyle Roche, in an absurd 
 speech, which, as a specimen of his celebrated style, we insert : — 
 
 " Sir Boyle Roche — I opposed this bill at its first rising in this house, in the shape 
 of a motion. [The house called to Sir Boyle to speak up.] Indeed I thiuk it nec- 
 essary that I should overcome my bashfulness and I lament that I was not brought 
 np to the learned profession of the law, for that is the best remedy for bashfulness 
 of all sorts. 
 
 " The just prerogative of the crown and the rights of parliament are the main pil- 
 lars that support the ponderous pile of our constitution. I never will consent to 
 meddle with cither, lest I should bring the whole building about my ears. 
 
 "I would not stop the fountain of royal favor, but let it flow freely, spontane- 
 ously and abundantly as Holywell in Wales, that turns so many mills. Indeed some 
 of the best men have drank of this fountain, which gives honor as well as vigor. 
 This is my way of thinking; at the same time I feel as much integrity and principle 
 as any man that hears me. Principle is the fair ground to act upon, and that any 
 man should doubt the principle of another, because he happens to difler with him in 
 opinion, is so bad an act that I do not choose to give it a name. — Debates, Vol. VI., 
 pp. 280, 81. 
 
 r^^^R. CUERAN said — I object to adjourning this bill to the first 
 JtHjig of August, because I perceive in the present disposition of 
 i the house, that a proper decision will be made upon it this 
 night. We have set out upon our enquiry in a manner so 
 honorable, and so consistent, that we have reason to expect the hap- 
 piest success, which I would not wish to see bafiled by delay. 
 
336 TREASUKY OF EI,OQUENCE. 
 
 Wo began with giving the full affirmative of this house, that no 
 grievance exists at all ; we considered a simple matter of fact, and 
 adjourned our opinion ; or rather, we gave sentence on the conclu- 
 sion, after having adjourned the premises. But I do begin to see a 
 great deal of argument in what the learned Baronet has said ; and I 
 beg gentlemen will acquit me of apostacy, if I offer some reasons why 
 the bill should not be admitted to a second reading. 
 
 I am surprised that gentlemen have taken up such a foolish opinion, 
 as that our constitution is maintained by its different component parts, 
 mutually checking and controlling each other ; they seem to think, 
 with Hobbes, that a state of nature is a state of warfare ; and that, 
 like Mahomet's coffin, the constitution is suspended between the at- 
 traction of different powers. INIy friends seem to think that the 
 crown should be restrained from doing wrong by a physical necessity ; 
 forgetting that if you take away from man all power to do wrong, 
 you, at the same time, take away from him all merit of doing right; 
 and, by making it impossible for men to run into slavery, you en- 
 slave them most effectually. But if, instead of the three different 
 parts of our constitution drawing forcibly in right lines, in different 
 directions, they were to unite their power, and draw all one way, in 
 one right line, how great would be the effect of their force, how 
 happy the direction of this union ! The present system is not only 
 contrary to mathematical rectitude, but to public harmony; but if, 
 instead of privilege setting up his back to oppose prerogative, he 
 were to saddle his back, and invite prer,)gative to ride, how comfort- 
 ably they miglit both jog along ! and therefore it delights me to hear 
 the advocates for the royal bounty flowing freely, and spontaneously, 
 and abundantly, as Holywell in AValcs. If the crown grant double 
 the amount of the revenue in pensions, they approve of their royal 
 master, for ho is the breath of their nostrils. 
 
 But we shall find that this complaisance, this gentleness between 
 the crown and its true servants, is not confined at home ; it extends 
 its influence to foreign powers. Our merchants have been insulted 
 in Portugal, our commerce interdicted; what did the British Hondo? 
 Did he whet his tusks? did he bristle up, and shake his mane? 
 did he roar? No; no such thing; the gentle creatui'o Avagged his 
 tail for six years at the court of Lisbon ; and now we hear from the 
 Delphic Oracle on the treasury bench, ihat he is wagging his tail in 
 
JOHN P. CUKRAN. 337 
 
 London to Chevalier Pinto, who, he hopes soon to be able to tell us, 
 will allow his lady to entertain him as a lap-dog ; and when she does, 
 no doubt the British factory will furnish some of their softest wool- 
 lens, to make a cushion for him to lie upon. But though the gentle 
 beast has continued so long fawning and couching, I believe his ven- 
 geance will be great as it is slow ; and that posterity, whose ances- 
 tors are j'et unborn, will be surprised at the vengeance he will 
 take! 
 
 This polyglot of wealth, this museum of curiosities, the pensioi\ 
 list, embraces every link ni the human chain, every description of 
 men, women, and children, from the exalted excellence of a Hawke 
 or a Rodney, to the debased situation of the lady who humbleth her- 
 self that she may be exalted. But the lessons it inculcates form its 
 greatest perfection ; it teacheth, that slowth and vice may eat that 
 bread which virtue and honesty may stai've for after they have earned 
 it. It teaches the idle and dissolute to look up for that supfiort 
 which they are too proud to stoop and earn. It directs the minds of 
 men to an entire reliance on the ruling power of the state, who feed 
 the ravens of the royal aviary, that cry continually for food. It 
 teaches them to imitate tliose saints on the pension list that are like 
 the lilies of the field, they toil not, neither do they spin, and yet are 
 aiTayed like Solomon in his glory. In fine, it teaches a lesson, 
 which, indeed, they might have learned from Epictetus, that it is 
 sometimes good not to be over virtuous ; it shows, that in propor- 
 tion as our distresses increase, the munificence of the ci'own increases 
 also ; in proportion as our clothes are rent, the royal mantle is 
 extended over us. 
 
 Notwithstanding that the pension list, like charity, covers a mul- 
 titude of sins, give me leave to consider it as coming home to the 
 members of this house — give me leave to say, that the crown, in 
 extending its charity, its liberality, its profusion, is laying a founda- 
 tion for the independence of parliament ; for hereafter, instead of 
 orators or patriots accounting for their conduct to such mean and 
 unworthy persons as freeholders, they will learn to despise them, 
 and look to the first man in the state ; and they will, by so doing, 
 have this security for their independence, that while any man in the 
 kingdom has a shilling, they will not want one. 
 
 Suppose at any future period of time the boroughs of Ireland 
 
33S TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 should decline from their present flourishing and prospej'ous state — 
 suppose they should fall into the hands of men who would wish to 
 drive a profitable commerce, by having members of parliament to 
 hire or let ; iu such a case a secretary would find great difficulty, if 
 the proprietors of members should enter into a combination to form 
 a monopoly : to prevent which, in time, the wisest waj' is to jDur- 
 chase up the raw material, young members of parliament, just rough 
 from the grass ; and when they are a little bitted, and he has got a 
 pretty stud, perhaps of seventy, he may laugh at the slave merchant ;. 
 some of them he may teach to sound through the nose, like a barrel 
 organ ; some, in the course of a few months, might be taught to cry, 
 " Hear ! hear ! " some " Chair ! chair ! " upon occasion — though 
 those latter might create a little confusion, if they were to forget 
 whether they were calling inside or outside of those doors. Again 
 he might have some so trained that he need only pull a string, and 
 up gets a repeating member : and if thej' were so dull that they 
 could neither speak nor make orations (for they are different things), 
 he might have them taught to dance, pedibus ire in nenlentia. This 
 improvement might be extended : he might have them dressed in 
 coats and shirts all of one color; and, of a Sunday, he might march 
 them to church two by two, to the great edification of the people, 
 and the honor of the Christian religion ; afterwards, like ancient 
 Spartans, or the fraternity of Kilmainham, they might dine all to- 
 gether iu a large hall. Good heaven ! what a sight to see them feeding 
 in public, upon public viands, and talking of public subjects, for the 
 benefit of the public ! It is a pity they are not immortal ; but I hope 
 they will flourish as a corporation, and that pensioners will beget 
 pensioners, to the end of the chapter. — Debates, Vol. VI., pp. 281-4. 
 
 The adjournment was, however, carried. We shall presently find that the bill 
 ■was renewed, and supported by Curran, in the next year. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 339 
 
 Stamp Officers' Salaries. 
 
 February 4th, 1790.* 
 
 On this day Curran spoke and proposed as follows : — 
 
 Wji RISE with that deep concern and melancholy hesitation, which 
 ^^ a man must feel who does not know whethei- he is addressing 
 ^ an independent parliament, the representatives of the people 
 J, of Ireland, or whether he is addressing the representatives of 
 corruption. I rise to make the experiment ; and I approach the 
 question with all the awful feelings of a man who finds a dear friend 
 prostrate and wounded on the ground, and who dreads lest the 
 means he should use to recover him may only serve to show that he 
 is dead and gone forever. I rise to make an experiment upon the 
 representatives of the people — whether they have abdicated their 
 trust, and have become the paltry representatives of castle influence ; 
 it is to make an experiment on the feelings and probity of gentle- 
 men, as was done on a great personage, when it was said "Thou art 
 the man." It is not a question respecting a paltry viceroy ; no, it is 
 a question between the body of the country and the administration ; 
 it is a charge against the government, for opening the batteries of 
 corruption against the liberties of the people. The grand inquest 
 of the nation are called on to decide this charge ; they are 
 called on to declare whether they would appear as the prosecutors 
 or the accomplices of corruption ; for though the question relative to 
 the division of the Boards of Stamps and Accounts is in itself of 
 little importance, yet it will develop a system of corruption tending 
 
 * It is riglit to mention here that on the 5th of January, 1790, Jolm Fane, Earl of 
 ■Westmoreland, succeeded the Marquis of Buckingham as Viceroy, and Mr. R. flo- 
 bart (afterwards Earl of Buckinghamshire), became Secretary to the Lord Lieuten- 
 ant. 
 
340 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to the utter destruction of Irish liberty, and to the sepai-ution of the 
 connexion vvitli England. 
 
 I bring forward an act of the meanest administration that ever 
 disgraced this country. I bring it forward as one of the threads by 
 which, united with others of similar texture, vermin of the meanest 
 kind have been able to tie down a body of strength and imjDortance. 
 Let me not be supposed to rest here ; when the murderer left the 
 mark of his bloody hand upon the wall, it was not the trace of one 
 finger, but the M'hole impression which convicted him.* 
 
 The Board of Accounts was instituted in Lord Townshend's ad- 
 ministration ;■)■ it came forward in a manner rather inauspicious ; 
 it was questioned in ijarliament, and decided for by the majority 
 of the five members who had received places under it.. Born in 
 corruption, it could only succeed by venality. It continued a use- 
 less board until the granting of the stamp duties, in Lord Harcourt's 
 time ;J the management of the stamps was then committed to it, 
 and a solemn compact was made that the taxes should not be jobbed, 
 but that both departments should be executed by one board. So 
 it continued till it was thought necessary to increase the salaries of 
 the commissioners, in the Marquis of Buckingham's famous admin- 
 tration.§ 
 
 Then nothing was held secret; the increase of the Revenue 
 Board, the increase of the Ordnance, thirteen thousand pounds a 
 year added to the infamous Pension List — these were not sufficient, 
 but a compact which should have been held sacred was violated, in 
 order to make places for members of parliament. How indecent ! 
 two county members prying into stamps ! What could have pro- 
 voked this insult? I will tell you. You remember when the sceptre 
 was trembling in the hand of an almost expiring monarch ; when a 
 factious and desperate English minister attempted to grasp it, you 
 stood up against the profanation of the English and the insult offered 
 to the Irish crown ; and had you not done it, the union of the empire 
 would have been dissolved. You remember this ; remember, then, 
 
 * Alluding to a notable conviction by circumstantial evidence. 
 
 t From 1767 to 1772. 
 
 J Lord Ilarcourt succeeded Lord Townshend. 
 
 § The Marquis of Bucl^inghara was Lord Lieutenant from the 15th of September, 
 1782, to the 3d of June, 1783, as Earl Temple, and from the 16th of December, 1787, 
 to the 5th of January, 1790, as Marquis of Buckingham. 
 
JOHN P. CUKRAN. 341 
 
 yourselves ; remember your triumph ; it was that triumph which ex- 
 posed you to submit to the resentmeut of the Viceroy ; it was that 
 triumph which exposed you to disgrace and flagellation. In propor- 
 tion as you rose by union 3'our tyrant became appalled ; but when 
 he divided he sunk you, and you became debased. How this has 
 happened no man could imagine ; no man could have suspected that 
 a minister without talents could have worked your ruin. There is a 
 pride in a great nation that fears not its destruction from a reptile ; 
 yet there is more than fable in what we are told of the Romans, that 
 they guarded the Palladium rather against the subtlet}' of a thief 
 than the force of an invader. 
 
 I bring forward this motion not as a question of finance, not as a 
 question of regulation, but as a penal inquiry ; and the people will 
 now see Avhether they are to hope for help within these walls, or, 
 turning their eyes towards heaven, they are to depend on God and 
 their own virtue. I rise in an assembly of three hundred persons, 
 one hundred of whom have places or pensions ; I rise in an assembly, 
 one-third of whom have their eai's sealed against the complaints of 
 the people, and their eyes intently turned to their own interest ; I 
 rise before the whisperers of the treasurj^ the bargainers and run- 
 ners of the castle ; I address an audience before whom was held forth 
 the doctrine that the crown ought to use its influence on this house. 
 It has been known that a master has been condemned by the confes- 
 sion of his slave, drawn from him by torment ; but here the case is 
 plain ; this confession was not made from constraint ; it came fiom a 
 country gentlemen, deservedly high in the confidence of administra- 
 tion, for he gave up other confidence to obtain theirs. 
 
 I rise, sir, to try, when the sluices of corruption have been let 
 loose upon us, whether there are any means left to stem the torrent. 
 Were our constituents now to behold us, defending the influence 
 which has been avowed, they would suppose we were met to vote 
 the robber}' of the people and to put the money into our pockets ; that 
 under the blasphemous pretence of guarding the liberty of the coun- 
 try we were working for our own emolument. 
 
 I know I am speaking too plain ; but which is the more honest 
 physician, he who lulls his patient into a fatal security, or he who 
 points out the danger and the remedy of the disease? I, Sir, am 
 
342 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 showing the danger that arises to our honor and our liberty, if we 
 submit to have corrujDtion let loose among us. 
 
 I should not be surprised if bad men of great talents should 
 endeavor to enslave a people; but, when I see folly uniting with 
 vice, corruption with imbecility, men without talents attempting to 
 overthrow our liberty, my indignation rises at the presumption and 
 audacity of the attempt. That such men should creep into power, 
 is a fatal symptom to the constitution ; the political, like the mate- 
 rial body, when near its dissolution, often bursts out in swarms of 
 vermin. 
 
 In this administration a place may be found for every bad man, 
 whether it be to distribute the wealth of the treasury, to vote in the 
 house, to whisper, and to Ijargain, to stand at the door and note the 
 exits and the entrances of j'our members, to mark M'hether they earn 
 their wages, whether it be for the hireling who comes for his hire, or 
 for the drunken aide-de-camp who swaggers in a brothel; nay, some 
 of them find their way to the treasury-bench, the political musicians, 
 or hurdy-gurdy men, to grind the praises of the viceroy. 
 
 Notwithstanding the profusion of government, I ask, what defence 
 have they made for the country, in case it should be invaded by a 
 foreign foe? They have not a single ship on the coast. Is it, then, 
 the smug aide-de-camj), or the banditti of the pension-list, or the 
 infantine statesmen, who play in the sunshine of the castle, that are 
 to defend the country? No, it is the stigmatized citizens. We are 
 now sitting in a countr^^ of four millions of people, and our boast is, 
 that they are governed bylaws to which themselves consent; but 
 ai'e not more than three millions of the people excluded from any 
 participation in making those laws? In a neighboring country, 
 twenty-four millions of people were governed by laws to which their 
 consent was never asked ; but we have seen them struggle for .free- 
 dom ; in this struggle they have burst their chains, and, on the altar 
 erected by despotism to public slaveiy, they have enthroned the 
 image of public liberty. 
 
 But are our people merely excluded ? No ; they are denied 
 redress. Next to the adoration which is due to God, I bend iii 
 reverence to the institutions of that religion, which teaches me to 
 know his divine goodness ; but what advantage does the peasant of 
 the South receive from the institutions of religion ? Does he experi- 
 
JOHN p. cuiiRAN. 343 
 
 •ence the blessing? No; he never hears the voice of the shepherd, 
 nor feels the pastoral crook, but when it is entering his flesh, and 
 goading his very soul. 
 
 In this country, Sir, our King is not a resident ; the beam of roy- 
 alty is often reflected through a medium, which sheds but a kind of 
 disastrous twilight, serving only to assist robbers and plunderers. 
 We have no security in the talents or responsibility of an Irish min- 
 istry ; injuries, which the English constitution would easily repel, 
 may here be fatal. I therefore call upon you to exert yourselves, to 
 heave ofl" the vile incumbrances that have been laid upon you. I 
 call on you not to a measure of finance or of regulation, but of crim- 
 inal accusation, which you may follow with punishment. I there- 
 fore. Sir, most humblj' move : — 
 
 " That an humble address be presented to his Majesty, praying 
 that he will order to be laid before this house the particulars of the 
 causes, considerations, and representations, in consequence of which 
 the Boards of Stamps and Accounts have been divided, with an 
 increase of salary to the ofiicers ; also, that he will be graciously 
 pleased to communicate to this house the names of the persons who 
 recommended that measure." 
 
 After a long debate, Currau replied ; the conclusiou of the following observations 
 refers to some vulgarly intemperate and threatening language, held towards him iu 
 the house by Sir Boyle Roche and others : — • 
 
 One member has boldly advanced and justified corruption as the 
 ■engine of government ; it is the first time that open bribery has 1)een 
 avowed, in even the worst of times, in this country; but the people 
 now are fairly told that it is lawful to rob them of their property, 
 and divide the plunder among the honest gentlemen who sell them 
 to administration. As to the honorable member not finding much 
 force in my arguments, I am not much surprised at it ; they labor 
 under much disadvantage when compared with the honorable mem- 
 ber's. My arguments are not all on the same side ; — they arc not 
 stamped with that current impression which has so visible an effect 
 on the honorable member's opinion — they are not arguments equally 
 despised by those to whom he deserted, and those from whom he 
 apostatized. They are not arguments compensated and disavowed, 
 hired and abhorred. The honorable member [the Solicitor-General] 
 lias talked of intimidation. I see no intimidation in talking of tho 
 
344 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 conduct of France. A great country asserting her freedom against 
 the vices and corruption of a court, is a glorious object of generous 
 emulation in every free assembly ; it is only to corruption and pros- 
 titution that the example can be terrible. But from what quai'tcr of 
 the house has intimidation dared to come ? 
 
 We have been told this night in express words, that the man who 
 dares to do his duty to his country in this house, may expect to be 
 attacked without these walls by the military gentlemen of the castle. 
 If the army had been directly or indirectly mentioned in the course 
 of the debate, this extraordinary declaration might be attributable to 
 the confusion of a mistaken charge, or an absurd vindication ; but 
 without connection with the subject, or pretence of connection with 
 the subject, a new principle of government is advanced, and that is 
 the bayonet ; and this is stated in the fullest house and most crowded 
 audience I ever saw. "\Ve are to be silenced by corruption within, 
 or quelled by force of arms without. If the strength of numbers or 
 corruption should fail against the cause of the public, it is to be 
 backed by assassination. Nor is it necessary that those avowed 
 principles of bribery and arms should come from any high personal 
 authoi'ity ; they have been delivered by the known retainers of 
 administration, in the face of that bench, and heard even without a 
 murmur of dissent or disapprobation. 
 
 For my part, I do not know how it may be my destiny to fall ; it 
 may be by chance, or malady, or violence ; but shouM it be my fate 
 to perish the victim of a bold and honest discharge of my duty, I 
 will not shun it. I will do that duty ; and if it should expose me to 
 sink under the blow of the assassin, and become a victim to the pub- 
 lic cause, the most sensible of my regrets would be, that on such an 
 altar there should not be immolated a more illustrioas sacrifice. As 
 to myself, while I live, I shall despise the peril. I feel in my own 
 spirit the safety of my honor, and in my OAvn and the spirit of the 
 people do I feel strength enough to hold that administration, which 
 can give a sanction to menaces like these, responsible for their con- 
 sequences to the nation and the individual. — Deba(es,Yo\. X., pp. 
 108 — 11, and 132, 3. 
 
 The resolution was rejected by 141 to 81. 
 
 One of the consequences of this speech was the duel between Curran and the 
 Eight Honorable Major llobart (afterw.ards Earl of Buckiugbamshire), of whiclil 
 have spoken in the preliminary Memoir. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 345^ 
 
 Government Corruption. 
 
 February 12th, 1791. 
 
 . On this clay Curran made another attempt to probe the impurities of government. 
 
 ^w^R. CURRAN observing the house thin, and the giilleiy 
 yil"^l-4 crowded, began by lamenting that curiosity seemed to act 
 ^cMjji;^ more powerfully on the public than a sense of duty on 
 ''^'^ the members of the house. After saying a few words 
 on his motives in making the intended motion, he stated its im- 
 jjortunce as going to induce enquiry into a crime which must, if 
 not punished and prevented, ultimately effect the destruction of the 
 society in which it was suffered ; it was raising men to the peerage 
 for money, which was disposed of to purchase the liberties of the 
 people. 
 
 A man who stands forth an accuser in a case lilie this ought to be 
 received by the house as its best friend, or, if his accusation should 
 prove unfounded and malicious, then the heaviest indignation of the 
 house should fall on him. When a motion of similar import was 
 proposed on a former day, I could not suppose that it would have 
 met with opposition ; but finding it has been opposed, I think the 
 house must have objected to its form, and that they were unwilling 
 to enter into an enquiry wherein the honor and privileges of the 
 Lords, as well as those of this house, are concerned, without their 
 lordships' concurrence. 
 
 I am not inclined, after what has passed so recently on this sub- 
 ject, to expatiate on the enormity of the act, nor on the wretched 
 situation of those miserable men who are, by it, introduced into this 
 house, like beasts of burden, to drudge for their employers — the 
 humble instruments and pliant tools of power. Still less am I in- 
 
346 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 cliued to depict the situation of tliose who are introduced into the 
 other, clothed in the robes of justice, to frame laws, and dispose of 
 the property of the kingdom, under the direction of that corruption 
 by which they have been raised. It would be moi'e useful to con- 
 sider what shoidd be done at such a crisis, and what is the duty of 
 the house : and this duty is not difficult to be ascertained — it is not 
 to be cited from volumes of law ; we are the gi-and inquest of the 
 nation — it is, therefore, our duty to enquire into the alleged ofience. 
 Every man capable of sitting on a Grand Jury is adequate to the 
 enquiry ; the oath of the Grand Juror suggests their duty — not to 
 till ppress from malice, nor find from favor . 
 
 I have heard it affirmed that common fame is not sufficient ground 
 to institute this enquiry ; but, on the principle of the constitution, I 
 do assert that common fame is a full and sufficient ground of enquiry ; 
 and I appeal to the house — to the kingdom — whether any report 
 can be more prevalent, or more credited, than that such corrupt con- 
 tract as I have mentioned, was entered into by administration. 
 
 But I rest not on common fame — I have ruooF, and I stake my 
 character on producing such evidence to a committee as shall fully 
 and incontroverti))ly establish the fact, that a contract has been en- 
 tered into by the present ministers to raise to the peerage certain 
 persons, on condition of their purchasing a certain number of seats 
 in this house. This evidence, however, I will not produce, till a 
 committee shall be appointed ; for no man can suppose that a man 
 who is rich enough to purchase a peerage is not rich enough to cor- 
 rupt the witnesses, if I should produce them at the bar, before an 
 inquiry is instituted. 
 
 I call on any lawyer to say, whether a man professing himself 
 ready to prosecute, and staking himself to convict, would not, in 
 any court, be admitted to go into trial ? I call on lawyers to answer 
 this question, for on this it depends, not whether the culprits shall 
 be tried, but whether the Commons of Ireland shall be acquitted. I 
 call on you to be cautious in your decision of this question, lor you 
 are in the heai-ing of a great number of the people of Ireland. 
 
 The Speaker called to order, and informed him it was unparliamentary to allude 
 to strangers — that there was a standing order, which excluded strangers, and if 
 :any allusions are made by a member, he must enforce the order. Sir H. Cavendish 
 also spoke to order, and censured Mr. Curran's language as highly disorderly. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 3^.7 
 
 Mr. Grattan did not think this doctrine was consistent with the nature of a pop- 
 ular assembly, such as the House of Commons. He quoted an expression of Lord 
 Chatham's, in support of this opinion, who, in the House of Peers, where such 
 language was certainly less proper thau in a House of Commons, addressed the 
 Peers : — "My Lords, I speak not to your Lordships — I speak to the public and to 
 the constitution." The expression, he said, was, at first, received with some mur- 
 murs, but the good sense of tlie house and the genius of the constitution justified 
 Mm. 
 
 Mr. Ciu-ran — I do not wish to use disorderly language, but I am 
 concerned for the honor of the house, which is degraded by becom- 
 ing a;'complices in a crime so flagrant ; this induces me to remind 
 you that you are in the presence of the public. 
 
 Chair again called to order, and must clear the house if auy allusiou to straugers. 
 
 I do not allude to any strangers in the gallerj-, but to the con- 
 structed presence oi the people of Ireland. I call on the house to 
 fix their eyes on four millions of people, whom a sergeant-at-arms 
 cannot keep unacquainted with your proceedings. I call on 3-ou to 
 consider yourselves as in the presence of the majesty of the people — 
 in the immortal presence — and not to give impunity to guilt, either 
 from consciousness of participation, or from favor to the criminal. 
 
 I direct your attention to the people without doors, because that 
 people must now have contracted a habit of suspicion at what passes 
 within these walls. In the course of two sessions the constitution 
 of Britain has been demanded in the name of the people and refused. 
 It is the wisdom of Great Britain to restrain the profusion of public 
 money for corrupt purposes, by limiting her pension-list. It is the 
 wisdom of Great Britain to preclude from lier senate men whose sit- 
 uations afford ground to suspect that they would be under undue 
 influence. It is the wisdom of Britain that certain individuals should 
 be responsible to the people for public measures. These were de- 
 manded by the people of Ireland, but the wisdom, certainly not the 
 corruption, of this house has denied them. 
 
 To have claims of alleged right continnalh- overborne by a majority 
 may induce credulous minds to suppose the house corrupt. Another 
 circumstance xaviy contribute to give strength to the suspicion. We 
 have enjoyed our constitution, such as it is, but eight years, and in 
 the course of that time, there has been twice that number of attacks 
 
;-;|3 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 made ou it ; and now those very gentlemen spend their nights in 
 patriotic vigils to defend that constitution, whose patriotic -nights 
 Avere formerly spent in opposing its acquisition. These circum- 
 stances naturally lead the public mind to suspicion — they are cor- 
 roborated by another no less remarkable. An honorable baronet* — 
 a man fleshed in opposition — one who had been emphatically called 
 the arithmetic of the house — to see such a man march to join the 
 corps of the minister, without any assignable motive for the trans- 
 ition — as if tired of explaining the orders of the house — of talking 
 of the majesty of the people, of constitution, and of .liberty — to- 
 day glorying in his strength, rejoicing like a giant to run his course, 
 and to-morrow cut down ; and nothing left of him but the bliglited 
 root from which his honors once had flourished. These are circum- 
 stances which, when they happen, naturally put the people on their 
 guard. I exhort the house to consider their dignity, to feel their 
 independence, to consider the charge I lay before you, and to pro- 
 ceed on it with caution and with spirit. If I charge a member of 
 your house, with a crime which I am ready to prove, if you give me 
 an opportunity, and am ready to submit to the infamy of a false 
 accuser if I fail — then to screen such a man, and not permit me to 
 prove liis guilt — is yourselves to convict him, and convict him of all 
 the guilt and baseness of a crime, allowing him no chance of extenu- 
 ation from the circumstances of the case. 
 
 Now I say again, we have full proof to convict ; I have evidence 
 unexceptionable, but if you call on me to declare this evidence, I 
 will not do it until you enter on the enquiry. I have some property 
 in this country ; little as it may be, it is my all : I have children, 
 whom I would not wish to disgrace — I have hope — perhaps more 
 than I have merit ; all these I stake on establishing my charge. I 
 call on you to enter on the trial. [After a very long and able speech 
 Mr. Curran moved — "That a committee.be appointed, consisting of 
 members of both houses of parliament, who do not hold any employ- 
 ment, or enjoy any pension under the crown, to enquire, in the 
 most solemn manner, whether the late or present administration 
 have, directly or indirectly, entered into any corrupt agreement with 
 any person or persons, to recommend such person or persons to his 
 Majesty, for the pui'pose of being created peers of this kingdom, on 
 * Sir Heury Cavendish, tlie notorious slave of Government, as Tone calls him. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 349 
 
 'Consideration of their paying certain snms of money, to be laid out 
 in tlie purchase of seats for members to serve in parliament, contrary 
 to the rights of the people, inconsistent with the independence of 
 parliament, and in direct violation of the fundamental laws of the 
 land."] 
 
 [He afterwards made an observation or two on tlie declaration of 
 the Lord Chancellor, when he sat in that house, that it cost govern- 
 ment half a million to beat down the aristocracy, and would cost 
 them another to beat down the present, and concluded by saying, 
 that should the motion be agreed to, it would be necessary, in the 
 next place, to send a deputation to the Lords, to desire their concur- 
 rence.] — Debates, Vol. XL, pp. 154-7. 
 
 A debate of great length and ability followed, wherein Barrington made a furious 
 speech against the motion ; after which Mr. Curran again rose, and replied : — 
 
 The subject of the present motion, however diffused or perplexed 
 in the course of this del)ate, whether through ignorance or design, 
 has yet reduced itself within a very narrow extent ; and I am fortified 
 in my opinion of the necessity of the resolution by the idle arguments 
 and the indiscreet assertions which have been urged against it. 
 Administration has resisted it with every tongue that could utter a 
 word ; cwexy legal gentleman has spoken, but all agree on the 
 criminality of selling the independency of this house for the honors 
 of the other, — of trafficking an abject and servile commoner for a 
 plebeian peerage, — of selling the representatives of the people like 
 beasts of labor, — and of exalting to the high dignity of the other 
 assembly a set of scandalous purchasers, a disgrace to the nobility, 
 and a dishonor to the crown. The guilt, then, being confessed, the 
 question must be, whether we have sufficient foundation for enquiry 
 into the fact. We have stated that we are in possession of evidence 
 to convict the actual offenders, by proving the fact upon them. I 
 stand here in my place, a member of your house, subject to your 
 power, subject to the vengeance which your justice shall let fall 
 upon my head, the accuser of that which you confess to be a crime 
 of the basest and blackest enormity. I stand forth, and I repeat 
 to you, that there have been very latel}' direct contracts entered into 
 for selling the honors of the peerage for money, in order that the 
 money so obtained should be employed in buj'ing seats for persons 
 
350 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to vote for the sellers of these honors. I assert the fact, and I offer, 
 at the expense of everything that can be dear to man, to prove the 
 charge. Will the accused dare to stand the trial, or vs^ill they admit 
 the charge by their silence, or will this house abandon every pretence 
 to justice, to honor, or to shame, by becoming their abettors? But 
 perhaps gentlemen give weight and credit to the objections of those 
 who have opposed mj^ motion. Late as I see it is, perhaps they may 
 wish to have their olyections examined. A right honorable gentle- 
 man [the Attorney-General] has objections, he says, to the substance, 
 and also to the form. AVe have not grounds, he says, for such an 
 enquiry : on a former night he thought common fame was no ground 
 for parliamentary enquiry ; he thought at that time the parliament 
 of the iirst and second of Charles the First a riotous assembly : he 
 now only tliinks the authority of that parliament which differs directly 
 from his opinion, is lessened b}^ the disturbance of the times. Does 
 the learned gentleman think that the commotion occasioned by the 
 desperate violence of state offenders can diminish the authority of 
 those proceedings by which they are brought to justice ! If he does 
 not think so, his objection has no weight, even in his own opinion, 
 and ought to have as little in yours. But let me take the liberty of 
 telling him that the answering my proposition upon only part of its- 
 merits, is but a pitiful fallacy. Yet into such has that very respect- 
 able member, I must suppose unintentionally fallen. I have not 
 moved upon common fame only ; I move on the offer of proving the 
 fact by evidence in my possession. But if I had moved merely on 
 common fame — I say that if no parliamentary precedent had existed, 
 you ought to make the precedent now. Unless you abdicate the 
 power, or abandon your duty as the grand inquest of the nation, you 
 must enquire on weaker grounds than those on which I have now 
 proposed to you. If you will not enquire until, as the learned 
 member says, there has been proof of the charge, he should have 
 told you that an offender should be convicted before his trial : if this 
 principle were carried further, in capital cases the offender should 
 be hanged before you bring him to trial. Or does he think you have 
 at least as much power, and as strong a duty as an ordinary grand 
 jury? Yes, sir, the great principle is very little different ; like them 
 you ought not to present from malice, or suppress from favor ; like 
 them, a probability of gnilt is sufficient to put the accused on his 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 352 
 
 trial ; like them, you may present on your own knowledge, without 
 any evidence upon oath ; like them, you ought to collect that pro- 
 baljility from the ordinary grounds of probability that will impress 
 themselves on any reasonable mind. Now, I ask, can any good 
 gi'ound be stronger than the univei'sal belief of the nation ? Is there 
 a man in this house that has not heard the minutest circumstanfces of 
 those scandalous transactions? Has any honorable member in this 
 house laid his hand on his heart and declai-ed his disbelief of the 
 fact? Will any member now say, upon his honor, he does not 
 believe it? But he says it is a libel on the King, the Lords, and 
 Commons : I answer, it is, if false ; I answer, it is a scandal, whether 
 false or not. 
 
 I add, if it be, you have a false accuser before you, or a guilty 
 criminal, whom in common justice you ought to punish. You can 
 convict the former only by trying the latter. I challenge that trial. 
 But ai-e there no circumstances to corroborate the common fame that 
 is dinning this libel into the ears of the people ? or to justify them in 
 suspecting that unfair practices have been used in obtaining the present 
 influence of administration. Dui'ing the whole of last session we 
 have, in the name of the people of Ireland, demanded for them the 
 constitution of Great Britain, and it has been imifoi-mly denied. We 
 would have passed a law to restrain the shameful profusion of a 
 pension-list — it was refused by a majority. We woukl have passed 
 a law to exclude persons who must ever be the chattels of the 
 government, from sitting in this house — it was refused by a majority. 
 A bill to make some person, resident among you, and therefore 
 amenable to public justice, responsible for the acts of your governors, 
 has been refused to Ireland by a majority of gentlemen calling them- 
 selves her representatives. Can we be so vain as to think that the 
 bare credit of those majorities can weigh down the opinion of the 
 public on the important subject of constitutional right. Or must 
 not every man in his senses know that the uniform denial of what 
 they look upon to be their indefeasible rights, must become a proof 
 to them that the imputation of corrupt practices is founded in fact. 
 Now, Sir, if the honorable gentleman's objections in point of sub- 
 stance are not to be supported — if, in short, the fact charged is 
 highly criminal — if you are competent to enquire into it — if you 
 have all the ground that can be expected — does he treat himself or 
 
352 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the house as he ought, when he makes objections of form? But see 
 what those are. We cannot, he says, appoint a committee of both 
 houses — we have power only over our own members. I answer, 
 the fact of the ol)jection does not exist. We affect no authority over 
 the Lords by the resolution I propose. The parliamentary course 
 in Great Britain is first to move for a joint committee, and then to 
 send a message to the Loi'ds to apprise them thereof, and to request 
 their concurrence. But he says it is interfering with their privileges. 
 I answer, the offence I state is an outrage upon them as well as upon 
 us, and therefore it is peculiarly proper to invite their lordships to 
 join us in an enquiry that affects both houses equally. The man 
 must be wretchedly ignorant indeed, who does not know that such 
 joint committees have been appointed in England, on various occa- 
 sions, both before and since the revolution. Such a committee you 
 find on their journals so early as the I'cign of Henry the Fomlh ; such 
 you find previous to the prosecution of Lord Strafford ; such you 
 find on the subject of the India charter, previous to the impeachment 
 of the Duke of Leeds, in 169.5. What then becomes of those objec- 
 tions in form or in substance ? But another right honorable gentle- 
 man [the Prime Sergeant*] put his objection on a single point, 
 which, if answered, he will vote for my motion. I accept the con- 
 dition, and I claim the promise. I ask him, where he found the 
 distinction? Lawyers here seem fond of authorities. But he has 
 cited none. Having, then, none of his own, let him submit to profit 
 by mine. In those I have already cited there was no previous 
 ascertainment of the fact any more than of the offenders, save what 
 arose from public common notoriety. [Here Mr. Curran adverted 
 to the particular circumstances oi those transactions, to show that 
 there was not and could not have been any evidence, either as to the 
 crimes or the delinquents, until the enquiry actually began.] But 
 the learned member seems to think the crime should first be proved 
 by witnesses. I ask him if he was prosecuting for the crown would 
 he be so incautious as to disclose his evidence before the actual trial ? 
 The honorable gentlemen, then, has opposed me upon a distinction 
 unsupported by precedent, and unsupportable by argument or 
 principle. [Mr. Curran then examined the arguments of the Solicitor, 
 which went nearly on the same ground that had already been taken.] 
 
 * Hou. James Fitzjrerald. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 353 
 
 One new observation which the learned member has produced from 
 a legal man, I am sorry is not to the question in debate. The 
 learned member, it seems, was surprised to find a motion for reform- 
 ing the senate, come from the rejDresentative of a borough. If the 
 mover of such a resolution was a man who had, in any instance, since 
 he was a member of this house, deserted the principles he professed, 
 or betrayed his trust, the observation would have weight, however 
 the honorable member is mistaken in thinking the fault of the repre- 
 sentative a demerit in the constitution ; but if I have done none of 
 those things, I cannot but regret the strange simplicity of argument 
 of the honorable gentleman, who comes forward witli a weapon which 
 can wound nobody but himself. [Mr. Curran then went through a 
 number of less important objections, which had been advanced by 
 gentlemen on the other side.] I am sorry to find the honorable 
 gentlemen of my own profession have not given more ground to 
 vindicate the constitutional independency of that profession. The 
 science of the law inspires' a love of libei'ty, of religion, of order, and 
 of virtue. It is like every seed, which fails or flourishes, according 
 to the nature of the soil. In a rich, and fertile, and ardent genius, 
 it is ever found to refine, to condense, and to exalt. In milder 
 temperaments it cannot be fairly judged of at a particular side in a 
 popular assembly. Far from thinking the silence or the unsuccessful 
 speeches of some of my learned brethren as a stain upon their pi"o- 
 fession, I think the reverse. I think it proves how strongly they 
 are impressed with the demerits of their cause, when they support it 
 so badly ; and I feel pleasui-e in seeing what honorable testimony is 
 borne by the disconcertion of the head, to the integrity of the heart. 
 If, indeed, those professional seeds had been sown in a poor, gross, 
 vulgar soil, I would expect nothing from it but a stupid, graceless, 
 unprincipled babble — the goodness of the seed would be destroyed 
 by the malignity of the soil, and the reception of such a profession 
 into such a mind could form only a being unworthy of notice, and 
 unworthy of description, unless, perhaps, the indignation of an 
 indiscreet moment, observing such an object wallowing in its favorite 
 dirt, should fling it against the canvass, and produce a figure of it 
 depicted in its own filth. As for my part, if such a description of 
 unhappy persons could be found to exist, and should even make me 
 the subject of their essays, I would pass them with the silence they 
 
354 TREASUEY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 deserve, happy to find myself the subject, and not the author of such 
 performances. I cannot sit down without reminding gentlemen of 
 one curious topic in \vhicli I have been opposed. It has been stated 
 that, in a former administration, the Peerage and the Bench were 
 actually exposed to sale. If so, the motion cannot be resisted, w-ith- 
 out an indelible stain upon the character of the house. I am willing 
 to extend the limits of the enquiry, to take in those persons who may 
 have been guilty of such a crime : let them be the subjects of the 
 same enquiry, and, if they be guilty, of the same punishment. — 
 Debates, Vol. XI., pp. 183-8. 
 
 Curran's motion was lost, by 147 to 85. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 355 
 
 Catholic Emancipation. 
 
 Febeuaey 18th, 1792. 
 
 CuRRAN was the uncharging friend of religious liberty. The Catholics had vainly 
 prayed for a relaxation of the Penal Code, till the destruction of the British armies 
 in America — ^then they succeeded. Again they prayed for further rela.vation; their 
 prayer was supported by Grattan and Curran and failed, till, in 1792-3, when Wolfe 
 Tone had worketl up a Catholic organization, and the French armies began to con- 
 quer, when they gained fresh privileges. 
 
 The pi'oceedings on the 18th of February, on the Roman Catholic Relief Bill are 
 most remarkable. They began by the presentation of a petition from the Protes- 
 tants of the County Antrim for tlie bill. A conversation on their admission to Trin- 
 ity College then occurred, which is so important as to deserve quotation : — 
 
 Mr. Grattan gave notice, that in addition to the privileges now about to be 
 granted to the Roman Catholics, the power of becoming Professors of Botany, 
 Anatomy, and Chemistry, should be given. 
 
 Hon. Mr. Knox said he also intended to propose that they should be permitted to 
 take the academic degrees in the University of Dublin. 
 
 Hon. Denis Browne rose to say, he would second both these intentions. 
 
 The Attorney-General said, under the present laws of the University, Roman 
 Catholics could not be admitted to take degrees without taking the oaths usually 
 taken by Protestants. As the University is a corporation deriving by charter under 
 the crown, and governed by the laws prescribed by its founder, it would not be very 
 decorous for parliament to break through those laws ; but the king might, if such 
 was his pleasure, direct the College to dispense with these oaths ; and in his opin- 
 ion it would be wise to do so. 
 
 Mr. Knox said it was not his intention to infringe upon any prerogative of the 
 crown, but he could not see how this proposal was an infringement, as the bill 
 must in its ultimate stage, pass under the inspection of the crown, and receive the 
 royal assent. Nevertheless, if any gentleman of the University would rise and say 
 the wish of the University was to have these impediments removed, he would then 
 not think it necessary to make the motion. 
 
 Sir Hercules Langrishe — The bill is intended to remove certain disabilities which 
 the Catholics (.by law) labor under. Now there is no law as to tliis point : When it 
 became necessary for me, in framing the bill, to search through the laws relative to 
 education, I found there was no law to prohibit Roman Catholics from taking 
 degrees, but the rules of the University itself; these rules can be changed when- 
 ever the crown shall think proper, but it would be very unbecoming for the parlia- 
 
356 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 meut to interfere. As to the principle tliere can be no difference of opinion ; we 
 differ only as to the mode of carrying it into effect. 
 
 Doctor Browne (of the College) — I am unable to say what the sentiments of the 
 heads of the College are upon this subject, as they have not informed me; but the 
 reason the right honorable gentleman has stated is certainly the true reason why 
 Roman Catholics are not admitted to degrees. If it shall be deemed expedient to 
 admit them, the college must be much enlarged, and a greater number of governors 
 must be appointed. My own sentiment is, that such a measure would tend much 
 to remove prejudices, and to make them coalesce with Protestants. This is my 
 own sentiment, and the sentiment of several persons of the University; but I can- 
 not say whether it be the sentiment of the majority. If the house shall think the 
 measure expedient, they may address his Majesty to remove the oath which bars 
 them from taking degrees. 
 
 After the presentation of a petition by Mr. Egan, for the restoration of the elec- 
 tive franchise, the discussion on the bill proceeded. The speeches of Michael 
 Smith, Hutchinson, Grattan, and Curran, gave the bill most powerful support. One 
 of the boldest and Unest speeches was that of the Hon. George Knox — a man too 
 little remembered 
 
 ^I^R. CUERAN said — I would have yielded to the lateness of. the 
 ^y^^ hour, my own indisposition, and the fatigue of the house, 
 (I'JIf) ^^^^ have let the motion pass without a word from me on 
 i/t^>^'. the subject, if I had not heard some principles advanced 
 
 »'^ which could not pass without animadversion, I know that 
 
 a trivial subject of the day would naturally engage you more deeply 
 than any more distant object, of however greater importance, but I 
 beg you will recollect, that the petty interest of party must expire 
 with yourselves, and that your heirs must be not statesmen, nor 
 placemen, nor pensioners, but the future people of the country at 
 large. I know of no so awful call upon the justice and wisdom of 
 an assembly, as the reflection that they are deliberating on the 
 interests of posterity. On this subject, I cannot but lament, that 
 the conduct of the administration is so unhappily calculated to dis- 
 turb and divide the public mind, to prevent the nation from receiv- 
 ing so great a question with the coolness it requires. 
 
 At Cork, the present viceroy was pleased to reject a most moder- 
 ate and modest petition from the Catholics of that city. The next 
 step was to create a division among the Catholics themselves ; the 
 next was to hold them up as a body formidable to the English gov- 
 ernment, and to their Protestant fellow-subjects ; for how else could 
 any man account for the scandalous publication which was hawked 
 about this city, in which his Majesty was made to give his royal 
 
JOHN p. CURRAN. 357 
 
 thanks to an individual of this kingdom, for his protection of the 
 state. But I conjure the house to be on their guard against those 
 despicable attempts to traduce the people, to alarm their fears, or 
 to inflame their resentment. Gentlemen have talked, as if the ques- 
 tion was, whether we may with safety to ourselves, relax or repeal 
 the laws w^hich have so long coerced our Catholic fellow subjects ? 
 The real question is, whether you can, with safety to the Irish con- 
 stitution, refuse such a measure? It is not a question merely of 
 their sufi"erings or their relief — it is a question of your own pres- 
 ervation. There are some maxims which an honest Irishman will 
 never abandon, and by which every public measure may be fairly 
 tried. These are the preservation of the constitution upon the prin- 
 ciples established at the revolution, in church and state ; and next 
 the independency of Ireland, connected with Britain as a confeder- 
 ated people, and united indissolubly under a common inseparable 
 crown. If you wish to know how these great objects may be afiected 
 by a repeal of those laws, see how they were affected by their 
 enactment. Here you have the infallible tests of fact and experi- 
 ence ; and wretched, indeed you must be, if false shame, false pride, 
 false fear, or false spirit, can prevent you from reading that lesson 
 of wisdom which is written in the blood and the calamities of your 
 country. [Here Mr. Curran went into a detail of the Popery laws, 
 as they aflected the Catholics of Ireland.] These laws were de- 
 structive of arts, of industry, of private morals and public order. 
 They were fitted to extirpate even the Christian religion from 
 amongst the people, and* reduce them to the condition of savages and 
 rebels, disgraceful to humanity, and formidable to the state. 
 
 [He then traced the progress and effects of those laws from the 
 revolution in 1779.] Let me now ask j'ou, how have those laws 
 affected the Protestant suliject and the Protestant constitution ? In 
 that interval were they free ? Did they possess that liberty which 
 they denied to their brethren? No Sir ; where there are inhabi- 
 tants, but no people, there can be no freedom ; unless there be a 
 spirit, and what may be called a pull, in the people, a free govern- 
 ment cannot he kept steady, or fixed in its seat. You had indeed a 
 government, but it was planted in civil dissension, and watered in 
 civil blood, and whilst the virtuous luxuriance of its branches aspired 
 to heaven, its infernal roots shot downward to their congenial 
 
358 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 regions, and were intertwined in hell. Your ancestors thought 
 themselves the oppressors of their fellow-subjects, but they were 
 only their gaolers, and the justice of Providence would have been 
 frustrated, if tiieir own slavery had not been the punishment of their 
 vice and their folly. But are these facts for which we must appeal 
 to history ? You all remember the year one thousand seven hun- 
 dred and seventy-nine. What were you then? Your constitution, 
 without resistance, in the hands of the British parliament ; your 
 trade in many parts extinguished, in every part coerced. So low 
 were you reduced .to beggary and servitude as to declare, that 
 unless the mercy of England was extended to your trade, you could 
 not subsist. Here you have an infallible test of the ruinous influ- 
 ence of those laws in the experience of a century ; of a constitution 
 surrendered, and commerce utterly extinct. But can you learn 
 nothing on this sul)ject from the events that followed? In 1778 you 
 somewhat relaxed the severity of those laws, and improved, in some 
 degree, the condition of the Catholics. What was the consequence 
 even of a partial union with your countrymen ? The united efforts 
 of the two bodies restored that constitution which had been lost by 
 their separation. In 1782 j-ou became free. Your Catholic breth- 
 ren shared the danger of the conflict, but you had not justice or 
 gratitude to let them share the fruits of the victory. You suflered 
 them to relapse into their former insignificance and depression. 
 And, let me ask you, has it not fared with you according to your 
 deserts? Let me ask you if the parliament of Ireland can ])oast of 
 being now less at the feet of the British minister, than at that period 
 it was of the British parliament? [Here he observed on the con- 
 duct of the administration for some years past, in the accumulation 
 of public burdens and parliamentary influence.] But it is not the 
 mere increase of debt ; it is not the creation of one hundred and ten 
 placemen and pensioners that forms the real cause of the jjublic 
 malady. The real cause is the exclusion of your people from all 
 influence upon the representative. The question, therefore, is, 
 whether you will seek your own safety in the restoration of your 
 fellow-subjects, or whether you will choose rather to perish than to 
 be just? "I now proceed to examine the objections to a general in- 
 corporation of the Catholics. On general principles no man can 
 justify the deprivation of civil rights on any ground but that of for- 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 359 
 
 feiturc for some offence. The Papist of the last century might for- 
 feit his property forever, for that was his own, but he could not 
 forfeit the rights and capacities of his unborn posterity. And let 
 me observe, that even those laws against the ofiender himself, were 
 enacted while injuries were recent, and while men were, not unnat- 
 urally, alarmed by the consideration of a French monarchy, a Pre- 
 tender, and a Pope ; things that we now read of, but can see no 
 more. But are they disaflected to liberty? On what ground can 
 such an imputation be supported ? Do you sec any instance of any 
 man's religious theory governing his civil or political conduct? Is 
 Popery an enemy to freedom? Look to France, and be answered. 
 Is protestantism necessarily its friend ? You are Protestants ; look 
 to yourselves, and bo refuted. But look further : do you find even 
 the religious sentiments of sectaries mai-ked by the supposed char- 
 acteristics of their sects. Do you not find that a Protestant Briton 
 can be a bigot, with only two sacraments, and a Catholic French- 
 man a Deist, admitting seven ? But you affect to think your prop- 
 erty in danger, by admitting them into the state. That has been 
 already refuted ; but you have yourselves refuted j'our own objec- 
 tion. Thirteen years ago you expressed the same fear, yet you 
 made the experiment ; you opened the door to landed property, and 
 the fact has shown the fear to be without foundation. 
 
 But another curious topic has been stated again ; the Pi'otestant 
 ascendancy is in danger. What do you mean by that word ? Do 
 you mean the rights, and properly, and dignities of the church? If 
 you do, you must feel they are safe. They are secured by the law, 
 by the coronation oath, by a Protestant Parliament, a Protestant 
 king, a Protestant confederated nation. Do you mean the free and 
 protected exercise of the Protestant religion ? You know it has the 
 same security to support it. Or do you mean the just and honorable 
 support of the numerous and meritorious clergy of your own country, 
 who really discharge the labors and duties of the ministry? As to 
 that, let me say, that if we felt on that subject as we ought, we 
 should not have so many men of talent and virtue struggling under 
 the difficulties of their scanty pittance, and feeling the melancholy 
 conviction that no virtues or talents can give them any hope of ad- 
 vancement. If you really mean the pi-eservation of every right and 
 every honor than can dignify a Christian priest, and give authority 
 
360 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to his function, I will protect them as zcalouslj' as 3^011. I will ever 
 respect and revere the man who employs himself in diflusing light, 
 hope, and consolation. But if you mean by ascendancy the power 
 of persecution, I detest and abhor it. If you mean the ascendancy 
 of an English school over an Irish university, I cannot look upon it 
 without aversion. An ascendancy of that form raises to my mind a 
 little greasy emblem of stall-fed theology, imported from some 
 foreign land, with the graces of a lady's maid, the dignity of a side- 
 table, the temperance of a larder, its sobriety the dregs of a patron's 
 bottle, and its wisdom the dregs of a patron's understanding, brought 
 hither to devour, to degrade, and to defame. Is it to such a thing 
 you would have it thought that you affixed the idea of the Pi'otest- 
 ant ascendancy? But it is said, admit them by degrees, and do not 
 run the risk of too precipitate an incorpoi'ation. I conceive both the 
 argument and the fact unfounded. In a mixed government, like 
 ours, an increase of the democratic power can scarcely ever be dan- 
 gerous. None of the three powers of our constitution act singly in 
 the line of its natural direction ; each is necessarily tempered and 
 diverted by the action of the other two ; and hence it is, that though 
 the power of the crown has, perhaps, far transcended the degree to 
 which theory might confine it, the liberty of the British constitution 
 may not be in much danger. An increase of power, to any of the 
 three, acts finally upon the state with a very diminished influence, 
 and, therefore, great indeed must be that increase in any one of 
 them which can endanger the practical balance of the constitution. 
 Still, however, I contend not against the caution of a general admis- 
 sion. Let me ask you can you admit them any otherwise than grad- 
 ually ? The striking and melancholy symptom of the public disease 
 is, that if it recovers at all, it can be only through a feeble and lin- 
 gering convalescence. Yet even this gradual admission your Catho- 
 lic brethi'cn do not ask, save under every pledge and every restriction 
 which your justice and wisdom can recommend to your adoption. 
 
 I call on the house to consider the necessity of acting with a social 
 and conciliatory mind. Contrary conduct may perhaps protract the 
 unhappy depression of our country, but a partial liberty cannot long 
 subsist. A disunited people cannot long subsist. With infinite 
 regret must any man look forward to the alienation of three millions 
 of our people, and to a degree of subserviency and corruption in a 
 
JOHN P. (JUERAN. 3QJ 
 
 fourth. I am sorry to think it is so very easy to conceive, that in 
 case of such au event, the inevitable consequence would be an union 
 with Great Britain. And if any one desires to know what that 
 would be, I will tell him. Tt would be the emigration of every man 
 of consequence from Ireland ; it would be the participation of British 
 taxes, without British trade ; it would be the extinction of the Irish 
 name as a people. We should become a wretched colony, j^erhaps 
 leased out to a company of Jews, as was formerly in contemplation, 
 and governed by a few tax-gatherers and excisemen, unless, possibly, 
 you may add fifteen or twenty couple of Irish member's, who may be 
 found every session sleeping in their collars under the manger of the 
 British minister. — Debates, Vol. XII., pp. 174-178. 
 
5(j2 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Rev. William Jackson. 
 
 April 23d, 1795. 
 
 Mr. W. H. Curran, in the Memoirs of liis Father, thus describes Jackson : — 
 
 " Mr. Jackson was a clergyman of the Established Church; he was a native of 
 Ireland, but he had for several years resided out of that country. He spent a part 
 ■of his life in the family of the noted Duchess of Kingston, and is said to liave been 
 the person who conducted that lady's controversy with the celebrated Foote. At 
 the period of the French Revolution ho passed over to Paris, where he formed 
 political connections with tlie constituted authorities. From France he returned to 
 London, in 1794, for the purpose of procuring information as to the practicability 
 of an invasion of England, and was thence to proceed to Ireland on a similar mis- 
 sion. Upon his arrival in London, lie renewed an intimacy with a person named 
 Cockayne, who had formerly been his friend and confidential attorney. Tlic extent 
 of his communications, in the first instance, to Cockayne, did not exactly appear. 
 The latter, however, was prevailed upon to write the directions of several of Jack- 
 son's letters, containing treasonable matters, to his correspondents abroad; but in 
 a little time, either suspecting or repenting that he had been furnishing evidence of 
 treason against himself, he revealed to the British Minister, Mr. Piit, all that he knew 
 or conjectured relative to Jackson's objects. By the desire of Mr. Pitt, Cockayne 
 accompanied Jackson to Ireland, to watch and defeat his designs ; and as soon as 
 the evidence of his treason was mature, announced himself as a witness for the 
 crown. Mr. Jackson was accordingly arrested, and committed to stand his trial for 
 high treason. 
 
 " Mr. Jackson was committed to prison in April, 1794, but his trial was delayed, 
 by successive adjournments, till the same mouth in the following year. In the inter- 
 val he wrote and published a refutation of Paine's Age of Reason, probably in the 
 hope that it might be accepted as an atonement. He was convicted, and brought up 
 for judgment on the 30th of April, 1795." 
 
 He was indicted for treason in the Summer of 1794 ; but, sometimes for the crown, 
 and others for the prisoner, the trial was postponed till the 23d of April, 1795. 
 
 Court — Right Hon. the Earl of Clonmel, Chief Justice; * Hon. Mr. Justice 
 Downes, Hon. Mr. Justice Chamberlaine. 
 
 Counsel for the Crown — Mr. Attorney-General, Mr. Prime-Sergeant, Mr. Solici- 
 tor-General, Mr. Fraukland and Mr. Trench. Agent — Thomas Kemmis, Esq., 
 Crown Solicitor. 
 
 *Hon Mr. Justice Boyd was prevented froA attending by indisposition. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 3(53 
 
 Counsel assigned to the prisoner — Mr. Curran and Mr. Ponsonby. 
 Assistant Counsel — Mr. R. Guinness, Mr. M'Nally, Mr. Emraett, Mr. Burton and 
 Mr. Sampson. Agent — Edward Croolvslianlv Keane, Esq. 
 
 Tlie Attorney-General led tlie prosecution. His cliicf witness was Coclvayne, an 
 Englisli attorney. Among tlic papers proved was tliis remarkable View of Iuelaxd, 
 by Tone : — 
 
 " Tlie situation of Ireland and England is fundamentally different in this: the 
 government of England is national — that of Ireland provincial. The interest of 
 the first is the same n ith that of the people ; of the last, directly opposite. The 
 people of Ireland are divided into three sects — the Established Church, the Dissen 
 ters and Catholics. The first — infinitely the smallest portion — have engrossed, 
 besides the whole church patronage, all the profits and honors of the country 
 exclusively, and a very great share of tlie lauded property. They are, of course, 
 aristocrats, adverse to any change, and decided enemies of the French Revolution. 
 The Dissenters — who are much more numerous — are the most enlightened body of 
 the nation; they are steady Republicans, devoted to liberty, and, through all the 
 stages of the French RevoUitiou, have been enthusiastically attached to it. The 
 Catholics — the great body of the people — are in the lowest degree of ignorance, 
 and arc ready for any change, because no change can make them worse. The whole 
 peasantry of Ireland, the most oppressed and wretched in Europe, may be said to be 
 Catholic. They have within these two years received a certain degree of informa- 
 tion, and manifested a proportionate degree of discontent, by various insurrections, 
 &c. They are a bold, hardy race, and make excellent soldiers. There is nowhere 
 a higher spirit of aristocracy than in all the privileged orders, the clergy and gentry 
 of Ireland, down to the very lowest; to countervail which, there appears now a 
 spirit rising in the people which never existed before, but which is spreading most 
 rapidly, as appears by the Defenders, as they are called, and other insurgents. If 
 the people of Ireland be 4,500,000, as it seems probable they arc, the Established 
 Church may be reckoned at 450,000; the Dissenters at 000,000; the Catholics at 
 3,150,000. The prejudices in England are adverse to the French nation under what- 
 ever form of government. It seems idle to suppose the present rancor against the 
 French Is owing merely to their being Republicans ; it has been cherished by the 
 manners of four centuries, and aggravated by continual wars. It is morally certain 
 that any invasion of England would unite all ranks in opposition to tlie invaders. 
 In Ireland — a conquered, oppressed and insulted country — the name of England 
 and her power is universally odious, save with those who have an interest in main- 
 taining it; a body, however, only formidable from situation and property, but which 
 the first convulsion would level in tlie dust. On the contrary, the great bulk of the 
 people of Ireland would be ready to throw off the yoke in this country, if they saw 
 any force sufficiently strong to resort to for defence until arrangements could 
 be made : the Dissenters are enemies to the English power, from reason and 
 from reflection; the Catholics, from a hatred of the English name. In a word, the 
 prejudices of one country are directly adverse to the other — dii-ectly favorable to 
 an invasion. The government of Ireland is only to be looked upon as agovernment 
 of force; the moment a superior force appears, it would tumble at once, as being 
 founded neither in the interests nor in the affections of the people. It may be said, 
 the people of Ireland show no political exertion. In the first place, public spirit is 
 completely depressed by the recent persecutions of several. The convention act, 
 the gunpowder, &o., declarations of government, parliamentary unanimity, ordecla- 
 
3(;4 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 rations of grand juries — all proceeding from aristocrats, whose interest is adverse 
 to that of the people, and who think such conduct necessary for their security — 
 are no obstacles ; the weight of such men falls in the general welfare, and their own 
 tenantry and dependants would desert and turn against them. The people have no 
 way of expressing their discontent civiliter, which is, at the same time, greatly 
 aggravated by those measures ; and they are, on the other hand, in that semi-bar- 
 barous state, which is, of all others, the best adapted for making war. The spirit 
 of Ireland cannot, therefore, be calculated fi'om newspaper publications, county 
 meetings, &c., at which the gentry only meet and speak for themselves. They are 
 so situated that they have but one way left to make their sentiments known, and 
 that is by war. The church establishment and tithes are very severe grievances, 
 and have been the cause of numberless insurrections. In a word, from reason, 
 reflection, interest, prejudice, the spirit of change, the misery of the great bulk of 
 the nation, and, above all, the hatred of the English name, resulting from the 
 tyranny of near seven centuries, there seems little doubt but an invasion and suffi- 
 cient force would be supported by the people. There Is scarce any army in the 
 country, and the militia, the bulk of whom are Catholics, would, to a moral cer- 
 tainty, refuse to act, if they saw such a force as they could look to for support." 
 
 Curran said : — 
 
 ■^ ;'^Y LORDS AND Gentlemen of the Jury, — I am sure the 
 attention of the court must be a good deal fatigued. I 
 C, .,. ■ i am sure, gentlemen of the iury, that your minds must 
 X of necessity be fatigued also. Whether counsel be fatigued 
 
 or not, is matter very little worth the observation that may be 
 made upon it. I am glad that it is not necessary for me to add 
 a great deal to the labor, either of the court, or the jury. Of 
 the court I must have some knowledge — of the jury, I certainly 
 am not ignorant. I know it is as unnecessary for me to say 
 much, or, perhaps, anything to inform the court, as it would be 
 i-idiculous to affect to lecture a jury of the description I have the 
 honor to address. I know I address a court, anxious to expound 
 fairly and impartially the law of the country, without any apprehen- 
 sion of the consequences and effect of any prosecution. In the jury 
 I am looking to now, I know I address twelve sensible and respect- 
 able men of my country, who are as conscious as I am of the great 
 obligation to which they have pledged themselves by their oath, to 
 decide upon the question fitirly, without listening to passion, or being 
 swayed by prejudice — without thinking of anything except the charge 
 which has been made, and the evidence which has been brought in 
 support of that charge. They know, as well as I do, that the great 
 object of a jury is to protect the country against crimes, and to protect 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 365 
 
 individuals against all accusation that is not founded in truth. They 
 ■will remember — I know they will remember, that the great object 
 of their duty is, according to the expression of a late venerated judge, 
 in another country, that they are to come into the box with their 
 minds like white paper, upon which prejudice, or passion, or bias, or 
 talk, or hope, or fear, has not been able to scrawl anything ; that you, 
 gentlemen ! come into the box, standing indifferent as you stand 
 unsworn. 
 
 In the little, gentlemen, that I shall take the liberty of addressing 
 to you, I shall rest the fate of it upon its intrinsic weight. I shall 
 not leave the case in concealment. If there be no ground on which 
 the evidence can be impeached, I will venture to say I will neither 
 bark at it, nor scold it, in lieu of giving it an answer. Whatever 
 objection I have to make, shall be addressed to your reason. I will 
 not say tliey are great, or conclusive, or unanswerable objections. 
 I shall submit them to you nakedly as they appear to me. If they 
 bave weight, you will give it to them. If they have not, a great 
 promise, on m}' part, will not give anticipated weight to that whose 
 debility will appear when it comes to be examined. 
 
 Gentlemen, you are empannelled to try a charge. It consists of 
 two offences, particularly described in the indictment. The first 
 question is, what is the allegation ? In the first branch, the prisoner 
 is indicted upon a statute, which inflicts the pains and penalties of 
 high treason upon any man who shall compass or imagine the king's 
 death. The nature of the oflence, if you required any comment on 
 it, has been learnedly, and, I must add, candidly commented upon 
 by Mr. Attorney-General in stating the case. The second part is, 
 that the prisoner did adhere to the king's enemies. By the law of 
 this country, there are particular rules, applicable to cases of jirose- 
 cutions for high treason, contra-distinguished from all the other 
 branches of the criminal law. The nature of the offence called for 
 this peculiarity of regulation. There is no species of charge to 
 which innocent men ma^'' more easily be made victims, than that of 
 ■ofl'ences against the state, and therefore it was necessary to give an 
 additional protection to the subject. There is an honest impulse in 
 the natural and laudable loyalty of every man, that warms his 
 passions strongly against the person who endeavors to disturb the 
 public quiet and security ; it was necessary, therefore, to guard the 
 
36o TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 sul)ject against the most dangerous of all abuses — the abuse of a 
 virtue, b}' extraordinaiy vigilance. There was another I'eason : — 
 There is no charge which is so vague and indefinite, and yet would 
 be more likely to succeed, than charging a man as an enemy to the 
 state. There is no case in which the venality of a base informer 
 could have greater expectation of a base reward. Therefore, gen- 
 tlemen, it was necessary to guard persons accused from the over- 
 hasty virtue of a jury on the one hand, and on the other from being 
 made the sacrifice of the base and rank prostitution of a depraved 
 informer. How has the law done this ? By pointing out in terms, 
 these rules and orders that shall guide the court, and bind the jury 
 in the verdict they shall give. The man shall be a traitor, if ho 
 commits the crime, but it must be a crime of which he should be 
 l)roveably attaint, by overt acts. And in order that there be au 
 opportunity of investigation and defence, the features of the overt 
 acts should be stated of public record in the very body of the indict- 
 ment. Justly do I hear it observed, that there cannot be devised a 
 fairer mode of accusation and trial than this is. Gentlemen, I have 
 stated to you how the foundation of it stands in both countries, 
 touching the mode of accusation and trial. I have to add to you, 
 that in Great Britain it has been found necessary still further to 
 increase the sanction of the jury, and the safety of the prisoner, by 
 an express statute in King William's time. By that law it is now 
 settled in that great country, that no man shall be indicted or con- 
 victed, except upon the evidence of two witnesses, and it describes 
 what sort of evidence that shall be ; either two witnesses swearing 
 directly to the same overt act laid in the indictment, or two witnesses, 
 one swearing to one overt act, and the other to another overt act of 
 the same si^ecies of treason. So that, in that country, no man can 
 be found guilty, except upon the evidence of two distinct credible 
 witnesses — credible in their testimony, distinct in their persons, 
 and concurring in the evidence of acts of one and the same class of 
 treason; for it must be to the same identical treason, sworn to by 
 both witnesses ; or one witness deposing to one act of treason, and 
 the other to another act of the same class of treason. That is the 
 settled law of the neighljoring kingdom, and I state it emphatically 
 to you to be the settled law; because far am I from thinking, that 
 we have not the blcssinc: of livinc: under the same sanction of law — 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 367" 
 
 far am I from ima<jining that the breath which cannot even taint the 
 character of a man in England, shall here blow him from the earth — 
 that the proof, which in England wonld not wound the man, shall 
 here deprive him of his life — that though the people in England 
 would laugh at the accusation, yet here it shall cause the accused to 
 perish under it. Sure I am that in a country where so few instances 
 of a foul accusation of this sort have occurred, the judges of the 
 court will need little argument to give effect to every thing urged 
 to show that the law is the same in Ireland as in England. 
 
 Lord Clonmel — Do you mean to argue that the statute of William is iu force ia 
 Ireland ? 
 
 Mr. Curi-an. — No, my lord ; not that the statute of William is in 
 force — but I mean to argue, that the necessity of two witnesses in 
 the case of treason is as strong here as in England. It is the opinion 
 of Lord Coke, founded upon a number of authorities ; the ojiinion of 
 Lord Coke, referring to a judicial coniirmation of what he says ; the 
 opinion of Lord Coke controverted, if it can be said to be contro- 
 verted, by the modest and diiSdent dissent of Sir Michael Foster. 
 It is laid down by Lord Coke, that he conceives it to be the estab- 
 lished law, that two witnesses are necessary to convict : 3 Inst. 26. 
 "It seemcth tiiat by the ancient common- law, one accuser or witness 
 was not sufficient to convict any person of high treason — and that 
 two witnesses be required, appeaix'th by our books, and I remember 
 no authority in our books to the contrary." I know of no judicial, 
 determination in our books to the contrary of what Lord Coke here 
 states : the common law is grounded upon the principles of reason. 
 I consider the statutes of Edward VI., and William 111., as statutes 
 which had become necessary from the abuses occasioned by a depar- 
 ture from the common law. After the statute of Edward VL, 
 expressly declaring the necessity of two witnesses, the courts had 
 fallen into perhaps a well-intentioned departure from the meaning of 
 the statute of Edward VI. , so far that the place of two witnesses 
 was supplied in evidence by any thing that the court thought a 
 material additional circumstance in the case ; and to the time of 
 William III., such a dejiarturo had prevailed, and this was thought 
 sufficient to discharge every thing respecting the obligations of the 
 statute. It became necessary, therefore, to enact and by that enact- 
 
368 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 merit to do away the abuse of the principle of the common law, by 
 expressly declaring that no man should be indicted or convicted 
 except by two witnesses to one overt act, or one witness to one act, 
 and a second to another act of high treason of the same species. 
 And there seems to me to be a sound distinction between the case of 
 high treason, and of any other crime. It is the only crime which 
 every subject is sworn against committing : it is the only crime 
 which any subject is sworn to abstain from. In every other case 
 the subject is left to the fear of punishment which he may feel, or to 
 the dictates of his conscience to guard himself against transgressing 
 the law ; but treason is a breach of his oath of allegiance, and is so 
 f:ir like the case of perjury : and therefore in the case of treason no 
 man should be convicted by the testimony of a single witness, 
 because it amounts to no more than oath against oath : so that it is 
 only reasonable there should be another to turn the scale ; and 
 therefore it is that I conceive Lord Coke well warranted in la3'ing 
 down this rule, a rule deduced from general justice, and even from 
 the law of God himself. Gentlemen, what I am now stating, I offer 
 to the court as matter of law. 
 
 But what were these witnesses? Witnesses in all cases beyond 
 exception in their personal circumstances, and in their personal 
 credit. Therefore it is the law, that no man shall be found guilty of 
 any offence that is not legally proved upon him by the sworn testi- 
 mony of credible witnesses. Gentlemen, I have submitted my 
 humble ideas of the law — I have stated the charge which the pris- 
 oner is called upon to answer, let me now state the overt acts, which 
 in this particular case are necessary to be proved. The first is, that 
 the prisoner did traitorously come to, and land in, Ireland, to pro- 
 cure information concerning the subjects of Ireland, and to send 
 that information to the persons exercising the government in France, 
 to aid them in carrying on the war against the King. I do not recol- 
 lect that Cockayne said one single word of the prisoner's coming 
 here for such a purpose. The second overt act is, that the prisoner 
 did ti-aitorously intend to raise and levy war, and incite persons to 
 invade Ireland with arms and men ; that he did incite Theobald 
 Wolfe Tone to go beyond seas to incite France to invade this king- 
 dom ; that he did endeavor to procure persons to go to France, and 
 that he agreed with other persons, that they should be sent to 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 3g9 
 
 France for the same purpose. Having stated these overt acts which 
 are laid in the indictment, you will be pleased to recollect the evi- 
 dence given by Cockayne. Cockayne did not say that the prisoner 
 came over here for any such purpose as the overt act attributes to 
 him. Then, as to the overt act of endeavoring to procure persons 
 to go to France for the purpose of giving information to the enemy ; 
 the witness said he met Mr. M'Nally ; he had known him in Eng- 
 land ; Jackson was a clergyman ; he had known him also. Cock- 
 ayne had professional business with Mr. M'Nally. Mr. M'Nally 
 paid them a courtesy which any decent person would have been 
 entitled to. They dined at his house, and met three or, four per- 
 sons there ; they talked of the politics of Ireland ; of the dissatis- 
 faction of the people ; but not a syllable of what is stated in the 
 indictment ; not one word of any conspiracy ; Cockayne did not 
 pretend to be able to give any account of any specific conversation ; 
 He went to Newgate ; Rowan was then in confinement ; he some- 
 times went by himself : sometimes met Tone, sometimes Jackson; 
 he gave you an account of encouragement: what was it? Was 
 there anything to support this indictment ? Let me remind you that 
 you are to found your vei-dict on what the witness says and you 
 believe, and not on what learned counsel may be instructed to state. 
 Then what does the witness say ? He admits that he did not hear 
 all the conversation. The crying injustice must strike you of 
 making a man answerable for a part of a conversation, where the 
 witness did not hear it all ; but take it as he has stated it, unquali- 
 fied and unconstrued : how high was he wrought up by it ? He 
 heard talk of somebody to go to France ; he was to carry papers ; 
 he heard an expression of instructions to the French. What French 
 — what instructions ? It might be to French manufacturers ; it 
 might be to French traitors ; it might be to the French King ; it 
 might be to the French convention. Do I mean to say that there 
 was nothing by which a credulous or reasonable man might not have 
 his suspicion raised, or that there was nothing in three or four men 
 huddling themselves together in Newgate, and talking of an inva- 
 sion ? No ; but my reasoning is this : that your verdict is to be 
 founded on evidence of positive guilt established at the hazai'd of 
 the personal punishment of the witness ; you are not to pick up the 
 conjectures either of his malignity or credulity. I say that this 
 
370 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 man stands in defiance of your verdict, because it will be affected by- 
 nothing but that irresistible evidence on which alone it ought to be 
 founded. But what was the fact which Tone was to do, or any other 
 person? It was an illegal one. By a late act, an English subject 
 going to France is liable to six months' imprisonment. By a clause 
 in the same statute the crime of soliciting a person to go is also 
 punishable. The encouraging any person to go to that country was, 
 therefore, exposing him to danger, but whether it was a motive of 
 trade, or smuggling, or idle adventure, is not the question for joa. 
 It is whether the intention was to convey an incitement to the 
 French to make a descent on this kingdom, and endeavor to subvert 
 the constitution of it. You have a simple question before you — 
 has even the prosecutor sworn that he endeavored to do so ? I think 
 not. The next overt act charged is, that he did compose and write 
 a letter in order to be sent to William Stone, in which he traitor- 
 ously desired Stone to disclose to certain persons in France the 
 scheme and intention of Jackson, to send a person to inform them of 
 the state of Ireland, for the pui'pose of giving support and effect to 
 a hostile invasion of this country. You have heard these letters 
 read. You must of necessity look on them in one or two important 
 and distinct points of view. The iiret, perhaps, that will naturally 
 strike you is, what are these letters? Do they sustain the allega- 
 tions of the overt act? 'Are they letters requiring Stone to inform 
 the Convention of this country being in such a state as to encourage 
 an invasion? Does that pajjer support this allegation? God help 
 us ! gentlemen of the jury. I know not in what state the property 
 or life of any man will be if they are always to be at the mercy, and 
 to depend on the possibility of his explaining either the real or pre- 
 tended circumstances on which he corresponds with persons abroad. 
 The letters are written apparently upon mercantile subjects — he 
 talks of manufactures, of a firm, of prices changed, of different 
 families, of differences among them, of overtures to be accepted of, 
 of disputes likely to be settled by means of common mediation ; what 
 is the evidence on which you can be supported in saying that manu- 
 factures mean treason — that Nicholas means the war minister of 
 France — the sister-in-law Ireland — that " the firm has been changed," 
 means Danton has been guillotined, but that makes no alteration in 
 the state of the house, meaning the circumstances of the revolution — 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 371 
 
 that the change of prices and manufactures means anything else neces- 
 sary to give consistency to the charge of treason. Give me leave to 
 say that this ludicrous and barbarous consequence would follow from 
 a rule of this sort, the idlest letter might be strained to any purpose. 
 The simplicity of our law is, that a man's guilt should be proved by 
 the evidence of witnesses on their oaths, which shall not be supplied 
 by foncy, nor elicited by the ingenuity of any pei'son making sug- 
 gestions to the wretched credulity of a jury that should be weak 
 enough to adopt them. I come now to this. A letter produced 
 imports on the face of it to be a letter of business, concerning manu- 
 factures — another concerning family differences. In which way are 
 they to be understood? I say with confidence, better it should be 
 to let twenty men, that might have a criminal purpose in writing 
 letters of this kind, escape, than fall into the dreadful alternative of 
 making one man a victim to a charge of this kind not supported by 
 such proof as could bring conviction on the mind of a rational jury. 
 I do not think it necessary to state to you minutely the rest of 
 these allegations of the overt acts. The charge against the prisoner 
 is supported, and this is perhaps the clearest way of calling your 
 attention to the evidence, either by the positive evidence of Cock- 
 ayne ap to these facts, or by the written evidence which stands also 
 on his testimonj' alone. Touching actual conspiracy he said nothing ; 
 somebody was to go to France — he knew not for what — he had an 
 idea on his mind for what it was — but never from any communica- 
 tion with Jnckson. Tliere have been other lettei's read in evidence. 
 Two of them contained duplicates of a sort of representation of the 
 supposed state of Ireland. Cockayne says that he got the packet 
 from Jackson, that he himself wrote the directions ; one addressed 
 to Amsterdam, the other to Hamburgh. They were read, and they 
 contain assertions, whether true or false I do not think material, of 
 the state of this country : — if material at all, material only in their 
 falsehood. The public are satisfied that these allegations are false. 
 It is known to every man in this country, and must be known with 
 great satisfaction by every honest man, that it is not in that state 
 that could induce any but the most adventurous and wicked folly to 
 try an experiment upon it. It is unnecessary for me to comment 
 on the opinions contained in that paper ; there is a matter more 
 material, and calling more loudly for your attention. It is stated 
 
372 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to be written for the purpose of inviting the persons governing in 
 France to try a descent upon Ireland. This paper is evidence to 
 support that charge ; you have heard it read. On what public sub- 
 ject have you ever heard six men speak, and all to agree? Might 
 not a stranger in a fit of despondency, imagine that an invasion 
 might have a fatal effect on this country ? It is not impossible but 
 if ten men were to make a landing, some mischief might happen. 
 Then, again, what do I mean to argue? Is it that this letter bears 
 no marks of the design imjDuted to it? No such thing. It is a let- 
 ter that the most innocent man might write, but it is also such a one 
 as a guilty man might write, but unless there was clear evidence of 
 his guilt, he would be entitled to your verdict of acquittal. Though 
 it was not expressly avowed, j'et I cannot help thinking that it was 
 meant to lay some little emphasis on cei'tain names which I have met 
 with in the newspapers — I am sure I have met the name of Laigne- 
 lot in the debates of the convention — I have met the names of Horne 
 Tooke and Stone in the English papers. I have read that Horne 
 Tooke was tried for high treason and acquitted — that Stone made 
 his escape into Switzerland. I believe it is said that there is a per- 
 son of that name in confinement in England at present. But let me 
 tell you, you are not to draw any inferences from circumstances 
 of this kind against the prisoner ; let me tell you, it is the guilt 
 of the man, and not the sound of names, by which his fate is to be 
 decided. 
 
 Other papers have been read. One seems to contain some forms 
 of addresses. A letter said to come from Stone has been read to 
 you. The letter to Beresford, said to be written by Jackson, has 
 also been read to you. I have stated the material parts of the evi- 
 dence. I have endeavored to submit my poor idea of the rule by 
 which you ought to be guided. I see only one remaining topic to 
 trouble you upon ; it appears to me to be a topic of the utmost 
 importance. And, gentlemen, it is this. Who is the man that has 
 been examined to support this charge ? One witness I I beseech 
 you to have that engraven on your minds. The charge, in all its 
 parts, stands only on the evidence of Cockayne ; there is no other 
 evidence of any conversation, there is not a material letter read in 
 this case that does not rest upon Cockayne's evidence, and that I am 
 warranted in this assertion you will see to a demonstration when I 
 
JOHN P. CURUAN. 373 
 
 remind the court that ho was the only witness, as I recollect, called 
 to prove the handwriting of Jackson. On his testimony alone must 
 depend the fact of their being his handwriting, of the inuendoes 
 imputed to them, or the purpose with which they were sent. 
 
 Gentlemen, I am scarcely justified in having trespassed so long on 
 your patience. It is a narrow case. It is a case of a man charged 
 with the highest and most penal offence known by our law, and 
 charged l)y one witness only. And let me ask who that witness is. 
 A man, stating that he comes from another country, armed with a 
 pardon for treasons, committed in Ireland, but not in England 
 whence he comes. What ! were you never on a jury before? Did 
 you ever hear of a man forfeiting his life on the unsupported evi- 
 dence of a single witness, and he an accomplice by his own confes- 
 sion? What! his character made the subject of testimony and 
 support ! — take his own vile evidence for his character. He was 
 the foul traitor of his own client. What do you think now of his 
 chai-acter? He was a spy upon his friend. He was the man that 
 yielded to the tie of three oaths of allegiance, to watch the steps of 
 his client for the bribe of government, with a pardon for the treasons 
 he might commit ; and he liad impressed on his mind the conviction 
 that he was liable to be executed as a traitor. Was he aware of his 
 crime? — his pardon speaks it. Was he aware of the turpitude of 
 his character ? — became with the cui'e ; he brought his witness in 
 his pocket. To what ? To do away an offence which he did not 
 venture to deny, that he had incautiously sworn that which was false 
 in fact, though the jury did not choose to give it the name of wilful 
 and corrupt perjury. Gracious God ! Is it, then, on the evidence 
 of a man of this kind, with his pardon in his pocket, and his bribe — 
 not yet in his pocket — that you can venture to convict the prisoner? 
 He was to be taken care of. How so? Jackson owed him a debt — 
 " I was to do the honorable business of a spy and informer, and to 
 be paid for it in the common way ; it was common acreable work — 
 treason and conspiracy. I was to be paid for it by the sheet." Do 
 you find men doing these things in common life? I have now stated 
 the circumstances by which, in my opinion, the credit of Cockayne 
 ought to be reduced to nothing in your eyes. But I do not rest 
 here. Papers were found in the chamber of Mr. Jackson ; the door 
 was open — and, by the bye, that carelessness was not evidence of 
 
;]74r TREASURY OF EI-OQUENCE. 
 
 any conscious guilt ; the papers were seized. Tliat there were some 
 belonging to Jackson is clear, because he expressed an anxiety 
 about some that are confessed not to have any relation to the sub- 
 ject of this day's trial. I asked Cockayne if he had any papers in 
 Jackson's room the night before he was arrested? He said not. I 
 asked him if he had told any person that he had? He said not. 
 Gentlemen, the only witness I shall call will be one to show you 
 that he has in that sworn falsely. And let me here make one obser- 
 vation to you, the strength and good sense of which has been repeat- 
 ed an hundred times, and, therefore, rests on better authority than 
 mine. Where a witness swears glibly to a number of circumstan- 
 ces, where it is impossible to produce contradictory proof, and is 
 found to fail in one, it shall overthrow all the others. And see how 
 strongly the observation applies here : he swore to a conversation 
 with Jackson as to what he said and did, well knowing that Jackson 
 could not be a witness to disprove that unless the good sense of the 
 jury should save his life, and enable him to become, in his turn, a 
 pi'osecutor for the perjury. If on a point of this kind this man 
 should be found to have forsworn himself, it cannot occasion any 
 other sentiment but this, that if you have felt yourselves disposed 
 to give anything like credit to his evidence wliere he has sworn to 
 facts which he must have known, it is the key-stone of the arch iu 
 his testimony, and if you can pluck it from its place, the remainder 
 of the pile will fall iu ruins about his head. 
 
 I will produce that witness — but, before I sit down, permit me, 
 gentlemen of the jury, to remind you, that if every M'ord which 
 Cockayne has here sworn were sworn in Westminster-Hall, the 
 judges would immediately have said — There is not anything for the 
 jury to decide upon ; the evidence of the indictment rests on him 
 alone; there is no second witness. So does the transaction of the 
 letters, for De Joncourt's testimony could not have satisfied the stat- 
 ute ; it was not evidence to the same overt act as affecting Jackson 
 personally, nor was it evidence of any distinct overt act ; it was 
 merely that species of evidence, the abuse of which had been the 
 cause of introducing the statute of William ; a mere collateral con- 
 comitant evidence. The overt act was writing and putting into the 
 post-office ; that was sworn to by Cockayne, and if he deserved 
 credit, would go so far as to prove the fact by one witness. See 
 
JOHN P. CUKRAN. 375 
 
 what the idea of the statute is ; it is that it must be an overt act 
 brought home to the prisoner by each of the two witnesses swearing 
 to it. If Do Joncourt's evidence stood single, it could not have 
 brought anything home to Jackson. Cockayne swore the super- 
 scription was his writing; he put the letters into the office. De 
 Joncourt said nothing but that he found in the office a letter which 
 he produced, and which Cockayne said was the one he had put into 
 it. This observation appears to collect additional strength from this 
 circumstance. Why did they not produce Tone? It is said they 
 could not. I say they could. It was as easy to pardon him as to 
 pardon Cockayne. But whether he was guilty or not, is no objec- 
 tion. Shall it be said that the argument turns about and affects 
 Jackson as much as it does the prosecutor? I think certainly not. 
 Jackson, I believe it has appeared in the course of the evidence, and 
 is matter of judicial knowledge to the court, has lain in prison for 
 twelve months past, from the moment of his arrest to the moment of 
 his trial. If he is conscious that the charge is false, it is impossible 
 for him to prove that falsehood ; he was so circumstanced as that he 
 could not procure the attendance of witnesses ; a stranger in the 
 country, he could not tell whether some of the persons named were 
 in existence or not. 
 
 I have before apologized to you for trespassing upon your patience, 
 and I have again trespassed — let me not repeat it. I shall only 
 take the liberty of reminding you, that if you have any doubt, in a 
 criminal case doubt should be acquittal ; that you are trying a case 
 which if tried in England would preclude the jury from the possibility 
 of finding a verdict of condemnation. It is for you to put it into 
 the power of mankind to say, that that which should pass harmlessly 
 over the head of a man in Great Britain shall blast him here ; — 
 whether life is more valuable in that country than in this, or whether 
 a verdict ma}'' more easily be obtained here in a case tending to 
 establish pains and penalties of this severe nature. 
 
376 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Suspension of the Habeas Corpus. 
 
 October 14th, 1796. 
 
 I 
 
 In Committee Ponsonby opposed the bill ; so did Curran : — 
 
 ^^ CONJURE the house to reflect seriously upon the moment that 
 ^1^ has beeu chosen by administration for the bringing in of this bill ; 
 
 fl think it a melancholy proof of their want of temper and their 
 want of judgment. My right honorable friend moved an 
 amendment to the address in ftivor of the Roman Catholics ; it was a 
 motion of the very utmost importance ; in the debates upon that motion 
 the rights of the Roman Catholics were strongly urged, and as strongly 
 opposed ; the disposition of the administration towards them was 
 fully manifested, and the motion was rejected. Of the propriety of 
 that rejection I will not speak — I cannot but lament it; I lament 
 still more the effect that I am sure the making of the present bill the 
 immediate sequel to that rejection, will have on the public mind. 
 [He dwelt strongly upon the indiscretion of ministers, in thus ap- 
 pearing to make the bill be an attack and an insult upon the Catho- 
 lics ; and then replied to the arguments that had beeu used in 
 support of the measure ; he adverted to the bills of the last session.] 
 The Habeas Corpus act is almost the only remaining guardian of our 
 liberties ; and the ministry have stabbed the guardian upon its post 
 and in the dark. The house was exhausted by a long debate upon a 
 subject of the last importance to the union and to the peace of the 
 country ; those members of parliament who were likely to defend 
 this last privilege of the people were withdrawn, and it was pot till 
 the next morning that they were told in their beds, that the Habeas 
 Corpus act was repealed. That sacred palladium of our libei'ties 
 which was never suflered to sleep, ought not to have been stolen 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 377 
 
 from us while we slumbered. I ask whj' the wisdom of our ances- 
 tors has opposed so many checks to the progress of a bill through 
 parliament ! I ask whether those checks are intended only to pre- 
 vent the precipitation of measures of no moment, and that the dearest 
 interests, and most sacred privileges of the subject, are to be left 
 exposed to.all the fatal consequences of rashness and intemperance ? 
 Befoi'e a bill can be laid before the house, its leave must be asked, 
 and obtained for bringing it in — here it may be debated and opposed 
 in its very first onset. It is then, by the leave of the house, to be 
 read a first time, and upon this reading its principle is to be dis- 
 cussed ; a day is then appointed for the further discussion of its 
 principle upon a second reading ; it is then, if so far approved of, to 
 be considered, and, if possible, to be amended by a committee of 
 the whole house. Has the constitution no object in all these provis- 
 ions for deliberation, or is such deliberation intended to be only upon 
 trifles ? 
 
 At two o'clock in the morning the house was moved for leave to 
 bring in a bill to repeal the Habeas Corpus act ; at five minutes past 
 two in the morning the bill was read a first time ; and, after grave 
 and mature deliberation, the bill was ordered to be read, and was 
 accordinglj' read, a second time at ten minutes after two in the morn- 
 ing. Its principle was then fully considered and approved of; and 
 at fifteen minutes after two in the morning, it was laid before a com- 
 mittee of the whole house ! I ask, what peculiar and extraordinary 
 urgency has been stated for refusing to such a bill the deliberation 
 of eight-and-forty hours? and I insist, that whatever arguments 
 have been offered for the necessity of passing such a bill at all, not 
 one has been even insinuated for forcing it into a law without exam- 
 ination and without reflection. I believe there was but one motive 
 for it, and that was to create an unfounded alarm in the country, 
 and, if possible, to silence the murmurs of the people. If ministers 
 wish to excite alarm, they may succeed — they have already suc- 
 ceeded. Their industrious reports of an invasion, of which I am 
 convinced they have no apprehension, have nearly destroyed public 
 credit in the South. I have it from what I believe the best author- 
 ity, and upon such matters I can only speak from information, that 
 in Cork and AVaterford discount is wholly stopped. If ministers 
 hope to dismay the people into silence, I tell them they cannot ter- 
 
378 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 rify them into apathy, and that they may exasperate their abhorrence 
 into violence. 
 
 It remains now to consider the nature of what has been adduced 
 as evidence of a treasonable confederation at present existing in the 
 country, and which has been urged as the justification of the measure 
 before the house. It cannot be denied that there has been treason 
 in the country, because several men have been long since tried and 
 convicted, and executed as traitors : but I do deny that thei'e is any 
 evidence whatever before the house of a treason.able confederation 
 now subsisting. I cannot too strongly reprobate the idea of con- 
 sidering a passage in the speech from the throne as evidence upon 
 which to pass a bill of attainder against the constitution ; if such a 
 doctrine were to be endured, it would be at any time in the power 
 of a corrupt minister to lay the people at his feet. < I insist that the 
 assertions of the Attorney-General, even if they could be admitted 
 as evidence, amount to no more than that informations have been 
 sworn against certain individuals for crimes, the nature of which has 
 not been disclosed, and that they have been apprehended. As to 
 the late imprisonment of persons in the North, I will not say it was 
 a mere pretext for the introduction of this bill ; I disclaim the idea 
 of making so horrid a charge, but I cannot but say it is no founda- 
 •tion whatever for such a bill : to say that it is, would be to say, these 
 persons arc guilty — to pronounce them guilty without the forms of 
 trial . Whatever facts have been stated to tne house have only tended 
 to show that the bill is unnecessary ; men suspected of treason 
 against the government may be apprehended and detained without 
 the bill ; but confederation for the mere purpose of obtaining by 
 constitutional moans, a reform in the representation, is not a circum- 
 stance that can justify the house in abandoning the peopie, and laj-ing 
 their liberty at the mercy of the executive power. I shall vote for 
 Mr. Mason's leaving the chair. — Debaten, Vol. XVII., pp. 56-9. 
 
 The division was 137 to 7. 
 
JOHN P. CUHRAN. 379 
 
 Last Speech in the Irish Commons. 
 
 Mat 15Tn, 1797. 
 
 The reader has seen the decreasing minorities of the partywho gallantly struggled 
 to maintain the parliamentary constitution of Ireland. But they grew daily more 
 powerless. The people looked to the United Irish Executive, to France, to arms, to 
 revolution. The government persisted in refusing Reform and Emancipation, con- 
 tinued the suspension of the constitution, and incessantly augmented the despotism 
 of their laws, the profligacy of their administration, and the violence of their soldiery 
 — they trusted to intimidation. Under these circumstances, the opposition deter- 
 mined to abandon the contest. They did unwisely. They might have embarrassed 
 ministers seriously in the following year, and they did not so, nor did they join the 
 military organization of the patriots. 
 
 The pre-determined secession took place on the 15tli May, 1797. As the proceed- 
 ings are of peculiar interest, I copy them from the Debates: — 
 
 The expectatiouof the very important business which was announced for this even- 
 ing, the Reform in the Representation, had filled the galleries at three o'clock. The 
 speaker took the chair at four, and proceeded to business. Two debates followed 
 — the one on the Lords' address, the other on the Reform. The house continued to 
 sit until past five next morning. 
 
 Lord Castlereagh pre-occupied the attention of the house by moving, that the ad- 
 dress of the Lords on the subject of the treasonable papers, be now taken into 
 consideration. The address contained strong expressions of the loyalty and affection 
 of the house — alluded in very stroug term; to the enormity and exteut of this 
 traitorous conspiracy — thanked his Majesty for the measures which had been 
 already taken for restoring the due observation of the laws, and recommended to 
 his adoption the most severe measures for the complete suppression of these dan- 
 gerous disorders. His lordship animadverted on the danger of the conspiracy which 
 had given occasion to this address — stated its object to be the overthrow of our 
 most excellent constitution, and the separation of this country from Great Britain 
 — that the evidence in proof of these assertions had been so full that even the most 
 sceptic could not doubt, and so plain that no man could question the inferences 
 which had been made by their lordships. His lordship then entered into a long 
 and minute history of the society of United Irishman, repeating nearly what had 
 been said on that subject in the report of the Secret Committee. He deprecated, 
 in any debate which might arise on this question, the admixture of any foreign 
 matter with this particular subject, which was simply an inquiry into the most ex- 
 traordinary mass of treason which had ever appeared in the country; to introduce 
 any other matter into the debate would be construed by the ignorauce of the coun- 
 
380 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 try as a proof that treason and traitors had abettors even within those walls. A 
 speech of much vuhcmeuce against the United Irishmen &c., was concluded by a 
 motion — "that thi; Commons should agree with their Lordships in this address." 
 
 Mr. Grattan dechired that he did not on this subject wish to bring on a debate, as 
 he would reserve the opinion which he meant to give at large on the state of the 
 country, for the debate on the question of Reform. He could not help, however, 
 declaring, that to that part of the address which expressed approbation of the, 
 measures of government, he was bound in consistency not to give any approbation, 
 neither could he do so of that part which prayed for a contiuance of coercion, be- 
 cause he believed in his conscience that such measures could be productive of no 
 good. 
 
 Mr. Smith, after a short preface, moved an amendment, which alone could recon- 
 cile him to the address. His amendment was in substance a request that his Majesty 
 would use conciliatory measures to remove every pretext of discontent from the well- 
 disposed, as well as measures of coercion for the prevention and punishment of 
 conspiracy and treason — urging the necessity of correcting abuses, as well as adopt- 
 ing strong laws to repress disaffection, &c. 
 
 This amendment introduced much very animated conversation from Mr. George 
 Ponsonby, Mr. Fletcher, Mr. Jephson, Mr. Grattan, and Mr. Hoare, who supported 
 the amendment, which was opposed by the Attorney-General, Denis Browne, Mr. 
 Egan, Sir B. Roche, Mr. Alexander, Messrs. J. and M. Beresford, Mr. Ogle, Mr. 
 Toler, and Mr. Anuesley. 
 
 The most contentious topic in the debate was an expression which fell from Mr. 
 Fletcher in the course of his speech, in which he said, that if coercive measures were 
 to be pursued, the whole country must be coerced, for the spirit of insurrection had 
 pervaded every part of it. 
 
 Mr. M. Beresford ordered the clerk to take down these words, and the gallery was 
 instantly cleared. When strangers were again admitted, the debate on the address 
 still continued, and in the course of it Mr. J. 0. Beresford thought himself called 
 on to defend the Secret Committee against an assertion which had fallen from Mr. 
 Fletcher in the course of his speech. The assertion was in substance that he feared 
 the people would be led to look on the report of the committee as fabricated rather 
 to justify the past measures of Government, than to state facts! 
 
 Mr. Fletcher contended that he had a right to animadvert on the report, but dis- 
 claimed any design of imputing anything unfair to the members of that committee 
 individually. 
 
 In the course of the altercation which followed on this subject, Mr. Toler threat- 
 ened, and actually did move an abstract resolution, declaring that the imputation 
 conveyed in these words (of Mr. Fletcher) was an uufounded calumny on the re- 
 port. He was at length, hovi'ever persuaded to withdraw his motion. The house 
 then divided on Mr. Smith's amendment which was lost without a division. 
 
 PAELIAMENTARY REFORM. 
 
 Mr. W. Ponsonby, in a short prefatory speech, proposed his Resolutions on Par- 
 liamentary Reform. Before he moved any of them specifically, he read them all to 
 the house. They are in substance as follow : — 
 
 " Resolved, that it is indispensably necessary to a fundamental reform of the rep- 
 resentation, that all disabilities on account of religion be forever abolished, and 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 381 
 
 that Catholics shall he admitted into the legislature, and all the great offices of state 
 in the same extent, &c., as Protestants now are. 
 
 " That It is the indispensable right of the people of Ireland to be fully and fairly 
 represented in Parliament. 
 
 "That in order that the people may be fully enabled to exercise that right, the 
 privilege of returning members for cities, boroughs, &c., in the present form shall 
 cease; that each county be divided into districts, consisting of 6,000 houses each, 
 each district to return two members to parliament. 
 
 " That all persons possessing freehold property to the amount of 40s. per annum; 
 all possessed of leasehold interests, of the value of ; all possessed of a house 
 
 of the value of ; all who have resided for a certain number of years in any 
 
 great city or town, following a trade ; and all who shall be free of any city, &c., by 
 birth, marriage, or servitude, shall vote for members of parliament. 
 
 " That seats in parliament shall endure for number of years. (The blanks were 
 left to be tilled up by the discretion of the house.)" — Z)e?)aies, Vol. XVII., pp. 
 S27-30. 
 
 Mr. Pelham moved and spoke for an adjournment, and was supported by Mr. D. 
 Browne, Sir. M. Beresford, Sir H. Langrishe, Sir Frederick Flood, Mr. M. Mason, 
 Mr. C. Osborne, Mr. William Smyth (afterwards judge, whom Curran followed); 
 some opposing emancipation, some reform, some resisting the proposal of Ponsonby 
 as ill-timed, or as Mr. Brown said, " thatching a house in a hurricane." The original 
 motion was sustained by Mr. Stewart (of Killymoon), Sir J. Freake, George Pon- 
 sonby, Mr. Jephson, the Knight of Kerry (Mr. Fitzgerald), Mr. Fletcher (after- 
 wards judge), and Counsellor Hoare (of whom Curran used to say, his smile was 
 like the shining of the brass plate on a coffin). 
 
 W^ CONSIDER this as a measure of justice, with respect to the 
 1^ Catholics and the people at large. The Catholics in former 
 
 f times groaned under the malignant folly of penal laws — Avan- 
 dercd like herds upon the earth, or gathered under some thread- 
 bare grandee who came to Dublin, danced attendance at the Castle, 
 was smiled on by the Secretary, and carried back to his miserable 
 countrymen the gracious promise of favor and protection. They are 
 no longer mean dependents, but owners of their country, and claim- 
 ing simply and boldly, as Irishmen, the national privileges of men and 
 natives of thtir country. [Upon this part of the question he went 
 into a variety of very interesting topics, descriptive of their im- 
 portance and their oppressions, which he attributed wholly to the 
 wicked* propagation of religious antipathies, and concluded that 
 their claim to perfect freedom in their own land could be denied only 
 by the grossest malignity and tyranny.] 
 
 I now pi-oceed to answer the objections to the measure. I was 
 extremely shocked to see the agent of a foreign cabinet rise up in 
 the assembly that ought to represent the Irish nation, and oppose a 
 
382 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 motion that was made on the acknowledged and deplored corruption 
 which has been imported from his country. Such an opposition is 
 a proof of the charge, which I am astonished he could venture upon 
 at so awful a crisis. I doubt Avhether the charge, or this proof of it, 
 ' would appear most odious. However, I will examine the objections. 
 It is said — It is not the time. This argument has become a jest in 
 Ireland, for it has been used in all times ; in war, in peace, in quiet, 
 and in disturbance. It is the miserable, dilatory plea of persever- 
 ing and stupid corruption, that wishes to postpone its fate by a 
 promise of amendment, w^hich it is resolved never to perform. Re- 
 form has become an exception to the proverb that says there is a 
 time for all things ; but for Reform there is no time, because at all 
 times corruption is more profitable to its authors than public virtue 
 and propriety, which they know must be fatal to their views. As 
 to the present time, the objections to it ai'e a compound of the most 
 unblushing impudence and folly. Forsooth it would seem as if the 
 house had j'ielded through fear. Personal bravery or fear are inap- 
 plicable to a jjublic assembly. I know no cowardice so despicable 
 as the fear of seeming to be afraid. To be afraid of danger is not 
 an imnatural sensation ; but to be brave in absurdity and injustice, 
 merely from fear of having your sense or honesty imputed to your 
 own apprehension, is a stretch of folly which I have never lieard of 
 before. But the time is pregnant w'ith arguments very different, 
 indeed, from those I have heard ; I mean the report of the Secret 
 Committee and the dreadful state of the country. The allegation is 
 that the people are not to have justice, because a rebellion exists 
 within, and because we have an enemy at our gates — because, for- 
 sooth, reform is only a pretext, and separation is the object of the 
 leaders. If a rebellion exist, every good subject ought to be de- 
 tached from it. But if an enemy threaten to invade us, it is only 
 common sense to detach every subject from the hostile standard and 
 bring him back to his duty and his country. 
 
 The present miserable state of Ireland — its distractions, iffe dis- 
 tresses, its bankruptcy — are the effects of the war, and it is the duty 
 of the authors of that war to reconcile the people by the most timely 
 and liberal justice ; the utmost physical strength should be called 
 forth, and that can be done only by union. This is a subject so tre- 
 mendous I do not wish to dwell on it ; I will therefore leave it ; I 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 38,3 
 
 will support a Reform on its own merits, and as & measure of inter- 
 nal peace at this momentous juncture. Its merits are admitted by 
 the objection to the time, because the objection admits that at any 
 other time it would be proper. For twenty years past there was no 
 man of any note in England or Ireland who did not consider the 
 necessity of it as a maxim ; they all saw and confessed that the 
 people are not represented, and that the}' have not the benefit of a 
 mixed monarchy. They have a monarchy which absorbs the two 
 other estates, and, therefore, they have the insupportable expense of 
 a monarchy, an aristocracy, and a democracy, without the simplicity 
 or energy of any one of those forms of government. In Ireland 
 this is peculiarly fatal, because the honest representation of the 
 people is swallowed in the corruption and intrigue of a cabinet of 
 another country. From this may be deduced the low estate of the 
 Irish people ; their honest labor is wasted in pampering their be- 
 trayers, instead of being employed, as it ought to be, in accommo- 
 dating themselves and their children. On these miserable conse- 
 quences of corruption, and which are all the fatal efiects of inadequate 
 representation, I do not wish to dwell. To expatiate too much on 
 them might be unfair, but to suppress them might be treason to the 
 public. It is said that reform is only a pretence, and that separa- 
 tion is the real object of leaders ; if this be so, confound the leaders 
 by destroying the jiretext, and take the followers to yourselves. 
 You say there are one hundred thousand ; I firmly believe thei-e is 
 three times the number. So much the better for you ; if these se- 
 ducers can attach so many followers to rebellion by the hope of re- 
 form through blood, how much more readily will you engage them, not 
 by the promise, but the possession, and without blood? You allude 
 to the British fleet ; learn from it to avoid the fatal consequence that 
 may follow even a few days' delay of justice. It is said to be only 
 a pretext; I am convinced of the contrary — I am convinced the 
 people are sincere, and would be satisfied by it. I think so from the 
 perseverance in petitioning for it for a number of years ; I think so, 
 because I think a monarchy, properly balanced by a fair representa- 
 tion of the people, gives as perfect liberty as the most celebrated 
 republics of old. But, of the real attraction of this object of reform, 
 you have a proof almost miraculous ; the desire of reform has anni- 
 hilated religious antipathj' and united the country. In the history 
 
384 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of mankind it is the only instance of so fatal a religious fanaticism 
 being discarded by the good sense of mankind, instead of dying 
 slowly by the development of its folly. And I am persuaded the 
 hints thrown out this night to make the diflerent sects jealous of 
 each other will be a detected trick, and will only unite them still 
 more closely. The Catholics have given a pledge to their counti-y- 
 men of their sincerity and their zeal, which cannot fail of producing 
 the most firm reliance ; they have solemnly disclaimed all idea of 
 what is called emancipation, except as a part of that reform without 
 which their Presbyterian brethren could not be free. Reform is a 
 necessary change of mildness for coercion. The latter has been 
 tried ; what is its success ? The convention bill was passed to punish 
 the meetings at Dungaunon and those of the Catholics ; the govern- 
 ment considered the Catholic concessions as defeats that called for 
 vengeance, and cruelly have they avenged them. But did that act, 
 or those which followed it, put down those meetings ? The contrary 
 was the fact. It concealed them most foolishly. When popular 
 discontents are abroad, a wise government should put them into a 
 hive of glass. You hid them. The association at first was small ; 
 the earth seemed to drink it as a rivulet, but it only disappeai'cd for 
 a season. A thousand sti'cams, through the secret windings of the 
 earth, found their way to one course, and swelled its waters, until 
 at last, too mighty to be contained, it burst out a great river, fertil- 
 izing by its exudations or terrifying by its cataracts. This is the 
 effect of our penal code ; it swelled sedition into rebellion. What 
 else could be hoped from a system of terrorism. Fear is the most 
 transient of all the passions ; it is the warning that nature gives for 
 self-preservation. But when safety is unattainable the warning 
 must be useless, and nature does not, therefore, give it. Adminis- 
 tration, therefore, mistook the quality of penal laws ; they were sent 
 out to abolish conventions, but they did not pass the threshold ; they 
 stood sentinels at the gates. You think that penal laws, like great 
 dogs, will wag their tails to their masters and bark only at their 
 enemies. You are mistaken ; they turn and devour those they are 
 meant to protect, and are harmless where they are intended to 
 destroy. I see gentlemen laugh ; I see they are still veiy ignorant 
 of the nature of fear ; it cannot last ; neither while it does can it 
 be concealed. The feeble glimmering of a forced smile is a light 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 335 
 
 that makes the cheek look paler. Trust me, the times are too hu- 
 manized for such systems of government. Humanity will not exe- 
 cute them, but humanity will abhor them and those who wish to rule 
 by such means. This is not theory ; the experiment has been tried 
 and proved. You hc^jed much, and, I doubt not, meant well by 
 those laws ; but they have miserably failed you ; it is time to try 
 milder methods. You have tried to force the people ; the rage of 
 your penal laws was a storm that only drove them in groups to shel- 
 ter. Your convention law gave them that organization which is 
 justly an object of such alarm ; and the very proclamation seems to 
 have given them arms. Before it is too late, therefore, try the bet- 
 ter force of reason, and conciliate them by justice and humanity. 
 The period of coercion in Ireland is gone, nor can it ever return 
 until the people shall return to the folly and to the natural weakness 
 of disunion. Neither let us talk of innovation ; the progress of na- 
 ture is no innovation. The increase of people, with the growth of 
 the mind, is no innovation ; it is no way alarming unless the growth 
 of our minds lag behind. If we think otherwise, and think it an 
 innovation to depart from the folly of our infancy, we should come 
 here in our swaddling-clothes ; we should not innovate upon the 
 dress, more than the understanding of the cradle. As to the system 
 of peace now proposed, jmi must take it on principles ; they are 
 simply two — the abolition of religious disabilities and the represen- 
 tation of the people. I am confident the eflects would be every- 
 thing to be wished. The pi-esent alarming discontent will vanish, 
 the good will be separated from the evil-intentioned ; the friends of 
 mixed government in Irelaud are many ; every sensible man must 
 see that it gives all the enjoyment of rational liberty if the people 
 have their due place in the state. This system would make us in- 
 vincible against a foreign or domestic enemy ; it would make the 
 empire strong at this iraportant crisis ; it would restore us to liberty, 
 industry, and peace, which I am satisfied can never by any other 
 means be restored. Instead, therefore, of abusing the people, let 
 us remember that there is no physical strength but theirs, and con- 
 ciliate them by justice and reason. I am censured heavily for hav- 
 ing acted for them in the late prosecutions. I feel no shame at such 
 a charge, except that, at such a time as this, to defend the people 
 should be held out as an imputation upon a king's counsel, when the 
 
386 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 people are prosecuted by the state. I think every counsel is the 
 property of his fellow-subjects. If, indeed, because I wore his 
 Majesty's gown, I had declined my duty or done it weakly or treach- 
 erously ; if I had made that gown a mantle of hypocrisy, and be- 
 trayed my client or sacriticed him to any personal view, I might, 
 perhaps, have been thought wiser by those who have blamed me ; 
 but I should have thought myself the basest villain upon earth. 
 The plan of peace, proposed by a Reform, is the only means that I 
 and my friends can see left to save us. It is certainly a time for 
 decision, and not for half measures. I agree that unanimity is in- 
 dispensable. The house seems pretty nearly unanimous for force ; 
 I am sorry for it, for I bode the worst from it. I will retire from a 
 scene where I can do no good — where I certainly would interrupt 
 that unanimity. I cannot, however, go without a parting entreaty 
 that gentlemen will reflect on the awful responsibility in which they 
 stand to their country and to their conscience, before they set the 
 example to the people of abandoning the constitution and the law, 
 and resorting to the terrible expedient of force. — Debates, Vol. 
 XVII., pp. 553—8. 
 
 Grattan followed him, closing the debate, his speech, and the attendance of the 
 opposition, in these words : 
 
 Before they are to be reformed, rebellion, you tell us, must be subdued. You 
 tried that experiment in America. America required self-legislation ; you attempted 
 to subdue America by force of angry laws, and by force of arms — you exacted of 
 America unconditional submission — the stamp act and the tea tax were only pre- 
 texts. So you said. The object, you said, was separation. So here the Reform of 
 P.arliament, you say, and Catholic Emancipation are only pretexts : the object, you 
 say, is separation. And here you exact unconditional submission: "You must 
 SUBDUE BEFOKE YOU iiEFORM " — indeed ! Alas, you think so ; but you forget you 
 subdue by reforming. It is the best conquest yon can obtain over your own people. 
 But let me suppose you succeed ; what is your success } A military government, a 
 perfect despotism, a hapless victory over the principles of a mild government .and a 
 mild constitution. But what may be the ultimate consequence of such a victory .' — 
 a separation. Let us suppose that the war continues, and that your conquest over 
 your own people is interrupted by a French Invasion. What would be your situa- 
 tion then ? I do not wish to think of It ; but I wish you to think of it, and to make 
 a better preparation against such an event than such conquests and such victories. 
 When you consider the state of your arms abroad, and the ill-assured state of your 
 government at home, precipitating on such a system, surely you should pause a 
 little. Even on the event of a peace you are ill-secured against a future war, which 
 the state of Ireland, under such a system, would be too apt to invite; but in the 
 eventof the continuation of the war, your system is perilous, indeed. I speak with- 
 
JOHN P. CUKRAN. 387 
 
 out asperity — I speak without resentment; I speak, perhaps, my delusion, but it 
 is my heart-felt conviction — I speak my apprehension for the immediate state of 
 . our liberty, and for the ultimate state of the empire. I see, or I imagine I see, in 
 this system, everything which is dangerous to both. I hope I am mistaken — at 
 least, I hope I exaggerate; possibly I may. If so, I shall acknowledge my error 
 with more satisfaction than is usual in the acknowledgment of error. I cannot, liow- 
 ever, banisli from my memory tlie lesson of the American war ; and yet at that time 
 the English government was at the head of Europe, and was possessed of resources 
 comparatively unbroken. If that lesson has no effect on ministers, surely I can 
 suggest notliing that will. We have olfered you our measure — you will reject it; 
 we deprecate yours — you will persevere. Having no hopes left to persuade or dis- 
 suade, and having discharged our duty, we shall trouble you no more, and, AFTER 
 THIS DAY, SHALL NOT ATTEND THE HOUSE OF COMMONS ! — Z)e6aJcs, 
 Vol. XVII., pp. 560-70. 
 
 The question being put on the adjournment it was carried: — for it, 170; against 
 it, 30. 
 
 The opposition ceased to attend, and the parliament, after a few sittings, was 
 adjourned, in a speecli from the Lord Lieutenant, of unusual length, on the 3rd of 
 July, 1797. Thus, in the twilight of his country, ended Curran's parliamentary 
 career; but iu the awful iiight which followed, he was a beacon. 
 
388 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 For Peter Finnerty, Publisher of " The Press," 
 
 [LIBEL. ] 
 
 December 22nd, 1797. 
 
 The Government and the United Irishmen were now face to face, the former armed 
 with a full code of coercion, and a large army and unscrupulous agents to support 
 it ; — the latter with a good cause, the organization given by Tone, and the prospect 
 of French aid. Each party tried to strengthen itself by conciliation and intimida- 
 tion. Among the government instruments were spies (such as Maguane and others, 
 chronicled in Dr. Madden's work), "the battalioa of testimony" (Bird, Newell, 
 O'Brien, &c.), free quarters, prosecutious, bribery, patronage and calumny. 
 
 One of the best auxiliaries summoned by the United Irishmen was " The Press" 
 newspaper. 
 
 The first number of it was published in Dublin, on Thursday, the 28th of Septem- 
 ber, 1797, and was thence continued on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays, until 
 Tuesday, the 13th of March, 1798, when the G9th and last number was seized by the 
 government. It was not, like the " Northern Star," a chronicle of French politics. 
 It was a true propagandist organ of Liberal and National opinions, filled with 
 essays, letters and addresses of great ability. Arthur O'Connor mainly originated 
 it, and he, Thomas Emmet, Drennan, Sampson, &c., wrote it. 
 
 Government naturally longed to crush such a paper, as it had done the " Northern 
 Star," but raw force was premature for Dublin, so they waited for a libel, and, as 
 they gave plenty of provocation, they waited not long. They found one, which irri- 
 tated them deeply, while it gave them a good opening, in a letter published on 
 Thursday, the 26th of October, 1797, addressed to the Lord Lieutenant, signed 
 " Marcus." Most of the letter is set out in the indictment; so are the legal facts 
 which were the text of it, but it is right to say something more of them. 
 
 William Orr was a Presbyterian former, resident at Farraushane, in the County 
 of Antrim — a man of pious, gentle and gallant character ; a tall, athletic and hearty 
 fellow, too, and popular exceedingly. He was arrested in 1796, under the Insurrec- 
 tion Act (passed in the February of that year), for having, in April, 179G, admin- 
 istered the United Irish oath to Hugh Wheatly, a private in the Fifeshire Fencibles. 
 He was indicted at Carrickfergus, on the 17th of April, 1797, and tried on Saturday, 
 16th of September, 1797, before Chief Baron Lord Yelverton. The chief witness 
 was Wheatly, who deposed that Orr acted as chairman or secretary of a Baronial 
 Committee in Antrim, where Wheatly was induced to go, and was there forced to 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 389 
 
 take the oath. Lindsay, a private in the same corps, swore that he saw the oath 
 administered, but did not hear it. Ciirran and Sampson, Orr's counsel, contended 
 that this was a case for a prosecution for high treason; but Yelverton decided 
 otherwise, and cliarged for a conviction. The jury retired at seven at night, and 
 came into court at six o'clock on Sunday moruiug, and after much confusion (from 
 conscience or intoxication), gave iii a verdict of Guilty, with a recommendation to 
 mercy, which Yelverton sent by express to the Castle. On Monday, the 18th, Cur- 
 ran moved for a new trial, on the affidavit of two of the jurors, stating the drunken- 
 ness of some of the jurors, and the intimidation used to one of the deponents. He 
 had an affidavit from a third juror, swearing that he was deceived into the verdict; 
 but Orr was sentenced to be hanged on the 7th of October. Orr declared at the 
 close of the trial that he was innocent. Various attempts were made to save him. 
 His brother James signed a declaration of his guilt and a prayer for mercy, in Wil- 
 liam's name, and got it backed by the gentry ; but William disclaimed it. It was 
 also sworn by a Presbyterian clergyman that Wheatly had confessed himself guilty 
 of murder, perjury and other crimes. In consequence of all this, Orr was thrice 
 respited, and judging from the conciliatory and beseeching tone of " The Press" 
 (No. 5), Government seems to have had an opportunity of making themselves pop- 
 ular, and weakening the United Irishmen by a just leniency. They preferred the 
 harsh course, and on Saturday, the llth of October, Orr was hanged, outside Car- 
 rickfergus, amid a mass of troops. He distributed a written paper, declaring his 
 innocence, and died calmly and nobly. He left five children, and a wife, about again 
 to be a mother. 
 
 Indignation was nigh universal. Medals with " Remember Orr ! " were circulated ; 
 his name became a watchword (and continued so, as Sheares' proclamation proves; ; 
 " The Ministers in Orr's place " was a toast even in England, and Fox spoke of him 
 as a martyr. That he was a United Irishman is clear ; but that he gave Wheatly the 
 oath, or was therefore guilty in law, is not probable. Guilty or not, his execution 
 for such a crime, on such evidence, and after such a verdict, was a murder! So it 
 was treated in the letter of " Marcus," The author was a Mr. Deane Swift a fre- 
 quent contributor to " The Press." 
 
 On Tuesday, the 31st of October, Major Sirr arrested Peter Finnerty at 02 Abbey- 
 street ("The Press " office), for this publication, under a Judge's warrant, and put 
 him into Newgate, and on Thursday he was brought, haudcufl'ed, before Mr. Jame- 
 son, K. C, acting Judge at the Commission Court; true bills were found; he was 
 indicted in tlie dock, being refused liberty to bail. He was thence sent back to New- 
 gate, where he was exposed to threats to force a confession, but he was steady, and 
 on Friday, the 22d of December, was tried before Justice Downes at the Commission 
 Court. The indictment stated, 
 
 " That at a general assizes and general gaol delivery, holden at Carrickfergus, in 
 and for the County of Antrim, on the 17th day of April, in the thirty-seventh year 
 of the King, before the Honorable Matliias Finucane, one of the judges of his Maj- 
 esty's Court of Common Pleas in Ireland, and the Honorable Denis George, one of 
 the Barons of his Majesty's Court of Exchequer in Ireland, Justices and Commis- 
 sioners assigned to deliver the gaol of our said Lord the King, in and for the County 
 of Antrim, of the several prisoners and malefactors therein, one William Orr, late of 
 Farranshaue, in said County of Antrim, yeoman, was in lawful manner indicted for 
 feloniously administering a certain oath and engagement, upon a book, to one Hugh 
 Wheatly; which oath and engagement imported to bind the said Hugh Wheatly,' 
 
390 TREASUET OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 who then and there took the same, to be of an association, brotherhood, and Society, 
 formed for seditious purposes; and also for feloniously causing, procuring, and 
 inducing said Hugh Wheatly, to take an oath of said import last mentioned; and 
 also for feloniously administering to said Hugh Wheatly another oath, importing to 
 bind said Hugh Wheatly not to inform or give evidence against any brother, asso- 
 ciate, or confederate, of a certain society then and there formed ; and also for feloni- 
 ously causing, procuring, and seducing said Hugh Wheatly to take an oath of said 
 import last mentioned. And afterwards at Carrickfergus aforesaid, before the Right 
 Honorable Barry Lord Yelverton, Lord Chief Baron of his Majesty's Court of 
 Exchequer in Ireland, and the Honorable Tankerville Chamberlain, one of his Maj- 
 esty's Justices of his Court of Chief Pleas in Ireland, at a general assizes, &c., on the 
 16th day of September, in the 37th year of the King, said William Orr by the verdict 
 of a certain jury of said county of Antrim, between our said Lord the King and said 
 William Orr, taken of and for the felony aforesaid in due manner, was tried, con- 
 victed, and attainted, and for the same was duly executed; and that he, the said 
 Peter Finnerty, well knowing the premises, but being a wicked and ill-disposed 
 person, and of unquiet conversation and disposition, and devising and intending to 
 molest and disturb the peace and public tranquillity of this kingdom of Ireland ; and 
 to bring and draw the trial aforesaid, and the verdict thereon, for our said Lord the 
 King against this William Orr given, and the due course of law in that behalf had, 
 as aforesaid. Into hatred, contempt, aud scandal, with all the liege subjects of our 
 said Lord the King; and to persuade, and cause the subjects of our said Lord the 
 King to believe that the trial aforesaid was unduly had, and that the said William 
 Orr did undeservedly die in manner aforesaid, and that his Excellency John Jetferys, 
 Earl Camden, the Lord Lieutenant of this kingdom, after the conviction aforesaid, 
 ought to have extended to the said William Orr, his Majesty's gracious pardon of 
 the felonies afoi'esaid ; and that in not so extending such pardon, he, the said Lord 
 Lieutenant, had acted inhumanly, wickedly, and unjustly, and in a manner unwor- 
 thy of the trust which had been committed to him by our said Lord the King in that 
 behalf; and that the said Lord Lieutenant in his government of this kingdom, had 
 acted unjustly, cruelly, aud oppressively, to his Majesty's subjects therein : And 
 the said Peter Finnerty, to fulfil and bring to effect his most wicked and detestable 
 devices and intentions aforesaid, on the 26th of October, in the 37th year of the 
 King, at Mountrath Street aforesaid, city of Dublin aforesaid, falsely, wickedly, 
 maliciously, and seditiously did print and publish, and cause and procure to be 
 printed and published, in a certain newspaper entitled ' The Press,' a certain false, 
 wicked, malicious and seditious libel, of and concerning the said trial, conviction, 
 attainder, and execution of the said William Orr, as aforesaid, aud of aud concern- 
 ing the said Lord Lieutenant and his government of this kingdom, and his Majesty's 
 Ministers employed by him in his government of this kingdom, according to the 
 tenor and effect following, to wit : — 
 
 " ' The death of Mr. Orr (meaning the execution of the said William Orr) the 
 nation has pronounced one of the most sanguinary and savage acts that had dis- 
 graced the laws. In perjury, did you not hear, my Lord (meaning the said Lord 
 Lieutenant), the verdict (meaning the verdict aforesaid) was given.? Perjury 
 accompanied with terror, as terror has marked every step of your government 
 (meaning the government of this kingdom aforesaid, by the said Lord Lieutenant). 
 Vengeance and desolation were to fall on those who would not plvmge themselves 
 in blood. These were not strong enough : against the express law of the land, not 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 391 
 
 only was drink introduced to the jury (meaning the jury aforesaid), but drunken- 
 ness itself, beastly and criminal drunkenness, was employed to procure the murder 
 of-a better man (meaning tlio said execution of the said William Orr) than any that 
 now sniTounds you (meaning the said Lord Lieutenant).' 
 
 " And in another part thereof, according to the tenor and effect following, to 
 wit : — 
 
 " ' Repentance, which is a slow virtue, hastened, however, to declare the inno- 
 cence of the victim (meaning the said WilUam Orr) ; the mischief (meaning the said 
 conviction of the said William Orr) which perjury had done, truth now stepped for- 
 ward to repair. Neither was she too late had humanity formed any part of your 
 counsels (meaning the counsels of the said Lord Lieutenant). Stung with remorse, 
 on the return of reasou, part of his jury (meaning the jury aforesaid) solemnly and 
 soberly made oath that their verdict (meaning the verdict aforesaid) had been given 
 under the unhappy influence of intimidation and drink ; and m the most serious affi- 
 davit that ever was made, by acknowledging their crime, endeavored to atone to 
 God and to their country for the sin into which they had been seduced.' 
 
 "And in another part thereof, according to the tenor and efiect following, to 
 wit: — 
 
 " ' And though the innocence of the accused (meaning the said William Orr) had 
 even remained doubtful, it was your duty (meaning the duty of the said Lord Lieu- 
 tenant), my Lord, and you (moaning the said Lord Lieutenant) had no exemption 
 from that duty, to have interposed your arm and saved him (meaning the said Wil- 
 liam Orr) from the death (meaning the execution aforesaid) that perjury, drunken- 
 ness and reward had prepared for him (meaning the said William Orr). Let not 
 the nation be told that you (meaning the Lord Lieutenant) are a passive instrument 
 in the hands of others; if passive you be, then is your office a shadow indeed. If 
 an active instrument, as you ought to be, you (meaning the said Lord Lieutenant) 
 did not perform the duty which the laws required of you; you (meaning the said 
 Lord Lieutenant) did not exercise the prerogative of mercy; that mercy which the 
 constitution had entrusted to you (meaning the said Lord Lieutenant) for the safety 
 of the subject, by guarding him from the oppression of wicked men. Innocent it 
 appears he (meaning the said William Orr) was; his blood (meaning the blood of 
 the said William Orr) has been shed, and the precedent indeed is awful.' 
 
 " And in another part thereof, according to the tenor and effect following, to 
 wit: — 
 
 " ' But suppose the evidence of Wheatly had been true, what was the offence of 
 Mr. Orr (meaning the said WiUiam Orr) ? Not that he had taken an oath of blood 
 and extermination, for then he had not suffered; but that he (meaning the said 
 William Orr) had taken an oath of charity and of union, of humanity and of peace, he 
 (meaning the said William Orr) has suffered. Shall we then be told that your gov- 
 ernment (meaning the government of this kingdom aforesaid, by the said Lord 
 Lieutenant), will conciliate public opinion, or that the people will not continue to 
 look for a better ? ' 
 
 " And in another part thereof, according to the tenor and effect following, that is 
 to say : — 
 
 " ' Is it to be wondered that a successor of Lord Fitzwilliam should sign the 
 death-warrant of Mr. Orr (meaning the said William Orr) .' Mr. Pitt had learned 
 that a merciful Lord Lieutenant was unsuited to a government of violence. It was 
 no compliment to the native clemency of a Camden, that he sent you (meaning the 
 
392 TREASURE OF ELOQUENCE 
 
 isaid Lord Lieutenant) into Ireland, and what has been our portion under the change 
 but massacre and rape, military murders, desolation and terror.' 
 
 " And in another part thereof, according to the tenor and effect here following, 
 that is to say : — 
 
 " ' Feasting in your castle, in the midst of your myrmidons and bishops, you 
 (meaning the said Lord Lieutenant) have little concerned yourself about the expelled 
 and miserable cottager whose dwelling, at the moment of your mirth, was in flames, 
 his wife and his daughter then under the violation of some commissioned ravager, 
 his sou agonizing on the bayonet, and his helpless infants crying in vain for mercy. 
 These are lamentations which stain not the house of carousal. Under intoxicated 
 counsels (meaning the counsels of the said Lord Lieutenant), the constitution has 
 reeled to its centre, justice is not only blind drunk, but deaf, like Festus, to the 
 words of soberness and truth.' 
 
 " And in another part thereof, according to the tenor and effect here following, to 
 wit: — 
 
 " Let, however, the awful execution of Mr. Orr (meaning the execution aforesaid 
 of the said William Orr) be a lesson to all unthinking juries, and let them cease to 
 flatter themselves that tlie soberest recommendation of theirs, and of the presiding 
 judge, can stop the course of carnage, which sanguinary, and I do not fear to say, 
 unconstitutional laws have ordered to be loosed. Let them remember, that, like 
 Macbeth, the servants of the crown have waded so far in blood, that they find it 
 easier to go ou than to go back.' 
 
 " In contempt, &c., and against the peace, &c." 
 
 The Counsel for the prosecution were the Attorney-General (Arthur Wolfe), 
 Prime Sergeant, Solicitor-General (Toler), Messrs. Ridgeway, Townsheud, and 
 Worthington; for the defeuce, Curran, Fletcher, M'Nally, Sampson, Sheares and 
 Orr. The Attorney-General stated the case, and produced witnesses, who proved 
 printing and publication. Mr. Fletcher opened the defence, and called Lord Yelver- 
 ton and Mr. E. Cooke (Chief Clerk in the Secretary's oflice), to prove the truth of 
 the libel ; but the evidence was soon stopped, as illegal, and then Cui-ran spoke as 
 follows : — 
 
 ij^pEVER did I feel myself so sunk under the importance of any 
 ^^k^ cause. To speak to a question of thi.s kind, at any time, 
 *^ would require the greatest talent and the most mature dclib- 
 J eration ; but to be o1)liged, without either of those advan- 
 tages, to speak to a subject that has so deeply shaken the feelings 
 of this already irritated and agitated nation, is a task that fills me 
 with embarrassment and dismaJ^ 
 
 Neither my learned colleague nor myself received any instruction 
 or license until after the jury were actually sworn, and we both of 
 us came here under an idea that we should not take any part in the 
 trial. This circumstance I mention, not as an idle apology for an 
 effort that cannot be the subject of either praise or censure, but as a 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 393 
 
 call upon you, gentlemen of the, jury, to supply the defects of my 
 efforts, hy :i double exeilion of your attention. 
 
 Perhaps I ought to regret that I cannot begin with any compli- 
 ment, that may recommend me or my client personally to your 
 favor. A more artful advocate would probably begin his address 
 to you by compliments on your patriotism, and by felicitating his 
 client upon the happy selection of his jury, and upon that vinsus- 
 pected impartiality in which, if he was innocent, he must be safe. 
 You must be conscious, gentlemen, that such idle verbiage as that, 
 could not convey either my sentiments, or my client's upon that 
 subject. You know, and we know, upon what occasion you arc 
 come, and by whom you have been chosen ; you are come to try an 
 accusation professedly brought forward by the state, chosen by a 
 sheriff who is appointed by our accuser. 
 
 The Attorney-Geueral, interrupting Mr. Curran, said the sheriff was elected by 
 the city and that the observation was therefore unfounded. 
 
 Be it so [continued Mr. Curran] : I will not now stop to inquire 
 whose property the city may be considered to be : but the learned 
 gentleman seems to forget, that the election by that city, to whom- 
 soever it may belong, is absolutely void without the approbation of 
 that very Lord Lieutenant, who is the prosecutor in this case. I do 
 therefore repeat, gentlemen, that not a man of you has been called 
 to that box by the voice of my client ; that he has had no power to 
 object to a single man among you, though the crown has ; and that 
 you yourselves must feel under what influence you are chosen, or for 
 what qualifications you are particularly selected. At a moment when 
 this wretched land is shaken to its centre by the dreadful conflicts of 
 the difl'orent branches of the community ; between those who call 
 themselves the partisans of liberty, and those that call themselves 
 the partisans of power ; between the advocates of infliction and the 
 advocates of suffering ; upon such a question as the present, and at 
 such a season, can any man be at a loss to guess to what class of 
 character and opinion, a friend to either party would resort for that 
 jury, which was to decide between both? I trust, gentlemen, you 
 know me too well to suppose that I could be capable of treating you 
 with any personal disrespect ; I am speaking to you in the honest 
 confidence of your fellow-citizen. When I allude to those unworthy 
 
394- TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 imputations of supposed bias, or passion, or partiality, that may have 
 marked you out for your present situation, I do so, in order to warn 
 you of the ground on which you stand, of the point of awful respon- 
 sibility in which you are placed, to your conscience, and to your 
 country; and to remind j'ou, that if you have been put into that 
 box from any unw'orthy reliance on your complaisance or your ser- 
 vility, you have it in your power, before you leave it, to refute and 
 to punish so vile an expectation, by the integrity of your verdict ; 
 to remind you, too, that you have it in your power to show to as 
 many Irishmen as yet linger in this country, that all law and justice 
 have not taken their flight with our prosperity and peace ; that the 
 sanctity of an oath, and the honesty of a juror are not yet dead 
 amongst us ; and that if our courts of justice are superseded by so 
 many strange and terrible tribunals, it is not because they are defi- 
 cient either in wisdom or virtue. 
 
 Gentlemen, it is necessary that you should have a clear idea, first, 
 of the law by which this question is to be decided ; secondly, of the 
 nature and object of the prosecution. As to the first, it is my duty 
 to inform you, that the law respecting libels has been much changed 
 of late. Heretofore, in consequence of some decisions of the judges 
 in Westminster-Hall, the jury was conceived to have no province but 
 that of finding the truth of the inuendos, and the fact of publica- 
 tion ; but the libellous nature of that publication, as well as the guilt 
 or innocence of the publication, were considered as exclusively 
 belonging to the court. 
 
 In a system like that of law, which reasons logicalljs no one 
 erroneous principle can bo introduced, without producing every 
 other that can be deducible from it. If in the premises of any 
 argument you admit one erroneous proposition, nothing but bad 
 reasoning can save the conclusions from falsehood. So it has been 
 with this encroachment of the court upon the province of the jury 
 with respect to libels. The moment the court assumed as a prin- 
 ciple that they, the court, were to decide upon every thing but the 
 publication ; that is, that they were to decide upon the question of 
 libel or no libel, and upon the guilt or innocence of the intention, 
 which must form the essence of every crime, the guilt or innocence 
 must of necessity have ceased to be material. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 395 
 
 You see, gentlemen, clearly, that the question of intention is a 
 mere question of fact. 
 
 Now the moment the court determined that the jury was not to 
 try that question, it followed of necessity that it was not to be tried 
 at all ; for the court cannot try a question of fact. When the court 
 said that it was not triable, there was no way of fortifying that ex- 
 traordinary proposition, except bj' asserting that it was not material. 
 The same erroneous reasoning carried them another step, still more 
 mischievous and unjust ; if the intention had been material, it must 
 have been decided upon as a mere fact, under all its circumstances. 
 Of these circumstances, the meanest understanding can see that the 
 leading one must be the truth or the falsehood of the publication ; 
 but having decided the intention to be immaterial, it followed that 
 the truth must bo equally immaterial, and under the law so dis- 
 torted, any man in England who published the most undeniable 
 truth and with the purest intention, might be punished for a crime 
 in the most ignominious manner without imposing on the prosecutor 
 the necessity of proving his guilt, or his getting any opportunity of 
 showing his innocence. 
 
 I am not in the habit of speaking of legal institutions with dis- 
 respect ; but I am warranted in condemning that usurpation upon 
 the right of juries, by the authority of that statute by which your 
 jurisdiction is restored. For that restitution of justice, the British 
 subject is indebted to the splendid exertions of Mr. Fox and Mr. 
 Erskine, those distinguished supporters of the constitution and of 
 the law ; and I am happy to say to you, that though we can claim no 
 share in the glory they have so justly acquired, we have the full ben- 
 efit of their success ; for j'ou are now sitting under a similar act 
 passed in this country, which makes it your duty and right to decide 
 on the entire question upon the broadest grounds, and under all its 
 circumstances, and of course, to determine by your verdict, whether 
 this publication be a false and scandalous libel ; false in fact, and 
 published with the seditious purpose alleged, of bringing the govern- 
 ment into scandal, and instigating the people to insui-rection. 
 
 Having stated to you, gentlemen, the great and exclusive extent 
 of your jurisdiction, I shall beg leave to suggest to you a distinction 
 that will strike you at first sight ; and that is, the distinction between 
 public animadversions upon the character of private individuals, and 
 
39G TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 those which are written upon measures of government, and the per- 
 sons who conduct them. 
 
 The former may be called personal, and the latter political publi- 
 cations. No two things can be more different in their nature, nor in 
 the point of view in which they ai-e to be looked on by a jury. The 
 criminality of a mere personal libel consists in this, that it tends to a 
 breach of the peace ; it tends to all the vindictive paroxysms of 
 exasperated vanity, or to the deeper or more deadly vengeance of 
 irritated pride. The truth is, few men see at once that they cannot 
 be hurt so much as they think by the mere battery of a newspaper. 
 They do not reflect that every character has a natural station, from 
 which it cannot be effectually degraded, and beyond which it cannot 
 be raised by the bawling of a news-hawker. If it is wantonly 
 aspersed, it is but for a season, and that a short one, when it 
 emerges, like the moon from a passing cloud, to its original bright- 
 ness. It is right, however, that the law, and that you, should hold 
 the strictest hand over this kind of public animadversion, that forces 
 humility and innocence from their retreat into the glare of public 
 view ; that wounds and terrifies, that destroys the cordiality and the 
 peace of domestic life, and that, without eradicating a single vice, or 
 single folly, plants a thousand thorns in the human heart. 
 
 In cases of that kind, I perfectly agree with the law as stated from 
 the bench ; in such cases, I hesitate not to think, that the truth of a 
 charge ought not to justify its publication. If a private man is 
 charged with a crime, he ought to be prosecuted in a court of justice, 
 where he may be punished, if it is true, and the accuser, if it is false. 
 But {av differently do I deem of the freedom of political publication. 
 The salutary I'estraint of the former species, which I talked of, is 
 found in the general law of all societies whatever ; but the more 
 enlarged freedom of the press, for which I contend, in political pub- 
 lication, I conceive to be founded in the peculiar nature of the British 
 constitution, and to follow directly from the contract on which the 
 British government hath been placed by the Revolution. By the 
 British constitution, the power of the state is a trust, committed by 
 the people, upon certain conditions ; by the violation of which, it 
 maybe abdicated by those who hold, and resumed by those who con- 
 ferred it. The real security, therefore, of the British sceptre, is, the 
 sentiment and opinion of the people, and it is, consequently, their 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 397 
 
 duty to observe the coatluct of the government ; and it is the privi- 
 lege of every man to give them full and just information upon that 
 important subject. Hence the liberty of the press is inseparably 
 twined with the liberty of the people. 
 
 The press is the great public monitor : its duty is that of the his- 
 torian and the witness, that " nil falsi audeat, nil veri non audeat 
 dicere ; " that its horizon shall extend to the farthest verge and limit 
 of truth ; that it siiall speak truth to the king in tbe hearing of the 
 people, and to the people in the hearing of the king ; that it shall not 
 perplex either the one or the other with false alarm, lest it lose its 
 characteristic veracity, and become an unheeded warner of real dan- 
 ger ; lest it should vainly warn them of that sin, of which the inevi- 
 table consequence is death. This, gentlemen, is the great privilege 
 upon which you are to decide ; and I have detained you the longer, 
 because of the late change of the law, and because of some observa- 
 tions that have been made, which I shall find it necessary to com- 
 pare with the principles I have now laid down. 
 
 And now, gentlemen, let us come to the immediate subject of the 
 trial, as it is brought before you, by the charge in the indictment, to 
 which it ought to have been confined ; and also, as it is presented to 
 you by the statement of the learned counsel who has taken a much 
 wider range than the mere limits of the accusation, and has endeav- 
 ored to force upon your consideration extraneous and irrelevant facts, 
 for reasons which it is not my duty to explain. 
 
 The indictment states simply that Mr. Finnerty has published a 
 false and scandalous libel upon the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, tend- 
 ing to bring his government into disrepute, and to alienate the affec- 
 tions of the people ; and one would have expected, that, without 
 stating any other matter, the counsel for the crown would have gone 
 directly to the proof of this allegation ; but he has not done so ; he 
 has gone to a most extraordinary length, indeed, of preliminary 
 observation, and an allusion to facts, and sometimes an assertion of 
 facts, at which, I own, I was astonished, until I saw the drift of 
 these allusions and assertions. Whether you have been fairly dealt 
 with by him, or are now honestly dealt with by me, you must be 
 judges. 
 
 He has been pleased to say, that this prosecution is brought against 
 this letter signed " Marcus," merely as a part of what he calls a sys- 
 
398 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tem of attack upon the government, by the paper called " The Press." 
 As to this, I will only ask you whether you are fairly dealt with? 
 whether it is fair treatment to men upon their oaths, to insinuate to 
 them, that the general character of a newspaper (and that general 
 character founded merely upon the assertion of the jirosecutor), is to 
 have any influence upon their minds, when they are to judge of a 
 particular publication? I will only ask you, what men you must bo 
 supposed to be, when it is thought, that even in a court of justice, 
 and with the eyes of the nation upon you, you can be the dupes of 
 that trite and exploded expedient, so scnndalous of late in this coun- 
 try, of raising a vulgar and mercenary cry against whatever man, or 
 whatever principle, it is thought necessary to put down ; and I shall, 
 therefore, merely leave it to your own pride to suggest upon ^^hat 
 foundation it could be hoped, that a senseless clamor of that kind 
 could be echoed back by the yell of a jury upon their oaths. I trust 
 you see that this has nothing to do with the question. 
 
 Gentlemen of the jury, other matters have been mentioned which 
 I must repeat for the same purpose ; that of showing you that they 
 have nothing to do with the question. The learned counsel has been 
 pleased to say, that he comes forward in this prosecution as the real 
 advocate for the liberty of the press, and to protect a mild and a 
 merciful government from its licentiousness; and he has been 
 pleased to add, that the constitution ^caii never be lost while its free- 
 dom remains, and that its licentiousness alone can destroy that free- 
 dom. As to that, gentlemen, he might as well have said, tliat there 
 is only one mortal disease of which a man can die : I can die the 
 death inflicted by tyranny ; and when he comes forward to extin- 
 guish this paper, in the ruin of the printer, by a state prosecution, 
 in order to prevent it from dying of licentiousness, you must judge 
 how candidly he is treating you, both in the foct and in the reason- 
 ing. Is it in Ireland, gentlemen, that we are told licentiousness is 
 the only disease that can be mortal to the press ? Has he heard of 
 nothing else that has been fatal to the freedom of publication ? I 
 know not whether the printer of the "Northern Star "may have heard 
 of such things in his captivity ; but I know that his wife and chil- 
 dren are well apprised that a press may be destroyed in the open 
 day, not by its own licentiousness, but by the licentiousness of a 
 military force. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 399 
 
 As to the sincerity of the declaration, that the state has prosecuted, 
 in order to assert the freedom of the press, it starts a train of 
 thought — of melancholy retrospect and direful prospect — to which 
 I did not think the learned counsel would have wished you to com- 
 mit your minds. It leads you naturally to reflect at what times, 
 from what motives, and with what conscquenc^cs, the government 
 has displayed its patriotism, by prosecutions of this sort. As to the 
 motives, does history give you a single instance in which the state 
 has been provoked to these conflicts, except by the fear of truth and 
 by the love of vengeance? Have you ever seen the rulers of any 
 country bring forward a prosecution from motives of filial piety, for 
 libels upon their departed ancestoi's ? Do you read that Elizabeth 
 directed any of those state prosecutions against the libels which the 
 divines of her times had written against her CathoUc sister, or 
 against the other libels which the same gentlemen had written against 
 her Protestant father? No, gentlemen, we read of no such thing; 
 but we know she did bring forward a prosecution from motives of 
 personal resentment ; and we know that a jury was found, time- 
 serving and mean enough to give a verdict which she was ashamed 
 to carry into effect. 
 
 I said the learned counsel drew you back to the times that have 
 been marked by these miseraljle conflicts. I see you turn your 
 thmights to the reign of the second James. I see you turn your 
 eyes to those pages of governmental abandonment, of popular deg- 
 radation, of expiring liberty, of merciless and sanguinary persecu- 
 tion : to that miserable period, in which the fallen and abject state 
 of man might have been almost an argument in the mouth of the 
 atheist and the blasphemer, against the existence of an all-just and 
 all-wise First Cause ; if the glorious era of the Revolution that fol- 
 lowed it had not refuted the impious infei'ence, by showing that if 
 a man descends, it is not in his own proper motion ; that it is with 
 labor and v/ith pain ; that he can continue to sink only until, by the 
 force and pressure of the descent, the spring of his immortal faculties 
 acquires that recuperative energy and effort that hurries him as 
 many miles aloft ; that he sinks but to rise again. It is at that 
 period that the state seeks for shelter in the destruction of the press ; 
 it is in a period like that, that the tyrant prepares for an attack upon 
 the people, by destroying the liberty of the press ; by taking away 
 
400 TREASURY OB^ ELOQUENCE. 
 
 that sliield of wisdom and of virtue behind which the people are 
 iuviilnei-ablc ; in whose pure and polished convex, ere the lifted blow 
 has fallen, he beholds his own imajje, and is tui'ned into stone. It 
 is at those periods that the honest man dares not speak, because 
 truth is too dreadful to be told ; it is then humanity has no eai'S, 
 because humanity has no tongue. It is then the proud man scorns 
 to speak, but, like a physician baffled by the wayward excesses of a 
 dying patient, retires indignantly from the bed of an unhappy 
 wretch, whose ear is too fastidious to bear the sound of wholesome 
 advice, whose palate is too debauched to bear the salutary bitter of 
 the medicine that might redeem him ; and therefore leaves him to 
 the felonious piety of the slaves that talk to him of life, and strip 
 him before he is cold. 
 
 I do not care, gentlemen, to exhaust too much of your attention, 
 by following this subject through the last century with much minute- 
 ness ; but the facts are too recent in your mind not to show you, 
 that the liberty of the press and the liberty of the people sink and 
 rise together ; that the liberty of speaking and the liberty of acting 
 have shared exactly the same fate. You must have observed in 
 England, that their fate has been the same in the successive vicissi- 
 tudes of their late depression ; and sorry I am to add, that this 
 country has exhibited a melancholy proof of their inseparable des- 
 tiny, through the various and fitful stages of deterioration, down to 
 the period of their final extinction, when the constitution has given 
 place to the sword, and the only printer in Ireland who dares to 
 speak for the people is now in the dock. 
 
 Gentlemen, the learned counsel has made the real subject of this 
 prosecution so small a ])art of his statement, and has led you into so 
 wide a range — certainly as necessary to the object, as inapplicable 
 to the subject of this prosecution — that I trust you will think me 
 excusable in having somewhat followed his example. Glad am I to 
 find that I have the authority of the same example far coming at last 
 to the subject of this trial. I agree with the learned counsel that the 
 charge made against the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland is that of having 
 grossly and inhumanly abused the royal prerogative of mercy, of 
 which the King is only the trustee for the benefit of the people. 
 The facts are not controverted. It has been asserted that their truth 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 401 
 
 or falsehood is indifferent, and they arc shortly these, as they appear 
 in this publication. 
 
 William Orr was indicted for having administered the oath of a 
 United Irishman. Every man now knows what the oath is : that it 
 is simply an engagement, first, to promote a brotherhood of affec- 
 tion among men of all religious distinctions ; secondly, to labor for 
 the attainment of a parliamentary reform ; and thirdly, an obligation 
 of secrecy, which was added to it when the convention law made it 
 criminal and punishable to meet by any public delegation foi- that 
 purpose. 
 
 After remaining upwards of a year in gaol, Mr. Orr was brought 
 to his trial ; was prosecuted by the state ; was sworn against l)y a 
 common informer of the name of Whcatly, who himself had taken 
 the obligation ; and was convicted under the Insurrection Act, 
 which makes the administering such an obligation felony of death. 
 The jury recommended Mr. Orr to mercy, and the judge, with a 
 humanity becoming his character, transmitted the recommendation 
 to the noble prosecutor in this case. Three of the jurors msKle 
 solemn affidavit in court, that liquor had been conveyed into their 
 box ; that they were brutally threatened by some of their fellow- 
 jurors with criminal prosecution if they did not find the prisoner 
 guilty ; and that under the impression of those threats, and worn 
 down by watching and intoxication, they had given a verdict of 
 guilty against him, though they believed him in their consciences to 
 be innocent. That further inquiries were made, which ended in a 
 discovery of the infamous life and character of the informer ; that a 
 respite was therefore sent once, and twice, and thrice, to give time, 
 as Mr. Attorney-General has stated, for his Excellency to consider 
 whether mercy could be extended to him or not ; and that with a 
 knowledge of all these circumstances, his Excellency did finally de- 
 termine that mercy should not be extended to him ; and that he was 
 accordingly executed upon that verdict. 
 
 Of this publication, which the indictment charges to be fiilse and 
 seditious, Mr. Attorney-General is pleased to say, that the design of 
 it is to bring the courts of justice into contempt. As to this point 
 ■of fact, gentlemen, I beg to set you right. 
 
 To the administration of justice, so far as it relates to the judges, 
 this publication has not even an allusion in any part mentioned in 
 
402 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 this indictment; it relates to a department of justice, that cannot 
 begin until the duty of the judge closes. Sorry should I be, that, 
 with respect to this unfortunate man, any censure should be flung on 
 those judges who presided at the trial, with the mildness and temper 
 that became them upon so awful an occasion as the trial of life and 
 death. Sure am I, that if they had been charged with inhumanity 
 or injustice, and if they had condescended at all to prosecute the re- 
 viler, they would not have come forward in the face of the public to 
 say, as has been said this day, that it was immaterial whether the 
 charge was true or not. Sure I am, their first object would have 
 been to show that it was false, and readily should I have laeen an 
 eye-witness of the fact, to have discharged the debt of ancient friend- 
 shiji, of private respect, and of pul)lic dut}^ and upon my oath to 
 have repelled the falsehood of such an imputation. 
 
 Upon this subject, gentlemen, the presence of those venerable 
 judges restrains what I might otherwise have said, nor should I have- 
 named them at all, if I had not been forced to do so, and merely to 
 imdeceive you, if you have been made to believe their characters to 
 have any community of cause whatever with the Lord Lieutenant of 
 Ireland. To him alone it is confined, and against him the charge is 
 made, as strongly, I suppose, as the writer could find words to ex- 
 press it, that the Viceroy of Ireland has cruelly abused the preroga- 
 tive of royal mei'cj'', in suffering a man under such circumstances to 
 perish like a common malefactor. For this Mr. Attorney-General 
 calls for your conviction as a false and scandalous libel ; and after 
 stating himself every fact that I have repeated to you, either from 
 his statement, or from the evidence, he tells you, that you ought to 
 find it false and scandalous, though he almost in words admits that 
 it is not false, and has resisted the admission of the evidence by 
 which we offered to prove every word of it to be true. 
 
 And here, gentlemen, give me leave to remind you of the j^arties 
 before j'ou. 
 
 The travei'ser is a printer, who follows that profession for bread, 
 and who at a time of great public misery and terror, when the people 
 are restrained by law from debating under any delegated form ; when 
 the few constituents that we have are prevented by force from meet- 
 ing in their own persons, to deliberate or to petition ; when every 
 other newspaper in Ireland is put down by force, or j^urchased by 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 403 
 
 the administration (though here, gentlemen, perhaps I ought to beg 
 your pardon for stating without authority ; I recollect when we at- 
 tempted to examine as to the number of newspapers in the pay of 
 the castle, that the evidence was objected to) ; at a season like this, 
 Mr. Finnerty has had the courage, perhaps the folly, to print the 
 publication in question, for no motive under heaven of malice or 
 vengeance, but in the mere duty which he owes to his family, and to 
 the public. 
 
 His prosecutor is the King's minister in Ireland ; in that character 
 does the learned gentleman mean to say, that his conduct is not a 
 fair subject of public observation? Where does he find his authority 
 for that in the law or practice of the sister country ? Have the vir- 
 tues, or the exalted station, or the general love of his people )ire- 
 served the sacred person even of the royal master of the prosecutor, 
 from the asperity and intemperance of public censure, unfounded as- 
 it ever must be, with any personal respect to his Majesty, in justice- 
 or in truth? Have the gigantic abilities of Mr. Pitt, have the more 
 gigantic talents of his great antagonist, Mr. Fox, protected either of 
 them from the insolent familiarity, and for aught we know, the in- 
 justice with which writers have treated them ? What latitude of 
 invective has the King's minister escaped upon the subject of the 
 present war?. Is there an epithet of contumel}', or of reproach, that 
 hatred or that fancy could suggest, that is not publicly lavished upon 
 them? Do you not find the words, advocate of despotism, robber 
 of the puljlic treasure, murderer of the King's subjects, debaucher of 
 the public morality, degrader of the constitution, tarnisher of the 
 British empire, by frequency of use lose all meaning whatsoever, 
 and dwindle into terms, not of any peculiar reproach, but of ordinary 
 appellation ? 
 
 And why, gentlemen, is this permitted in that country? I'll tell 
 you Avhy ; because in that country they ai-e yet wise enough to see 
 that the measures of the state are the proper subject for the freedom 
 of the press ; that the principles relating to personal slander do not 
 apply to rulers or to ministers ; that to publish an attack upon a 
 public minister, without any regard to truth, but merely because of 
 its tendency to a breach of the peace, would be ridiculous in the 
 extreme. What breach of the peace, gentlemen, I pray you, in such 
 a case? Is it the tendency of such publications to provoke Mr. 
 
404 t)F ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Pitt or Mr. Duadas to break the head of the writer, if they should 
 happen to meet him? No, gentlemen ; in that country this freedom 
 is exercised, because the people feel it to be their right ; and it is 
 wisely suffered to pass bj' the state, from a consciousness that it 
 would be vain to oppose it ; a consciousness confirmed by the event 
 of .every incautious experiment. It is suffered to pass from a con- 
 viction that, in a court of justice at least, the bulwarks of the consti- 
 tution will not be surrendered to the state ; and that the intended 
 victim, whether clothed in the humble guise of honest industry, or 
 decked in the honors of genius, and virtue, and philosophy, whether 
 a Hardy or a Tookc, will find certain protection in the honesty and 
 spirit of an English jury. ' 
 
 But, gentlemen, I suppose Mr. Attorney-General will scarcely 
 wish to carry his doctrine altogether so fiir. Indeed, I remember, 
 he declared himself a most zealous advocate for the liberty of the 
 press. I may, therefore, even according to him, presume to make 
 some observations on tiie conduct of the existing government. I 
 should wish to know how far he supposes it to extend ; is it to the 
 composition of lampoons and madrigals, to be sung down the grates 
 by ragged ballad-mongers to kitchen-maids and footmen? I will not 
 suppose .that he means to confine it to the ebullitions of Billing.sgate, 
 to those cataracts of ribaldry and scurrilitj', that are daily spouting 
 upon the miseries of our wretched fellow-sufferers, and the unavail- 
 ing efforts of those who have vainly labored in their cause. I will 
 not suppose that ho confines it to the poetic license of a birthday 
 ode ; the Laureat would not use such language ! In which case I 
 do not entirely agree with him, that the truth or the falsehood is as 
 perfectly immaterial to the law, as it is to the Laureat; as perfectly 
 unrestrained by the law of the land, as it is by any law of decency 
 or shame, of modesty or decorum. 
 
 But as to the privilege of censure or blame, I am sorry that the 
 learned gentleman has not favoi-ed you with his notion of the liberty 
 of the press. 
 
 Suppose an Irish Viceroy acts a very little absurdly, may thc» 
 press venture to be respectfully comical upon that absurdity? Tho 
 learned counsel does not, at least in terms, give a negative to that. 
 But let me treat you honestly, and go further, to a more material 
 point ; suppose an Irish Vicero}' does an act that brings scandal upon 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 4()5 
 
 his muster, that fills the mind of a reasonable man with the fear of 
 approaching despotism ; that leaves no hope to the people of pre- 
 serving themselves and their children from chains, but in common 
 confederacy for common safety. "What is that honest man in that 
 case to do ? 
 
 I am sorry the right honorable advocate for the liberty of the press 
 has not teld yon his opinion, at least in any express words. I will 
 therefore venture to give you my far himibler thoughts upon the 
 subject. 
 
 I think an honest man ought to tell the people frankly and boldly 
 of their peril ; and I must say I can imagine no villainy greater than 
 that of his holding a traitorous silence at such a crisis, except the 
 villainy and baseness of prosecuting him, or of finding him guilty 
 for such an honest discharge of his pul)lic duty. And I found myself 
 on the known principle of the revolution of England, namely, that 
 the crown itself may be abdicated by certain abuses of the trust 
 reposed ; and that there are possible excesses of arbitrarj^ power, 
 which it is not only the right, but the bounden duty, of every honest 
 man to resist, at the risk of his fortune and his life. 
 
 Now, gentlemen, if this reasoning be admitted, and it cannot be 
 denied ; if there be any possible event in which the people are 
 obliged to look only to themselves, and are justified in doing so ; 
 can you be so absurd as to say, that it is lawful for the people to act 
 upon it when it unfortunately does arrive, but that it is criminal iu 
 any man to tell them that the miserable event has actually arrived, 
 oris imminently approaching? Far am I, gentlemen, from insinu- 
 ating that (extreme as it is) our misery has been matured into any 
 deplorable crisis of this kind, from which I pray that the Almighty 
 God may forever preserve us ! But I am putting my principles 
 upon the strongest ground, and most favorable to my opponents, 
 namely, that it never can be criminal to say anything of government 
 but what is fiilse ; and I put this in the extreme, in order to demon- 
 strate to you, a fortiori, that the privilege of speaking truth to the 
 people, which holds in the last extremity, must also obtain in every 
 stage of infei'ior importance ; and that, however a court may have 
 decided, before the late act, that the truth was immaterial in case of 
 libel, since that act, no honest jury can be governed by such prin- 
 ciple. 
 
406 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Be pleased now, gentlemen, to consider the grounds upon which 
 this publication is called a libel, and criminal. 
 
 Mr. Attorney-General tells you it tends to excite sedition and in- 
 surrection. Let me again remind you, that the truth of this charge 
 is not denied by the noble prosecutor. What is it, then, that tends 
 to excite sedition and insurrection ? " The act that is charged upon 
 the prosecutor, and is not attempted to be denied? " And, gracious 
 God ! gentlemen of the jury, is the public statement of tiie king's 
 representative this, " I have done a deed that must fill the mind of 
 every feeling or thinking man with horror and indignation; that 
 must alienate every man that knows it from the king's government, 
 and endanger the separation of this distracted empire : the traverser 
 has had the guilt of publishing this fact, which I myself acknowledge, 
 and I pray you to find him guilty ? " Is this the case which the Lord 
 Lieutenant of Ireland brings forward? Is this the principle for 
 which he ventures, at a dreadful crisis like the present, to contend 
 in a court of justice ? Is this the picture which he wishes to hold out 
 of himself to the justice and humanity of his own countrj^men? Is 
 this the history which he wishes to be read by the poor Irishmen of 
 the South and of the North, by the sister nation, and the common 
 enemy ? 
 
 With the profoundest respect, permit me humbly to defend his 
 Excellency, even against his own opinion. The guilt of this publi- 
 cation he is pleased to think consists in this, that it tends to insur- 
 rection. Upon what can such a fear be supported? After the 
 multitudes that have perished in this unhappy nation within the last 
 three years, unhappiness which has been borne with a patience not 
 paralleled in the history of nations, can any man suppose that the 
 fate of a single individual could lead to resistance or insurrection? 
 
 But suppose that it might, what then ought to be tlae conduct of 
 an honest man? Should it not be to apprize the government of the 
 country and the Viceroy — you will drive the people to madness, if 
 you persevere in such bloody councils ; you will alienate the Irish 
 nation ; you will distract the common force ; and you will invite the 
 common enemy? Should not an honest man say to the people, the 
 measure of your afiliction is great, but you need not resort for 
 remedy to any desperate expedients. If the King's minister is 
 defective in humanity or wisdom, his royal master, your beloved 
 
JOHN P. CURUAN. 407 
 
 sovereign, is abounding in both. At such a moment, can you be so 
 senseless as not to feel that any one of you ought to hold such 
 language ; or is it possible you could be so infatuated, as to punish 
 the man who was honest enough to hold it ? — or is it possible that 
 you could bring yourselves to say to your country, that at such a 
 season the press ought to sleep upon its post, or to act like the 
 perfidious watchman on his round, that sees the villain wrenching the 
 door, or the flames bursting from the windows, while the inhabitant 
 is wrapped in sleep, and cries out that " 'tis past past five o'clock, 
 the morning is fair, and all well ! " 
 
 " On this part of the case I shall put only one question to you. I 
 do not aflect to say it is similar in all its points ; I do not affect to 
 compare the humble foi'tunes of Mr. Orr with the sainted names of 
 Kussell or Sidney ; still less am I willing to find any likeness between 
 the pi'esent period and the year 1688. But I will put a question to 
 you, completely parallel in pi-inciple : When that unhappy and 
 misguided monarch had shed the sacred blood, which their noble 
 hearts had matured into a fit cement of revolution, if any honest 
 Englishman had been brought to trial for daring to proclaim to the 
 world his abhorrence of such a deed, what would you have thought 
 of the English jury that could have said, wo know in our hearts what 
 he said was true and honest, but we will say, upon our oaths, that 
 it was false and criminal ; and we will, by that base subserviency, 
 add another item to the catalogue of public wrongs, and another 
 argument for the necessity of an appeal to heaven for redress ? 
 
 Gentlemen, I am perfectly aware that what I say may be easily 
 misconstrued ; but if you listen to me, with the same feirness that I 
 address you, I cannot be misunderstood. When I show you the full 
 extent of your political rights and remedies ; when I answer those 
 slanderers of British liberty, who degrade the monai'ch into a despot, 
 who pervert the steadfastness of law into the waywardness of will ; 
 when I show you the inestimable stores of political wealth, so deai'Iy 
 acquired by our ancestors, and so solemnly bequeathed ; and when I 
 show you how much of that precious inheritance has yet survived all 
 the prodigality of their posterity, I am far from saying that I stand 
 in need of it all upon the present occasion. No, gentlemen, far am 
 I indeed from such a sentiment. No man more deeply than myself 
 deplores the present melancholy state of our unhappy country. 
 
408 TREASUIIY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Neither does any nian more fervently wish for the return of peace 
 and ti'anquillity, through the natural channels of mercy and of justice. 
 I have seen too much of force and of A'iolence to hope much good 
 from the continuance of theui on the one side or the retaliation of 
 them on another. I liave of late seen too much of political rebuild- 
 ing, not to have observed, that to demolish is not the shortest way 
 to repai^. It is with pain and anguish that I should search for the 
 miserable right of breaking ancient ties, or going in quest of new 
 relations, or untried adventures. No, gentlemen, the case of my 
 client rests not upon these sad privileges of despair. I trust, that 
 as to the fact, namely, the intention of exciting insurrection, you 
 must see it cannot be found in this publication ; that it is the mere 
 idle, unsupported imputation of malice, or panic, or falsehood. And 
 that as to the law, so far has he been from transgressing the limits of 
 the constitution, that whole regions lie between him and those limits, 
 which he has not trod, and which I pray to heaven it may never be 
 necessaiy for an}'' of us to tread. 
 
 Gentlemen, Mr. Attorney-General has been pleased to open another 
 battery upon this publication, which I do trust I shall silence, unless 
 I flatter mj^self too much iu supposing that hitherto mj' resistance 
 has not been utterly unsuccessful. 
 
 He abuses it for the foul and insolent familiarity of its address. I 
 do clearly imderstand his idea ; he considers the freedom of the 
 press to be the license of offering that paltry adulation which no man 
 ought to stoop to utter or to hear ; he supposes the freedom of the 
 press ought to be like the freedom of a king's jester, who, instead of 
 reproving the faults of wliich majesty ought to be ashamed, is base 
 and cunning enough, under the mask of servile and adulatory censure, 
 to stroke down and pamper those vices of which it is foolish enough 
 to be vain. He would not have the press presume to tell the Viccroj', 
 that the prerogative of mercy is a trust for the benefit of the subject, 
 and not a gaudy feather stuck into the diadem to shake in the wind, 
 and by the waving of the gorgeous plumage to amuse the vanity of 
 the wearer. He would not have it to say to him, that the discretion 
 of the crown as to mercy, is like the discretion of a court of justice 
 as to law ; and that iu the one case, as well as the other, wherever 
 the propi'iety of the exercise of it appears, it is equally a matter of 
 right. He would have the press all fierceness to the people, and all 
 
JOHN P. CURR.VN". 40^ 
 
 sycophancy to power ; he would consider the mad and frenetic out- 
 rages of authority, like the awful and inscrutable dispensations of 
 Providence, and say to the unfeeling and despotic spoiler, in the 
 blasphemed and insulted language of religious resignation, " the Lord 
 hath given, and the Lord hath taken away, blessed be the name of 
 the Lord." 
 
 But let me condense the generality of the learned gentleman's in- 
 vective into questions that you can conceive. Does he mean that the 
 air of this publication is rustic and uncourtly? Does he mean, that 
 when "Marcus" presumed to ascend the steps of the castle, and to 
 address the Vicero}', he did not turn out his toes as he ought to have 
 done? But, gentlemen, you are not a jury of daiicing-masters ; or 
 does the learned gentleman mean that the language is coarse ||kI 
 vulgar? If this be his complaint, my client has but a poor advo- 
 cate. 
 
 I do not pretend to be a mighty grammarian, or a formidable critic ; 
 but I v.'oukl beg leave to suggest to you, in serious humility, that a 
 free press can be supported only by the ardor of men who feel the 
 prompting sting of real or supposed capacity ; who write from the 
 enthusiasm of virtue, or the ambition of praise, and over whom, if 
 you exercise the rigor of a grammatical censorship, you will inspire 
 them with as mean an opinion of your integrity as of your wisdom, 
 and inevitably drive them from their post ; and if you do, rel}' upon 
 it, you Avill reduce the spirit of jiublication, and with it the press of 
 this country, to what it for a long interval has been — the register of 
 births, and fairs, and funerals, and the general abuse of the people 
 and their friends. 
 
 Gentlemen, in order to bring this charge of insolence and vulgarity 
 to the test, let me ask you, whether you know of any language which 
 could have adequately described the idea of mercy denied, where it 
 ought to have been granted ; or of any phrase vigorous enough to 
 convey the indignation which an honest man would have felt upon 
 such a subject ? 
 
 Let me bog of you for a moment to suppose that any one of you 
 had been the writer of this very severe expostulation with the Vice- 
 roy, and that you had been the witness of the whole progress of this 
 never-to-be-forgotten catastrophe. 
 
 Let me supjiose that you had known the charge upon which Mr. 
 
410 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Orr was apprehended — the charge of abjuring that bigotry which 
 tad torn and disgraced his country — of pledging himself to restore 
 the people of his country to their place in the constitution — and of 
 binding himself never to be the betrayer of his fellow-laborers in that 
 enterprise ; that you had seen him upon that charge removed from 
 his industry, and confined in a gaol ; that through the slow and lin- 
 gering progress of twelve tedious months you had seen him confined 
 in a dungeon, shut out from the common use of air and of his own 
 limbs ; that day after day you had marked the unhappy captive 
 cheered by no sound but the cries of his family, or the clinking 
 of chains ; that you had seen him at last brought to his trial ; that 
 you had seen the vile and perjured informer dej^osing against his life ; 
 th^you had seen the drunken, and worn-out, and ten-ified jury give 
 in a verdict of death ; that you had seen the same jury when their 
 returning sobriety had brought back their conscience, prostrate them- 
 selves before the humanity of the bench, and pray that the mercy of 
 the crown might save their characters fi'om the reproach of an invol- 
 untary crime, their consciences from the torture of etenial self-con- 
 demnation, and their souls from the indelible stain of innocent blood. 
 Let me suppose that you had seen the respite given, and that con- 
 trite and honest reconunendation transmitted to that scat ^v'here mercy 
 was presumed to dwell— that new and before unheard-of crimes are 
 discovered against tlie informer — that the royal mercy seems to re- 
 lent, and that a new respite is sent to the prisoner — that time is 
 taken, as the learned counsel for the crown has expressed it, to see 
 whether mercy could be extended or not ! — that after that period of 
 lingering deliberation passed, a third respite is transmitted — that 
 the unhappy captive himself feels the cheering hope of being restored 
 to a family that he had adoi-ed, to a character that he had never 
 stained, and to a country that he had ever loved — that you had seen 
 his wife and children upon their knees, giving those tears to grati- 
 tude, which their locked and frozen hearts could not give to anguish 
 and despair, and imploring the blessings of Eternal Providence upon 
 Lis head, who had gi-aciously spared the father, and restored him to 
 his children — that you had seen the olive branch sent into his little 
 ark, but no sign that the waters had subsided. 
 
 "Alas! 
 Kor wife, nor children more shall he behold — 
 Nor friends, nor sacred home ! " 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 411 
 
 No seraph mercy unbars his dungeon, and leads him forth to h'ght 
 and life ; but the minister of death hurries him to the scene of suf- 
 fering and of shame, where, unmoved by the hostile array of artillery 
 and armed men collected together, to secure, or to insult, or to 
 disturb him, he dies with a solenm declaration of his innocence, and 
 utters his last breath, in a prayer for the liljerty of his country. 
 
 Let me now ask you, if any of you had addressed the public ear 
 upon so foul and monstrous a subject, in what language would you 
 have conveyed the feelings of horror and indignation? Would you 
 have stooped to the meanness of qualified complaint? wovild you 
 have checked your feelings to search for courtly and gaudy language ? 
 would you have been meap enough — but I entreat your forgiveness 
 — I do not think meanly of you. Had I thought so meanly of you 
 I could not suffer my mind to commune Avith you as it has done ; 
 had I thought you that base and vile instrument, attuned by hope 
 and by fear into discord and falsehood, from whose vulgar string no 
 groan of suffering could vibrate, no voice of integrity or honor could 
 speak, let me honestly tell you, I should have scorned to fling my 
 hand across it — I should have left it to a fitter minstrel. If I do 
 not, therefore, grossly err in my opinion of you, I could use no 
 language upon such a subject as this, that must- not lag behind the 
 rapidity of your feelings, and that would not disgrace those feelings, 
 if it attempted to describe them. 
 
 Gentlemen, I am not unconscious that the learned counsel for the 
 crown seemed to address you with a confidence of a very different 
 kind ; he seemed to expect from you a kind and respectful sympathy 
 ■with the feelings of the Castle, and with the griefs of chided authority. 
 Perhaps, gentlemen, he may know you better than I do. If he does, 
 he has spoken to you as he ought ; he has been i-ight in telling you 
 that if the reprobation of this writer is weak, it is because his genius 
 could not make it stronger; he has been right in telling you, that 
 his language has not been braided and festooned as elegantly as it 
 might — that he has not pinched the miserable plaits of his phrase- 
 ology, nor placed his patches and feathers with that correctness of 
 millinery which became so exalted a person. 
 
 If you agree with him, gentlemen of the jury — if you think that 
 the man who ventures, at the hazard of his own life, to rescue from 
 the deep the drowning honor of his country, 3'ou must not presume 
 
412 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 upon the guilty familiarity of plucking it uj:) by the locks. I have 
 no more to say ; do a courteous thing. Upright and honest jurors, 
 find a civil and obliging verdict against the printer ! And when 
 you have done so, march through the ranks of your fellow-citizens 
 to 3'ovir own homes, and bear their looks as j'ou pass along. Retire 
 to the bosom of your families and your children, and when you are 
 13i"esiding over the morality of the parental board, tell those infants, 
 who are to be the future men of Ireland, the history of this day. 
 Form their young minds by your precepts, and confirm tliose pre- 
 cepts by your own example — teach them how discreetly allegiance 
 may be peijured on the table, or loyalty be foi'sworn in the jury- 
 box ; and when you have done so, tell them the story of Orr — tell 
 them of his captivity, of his children, of his crime, of his hopes, of 
 his disappointments, of his courage, and of his death; and when 
 you find your little hearers hanging from your lips — when you see 
 their eyes overflow with sympathy and sorrow — and their 3'oung 
 hearts bursting Avith the pangs of anticipated orphanage — tell them 
 that you had the boldness and the justice to stigmatize the monster 
 who had dared to publish the transaction ! 
 
 Gentlemen, I believe I told you befoi-e, that the conduct of the 
 Viceroy was a small part, indeed, of the subject of this trial. If 
 the vindication of his mere personal character had been, as it ought 
 to have been, the sole object of this prosecution, I should have felt 
 the most respectful regret at seeing a person of his high considera- 
 tion come forward in a court of pnljlic justice in one and the same 
 breath to admit the truth, and to demand the punishment of a pub- 
 lication like the present, to prevent the chance he might have had of 
 such an accusation being disbelieved, and, by a prosecution like this,, 
 to give to the passing stricture of a newspaper that life and body, 
 and action and reality, to prove it to all mankind, and make the- 
 record of it indelible. Even as it is, I do own I feel the utmost 
 concern that his name should have been soiled by being mixed in a 
 question of which it is the mere pretext and scapegoat. 
 
 Mr. Attorney-General was too wise to state to you the real ques- 
 tion, or the object which he wished to be answered b}' j'our verdict. 
 Do you remember that he was pleased to say that this publication 
 was a base and foul misrepresentation of the virtue and wisdom of 
 the government, and a false and audacious statement to the world, 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 413 
 
 that the King's government in Ireland was base enough to pay in- 
 formers for taking away the lives of the people? When I heard this 
 statement to-day, I doubted whether you were aware of its tendency 
 or not. It is now necessary that I should explain it to you more at 
 large. 
 
 You cannot l)e ignorant of the great conflict between prerogative 
 and privilege which hath convulsed the country for the last fifteen 
 years ; when I say privilege, j'ou cannot suppose that I mean the 
 privilege of the House of Commons, — I mean the privileges of the 
 people. 
 
 You are no strangers to the various modes by which the people 
 labored to approach their object. Delegations, conventions, re- 
 monstrances, resolutions, petitions to the parliament, petitions to 
 the throne. 
 
 It might not be decorous in this i)Iace to state to you, with any 
 sharpness, the various modes of resistance that were employed on 
 the other side ; but you, all of you, seem old enough to remember 
 the variety of acts of parliament that have been made, by which the 
 people were deprived, session after session, of what they had sup- 
 posed to be tlie known and established fundamentals of the consti- 
 tution, the right of public debate, the right of public petition, the 
 right of bail, the right of trial, the right of arms for self-defence ; 
 until the last, even the relics of popular privilege became superseded 
 by a military force ; the press extinguished ; and the state found its 
 last entrenchment in the grave of the constitution. As little can you 
 be strangers to the tremendous confederations of hundreds of thou- 
 sands of your countrj'raen, of the nature and objects of which such 
 a variety of opinions have been propagated and entertained. 
 
 The writer of this letter presumed to censure the recall of Lord 
 Fitzwilliam, as well as the measures of the present Viceroy. Into 
 this subject I do not enter ; but you cannot yourselves forget that 
 the conciliatory measures of the former noble lord had produced an 
 almost miraculous unanimity in this country ; and much do I regret, 
 and sui-e I am that it is not without pain j'ou can reflect, how unfor- 
 tunately the conduct of his successor has terminated. His intentions 
 might have been the best ; I neither know them nor condemn them, 
 but their terrilde effects j'ou cannot be blind to. Every new act of 
 coercion has been followed by some new symptom of discontent, 
 
414 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 and ev,eiy new attack provoked some new paroxysm of r- sentment, 
 or some new combination of resistance. 
 
 In this deplorable state of affairs — convulsed and distracted 
 within, and menaced by a most formidable enemy from without — 
 it was thought that public safety might be found in union and con- 
 ciliation ; and repeated applications were made to the parliament of 
 this kingdom, for a calm enquiry into the complaints of the people. 
 These applications were made in vain. 
 
 Impressed by the same motives, Jlr. Fox brought the same sub- 
 ject l)efore the Commons of England, and ventured to ascribe the 
 jierilous state of Ireland to the severity of its government. Even 
 his stupendous al)ilities, excited by the liveliest sympathy with our 
 sufferings, and animated by the most ardent zeal to restore the 
 strength with the union of the empire, were repeatedly exerted 
 without success. The fact of discontent was denied — the fact of 
 coercion was denied — and the consequence was, the coercion be- 
 came more implacable, and the discontent more threatening and 
 irrecoucilable. 
 
 A similar application was made in the beginning of this session in 
 the Lords of Great Britain, by our illustrious countryman,* of whom 
 I do not wonder that my learned friend should have obsei'ved, how 
 much virtue can fling pedigree into the shade ; or how much the 
 transient honor of a body inherited from man, is obscured by the 
 lustre of an intellect derived from God. He, after being an eye- 
 witness of this country, presented the miserable picture of what he 
 had seen; and, to the astonishment of ever}^ man in Ireland, the 
 existence of those facts was ventured to be denied ; the conduct of 
 the Viceroy was justified and applauded; and the necessity of con- 
 tinuing that conduct was insisted upon as the only means of preserv- 
 ing the constitution, the peace and the prosperity of Ii'eland. The 
 moment the learned counsel had talked of this publication as a false 
 statement of the conduct of the government, and the condition of the 
 people, no man could be at loss to see that the awful question, which 
 had been dismissed from the Commons of Ireland, and from the 
 Lords and Commons of Great Britain, is now brought forward to 
 be tried by a side wind, and, in a coUateral way, liy a criminal 
 prosecution. 
 
 * Lord Moira. 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 4i5 
 
 The learned counsel has asserted that the paper which he prose- 
 cutes is only part of a system formed to misrepresent the state of 
 Ireland and the conduct of its government. Do you not, therefore, 
 discover that his object is to procure a verdict to sanction the Par- 
 liaments of both countries in refusing an enquiry into your griev- 
 ances? Let me ask yuu, then, are you prepared to say, upon your 
 oath, that those measures of coercion, which are daily practised, are 
 absolutely necessary and ought to be continued? It is not upon 
 Finnerty you are sitting in judgment ; but you are sitting in judg- 
 ment upon the lives and liberties of the inhabitants of more than 
 half of Ireland. You are to say that it is a foul proceeding to con- 
 demn the government of Ireland ; that it is a foul act, founded in 
 foul motives, and originating in falsehood and sedition ; that it is an 
 attack upon a government under which the people are prosperous and 
 happy ; that justice is administered with mercy ; that the statements 
 made in Great Britain are false — are the effusions of party or of dis- 
 content ; that all is mildness and tranquillity ; that there are no burn- 
 ings — no transportations ; that you never travel by the light of 
 conflagrations ; that the gaols are not crowded month after month, 
 from which prisoners are taken out, not f )r trial, but for embark- 
 ation ! These are the questions upon which, I say, you must virtually 
 decide. It is in vain that the counsel for the crown may tell you 
 that I am misrepresenting the case — that I am endeavoring to raise 
 false fears, and to take advantage of your passions — that the question 
 is, whether this paper be a libel or not — and that the circumstances 
 of the country have nothing to do with it. Such assertions must be 
 vain. The statement of the counsel for the crown has forced the 
 introduction of those important topics ; and I appeal to your own 
 hearts whether the country is misrepresented, and whether the gov- 
 ernment is misrepresented. 
 
 I tell you, therefore, gentlemen of the jury, it is not with respect 
 to Mr. Orr, or Mr. Finnerty, that your verdict is now sought. You 
 are called upon, on your oaths, to say, that the government is wise 
 and merciful — the people prosiDcrous and happy ; that military law 
 ought to be continued ; that the constitution could not with safety be 
 restored to Ireland ; and that the statements of a contrary import by 
 your advocates, in either country, are libellous and false. 
 
 I tell you these are the questions ; and I ask you, if you can have 
 
41G TREASURY OF EI-OQUENCE. 
 
 the front to give tlie expected answer in the face of a community Avho 
 know the country as well as you do? Let me ask you, how you 
 could reconcile with such a verdict, the gaols, the tenders, the gib- 
 bets, the conflagrations, the murders, the pi'oclamations that wc hear 
 of every day in the streets, and sec every day in the country? What 
 are the prosecutions of the learned counsel himself, circuit after cir- 
 cuit? Merciful God! what is the state of Ireland, and where shall 
 you find the wretched inhabitant of this land? You may find him, 
 perhaps, in a gaol, the only place of security — I had almost said of 
 ordinary habitation ! If j-ou do not find him there, you may sec him 
 flying with liis family from the flames of his own dwelling — lighted 
 to his dungeon by the conflagration of his hovel ; or you may find his 
 bones bleaching on the green fields of his countrj' ; or you may .find 
 him tossing on the surface of the ocean, and mingling his groans 
 with those tempests, loss savage than his persecutors, tliat drift him 
 to areturnless distance from his family and his home, without charge, 
 or trial, or sentence. Is this a foul misrepresentation? Or can you, 
 with these facts ringing in your ears, and staring in your face, say, 
 upon your oaths, they do not exist? You are called upon, in defi- 
 ance of shame, of truth, of honor, to deny the sufi'erings under 
 which you groan, and to flatter the persecution that tramples you 
 under foot. 
 
 Gentlemen, I am not accustomed to speak of circumstances of this 
 kind ; and though familiarized as I have been to them, when I como 
 to speak of them, my power fails me — my voice dies within me. I 
 am not able to call upon you. It is now I ought to have strength — 
 it is now I ought to have enei'gy and voice. But I have none ; I am 
 like the unfortunate state of the country — perhaps like you. This 
 is the time in which I ought to speak, if I can, or be dumb forever ; 
 in which, if you do not speak as you ought, you ought to be dumb 
 forever. 
 
 But the learned gentleman is further pleased to say, that the tra- 
 verser has charged the government with the encouragement of 
 informers. This, gentlemen, is another small fact that you are to 
 deny at the hazard of your souls, and upon the solemnity of your 
 oaths. You are upon your oaths to say to the sister country, that 
 the government of Ireland uses no such abominable instruments of 
 destruction as informers. Let me ask you honestly, what do you 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 417 
 
 feci, when in my hearing, when in the face of this andiencc, you are 
 called upon to give a verdict that every man of us, and every man of 
 you know, by the testimony of your own e3'es, to be utterly and 
 absolutely false ? I speak not now of the public proclamation for 
 informers, with a promise of secrecy, and of extravagant reward ; I 
 speak not of the fate of those horrid wretches who have been so often 
 transferred from the table to the dock, and from the docic to the 
 pillory; I speak of what your own eyes have seen, day after day, 
 during the course of this commission, from the box where you are 
 now sitting; the number of horrid miscreants, who acknowledged, 
 upon their oaths, th;it they had come from the seat of government — 
 from the very chambers of the Castle — where they had been worlvcd 
 upon, by the fear of death and the hope of compensation, to give evi- 
 dence against their fellows ; that the mild, tlac wholesome and merciful 
 councils of this government are holden over these catacombs of liv- 
 ing death, where the wretch that is buried a man, lies till his heart 
 has time to fester and dissolve, and is then dug up a witness ! 
 
 Is this a picture created by a hag-ridden fancy, or is it a fact? 
 Have you not seen him, after his resurrection from that region of 
 death and corruption, make his appearance upon the tal)le, the liv- 
 ing image of life and of death, and the supreme arbiter of both? 
 Have you not marked when he entered how the stormy wave of the 
 multitude retired at his approach? Have you not seen how the 
 human heart bowed to the supremacy of his power, in the undis- 
 scmljlcd homage of deferential horror? how his glance, like the 
 lightning of heaven, seemed to rive the body of the accused, and 
 mark it for the grave, while his voice warned the devoted wretch of 
 woe and death — a death which no innocence c;ui escape, no art 
 elude, no force resist, no antidote prevent. Tiiere was an antidote — 
 a. juror's oath 1 — but even that adamantine chain, tiiat bound the 
 integrity of man to the throne of eternal justice, is solved and molten 
 in the breath that issues from the informer's mouth ; conscience 
 swings trom her moorings, and the appalled and affrighted juror 
 consults his own safety in the surrender of the victim : — 
 
 " Et qUBC sibi quisque timebat, 
 Unius ill miscri csitium couversa tiilere." 
 
 Informers are worshipped in the temple of justice, even as the devil 
 
418 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 has been worshipped by Pagans and savages — even so in this wick- 
 ed country is the informer an object of judicial idolatry — even so 
 is he soothed by the music of human groans — even so is he placated 
 and incensed by the fumes and by the blood of human sacrifices. 
 
 Gentlemen, I feel I must have tired your patience ; lant I have 
 been forced into this length by the prosecutor, who has thought fit 
 to introduce those extraordinary topics, and to bring a question of 
 mere politics to trial, under the form of a criminal prosecution. I 
 cannot say I am surprised that this has been done, or that you 
 should be solicited by the same inducements, and from the same 
 motives, as if your verdict was a vote of approbation. I do not 
 wonder that the government of Ireland should stand appalled at the 
 state to whicli we are reduced. I wonder not that they should start 
 at the public voice, and labor to stifle or contradict it. I wonder 
 not that at this arduous crisis, Avhen the very existence of the empire 
 is at stake, and when its strongest and most precious limb is not 
 girt with the sword for battle, but pressed by the tourniquet for 
 amputation ; when tliey find the coldness of death already begun in 
 those extremities where it never ends ; that they are terrified at what 
 they have done, and wish to say to the surviving parties of that 
 empire, "they cannot say that we did it." I wonder not that they 
 should consider their conduct as no immaterial question for a court 
 of criminal jurisdiction, and wish anxiously, as on an inquest of 
 blood, for the kind acquittal of a friendly jury. 
 
 I wonder not that the}' should wish to close the chasm they have 
 opened, by flinging j-ou into the abyss. But trust me, my country- 
 men, you might perish in it, but you could not close it; trust me, if 
 it is yet possible to close it, it can be done only by truth and honor; 
 trust me, that such an effect could no more be wrought by the sacri- 
 fice of a jury, than by the sacrifice of Orr. 
 
 As a state measure, the one would be as unwise and unavailing as 
 the other ; but while you are yet upon the brink, while you are yet 
 visible, let me, before we part, remind you once more of your awful 
 situation. 
 
 You are upon a great forward ground, with the people at your 
 back, and the government in your front. You have neither the dis- 
 advantages nor the excuses of jurors a century ago. No, thank 
 God ! never was there a stronoer characteristic distinction between 
 
JOHN P. CURRAN. 419 
 
 those times, upon ■wbich no man can reflect without horror, and tho 
 present. You have seen this trial conducted with mildness and 
 joatience by the court. We have now no Jefferies, with scurvy and 
 vulgar conceits, to browbeat the prisoner and perplex his counsel. 
 Such has been the improvement of manners, and so calm the confi- 
 dence of integrity, that during the defence of accused persons, the 
 judges sit quietly, and show themselves worthy of their situation by 
 bearing, with a mild and merciful patience, the little extravagancies 
 of the bar, as you should bear with the little extravagancies of the 
 press. Let me then turn your eyes to that pattern of mildness in 
 the bench. The press is your advocate ; bear with its excess — bear 
 with everything but its bad intention. If it come as a villanous 
 slanderer, treat it as such ; but if it endeavor to raise the honor and- 
 glory of your country, remember that you reduce its power to a 
 nonentity, if you stop its animadversions upon public measures. 
 You should not check the efibrts of genius, nor damp the ardor of 
 patriotism. In vain will you desire the bird to soar, if you meanly 
 or madly steal from it its plumage. Beware lest, under the pretence 
 of bearing down the licentiousness of the press, you extinguish it 
 altogether. Beware how you rival the venal ferocity of those mis- 
 creants, who rob a printer of the means of bread, and claim from 
 deluded royalty the reward of integrity and allegiance. Let me, 
 therefore, remind you, that though the day may soon come when our 
 ashes shall be scattered before the winds of heaven, the memory of 
 what you do cannot die ; it will carry down to your posterity your 
 honor or your shame. In the presence and in the name of that ever 
 living God, I do therefore conjure you to reflect, that you have your 
 characters, your consciences, that you have also the character, per- 
 haps the ultimate destiny of your country, in your hands. In that 
 awful name, I do conjure you to have mercy upon your country and 
 yourselves, and so judge now, as you will hereafter be judged ; and 
 I do now submit the fate of my client, and of that country which we 
 have yet in common, to your disposal. 
 
 The Prime Sergeant (Hon. James Fitzgerald) shortly replied; Judge Downes 
 charged wealdy, but not rudely; and, after a short absence, the jury returned 
 " Guilty" on tlic issue paper. 
 
 On the following day, the 23rd of December, Mr. Finnerty was brought up for 
 judgment. Mr. Finnerty stated that he had been taken out of prison to Alderman 
 
420 
 
 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Alexander's office, aiul there threatened with public whippiug, if ho did not frivo up 
 the aullior of the libel. He boldly defended the letter, but w.is most respeci.I'iU to 
 the Bench. Judge Downes sentenced him to two }-ear»' imprisonment IVom the day 
 of his arrest, to stand in the pillory for an hour, pay .a fine of £20, and at ilu' expi- 
 ration of his imprisonment to give security, himself in £.")00, and two bailsmen i;i 
 £2uO each for his good behavior. On the 30th of December, Jlr. Finnerly did actu- 
 ally stand in the pillory, and the rest of this miscellaneous and iniciuilous seuienco 
 was also carried out. 
 
SPEECHES 
 
 Richard Lalor Sheil. 
 
 [4211 
 
lUCHARD LALOK SIIIEL. 
 
Clare Election. 
 
 Speech made at the Clare Election — Preceded bt an 
 Account of that Event, ^vritten bt Mr. Sheil, in Sep- 
 tember, 1828. 
 
 iKipnE Catholics had passed a resolution to oppose the election of 
 ^^ every candidate who should not pledge himself against the 
 ^ Dulic of Wellington's administration. This measure lay for 
 if some time a dead letter in the registry of the Association, and 
 was gradually passing into oblivion, when an incident occurred which 
 gave it an importance far greater than had originally belonged to it. 
 Lord John Kussell, flushed with the victory which had been achieved 
 in the repeal of the Test and Corporation Acts, and grateful to the 
 Duke of AVcliington for tiic part which he had taken, wrote a letter 
 to Mr. O'Connell, in which ho suggested that the conduct of his 
 Grace had lieen so fair and manly towards the Dissenters, as to enti- 
 tle liini to tbcir gratitude ; and that they would consider the reversal 
 of the resolution wiiich had been passed against his government, as 
 evidence of the interest which was felt in Ireland, not only in the 
 great question peculiaily applicable to that country, but in the asser- 
 tion of religious freedom tiu'ough the empire. Tiie authoritj' of 
 Lord John llussell is considerable, and Mr. O'Connell, under the 
 influence of his advice, proposed that the anti-Wellington resolution 
 should be withdrawn. This motion was violently opposed, and Mr. 
 O'Connell perceived that the antipathy to the Great Captain was 
 more deeply rooted than he had originally imagined. After a long 
 and tempestuous debate, he suggested an amendment, in which the 
 principle of his original motion was given up, and the Catholics 
 remained pledged to their hostility to the Duke of Wellington's 
 
 (423) 
 
421 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 iidniinistriilioii. Mr. 0'( omicU has reason to rejoice at his failure 
 in eurr3'ing this proposition ; for if he had succeeded, no ground for 
 opposing the return of Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald would have existed. 
 
 Tlie promotion of that gontlcnuui to a seat iu the cabinet created a 
 A'acmcy in the representation of the county of Clare; and an oppor- 
 tunity was aflbrded the lioman Catholic body of proving that the 
 resohitiou which had been passed against the Duke of Wellington's 
 government was not an idle vaunt, but that it could be carried in a 
 striking instance into elfect. It \v'as determined that all the power 
 ol the people should be put forth. The Association looked round 
 ibr a candidate, and without having previously consulted him, 
 selected Major M'Namara. He is a Protestant in religion, a Catho- 
 lic in politics, and a Milesian in descent. He was called upon to 
 stand. Some days elapsed and no .-mswcr was returned by him. 
 The [)ublic mind was tiirown into suspense, and various conjectures 
 went abroad as to the cause of this singular omission. Some alleged 
 that he was gone to an island off the coast of Clare, Mhere tlic pro- 
 ceedings of the Association had not reached him ; while others sug- 
 gested that he was only waiting until the clergy of the county should 
 deckire themselves more unequivocally favorable to him. 1 he latter, 
 it ^vas said, had evinced mucli apathy, and it was rumored that Dean 
 O'Shaughnessy, who is a distant relative of Mr. Fitzgerald, had inti- 
 mated a determination not to support any anti-ministerial candidate. 
 The major's silence, and the doubts which were entertained Avith 
 regard to the allegiance of the priests, created a sort of panic at the 
 Association. A meeting was called, and various opinions Avero 
 delivered as to the propriety of engaging in a contest, the issue of 
 which was considered exceedingly doubtful, and in which, failure 
 would be attended wiih such disasti-ous consequences. jNlr. O'Cou- 
 nell himself did not appear exceedingly sanguine : and Mr. Purcell 
 O'Gorman, a native of Clare, and who had a niiuuto knowledge of 
 the feelings of the people, expressed apprehensions. There were, 
 however, two gentlemen (O'Gorman Mahon and Mr. Steele), who 
 strongly insisted that the people might l)c roused, and that the 
 priests were not as lukewarm as was imagined. Upon the zeal of 
 Dean O'Shaughnessy, however, a good deal of question was thrown. 
 By a singular coincidence, just as his name was uttered, a gentleman 
 entered, who, but for the peculiar locality, might have been readily 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 425 
 
 mistaken for a clergyman of the Established Church. Between the 
 priesthood of the two religions there are, in aspect and demeanor, as 
 well as in creed and discipline, several points of affinity, and the 
 abstract sacerdotal character is readily perceptible in both. The 
 parson, however, in his attitude and attire, presents the evidences of 
 superiority, and carries the mannerism of ascendancy upon him. A 
 broad-brimmed hat, comjDosed of the smoothest and blackest mate- 
 rial, and drawn by two silken threads into a fire-shovel configura- 
 tion, a felicitous adaptation of his jerkin to the symmetries of his 
 chest and shoulder, stockings of glossy silk, which displayed the 
 happy proportions of a swelling leg, a ruddy cheek, and a bi-ight, 
 authoritative eye, suggested, at first view, that the gentleman who 
 had entered the room while the merits of Dean O'Shaughnessy were 
 under discussion, must be a minister of the prosperous Christianity 
 of the Established Church. It was, however, no other than Dean 
 O'Shauglinessy himself. He was received with a burst of applause, 
 which indicated that, whatever surmises with respect to his fidelity 
 had previously gone out, his appearance befoi'e that tribunal was 
 considered by the assembly as a proof of his devotion to the public 
 Interest. The dean, however, made a very scholastic sort of ora- 
 tion, the gist of which it was I)y no' means easy to arrive ct. He 
 denied that he had enlisted himself under Mr. Fitzgerald's banners, 
 but at the same time studiously avoided giving any sort of pledge. 
 He did not state distinctly what his opinion was with respect to the 
 co-operation of the priests with the Association ; and when he was 
 pressed, begged to be allowed to withhold his sentiments on the 
 subject. The Association were not, however, dismayed ; and it hav- 
 ing been conjectured that the chief reason for Major M'Namara hav- 
 ing omitted to return an answer was connected with pecuniary con- 
 siderations, it was decided that so large sum as £5,000 of the 
 Catholic rent should be allocated to the expenses of his election. 
 O'Gorman Mahon and Mr. Steele were directed to proceed at once 
 to Clare, in order that they might have a personal interview with 
 bim, and they innnediately set off. After an absence of two clays, 
 O'Gorman Mahon returned, having left his colleague behind in order 
 to arouse the people ; and he at length conveyed certain intelligence 
 with respect to the Major's determination. The obligations under 
 which his family lay to Mr. Fitzgerald were such, that he was bound 
 
426 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 in honor not to oppose him. This information pi'oclaccd a feeling of 
 deep disappointment among the Catholic body, while the Protestant 
 party exulted in his apparent desertion of the cause, and boasted 
 that no gentleman of the county would stoop so low as to accept of 
 the patronage of the Association. In this emergency, and when it 
 was universally regarded as an utterly hopeless attempt to oppose 
 the cabinet minister, the public were astonished by an address from 
 Mr. O'Connell to the freeholders of Clare, in which he offered him- 
 self as a candidate, and solicited their support. 
 
 Nothing but his subsequent success could exceed the sensation 
 which was produced by this address, and all eyes were turned 
 towards the field in which so remarkable a contest was to be waged. 
 The two candidates entered the lists with signal advantages upon 
 both sides. Mr. O'Connell had an unparalleled popularity, which 
 the services of thirty years had secured to him. Upon the other 
 hand, Mr. Vcsey Fitzgerald presented a combination of favorable 
 circumstances, which rendered the issue exceedingly difficult to cal- 
 culate. His father had held the office of prime sergeant at the Irish 
 bar; and, although indebted to the government for his promotion, 
 had the virtuous intrepidit}' to vote against the Union. This example 
 of independence had rendered him a great favorite with the people. 
 From the moment that his son had obtained access to power, he had 
 employed his extensive influence in doing acts of kindness to the 
 gentry of the county of Clare. He had inundated it with the over- 
 flowings of ministerial bounty. The oldest sons of the poorer gentle- 
 men, and the younger branches of the aristocracy, had been provided 
 for through his means ; and in the arny, the navy, the treasury, the 
 Four Courts, and the Custom House, the proofs of his political 
 friendship were everywhere to be found. Independently of any act 
 of his which could lie referred to his personal interest, and his anxiety 
 to keep up his influence in the county, Mr. Fitzgerald, who is a man 
 of very amiable disposition, had conferred many services upon his 
 Clare constituents. Nor was it to Protestants that these manifesta- 
 tions of favor were confined. He had laid not only the Catholic 
 proprietors, but the Catholic priesthood, luider obligation. The 
 bishop of the diocese himself (a respectable old genlleman Mho 
 drives about in a gig with a mitre upon it) is supposed not to have 
 escaped from his bounties ; and it is more than insinuated that some 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 427 
 
 droppings of ministerial manna had fallen upon him. Tiie conse- 
 quence of this systematized and uniform plan of benefaction is 
 obvious. The sense of favor was heightened by the manners of this 
 extensive distributor of the favoi's of the crown, and converted the 
 ordinary feeling of thankfulness into one of personal regard. To 
 this array of very favorable circumstances, Mr. Fitzgerald brought 
 the additional influence arising from his recent promotion to the 
 cabinet; which, to those wiio had former benefits to return, aflordcd 
 an opportunity for the exercise of that kind of prospective gratitude 
 which has been described to consist of a lively sense of services to 
 come. These were the comparative advantages with which the 
 ministerial and the popular candidate engaged in this celebrated 
 contest ; and Ireland stood hy to witness the encounter. 
 
 Mr. O'Connell did not immediately set off from Dublin, but before 
 his departure several gentlemen were despatched from the Associa- 
 tion in order to excite the minds of the people, and to prepare the 
 way for him. The most active and useful of the persons who were 
 employed upon this occasion, were the two gentlemen to whom I 
 have already referred, Mr. Steele and O'Gorman Mahon. They are 
 both deserving of special conmiendation. The former is a Protestant 
 of a respectable fortune in the county of Clare, and who has all his 
 life been devoted to the assertion of liberal principles. Jn Trinity 
 College he was amongst the foremc^st of the advocates of emancipa- 
 tion, and at that early period became the intimate associate of many 
 Eoman Catholic gentlemen who have since distinguished themselves 
 in the proceedings of their body. Being a man of independent cir- 
 cumstances, Mr. Steele did not devote himself to any profession, 
 and having a zealous and active mind, looked round for occupation. 
 The Spanish war afforded him a field for the display of that generous 
 enthusiasm by which he is distinguished. He joined the patriot 
 army, and fought with desperate valor upon the batteries of the 
 Trocadcro. It was only when Cadiz had surrendered, and the cause 
 of Spain became utterly hopeless, that Mr. Steele relinquished this 
 noble undertaking. He returned to England, surroumled by exiles 
 from the unfortunate country, for the liberation of which he had 
 repeatedly exposed his life. It was impossible for a man of so 
 much energy of character to remain in torpor; and on his arrival in 
 Ireland, faithful to the principles by which he had been uniformly 
 
428 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 swayed, ho joined the Catholic Association. There he delivered 
 several enthusiastic declamations in favor of religious liberty. Such 
 a man, however, was fitted for action as well as for harangue ; and 
 the moment the contest in Clare began, he threw himself into the 
 combat with the sam.e alacrity with which ho had rushed upon the 
 French bayonets at Cadiz. He was serviceable in. various ways. 
 He opened the political campaign by intimating his readiness to, 
 fight any landlord who should conceive himself to be aggrieved by 
 an interference with his tenants. This was a very impressive exor- 
 dium. He then proceeded to canvass for votes ; and, assisted by 
 his intimate friend, O'Gorman ]\Iahon, travelled through the countr^^, 
 and, both by day and night, addressed the people from the altars 
 round which they were assembled to hear him. It is no exaggera- 
 tion to say, that to him, and to his intrepid and indefatigable con- 
 federate, the success of Mr. O'Connell is greatly to be ascribed. 
 O'Gorman Mahon is introduced into this article as one amongst 
 many figures. He would deserve to stand apart in a poi'trait. 
 Nature has been peculiarly favorable to him. He has a very striking 
 physiognomy, of the Corsair character, which the Protestant Gul- 
 nares, and the Catholic Medoras, find it equally ditficult to resist. 
 His figure is tall, and he is peculiarly free and der/age in all his atti- 
 tudes and movements. In any other his attire would appear singu- 
 larly fantastical. Ilis manners are exceedingly frank and natural, 
 and have a character of kindliness as well as of self-reliance imprinted 
 upon them. He is wholly free from embarrassment, and carries a 
 well-founded consciousness of his personal merit; which is, however, 
 so well united with urbanity, that it is not in the slightest degree 
 offensive. His talents as a popular speaker are considerable. He 
 derives from external qualifications an influence over the multitude, 
 which men of diminutive stature are somewhat slow in obtaining, A 
 small man is at first view regarded I)y the great body of spectators 
 with disrelish; and it is only by force of phrase, and by the charm 
 of speech, that he can at length succeed in inducing his auditors to 
 overlook any infelicity f)f configuration ; but when O'Gorman jMa!h)ii 
 throws himself out before the people, and, touching his wiiiskers 
 with one hand, brandishes the other, an enthusiasm is at once pro- 
 duced, to which the fair portion of the spectators lend their tender 
 contribution. 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 429 
 
 Such a man was exactly adapted to the excitement of the people 
 of Clare ; and it must be admitted that, by his indefatigable exer- 
 tions, his unremitting activity, and his devoted zeal, he most mate- 
 rially assisted in the clectinn of Mr. O'Connell. While Mr. Steele 
 and ()"Gorman Mahon harangued the people in one district, Mr. 
 Lawless, who was also despatched upon a similar mission, applied 
 his f:icultios of excitation in another. This gentleman has obtained 
 deserved celebrity by his being almost the only individual among 
 the Irish di-puties who remonstrated against the sacrifice of the 
 rights of the forty-shilling freeholders. Ever since that period he 
 has been eminently popular ; and although he may occasionally, by 
 ebullitions of ill-regulated but generous enthusiasm, create a little 
 merriment amongst those whose minds are not as susceptible of 
 patriotic and disinterested emotion as his own, yet the conviction 
 which is entertained of his honesty of purpose, confers ujion him 
 a considerable intluence. "Honest Jack Lawless "is the designa- 
 tion by which he has been known since the "wings" were in discus- 
 sion. He has many distinguished qualities as a public speaker. 
 His voice is deep, round, and mellow, and is diversified by a great 
 variety of rich and harmonious intonation. His action is exceed- 
 ingly graceful and appropriate ; he has a good figure, which, by a 
 purposed swell and dilation of the shoidders, and an elaborate erect- 
 ncss, he turns to good account ; and by dint of an easy fluency, of 
 good diction, a solemn visage, an aquiline nose of no vulgar dimen- 
 sion, eyes glaring underneath a shaggy brow with a certain fierce- 
 ness of expi-ession, a quizzing-glass, which is gracefull_y dangled in 
 any pauses of thought or suspensions of utterance, and, above all, 
 by a certain attitude of dignity, which he assumes in the crisis of 
 eloquence, accompanied with a flinging back of his coat, which sets 
 his periods beautifully off", " Honest Jack " has become one of the 
 most popular and eflicient speakers at the Association. Shortly 
 after Mr. Lawless had been deapatched, a great reinforcement to the 
 oi-atorical corps was sent down in the person of the celebrated 
 Father Maguire, or, as he is habitually designated, "Father Tom." 
 This gentleman had been for some time a parish priest in the county 
 of Leitrim. He lived in a remote parish, where his talents were 
 unappreciated. Some accident brought Mr. Pope, the itinerant 
 controversalist, into contact with him. A challenge to defend the 
 
430 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 doctrines of his religion was tendered by the wandering disputant to 
 the priest, and the latter at once accepted it. Maguire had given 
 no previous jiroof of his abilities, and the Catholic body regretted 
 the encounter. The parties met in this strange duel of theology. 
 The interest created by their encounter was prodigious. Not only 
 the room where their debates were carried on was crowded, but the 
 whole of Sackville-street, where it was situated, was thronged with 
 population. Pope brought to the combat great fluency, and a 
 powerful declamation. Mnguiro was a master of scholastic logic. 
 After several days of controversy, Pope was overthrown, and 
 "Father Tom," as the champion of orthodoxy, became the object of 
 popular adoration. A base conspiracy was got up to destroy his 
 moral character, and by its failure raised him in the aflection of the 
 multitude. He had been under great obligations to Mr. O'Connell, 
 for his exertions upon his trial ; and from a jnst sentimciit of grati- 
 tude, he tendered his services in Clare. His name alone was of 
 great value ; and when his coming was announced, the people 
 everywhere rushed forward to hail the vindicator of the national 
 religion. He threw fresh ingredients into the caldron and contribu- 
 ted to impart to the contest that strong religious chai'iicter which it 
 is not the fault of the Association, but of the government, that 
 every contest of the kind must assume. "Father Tom" was em- 
 ployed upon a remarkable exploit. Mr. Augustine Butler, (he 
 lineal descendant of the celebrated Sir Toby Butler, is a proprietor 
 in Clare : he is a liberal Protestant, but supported Mr. Vescy Fitz- 
 gerald. "Father Tom " proceeded from the town of Ennis to the 
 county chapel where Mr. Butler's freeholders were assembled, in 
 order to address them ; aud Mr. Butler with an intrepidity which 
 did him credit, went forward to meet him. It was a singular 
 encounter in the house of God. The Protestant landlord called 
 upon his freeholders not to desert him. — "Father Tom" rose to 
 address them in behalf of Mr. O'Connell. He is not greatly gifted 
 with a command of decorated phraseology; but he is master of vig- 
 orous language, and has a power of strong and simple reasoning, 
 which is equally intelligible to all classes. He employs the syllo- 
 gism of the schools as his chief weapon in argimient ; but uses it 
 with such dexterity, that his auditors of the humblest class can 
 follow him without being aware of the technical expedient by which 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 431 
 
 he masters the understanding. His manner is ijeculjar: it is not 
 flowery, nor declamatory, but is short, somewhat abrupt, and, to 
 use the French phrase, is " (rancliant." His countenance is adapted 
 to his mind, and is expressive of the reasoning and controversial 
 faculties. A quick bine eye, a nose slightly turned up, a strong 
 bi'ow, a complexion of mountain ruddiness, and thick lips, which 
 are better formed for rude disdain than for polished sarcasm, are his 
 characteristics. He assailed Mr. Butler with all his powers, and 
 overthrew him. The topic to which ho addressed himself, was one 
 which was not only calculated to move the tenants of Mr. Butler, 
 but to stir Mr. Butler himself. He appealed to the memory of his 
 celebrated Catholic ancestor, of which Mr. Butler is justly proud. 
 He stated, that what Sir Toby Butler had been, Mr. O'Connell was ; 
 and he adjured him not to stand up in opposition to an individual, 
 whom he. was bound to sustain by a sort of hereditary obligation. 
 His appeal carried the freeholders away, and one hundred and fifiy 
 votes were secured to Mr. O'Connell. INIr. Maguire was seconded 
 in this achievement by Mr. Dominick Ronayne, a barrister of the 
 Association, of considerable talents, and who not only speaks the 
 English language with eloquence, but is master of the Irish tongue ; 
 and throwing an educated mind into the powerful idiom of the 
 country, wrought with uncommon power upon the passions of the 
 people. 
 
 Mr. Shell was employed as counsel for Mr. O'Connell before the 
 assessor ; but proceeded to the county Clare the day before the elec- 
 tion commenced. On his arrival, he understood that an exertion 
 was required in the parish of Corofin, which is situate upon the estate 
 of Sir Edward O'Brien, who had given all his interest to Mr. Vcsey 
 Fitzgerald. Sir Edward is the most opulent resident landlord in the 
 county. In the parish of Corofin he had no less than three hundred 
 votes ; and it was supposed that his freeholders would go with him. 
 Mr. Shell determined to assail him ni the citadel of his strength, and 
 proceeded upon the Sunday before the poll commenced to the chapel 
 of Corofin. Sir Edward O'Brien having learned that this agitator 
 intended this trespass upon his authority, resolved to anticipate him, 
 and set off in his splendid equipage, drawn by four horses, to the 
 mountains in which Corofin is situated. ThcAvhole population came 
 down from their residences in the rocks, which are in the vicinity of 
 
432 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the town of Ennis, and advanced in large bands, waving green 
 boughs, and preceded by fifes and pipers, upon the road. Their 
 landlord was met by them on his way. They passed by him in 
 silence, while they hailed his antagonist with shouts of applause, and 
 attended him in triumph to the chapel. Sir Edward O'Brien lost 
 his resolution at this spectacle ; and, feeling that he could have no 
 influence in such a state of excitation, instead of going to the house 
 of Catholic worship, proceeded to the church of Corofin. He left 
 his carriage exactly opposite the doors of the chapel, which is im- 
 mediately contiguous, and thus reminded the people of his Protest- 
 antism, by a circumstance, of which, of course, advantage was 
 instantaneously taken. Mr. Sheil arrived with a vast multitude of 
 attendants at the chapel, which was crowded with a people, who 
 had flocked from all quarters ; there a singular scene took place. 
 Father Murphy, the parish priest, came to the entrance of the 
 chapel, dressed in his surplice. When he appeared, the mul- 
 titude fell back at his command, and arranged themselves on either 
 side, so as to form a lane for the recei^tion of the agitator. Deep 
 silence was imposed upon the people by the priest, who had a voice 
 of subterraneous thunder, and appeared to hold them in absolute 
 dominion. When Mr. Sheil had reached the threshold of the chapel, 
 Father Murphy stretched forth his hand, and welcomed him to the 
 performance of the good work. The figure and attitude of the priest 
 were remarkable. My English reader draws his ordinary notion of 
 a Catholic clergyman from the caricatures which are contained in 
 novels, or represented in comedies upon the stage ; but the Irish 
 priest, who has lately become a politician and a scholar, has not a 
 touch of Foigardism about him ; and an artist would have found in 
 Father Murphy rather a study for the enthusiastic Macbriar, who 
 is so powerfully delineated in " Old Mortality," than a realization of 
 the familiar notions of a clergyman of the Church of Rome. Sur- 
 rounded by a dense multitude, whom he had hushed into profound 
 silence, he presented a most imposing oliject. His form is tall, 
 slender, and emaciated ; but was enveloped in his long robes, that 
 gave him a peculiarly sacerdotal aspect. The hand which he stretched 
 forth was ample, but worn to a skinny meagritude. His face was 
 long, sunken, and cadaverous, but was illuminated by eyes blazing 
 with all the fire of grenius and the enthusiasm of religion. His lank 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 433 
 
 black hair fell clown his temples, and eyebrows of the same color 
 stretched in thick straight lines along a lofty forehead, and threw 
 over the whole countenance a deep shadow. The sun was shining 
 with brilliancy, and rendered his figure, attired as it was in white 
 garments, more conspicuous. The scenery about him was in har- 
 mony ; it was wild and desolate, and crags, with scarce a blade of 
 verdure shooting through their crevices, rose everywhere around 
 him. The interior of the chapel, at the entrance of which he stood, 
 was visible. It was a large pile of building, consisting of bare walls, 
 rudely thrown up, with a floor of clay, and at the extremity stood 
 an altar made of a few boards clumsily put together. 
 
 It was on the thi'eshold of this mountain temple that the envoy of 
 the Association was hailed with a solemn greeting. The priest pro- 
 ceeded to the altar, and commanded the people to abstain, during 
 the divine ceremony, from all political thinking or occupation. He 
 recited the mass with great fervency and simplicity of manner, and 
 with all the evidences of unaffected piety. However familiar from 
 daily repetition with the ritual, he pronounced it with a just em- 
 phasis, and went through the various forms which are incidental 
 to it with singular propriety and grace. The people were deeply- 
 attentive ; and it was observable that most of them could read, for 
 they had prayer-books in their hands, which they read with a quiet 
 devotion. Mass being finished, Father Murphy threw his vestments 
 off, and, without laying down the priest, assumed the politician. He 
 addressed the people in Irish, and called upon them to vote for 
 O'Connell in the name of their country and of their religion. 
 
 It was a most extraordinaiy and powerful display of the externals 
 of eloquence, and as far as a person unacquainted with the language 
 could form an estimate of the matter by the eftects produced upon 
 the auditory, must have been pregnant with genuine oratory. It 
 will be supposed that this singular priest addressed his parishoners 
 in tones and gestures as rude as the wild dialect to which he was 
 giving utterance. His actions and attitudes were as graceful as those 
 of an accomplished actor, and his intonations were soft, pathetic, 
 denunciatory, and conjuring, according as his theme varied, and as 
 he had recourse to different expedients to influence the people. The 
 general character of this strange harangue was impassioned and sol- 
 emn, but he occasionally had recourse to ridicule, and his counte- 
 
434 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 nance at once adapted itself with a liappy readiness to derision. 
 Tlie finest spirit of sarcasm gleamed over his features, and shouts of 
 laughter attended his description of a miserable Catholic who should 
 prove recreant to the great cause, by making a sacrifice of his coun- 
 try to his landlord. The close of his speech was peculiarly effective. 
 He became inflamed by the power of his emotions, and while he 
 raised himself into the loftiest attitude to which he could ascend, he 
 laid one hand on the altar, and shook the other in the spirit of almost 
 jirophetic admonition, and while his eyes blazed and seemed to start 
 from his forehead, thick drops fell down his face, and his voice rolled 
 through lips livid with passion and covered with foam. It is almost 
 unnecessary to say that such an appeal was irresistible. The multi- 
 tude burst into shouts of acclamation, and would have been ready to 
 mount a battery roaring Mnth cannon at his command. Two days 
 after the results were felt at the hustings ; and while Sir Edward 
 O'Brien stood aghast, -Father Murphj' marched into Ennis at the 
 bead of his tenantry, and polled them to a man in fovor of Daniel 
 O'Connell. But I am anticipating. 
 
 The notion which had gone abroad in Dublin that the priests were 
 lukewarm, was utterly unfounded. With the exception of Dean 
 O'Shaughnessy, who is a relative of Mr. Fitzgerald (and for whom 
 there is perhaps much excuse), and a Father Cofiey, who has since 
 been deserted by his congregation, there was scarcely a clergyman 
 in the county who did not use his utmost influence over the peasantry. 
 On the day on which Mr. O'Connell arrived, you met a priest in 
 every street who assured you that the battle should be won, and 
 jiledged himself that "the man of the people " should be returned. 
 " The man of the people " arrived in the midst of the loudest accla- 
 mations. Near thirt}' thousand people were crowded into the streets 
 of Ennis, and were unceasing in their shouts. Banners were sus- 
 jiended from every window ; and women of great beauty were every- 
 where seen waving handkerchiefs, with the figure of the patriot 
 stamped upon them. Processions of freeholders, with their parish 
 priests at their head, marched like troops to difi"erent quarters of the 
 city ; and it w'as remarkable that not a single individual was intoxi- 
 cated. The most perfect order and regularity prevailed ; and the 
 large bodies of police which had been collected in the town stood 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 435 
 
 "without occupation. These were evidences of organization, from 
 ■which it was easy to conjecture the result. 
 
 The election opened, and the court-house in which the sheriff read 
 the writ presented a new and striking scene. On the left hand of the 
 sheriff stood a cabinet minister, attended by the whole body of the 
 aristocracy of the county of Clare. Their appearance indicated at 
 once their superior rank and their profound mortification. An ex- 
 pression of bitterness and of wounded pride was stamped in various 
 modifications of resentment upon their countenances ; while others 
 who were in the interest of Mr. Fitzgerald, and who were small 
 Protestant proprietors, affected to look big and important, and swelled 
 themselves into gentry upon the credit of voting for the minister. 
 On the right hand of the sheriff stood Mr. O'Connell, with scarcely 
 a single gentlemen by his side ; for most even of the Catholic pro- 
 prietors had abandoned him, and joined the ministerial candidate. 
 But the body of the court presented the power of Mr. O'Connell in 
 a mass of determined peasants, amongst whom black coats and sacer- 
 dotal visages were seen felicitously intermixed, outside the balustrade 
 of the gallei-y on the left hand of the sheriff. Before the business 
 began, a gentleman was observed on whom every eye was turned. 
 He had indeed chosen a most singular position ; for instead of sitting 
 like the other auditors on the seats in the gallery, he leaped over it, 
 and, suspending himself above the crowd, afforded what was an ob- 
 ject of wonder to the great body of the spectators, and of indigna- 
 tion to the high sheriff. The attire of the individual who was thus 
 perched in this dangerous position was sufficiently strange. He had 
 a coat of Irish tabiuet, with glossy ti'owsers of the same national 
 material ; he wore no waistcoat ; a blue shirt lined with streaks of 
 white was open at his neck ; a broad green sash, with a medal of 
 "the order of Liberators " at the end of it, hung conspicuously over 
 his breast ; and a profusion of black curls curiously festooned about 
 his temples, shadowed a veiy handsome and expressive counte- 
 nance, a' great part of which was occupied by -whiskers of a bushy 
 amplitude. "Who, Sir, are you?" exclaimed the high sheriff, in a 
 tone of imperious solemnity, which he had acquired at Canton, where 
 he had long resided in the sei'vice of the East India Company. But 
 I must pause here — and even at the hazard of breaking the regular 
 thread of the narration, I cannot resist the temptation of describing 
 
436 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the high sheriff. When he stood up with his wand of oiEcc, the con- 
 ti'ast between him and the aerial gentlemen whom he was addressing 
 was to the highest degree ludicrous. Of the latter some conception 
 has already been given. He looked a chivalrous dandy, who, under 
 the most fantastical apparel, carried the spirit and intrepidity of an 
 exceedingly fine fellow. Mr. High Sheriff had, at an early period 
 of his life, left his native county of Clare, and had migrated to 
 China, where, if I may judge from his manners and demeanor, he 
 must have been in immediate communication with a mandarin of the 
 first class, and made a Chinese functionary his favorite model. I 
 should conjecture that he must long have presided over the packing 
 of Boliea, and that some tincture of that agreeable vegetable had 
 been infused into his complexion. An oriental sedateness and 
 gravity ai'e sj^read over a countenance upon which a smile seldom 
 presumes to trespass. He gives utterance to intonations which were 
 originally contracted in the East, but have been since mehjdized by 
 liis religious habits into a puritanical chant in Ireland. The Chinese 
 language is monosyllabic, and Mr. Molony has extended its character 
 to the English tongue ; for he breaks all his words into separate and 
 elaborate divisions, to each of which he bestows a due quantity of 
 deliberate intonation. Upon arriving in Ireland he addicted himself 
 to godliness, having previously made great gains in China, and he 
 has so contrived as to impart the' cadences of Wesley to the accentu- 
 ation of Confucius. 
 
 Such was the aspect of the great public functionary, who, rising 
 with a peculiar magister-iality of altitude, and stretching forth the 
 emblem of his power, inquired of the gentleman who was suspended 
 from the gallery who he was. '' My name is O'Gorman Mahon," 
 ■was the reply, delivered with a firmness which clearly showed that 
 the person who had conveyed this piece of intelligence thought very 
 little of a high sheriff and a great deal of O'Gorman Mahon. The 
 sheriff had been offended by the general appearance of Mr. Mahon, 
 who had distracted the public attention from his own contemplation ; 
 but he was particularly irritated by observing the insurgent symbol 
 of "the order of Liberators" dangling at his breast. "I tell that 
 gentleman," said Mr. Molony, "to take off that badge." There was 
 a moment's pause, and then the following answer was slowly and 
 articulately pronounced : " This gentleman (laying his hand on his 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 437 
 
 breast) tells that gentleman (pointing with the other to the sheriff}, 
 that if that geutleman presumes to touch this gentleman, that this 
 gentleman will defend himself against that gentleman, or any other 
 gentleman, while he has got the arm of a gentleman to protect him." 
 This extraordinary sentence was followed by a loud burst of applause 
 from all parts of the court-house. The high sheriff looked aghast. 
 The expression of self-satisfaction and magisterial complacency passed 
 off his visage, and he looked utterly blank and dejected. After an 
 interval of irresolution down he sat. "The soul" of O'Gorman 
 Mahon (to use Curran's expression) " walked forth in its own maj- 
 esty " ; he looked " redeemed, regenerated, and disenthralled." The 
 medal of the "' order of Liberators " was pressed to his heart. 
 O'Connell surveyed him with gratitude and admiration ; and the first 
 blow was struck, which sent dismay into the heart of the party of 
 ■which the sheriff was considered to be an adherent. 
 
 This was the opening incident of this novel drama. When the 
 sensation which it had created had in some degree subsided, the 
 business of the day went on. Sir Edward O'Brien proposed Mr. 
 Vescy Fitzgerald as a proper person to serve in parliament. Sir 
 Edward had upon former occasions been the vehement antagonist of 
 Mr. Fitzgerald, and in one instance a regular battle had been fought 
 between the tenantry of both parties. It was supposed that this 
 feud had left some acrimonious feelings which were not quite extinct 
 behind, and many conjectured that the zeal of Sir Edward in favor 
 of his competitor was a little feigned. This notion was confirmed 
 by the circumstance that Sir Edward O'Brien's son (the member for 
 Ennis)* had subscribed to the Catholic rent, was a member of the 
 Association, and had recently made a vigorous speech in parliament 
 in defence of that body. It is, however, probable that the feudal 
 pride of Sir Edward O'Brien, which was deeply mortified by the de- 
 fection of his vassals, absorbed every other feeling, and that, how- 
 ever indifferent he might have been on Mr. Fitzgerald's account, yet 
 that he was exceedingly irritated upon his own. He appeared at 
 least to be profoundly moved, and had not spoken above a few min- 
 utes when tears fell from his eyes. He has a strong Irish chui-acter 
 impressed upon him. It is said that he is lineally descended from 
 
 * William Smith O'Biien, late member for Limerick ; oue of the traversers indicted 
 for high treason in 1848, and sentenced to transportation. 
 
438 TREASLTRY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Brian Boirumhe. He is squat, bluff, and impassioned. An expres- 
 sion of good nature, rather than of good humor, is mixed up with a 
 certain rough consciousness of his own dignity, which in his most 
 familiar moments he never lays aside, for the Milesian predominates 
 in his demeanor, and his royal recollections wait perpetually upon 
 him. He is a great favorite with the people, who are attached to 
 the descendants of the ancient indigenous families of the county, and 
 who see in Sir Edward O'Brien a good landlord, as well as the rep- 
 resentative of Brian Boirumhe. I was not a little astonished at 
 seeing him weep upon the hustings. It was, however, observed to 
 me, that he is given to the "melting mood," although his tears do not 
 fall like the gum of "the Araljian tree." In the House of Commons 
 he once produced a great effect by bursting into tears, while he de- 
 scribed the misery of the people of Clare, although, at the same 
 time his granaries were full. It was said that his hustings pathos 
 was of the same quality, and arose from the peculiar susceptibility 
 of the lachrymatory nerves, and not from any very nice fibres about 
 the heart ; still I am convinced that his emotion was genuine, and 
 that he was profoundly touched. He complained that he had been 
 deserted by his tenants, although he had deserved well at their 
 hands ; and exclaimed that the country was not one fit for a gentle- 
 man to reside in, when property lost all its influence, and things 
 were brought to such a pass. The motion was seconded by Sir A. 
 Fitzgerald in a few words. I\Ir. Gore, a gentleman of very large 
 estate, took occasion to deliver his opinions in favor of Mr. Fitz- 
 gerald ; and O'Gorman Mahon and Mr. Steele proposed Mr. O'Con- 
 nell. It then fell to to the rival candidates to speak, and Mr. Vesey 
 Fitzgerald, having been first put in nomination, first addressed the 
 freeholders. He seemed to me to be about five and forty years of 
 age, his hair being slightly marked with a little edging of scarcely 
 perceptible silver, bat the care with which it was distributed and 
 arranged, showed that the cabinet minister had not yet entirely 
 dismissed his Lothario recollections. I had heard, before I had even 
 seen Mr. Fitzgerald, that he was in great favor with the Calistas at 
 Almack's ; and I was not surprised at it, on a minute inspection of 
 his aspect and deportment. It is not that he is a handsome man, 
 (though he is far from being the reverse) , but that there is an air of 
 blended sweetness and assurance, of easy intrepidity and gentle 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 439 
 
 gracefulness about him, wlii(;li are considered to be eminently win- 
 ning. His countenance, though too fully circular, and a little 
 tinctured with Vermillion, is agreeable. The eyes are of bright 
 hazel, and have an expression of ever earnest frankness, which an 
 acute observer might suspect, while his mouth is full of a strenuous 
 solicitude to jolcase. The moment he rose I perceived that he was 
 an accomplished gentleman ; and when 1 had heard him utter a few 
 sentences, was satisfied that he was a most accomplished speaker. 
 He delivered one of the most effective and dexterous speeches which 
 it has ever been my good fortime to hear. There were evident 
 marks of deep pain and of fear to be traced in his features, which 
 were not free from the haggardness of many an anxious vigil ; but 
 though he was manifestly mortified in the extreme, he studiously 
 refrained from all exasperating sentiment or expression. He spoke 
 at first with a graceful melancholy, rather than a tone of impassioned 
 adjuration. He intimated that it was rather a measure of rigorous, 
 if not unjustifiable policy, to display the power of the Association 
 in throwing an individual out of parliament who had been the warm 
 and uniform advocate of the Catholic cause during his whole political 
 life. He enumerated the instances in which he had exerted himself 
 in behalf of that body which were now dealing with him with such 
 severity, and referred to his services with regard to the college of 
 Maynooth. The part of his speech which was most powerful, related 
 to his father. The latter had opposed the Union, and had many 
 claims upon the national gratitude. The topic was one which 
 required to be most delicately touched, and no orator could treat it 
 with a more exquisite nicety than Mr. Fitzgerald. He became as he 
 advanced, and the recollection of his father pressed itself more im- 
 mediately upon his mind, more impassioned. At the moment he 
 was speaking, his father, to whom he is most tenderly attached, and 
 by whom he is most beloved, was lying upon a bed from whence it 
 was believed that he would never rise, and efforts had been 
 made to conceal from the old man the contest in which his son was 
 involved. It was impossible to mistake genuine grief, and when 
 Mr. Fitzgerald paused for an instant, and turning away, wiped off the 
 tears that came gushing into his eyes, he won the sympathies of every 
 one about him. There were few who did not give the same evidence 
 of emotion : and when he sat down, although the great majoi'ity 
 
440 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of the audience were strongly opposed to him, and were enthusiasts 
 in favor of the rival candidate, a loud and unanimous burst of accla- 
 mation shook the court-house. 
 
 Mr. O'Conuell rose to address the people in reply. It was mani- 
 fest that he considered a great exertion to be requisite in order to do 
 away the impression which his antagonist had produced. It 
 was clear that he was collecting all his might, to those who 
 were acquainted with the workings of his physiognomy. Mr. 
 O'Connell bore Mr. Fitzgerald no sort of personal aversion, 
 but he determined in this exigency to have little mercy 
 on his feelings, and to employ all the power of vitupera- 
 tion of which he was possessed against him. This was abso- 
 lutely necessary ; for if mere dexterous fencing had been resorted 
 to by Mr. O'Connell, many might have gone away with the opinion 
 that, after all, Mr. Fitzgerald had been thanklessly treated by the 
 Catholic body. It was therefore disagreeably requisite to render 
 him for the moment odious. Mr. O'Connell began by awakening 
 the passions of the multitude in an attack on Mr. Fitzgerald's allies. 
 Mr. Gore had lauded him highly. This Mr. Gore is of Cromwel- 
 lian descent, and the people detest the memory of the Protector to 
 this day. There is a tradition (I know not whether it has the least 
 foundation) that the ancestor of this gentleman's family was anailor 
 by trade in the Puritan army. Mr. O'Connell, without any direct 
 reference to the fact, used a set of metaphors, such as "striking the 
 nail on the head," "putting a nail into a coffin," which at once re- 
 called the associations which were attached to the name of Mr. Gore, 
 and roars of laughter assailed that gentleman on every side. Mr. 
 Gore has the character of being not only very opulent, but of bearing 
 regard to his possessions proportioned to their extent. Nothing is so 
 uni^opular as prudence in Ireland ; and INIr. O'Connell rallied Mr. 
 Gore to such a point upon this head, and that of his supposed origin, 
 that the latter completely sunk under the attack. He next pro- 
 ceeded to Mr. Fitzgerald, and having drawn a picture of the late Mr. 
 Perceval, he turned round and asked of the rival candidate with 
 what face lie could call himself their friend when the first act of his 
 political life was to enlist himself under the banners of the " bloody 
 Perceval." This epithet (whether it be well or ill-deserved is not 
 the question) was sent into the hearts of the people with a force of 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 441 
 
 expression and a furious vehemence of voice that created a great 
 sensation amongst tiie crowd and turned Ihe tide against Mr. Fitz- 
 gerald. "This, too," said Mr. O'Connell, "is the friend of Peel — 
 the bloody Perceval and the candid and manly Mr. Peel — and he is 
 our fi"iend ! and he is everybody's friend ! The friend of the Cath- 
 olic was the friend of the bloody Perceval, and is the friend of the 
 candid and manly Mr. Peel ! " 
 
 It is unnecessary to go through Mr. O'Connell's speech. It was 
 stamped with all his powerful characteristics, and galled Mr. Fitzge- 
 rald to the core. That gentleman frequently muttered an interroga- 
 tory, "Is this fair?" when Mr. O'Connell was nsing some legitimate 
 sophistication against him. He seemed particularlj' offended when 
 his adversary said, "I never shed tears in public," which was in- 
 tended as a mockery of Mr. Fitzgei'ald's references to his father. It 
 will be thought Ijy some sensitive persons that Mr. O'Connell was 
 not quite warranted in this harsh dealing, but he had no alternative. 
 Mr. Fitzgerald had made a very powerful speech, and the effect was- 
 to be got rid of. In such a warfare a man must not pause in the 
 selection of his weapons, and Mr. O'Connell is not the man to hesi- 
 tate in the use of the rhetorical sabre. Nothing of any peculiar 
 interest occurred after Mr. O'Connell's speech upon the first day. 
 On the second the polling commenced ; and on that da}', in conse- 
 quence of an expedient adopted by Mr. Fitzgerald's committee, the 
 parties were nearly equal. A Catholic freeholder cannot, in strict- 
 ness, vote at an election without making Ji certain declatration upon 
 oath respecting his religious opinions, and obtaining a certificate of 
 his having done so from a magistrate. It is usual for candidates to 
 agree to dispense with the necessity of taking this oath. It was,. 
 however, of importance to Mr. Fitzgerald to delay the election ; 
 and with that view his committee required that the declaration 
 should be taken. Mr. O'Connell's committee were unprepared for 
 this form, and it was with the utmost difficulty that magistrates 
 could be procured to attend to receive the oath. It was therefore 
 impossible, on the first day, for Mr. O'Connell to bring his forces 
 into the field, and thus the parties appeared nearly equal. To those 
 "who did not know the real cause of this circumstance, it appeared 
 ominous, and the O'Connellites looked sufliciently blank ; but the 
 next day every thing was remedied. The freeholders were sworn 
 
442 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 en masse. They were brought into a yard enclosed within four 
 ■walls. Twenty-five were placed against each wall, and they simul- 
 taneously repeated the oath. When one batch of swearers had been 
 disposed of, the person who administered the declaration, turned to 
 the adjoining division, and despatched them. Thus he went thi'ough 
 the quadrangle, and in the course of a few minutes was able to dis- 
 charge one hundred patriots upon Mr. Fitzgerald. It may be said 
 that an oath ought to be more solemnly administered. In reply it 
 is only necessary to observe, that the declaration in question related 
 principally to "the Pretender," and when "the legislature persevere 
 in compelling the name of God to be thus taken in vain," the ritual 
 becomes appropriately farcical, and the manner of the thing is only 
 adapted to the ludicrous matter upon which it is legally requisite 
 that Heaven should be attested ! The oath which is imposed upon a 
 Roman Catholic is a violation of the first precept of the decalogue ! 
 This species of machinery having been thus applied to the art of 
 swearing, the effecttS upon the poll soon became manifest, and Mr. 
 O'Counell ascended to a triumphant majority. It became clear that 
 the landlords had lost all their power, and that their struggles were 
 utterly hopeless. Still they pei'sevei'ed in dragging the few serfs 
 whom they had under their control to the hustings, and in protract- 
 ing the election. It was Mr. Fitzgerald's own wish, I believe, to 
 abandon the contest, when its ultimate issue was alieady certain; 
 but his friends insisted that the last man whom they could command 
 should be polled out. Thus the election was procrastinated. In 
 ordinary cases, the interval between the first and the last day of 
 polling is monotonous and dull ; but during the Clare election so 
 many ludicrous and extraordinary incidents were every moment 
 occurring, as to relieve any attentive observer from every influence 
 of ennui. The writer of these jiages was under the necessity of 
 remaining during the day in the sheriff's booth, where questions of 
 law were chiefly discussed, but even here there was much matter for 
 "entertainment. The sherifl" afforded a perpetual fund of amusement. 
 He sat with his wand of oflice leaning against his shoulder, and al- 
 ways ready for his grasp. When there was no actual business going 
 forward, he still preserved a magisterial dignity of deportment, and 
 with half-closed eyelids, and throwing Ijack his head, and forming 
 with his chin an ol)tuse angle with the horizon, reproved any in- 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 443 
 
 dulgence in illicit mirth which might chance to pass amongst the 
 bar. The gentlemen who were professionally engaged having dis- 
 covered the chief foible of the sheriff', which consisted in the most 
 fontastical notions of himself, vied with each other in playing upon 
 his weakness. " I feel that I address myself to the first man of the 
 county," was the usual exordium with which every legal argument 
 was opened. The sheriff, instead of perceiving the sneer which 
 involuntarily played round the lips of the mocking sycophant, smiled 
 with an air of Malvolio condescension, and bowed his head. Then 
 came some noise from the adjoining liooths, upon which the sheriff' 
 used to start up and exclaim, "I declare I do not think that I am 
 treated with proper respect — verily I'll go forth and quell this 
 tumult — I'll show them I am the first man in the county, and I'll 
 connnit somebody." With that "the first man in the county,"' with 
 a step slightly accelerated by his resentment at a supposed indignity 
 to himself, used to proceed in quest of a riot, but generally returned 
 with a good-humored expression of face, observing : — "It was only 
 Mr. O'Connell, and I must say, when I remonstrated with him he 
 paid me proper respect. He is quite a different person from what I 
 had heard. But let nobody imagine that I was afraid of him. I'd 
 commit him, or Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald, if I was not treated with 
 proper respect ; for by virtue of my ofBce I am the first man in the 
 county." 
 
 A 3'oung gentleman (Mr. Whyte) turned his talent in mimicry to 
 a very pleasant and useful account. He acted as agent to Mr. 
 O'Connell, in a booth of which the chief officer, or sherifl"s deputy, 
 as he is called, was believed to be a partizan of Mr. Fitzgerald, and 
 used to delay Mr. O'Connell's tallies. A tumult would then ensue, 
 and the deputy would then raise his voice in a menacing tone against 
 the friends of Mr. O'Connell. The high sheriff" himself had been 
 accustomed to go to the entrance of the different booths and to 
 command silence with his long-drawn and dismal ejaculations. When 
 the deputy was bearing it with a high hand, Mr. Whyte would some- 
 times leave the booth, and standing at the outward edge of the 
 crowd, just at the moment that the deputy was about to commit 
 some partizan of Mr. O'Connell, the mimic would exclaim in a death- 
 bell voice, "Silence, Mr. Deputy, you are exceedingly disorderly — 
 silence." The deputy being enveloped by the multitude, could not 
 
444 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 see the individual who thus addressed him, and believing it to be the 
 sheriff, sat down confounded at the admonition, while Mr. O'Connell's 
 tally went rapidly on, and the disputed vote was allowed. These 
 vagaries enlivened occupations which in their nature were sufficiently 
 dull. But the sheriff's booth afforded matter more deserving of note 
 than his singularities. Charges of undue influence were occasionallj'- 
 bnjuglit forward, which exhibited the character of the election in its 
 strongest colors, One incident I particularly remember. An 
 attorney employed by Mr. Fitzgerald rushed in and exclaimed that 
 a priest was terrifying the voters. This accusation produced a 
 powerful effect. The counsel for Mr. O'Connell defied the attorney 
 to make out his charge. The assessor very properly required that 
 the priest should attend ; and behold Father Murphy of Corofin ! 
 His solemn and spectral aspect struclc everybody. He advanced with 
 fearlessness to the bar, behind which the sheriff was seated, and 
 enquired what the charge was which had been preferred against him, 
 with a smile of ghastly derision. "You were looking at my voters," 
 cries the attorney. "But I said nothing," replied the priest, "and I 
 suppose that I am to be permitted to look at my parishioners." 
 " Not with such a face as that ! " cried Mr. Dogherty, one of Mr. 
 Fitzgerald's counsel. This produced a loud laugh ; for, certainly, 
 the countenance of Father Murphy was fraught with no ordinary 
 terrors. "And this, then," exclaimed Mr. O'Connell's counsel, "is 
 the charge you bring against the priests. Let us see if there be an 
 act of parliament which prescribes that a Jesuit shall wear a mask." 
 At this instant, one of the agents of Mr. O'Connell preei})itated him- 
 self into the room, and cried out, "Mr. Sherifl", we have no fair play 
 — Mr. Singleton is frightening his tenants — he caught hold of one 
 of them JList now, and threatened vengeance against him." This 
 accusation came admirably apropos. "What ! " exclaimed the advo- 
 cate of Mr. O'Connell, "is this to be endured? Do we live in a free 
 country, and under a constitution ? Is a landlord to commit a battery 
 with impunity, and is a priest to be indicted for his physiognomy, 
 and to be found guilty of a look ? " Thus a valuable set-off against 
 Father Murphy's eyebrows was obtained. After a long debate, the 
 assessor decided that, if either a priest or a landlord actually inter- 
 rupted the poll, thej' should be indiscriminately committed ; but 
 thought the present a case only for admonition. Father Murphy 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 445 
 
 •was accordingly restored to his physiognomical functions. The 
 matter had been scarcely disposed of, when a loud shout was heard 
 from the multitude outside the court-house, which had gathered in 
 thousands, and yet generally presei"ved a profound tranquillity. 
 The large window in the sheriff's booth gave an opportunity of 
 observing whatever took place in the square below ; and, attracted 
 by the tremendous uproar, everybody ran to see what was going on 
 amongst the crowd. The tumult was produced by the arrival of 
 some hundred freeholders from Kilrush, with their landloi'd, Mr. 
 Vandeleur, at their head. He stood behind a carriage, and, with his 
 hat off was seen vehemently addressing the tenants who followed 
 him. It was impossible to hear a word which he uttered ; but his 
 gesture was sufficiently significant : he stamped, and waved his hat, 
 and shook his clenched hand. While he thus adjured them, the 
 crowd through which they were passing, assailed them with cries, 
 "Vote for your country, boys ! Vote for the old religion ! Three 
 cheers for liberty ! Down with Vesey, and hurrah for O'Conncll ! " 
 These were the exclamations which rent the air as they proceeded. 
 They followed their landlord until they had reached a part of the 
 square where Mr. O'Connell lodged, and before which a large plat- 
 form had been erected, which communicated with the window of his 
 apartment, and to which he could advance whenever it was necessary 
 to address the people. When Mr. Vandeleur's freeholders had 
 attained this spot, Mr. O'Connell i-ushed forward on the platform, 
 and lifted up his arm. A tremendous shout succeeded, and in an 
 instant Mr. Vandeleur was deserted by his tenants. This platform 
 exhibited some of the most remarkable scenes enacted in this 
 strange drama of "The Clare Election." It was sustained I)y pillars 
 of wood, and stretched out several feet from the wall to which it was 
 attached. Some twenty or thirty persons could stand upon it at the 
 same time. A large quantity of green boughs were turned about it ; 
 and from the sort of bower which they formed, occasional orators 
 addressed the people during the day. Father Sheehan, a clergyman 
 from Waterford, who had been mainly instrumental in the overthrow 
 of the Beresfords, displayed from this spot his popular abilities. 
 Dr. Kenny, a Waterford surgeon, thinking that "the times were out 
 of joint," came "to set them right." Father Maguii-e, Mr. Lawless, 
 indeed, the whole company of orators, performed on this theatre 
 
44-G TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 with indefatigable energy. Mirth and declamation, and anecdote 
 and grotesque delineation, and mimicry, were all blended together 
 for the public entertainment. One of the most amusing and attrac- 
 tive topics was drawn from the adherence of Father Coffey to Mr. 
 Fitzgerald. His manners, his habits, his dress, were all selected as- 
 materials for ridicule and invective ; and puns, not the less effective ' 
 because they were obvious, were heaped upon his name. The scora 
 and detestation with which he was treated by the mob, clearly proved 
 that a priest has no influence over them when he attempts to run 
 counter to their political j)assions. He can hurry them on in the 
 career into which their own feelings impel them, but he cannot turn 
 them into another course. Many incidents occurred about this 
 rostrum, which, if matter did not crowd too fast upon me, I should 
 stop to detail. I have not room for a minute narration of all that 
 was intei-esting at this election, which would occupy a volume, and 
 must limit myself to one, but that a very striking circumstance. 
 The generality of the orators were heard with loud and clamorous 
 approbation ; but, at a late hour one evening, and when it was 
 growing rapidly dark, a priest came forward on the platform, who 
 addressed the multitude in Irish. There was not a word uttered by 
 the people. Ten thousand peasants were assembled before the 
 speaker, and a profound stillness hung over the living, but almost 
 breathless mass. For minutes they continued thus deeply attentive, 
 and seemed to be struck with awe as he proceeded. Suddenly, I 
 saw the whole multitude kneel down, in one concurrent genuflection. 
 They were engaged in silent prayer, and when the priest arose (for 
 he too had knelt down on the platform), they .also stood up together 
 from their orison. The movement was performed with the facility 
 of a regimental evolution. I asked (being unacquainted with the 
 language) what it was that had occasioned this extraordinary spec- 
 tacle ? and was informed that the orator had stated to the people that 
 one of his own parishioners, who had voted for Mr. Fitzgerald, had 
 just died ; and he called upon the multitude to pray to God for the 
 repose of his soul, and the forgiveness of the offence which he had 
 committed in taking the bribery oath. Money had been his induce- 
 ment to give his sufirage against Mr. O'Connell. Thus it was the day 
 passed, and it was not until nearly nine o'clock that those who were 
 actively engaged in the election went to dinner. There a new scene 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 44^7 
 
 was opened. In a small room in a mean tavern, the whole body of 
 leading patriots, counsellors, attorneys, and agents, with divers 
 interloping partakei's of election hospitality, were crammed and piled 
 upon one another, while Mr. O'Connell sat at the head of the feast 
 almost overcome with fatigue, but yet sustained by that vitality 
 which success produces. Enormous masses were strewed upon the 
 deal boards, at which the hungry masticators proceeded to their 
 operations. The more intellectual season of potations succeeded. 
 Toasts were then proposed, and speeches pronounced, and the usual 
 "hip, hip, hurra!" with unusual accompaniments of exultation, 
 followed. The feats of the day were then narrated : — the blank 
 looks of Mr. Hickman (Mr. Fitzgerald's confidential solicitor and 
 conducting agent), whose face had lost all its natural hilarity, and 
 looked at the election like a full moon in a storm ; and the tears of 
 Sir Edward O'Brien, were alternately the subjects of merriment. 
 Mr. Whyte was called upon for an imitation of the sheriff, when he 
 used to ride upon an elephant at Calcutta. But in the midst of this 
 conviviality, which was heightened by the consciousness that there 
 was no bill to be paid by gentlemen who were the guests of their 
 country, and long before any inebriating effect was observable, a 
 solemn and spectral figure used to stride in, and the same deep 
 chui-ch-yard voice which had previously startled my ears, raised its 
 awful peal, while it exclaimed, "The wolf, the wolf is on the walk. 
 Shepherds of the people, what do you here? Is it meet that you 
 should sit in joyance, while the freeholders remain unprovided, and 
 temptation, in the shape of famine, is amongst them? Arise, I say, 
 arise — the wolf, the wolf is on the walk." 
 
 Such was the disturbing adjuration of Father Murphy of Corolin, 
 whose enthusiastic sense of duty never deserted him, and who, when 
 the feast was unfinished, entered like the figure of death in an Egyp- 
 tian banquet. He walked round the room with a measured pace, 
 chasing the revellers before him, and repeating the same dismal 
 warning, " The wolf, the wolf is upon the walk ! " Nothing was 
 comparable to the aspect of Fatlier Murphy upon these occasions, 
 except the physiognomy of Mr. Lawless. This gentleman, who had 
 been usefully exerting himself during the whole day, somewhat 
 reasonably expected that he should be permitted to enjoy the just 
 rewards of patriotism for a few hours without any nocturnal moles- 
 
448 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tation. It was about the time that the exhilarating influence of his 
 eloquent chalices was beginning to display itself that the dismal cry 
 was wont to come upon him. The look of despair with which he 
 surveyed this unrelenting foe to conviviality was almost as ghastly 
 as that of his merciless disturber ; and as, like another Tantalus, he 
 saw the draughts of pleasantness hurried away, a schoolmaster who 
 sat by him, and who "was abroad" during the election, used to 
 
 exclaim — 
 
 " A labris sitiens fngientia captat 
 Fluraiua." 
 
 It was in vain to remonstrate against Father Murphy, who insisted 
 that the whole company should go forth to meet " the wolf upon the 
 walk." Upon going down stairs, the lower apartments were found 
 thronged with freeholders and priests. To the latter had been as- 
 signed the office of providing food forsucli of the peasants as lived at 
 too great distance from the town to return immediately home ; and 
 each clergjman was empowered to give an order to the victuallers 
 and tavern-keepers to furnish the bearer with a certain quantity of 
 meat and beer. The use of whiskey was forbidden. There were 
 two remarkable features observable in the discharge of this office. 
 The peasant who had not tasted food perhaps for twenty-four hours 
 remained in perfect patience and tranquillity until his turn arrived to 
 speak "to his reverence;" and the Catholic clergy continued with 
 unwearied assiduity and the most amiable solicitude, though them- 
 selves quite exhausted with fatigue, in the performance of this neces- 
 sary labor. There they stayed until a late hour in the morning, and 
 until every claimant had been contented. It is not wonderful that such 
 men, animated by such zeal and operating upon so grateful and so 
 energetic a peasantry, should have effected what they succeeded in 
 accomplishing. The poll at length closed ; and after an excellent 
 argument delivered by the assessor, Mr. Eichard Keatinge, he in- 
 structed the sheriff to return Mr. O'Connell as duly elected. The 
 court-house was again crowded, as on the first day, and Mr. Fitz- 
 gerald appeared at the head of the defeated aristocracy. They 
 looked profoundly melancholy. Mr. Fitzgerald himself did not affect 
 to disguise the deep pain which he felt, but preserved that graceful- 
 ness and perfect good temper which had characterized him during 
 the contest, and which, at its close, disarmed hostility of all its ran- 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 449 
 
 cor. Mr. O'Conncll made a speech dlstingnishcd by just feeling and 
 good taste, and begged that Mr. Fitzgerald woidd forgive him if he 
 had upon the first daj- given him any sort of otlence. Mr. Fitzger- 
 ald came forward and unaffectedly assured him that whatever was 
 said should be forgotten. He was again hailed with universal ac- 
 clamation, and delivered a speech which could not surpass, in good 
 judgment and persuasiveness, that with which he had opened the 
 contest, but was not inferior to it. He left an impression which 
 hereafter will, in all probability, I'euder his return for the county 
 of Clare a matter of certainty ; and, upon the other hand, I feel 
 convinced that he has himself carried away from the scene of that 
 contention, in which he sustained a defeat, but lost no honor, a con- 
 viction that not only the interests of Ireland, but the safety of the 
 empire, require that the claims of seven millions of liis fellow-citi- 
 zens should be conceded. Mr. Fitzerald, during the progress of the 
 election, could not refrain from repeatedlj'^ intimating his astonish- 
 ment at what he saw, and from indulging in melancholy forebodings 
 of the events of which these incidents are perhaps but the heralds. 
 To do him justice, he appeared at moments utterly to forget himself , 
 and to be absorbed in the melancholy presages which pressed them- 
 selves upon him. "Where is all this to end? " was a question fre- 
 quentlj' put in his presence, and from which he seemed to shrink. 
 At the close of the poll, Mr. Sheil spoke in the following terms : — 
 I am anxious to avail myeelf of this opportunity to make a repara- 
 tion to Mr. Fitzgerald. Before I had the honor of hearing that gen- 
 tleman, and of witnessing the conciliator}' demeanor by which he is 
 distinguished, I hud in another place expressed myself with regard 
 to his political conduct, in language to ■which I believe that Mr. 
 Fitzgerald referred upon the first day of the election, and which was, 
 perhaps, too deeply tinctured with that animosity which is almost 
 inseparable from the passions by which this country is so unhappily 
 divided. It is but an act of justice to Mr. Fitzgerald to say, that, 
 however wo may be under the necessity of opposing him as a niem- 
 •bev of an administration hostile to our body, it is impossible to 
 entertain towards him a sentiment of individual hostility ; and I 
 confess, that, after having observed the admirable temper with 
 which he encountered his antagonists, I cannot but regret that, 
 before I had the means of forming a just estimate of his personal 
 
4-50 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 character, I should have indulged in remarks in which too much 
 acidity may have been infused. The situation in which Mr. Fitz- 
 gerald was placed, was peculiarl}" trying to his feelings. He had 
 been long in possession of this county. Though we considered him 
 as an inefBcicnt friend, avo Averc not entitled to account him an 
 opponent. Under these circumstances it may liave appeared harsh, 
 and perhaps unkind, that we should liave selected him as the nr^t 
 object for tlie manifestation of our power ; another would have found 
 it difficult not to give way to tlic language of resentment and of 
 reproach, but so far from doing so, his defence of himself was as 
 strongly marked by forbearance as it was by ability. I thought it, 
 however, not altogether impossible that before the fate of this elec- 
 tion was decided, Mr. Fitzgerald might have been mei'cly practising 
 an expedient of wily conciliation, and that when he appeared so 
 mock and self-controlled in the midst of a contest wliich would have 
 provoked the passions of any ordinary man, he was only stifling hi& 
 resentment, in the hope that he might succeed in appeasing the 
 violence of the opposition with which he had to contend. But Mr. 
 Fitzgerald, in the demeanor which he has preserved to-day, after 
 the election has concluded with his defeat, has given proof that his 
 gentleness of deportment was not affected and artificial: and, now 
 that he has no object to gain, wo cannot but give him as ample 
 credit for his sincerity, as we must give him for that persuasive 
 gracefulness by wliicli his manners are distinguished. Justly has he 
 said that he has not lost a friend in this country ; and he might have 
 added tliat, so far from having incurred any diminution of regard 
 among those who were attached to him, ho has appeased to a great 
 extent the vehemence of that political enmity in which the associate 
 of Mr. Peel was not very unnaturally held. But, sir, while I have 
 thus made the acknowledgment which was due to Mr. Fitzgerald, 
 let me not disguise my own feelings of legitimate, but not I hope 
 offensive exultation at tlio result of this great contest, that has 
 attracted the attention of the English people be} ond all example. I 
 am not mean enough to indulge in any contumelious vaunting over 
 one who has sustained his defeat with so honorable a magnanimit}'. 
 The victory which has been achieved, has been obtained not so much 
 over Mr. Fitzgerald, as over the faction with which I excuse him to 
 a great extent for having been allied. A great display of power 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 451 
 
 has been made by the Catholic Association, and that manifestation 
 of its influence over the national mind, T regard as not only a very 
 remarkable, but a very momentons incident. Let us consider Avhat 
 has taken place, in order that we may see this singular political 
 phenomenon in its just light. It is right that we attentively survey 
 the extraordinary facts before us, in order that we may derive from 
 them the moral admonitions which they are calculated to supply. 
 What then has happened ? Mr. Fitzgerald was promoted to a place 
 in the Duke of Wellington's councils, and the representation of this 
 great county became vacant. The Catholic Association determined 
 to oppose him, and at first view the undertaking seemed to bo des- 
 perate. Not a single Protestant gentleraau could bo procured to 
 enter the lists, and in the want of any other candidate, Mr. O'Con- 
 nell stood forward on behalf of the people. Mr. Yescy Fitzgerald 
 came into the field encompassed with the most signal advantages. 
 His father is a gentleman of large estate, and had been long and 
 deservedly popular in Ireland. Mr. Fitzgerald himself, inheriting 
 a portion of the popular favor with a favorite name, had for twenty 
 years been placed in such innnediate contiguity to power, that he 
 was enabled to circidate a large portion of the influence of govern- 
 ment through this fortunate district. There is scarcely a single 
 family of any significance among you, which does not labor under 
 Mr. Fitzgerald's obligations. At this moment it is only necessary 
 to look at him, with the array of aristocracy beside him, in order to 
 perceive upon what a high position for victory he was placed. He 
 stands encompassed bj^ the whole gentry of the county of Clare, 
 who, as they stood by him in the hour of battle, come here to cover 
 his retreat. Almost every gentleman of rank and fortune appears 
 as his auxiliary, and the gentry, by their aspect at this instant, as 
 well as by their devotedness dui-ing the election, furnish evidence 
 that in his person their own cause was to be asserted. To this com- 
 bination of favorable circumstances — to the political friend, to the 
 accomplished genthmau, to the eloquent advocate, at the head of all 
 the patrician opulence of the county, what did we oppose? We 
 opposed the power of the Catholic Association, and with that tre- 
 mendous engine we have beaten the calnnct minister, and the 
 phalanx of aristocracy by which he is surrounded, to the ground. 
 Why do I mention these tilings? Is it for the purpose (God forbid 
 
452 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 that it should !) of wounding the feelings or exasperating the pas- 
 sions of any man? No, but in order to exhibit the almost marvel- 
 lous incidents which have taken place, in the light in which they 
 ought to be regarded, and to present them in all their appalling 
 magnitude. Protestants who hear me, gentlemen of the county 
 Clare, you whom I address with boldness, perhaps, but certainly not 
 with any purpose to give you ofieuce, let me entreat j'our attention. 
 A baronet of rank and fortune. Sir Edward O'Brien, has asked 
 whether this was a condition of things to be endured ; ho has expa- 
 tiated ujoon the extraordinary influence which has been exercised in 
 order to effect these signal i-esults ; and, after dwelling upon many 
 other grounds of complaint, he has with great force inveighed 
 against the severance which we have created between the landlord 
 and tenant. Let it not be imagined that I mean to deny that we 
 have had recourse to the expedients attributed to us ; on the con- 
 trary, I avow it. We have put a great engine into action, and 
 applied the entire force of that powerful machinery which the law 
 has placed under our control. We are masters of the passions of 
 the people, and we have employed our dominion with a terrible 
 effect. But, sir, do you, or docs any man he're, imagine that we 
 could have acquired tliis formidable ability to sunder the strongest 
 ties by which the different classes of society are fastened, unless we 
 found the materials of excitement in the state of society itself? Do 
 you think that Daniel O'Connell has himself, and by the single 
 powers of his own mind, unaided by any external co-operation, 
 brought the country to this great crisis of agitation? Mr. O'Con- 
 nell, with all his talents for excitation, would have been utterly 
 powerless and incapable, unless he had been allied with a great cou- 
 sj^irator against the public jieacc : and I will tell you who that 
 confederate is^ — it is the law of the land itself tliat has been Mr. 
 O'Connell's main associate, and that ought to be denounced as the 
 mighty agitator of Ireland. The rod of oppression is the wand of 
 this enchanter, and the book of his spells is the penal code. Break 
 the wand of this political Prospero, and lake from him the volume 
 of his magic, and he will evoke the spirits which are now under his 
 control no longer. But why should I have recourse to illustration 
 which may be accounted fantastical, in order to elucidate what is in 
 itself so plain and obvious? Protestant gentlemen, who do me the 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 453 
 
 honor to listen to mc, look, I pniy 3"ou, a little dispassionately at 
 the real causes of the events which have taken place amongst yoii. 
 I beg of you to put aside your angry feelings for an instant, and 
 believe me that I am far from thinking that you have no good 
 ground for resentment. It must be most painful to the proprietors 
 of this county to be stripped in an instant of all their influence ; to 
 be left destitute of all sort of sway over their dependants, and to see 
 a few demagogues and priests usurping their natural authority'. This 
 feeling of resentment must be aggravated by the consciousness that 
 they have not deserved such a return from their tenants ; and as I 
 know Sir Edward O'Brien to be a truly benevolent landlord, I can 
 well conceive that tlie apparent ingratitude Avith which he was treat- 
 ed has added to the pain which ever}^ landlord must experience ; 
 and I own that I was not surprised to see tears upon his eyelids, 
 while his face was inflamed with the emotions to which it was not 
 iu human nature that ho should not give way. But let Sir Edward 
 O'Brien and his fcilow-pi'oprietors, who are gathered about him, 
 recollect that the facility and promptitude with which the peasantry 
 have thrown otT their allegiance, are owing not so much to any want 
 of just moral feeling on the part of the people, as to the operation 
 of causes for which the people are not to blame. In no other coun- 
 try, except in this, would such a revolution have been eflccted. 
 Wherefore? Because in no other country are the people divided 
 by the law from tlicir superiors, and cast into the hands of a set of 
 men who arc supplied with tiie means of national excitement 1)y the 
 system of government under which we live. Surely no man can 
 believe that such an anomalous body as the Catholic Association 
 could exist, excepting in a community which had been alienated 
 from the state by the state itself. The discontent and the resent- 
 ment of seven millions of the population have generated that domes- 
 tic government which sways public opinion and uses the national 
 passions as the instruments of its will. It would be utterly impos- 
 sible, if there were no exasperating distinctions amongst us, to 
 create any artificial causes of discontent. Let men declaim for a 
 century, and if they have no real grievance their harangues will' be 
 empty sound and idle air. But when what they tell the people is 
 true — when they are sustained by substantial facts, effects are pro- 
 duced, of which what has taken place at this election is only an 
 
454 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 example. The whole body of the people having been previously 
 excited, the moment any incident, such as this election, occurs, all 
 the popular passions start simultaneously up, and bear down every 
 obstacle before them. 
 
 Do not, therefore, lie surprised that the peasantry should throw 
 off their allegiance, when they are under the operation of emotions 
 which it would be wonderful if they could resist. The feeling by 
 which ihey are actuated, would maUe them not only vote against 
 their landlord, but w'ouicl make them scale the batteries of a fortress 
 and mount the breach ; and, gentlemen, give me leave to ask 3'ou, 
 whether, after a due reflection upon the motives by which j-our 
 vassals (for so they arc accounted) are governed, you will be dis- 
 posed to exercise any measure of severity in their regard. I hear it 
 said, that before many days go by, there will be many tears shed in 
 the hovels of your slaves, and that you will take a terrible vengeance. 
 I trust tliat you will not, when your own passions shall have sub- 
 sided, and your blood has had time to cool, persevere in such a 
 cruel, and let mo add, such an unjustitiable determination. Consider 
 whether a great allowance should not be made for the off"ence which 
 they have committed. If they are under the influence of fanaticism, 
 such an influence affords many circumstances of extenuation : — you 
 should forgive them, "for they know not what they do." They 
 have followed their priests to the hustings, and they would follow 
 them to the scaff"old. You will ask, wherefore they should prefer 
 their priests to their landlords, and have a higher reverence for tho 
 altars of their religion, than for the counter in which you calculate 
 your rents? Consider a little the relation in which the priest stands 
 towards the peasant. I will take for my example an excellent land- 
 lord and an excellent priest. The landlord shall be Sir Edward 
 O'Brien, and the priest shall be Mr. Murphy of Corofin. Who la 
 Sir Edward O'Brien? A gentleman who from tho windows of a 
 palace, looks upon possessions almost as wide as those which his 
 ancestors beheld from the summit of their feudal towers. His tenants 
 pay him their rent twice a year, and have their land at a moderate 
 rate. But what are his claims, when put into comparison with those 
 of Mr. Murphy of Corofin, to the confidence, to the afTection, and to 
 the fidelity of the peasants who are committed to his care ? He is 
 not only the minister of that humble altar at which their forefathers 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEH.. 455 
 
 and themselves were taught to kneel, but he is their kind, their 
 familiar, yet most respected friend. In their diflSculties and dis- 
 tresses they have no one else to look to ; he never fails wlien con- 
 sulted by them, to associate his sympathy with his admonition ; for 
 their sake he is ready to encounter every hazard, and, in the per- 
 formance of the perilous duties incident to his sacerdotal office, he 
 never hesitates to expose his life. In a stormy night, a knocking is 
 heard at the door of the priest of Corofin. He is told that at the 
 foot of the mountain a man of guilt and blood has scarcely more than 
 an hour to live. Will the teacher of the gospel tarry because of the 
 rain and of the wind, and wait until the day shall break, when the 
 soul of an expiring sinner can be saved, and the demons that are 
 impatient for him can still be scared away? He goes forth in the 
 blackness of the tempestuous midnight — he ascends tlie hill, he 
 travei'ses the morass — and faint, and cold, and dripping, finds his 
 way to the hovel where l.is coming is awaited ; — with what a gasp- 
 ing of inarticulate gratitude — with what a smile of agony is he 
 welcomed ! No fear of contagion, no di'ead of the exhalations of 
 mortality, reeking i'rom the bed of the pestilential man can appal 
 him, but kneeling down at the side of the departing culprit, and 
 sustaining him in his arms, he receives from lips impregnated with 
 death, the whisper with which the heart is unloaded of its mysteries, 
 . and, raising up his eyes to heaven, pronounces the ritual of absolu- 
 tion in the name of Him of whose conmiission of mercy he is the 
 befitting bearer, and wliosc precepts he illustrates in his life and 
 inculcates in his example. And can you feel wonder and resentment 
 that under the influence of such a man as I have described to you, 
 your dependants should have ventured upon a violation of j'our 
 mandates? Forgive me if I venture to supplicate, on behalf of your 
 tenants, for forbearance. Pardon them, in the name of one who 
 will forgive you your offences in the same measure of compassion 
 which you will show to the trespasses of those who have sinned 
 against yourselves. Do not persecute these poor peofile : don't 
 throw their children upon the public road, and send them forth to 
 starve, to shiver, and to die. For God's sake, Mr. Fitzgerald, as 
 you are a gentleman and a man of honor, interpose your influence 
 with j'our friends, and redeem your pledge. I address myself per- 
 sonally to you. On the first day of the election you declared that 
 
456 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 you would deprecate persecution, and that you were the last to wish 
 that vindictive measures should be cn)j)io3'ed. I believe j'ou — and 
 I call upon yon to redeem that pledge of mercy, to perform that 
 great moral promise. You will cover yourself with honor by so 
 doing, in the same way that you will share in the ignominy that will 
 attend upon any expedients of rigor. Before you leave this country 
 to assume your high functions, enjoin your friends with that 
 eloquence of which you arc the master, to refrain from cruelty and 
 not to oppress their tenants. Tell them, sir, that instead of l)usying- 
 themselves hi the worthless occupation of revenge, it is much fitter 
 that they should take the political condition of their country into 
 their deep consideration. Tell them that they should address them- 
 selves to the legislature, and implore a remedy for these frightful 
 evils. Tell them to call upon the men, in whose hands the destiny 
 of this great empire is placed to adopt a system of peace, and to 
 apply to Ireland the great canon of political morality — 2iacis impo- 
 iiere inorem. Let it not be imagined that any measure of disfran- 
 chisement, that any additional penalty, will aiford a remedy. 
 Things have been permitted to advance to a height from which they 
 cannot recede. Protestants, awake to a sense of your condition. 
 What have you seen during this election? Enough to make you 
 feel that it is not a mere local excitation, but that seven millions of 
 Iris!) people are completely arrayed and organized. That which you 
 behold in Clare, you would bchokl, under similar circumstances, in 
 every county in the kingdom. Did you mark our discipline, our 
 subordination, our good order, and that tranquillit}", which is for- 
 midable indeed? You have seen sixty thousand men imder our 
 command, and not a hand was raised, and not a forbidden word was 
 uttered in that amazing multitude. You have beheld an example of 
 our power in the almost miraculous sobriety of the people. Their 
 lips have not touched that infuriating beverage to which they ai'c so 
 much attached, and their habitual propensity vanished at our com- 
 mand. Is it meet and wise to leave us armed with such a dominion? 
 Trust us not with it; strip us of this appalling power; disarray us 
 by equality ; instead of angry slaves make us contented citizens : if 
 you do not, tremble for the result. 
 
BICHAKD LALOR SIIEIL. 457 
 
 Repeal of the Union. 
 
 Speech m the House of Co.mjions on the 25Tn of April, 1834. 
 
 ^ipHE speech just spoken by the member for the county of Wcx- 
 ^^ ford has been received with acclamations, and if it were less 
 ^ able, the acclamation would not, perhaps, have been less cn- 
 i thusiastic, or less loud. Foilunate advocate, whose success 
 
 depends as much at least on the predilections of the tribunal, as uj)on 
 the merits of the cause ! I have heard my honorable friend when he 
 exhiljitcd fully as much eloquence as upon this occasion, but never 
 saw him received with such cordiality at the outset, or such rapture 
 at the termination of any of his former liarangues. With what clear- 
 ness of exposition, with what irresistible force, for example, did he 
 demand justice for the Irish people after the massacre of Newtown- 
 barry? He presented a picture of that atrocious transaction, com- 
 pared to which, his accounts of the fatal effects of agitation are weak 
 and inefKcienl indeed. The incidents which he described, and the 
 picturesque diction in which his narrative was conveyed, ought to 
 have produced a great impression upon his auditory, yet how coldly 
 did all that he then m-ged fall upon his hearers. You were then 
 frigid and apathetic ; you are now, in the highest degree, susceptiblo 
 and alive to the accomplishments of the member for the county of 
 "Wexford. My honorable friend is now a devoted and unqualified 
 antagonist of repeal. Was it alwa^'s thus ? Did he not say — that 
 if justice was not done to Ireland on the titlic question, he should, 
 however reluctantly, become an advocate for repeal? 
 
 Mr. Lambert — 1 do not i-ecollect having ever said so. 
 
 Mr. Sheil — At all events, he declared that the denial of justice 
 with respect to the Irish Church, would have the effect of inducing 
 the great mass of the population to embrace repeal. Whether he 
 
458 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 spoke of himself, or of the country, putthig personal considerations 
 out of view, the inference is neurly the same. He expressed a de- 
 sire when he began, that the member for Dublin should be in attend- 
 ance while he reviewed his conduct. The wish was gratified. The 
 member for Dublin entci-ed the house (which the honorable mcmbei 
 for the county of Wexford never would have entered but for the 
 member for Dublin), and I own that I did not think that he had any 
 cause to wince under the chastisement applied to him by the hon. 
 member. But how, after all, are the real merits of this great question 
 aifected by these resentful references to incidents which have taken 
 place outside this house? Is this the proper field for encounter be- 
 tween two honorable gentlemen? The member for the county of 
 Wexford may have been wronged ; — language may have been applied 
 to him by the member for Dublin with regard to his conduct on the 
 Coercion Bill, which deserves condemnation. I regret it; but let 
 him bear in mind that the obligation conferred ujDon him by the 
 member for Dublin, ought to outweigh every injurj^ Though ho 
 has been smitten in the face, let him rcmeml)er that the hand that 
 struck him, struck his fetters off. The honorable member for Wex- 
 ford has adverted to the remuneration, which the people of Ireland 
 have bestowed upon the member for Dublin. He should have con- 
 sidered the extent of tlie service, before ho derided the reward. For 
 thirty years the member for Dublin has toiled in the cause of Ire- 
 land ; he has been mainly instrumental in achieving the liberty of 
 his fellow-countrymen ; he has relinquished great emoluments by ab- 
 stracting himself from his pi-ofession, and by making a dedication of 
 his faculties to the interests of his country : — Ii'eland felt that it be- 
 hove her to prove her gratitude for that freedom, which is above all 
 price. 
 
 I turn from these painful topics to the subject presented to our 
 deliberation. Not a word has yet been said upon the amendment. 
 
 Many may conceive that the original proposition ought lo be re- 
 jected, and yet will, I hope, pause before they adopt the sentiments 
 contained in the address. The question before the house is, not 
 merely whether a committee should be granted for the purpose of 
 investigating a question on which the Seci'ctary for the Treasury 
 thought it not inexpedient to deliver an harangue, of which the 
 length must be admitted to be unsurpassed, but whether we shall 
 
RICHARD LALOR SEIEIL. 459 
 
 vote an address, which not only contains an approval of the Union, 
 but states besides, that the policy adopted with respect to Ireland 
 has been judicious, wise, and just. Observe what it is you are 
 called upon to place on record ; mark the following paragraph : — 
 
 " We humbly represent to your Majesty that tiio Imperial Parlia- 
 ment have taken the aifairs of Ireland into their most serious con- 
 sideration, ;md that various salutary laws liavc been enacted since 
 the Union for the advancement of the most important interests of 
 Ireland, and of the empire at large." 
 
 What other object can there bo for this assertion, but to declare 
 that the course pursued by parliament has been such, as not to make 
 it requisite that any change should bo adopted. Suppose that in 
 the year 1827, Avlien Mr. Canning was Prime jNIinistcr, and so many 
 members of the present cabinet were associated with him, the uoIjIc 
 lord, ti)o Paymaster of the Forces had introduced the question of 
 parliamentary reform, which Mr. Canning declared he would resist, 
 — not "to the death," but to the last moment of his life, and that 
 the Conservative party had introduced an address against reform 
 similar to this address against repeal, would not all the arguments 
 advanced in support of tiiis address have applied as forcibly to that 
 which I have hypoiiietically suggested? The Conservative address 
 against reform might have run thus: — "We, your Majesty's most 
 dutiful and loyal subjects, the Commons in parliament assembled, 
 feel it our duty humbly to approach your Majesty's throne, to re- 
 cord, in the most solemn manner, our fixed determination to main- 
 tain, unimpaired and undisturljed, the constitution or parliament — 
 (I substitute it for 'legislative union'), which we consider to be 
 essential to the strength and stability of the empire, to the con- 
 tinuance of the connection between the two countries, and to the 
 peace, and security and happiness of all classes of your Majesty's 
 subjects. In expressing to your Majest}' our resolution to maintain 
 the constitution inviolate, we humbly beg leave to assure your 
 Majesty, that we shall persevere in applying our best attention to 
 the removal of all just causes of complaint, and to the promotion 
 of all well-considered measures of improvement." 
 
 Had such an address been proposed, how would it have been 
 denounced? Would it not have been considered as amounting to 
 a sanction of all the policy pursued by the lioroughmougering ad- 
 
460 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ministrations? In that light it would, beyond doubt, have been 
 represented by that Whig party, which, after having passed their 
 political lives in reprobating the conduct of their opponents while 
 they were in power, call on the house to pronounce upon the meas- 
 ures of the last thirty-four years an unqualified panegyric. I shall, 
 in the course of the observations I mean to make, revert to this view 
 of the amendment, which I have only suggested, in order that the 
 house miglit see exactly what it was called on to do, and the extent 
 of the proposition which has been made by the government. I 
 return to the original motion. The member for Dublin demands a 
 committee to enquire into the results of the Union, and the probable 
 consequences of its continuance. I should at once grapple with the' 
 argument derived from the alleged likelihood of separation, but that 
 it belongs to the prophetic part of the case ; — it is better to deal 
 with facts before we indulge in predictions ; and, before we look 
 forward, to look back. Before the year 1782, Ireland lay prostrate. 
 The foot of England was upon her neck, and was applied with the 
 pressure which, in such an attitude, is habitually employed. Why 
 do I revert to a period so remote? I call up your ancestors in order 
 to show 3'ou that j'ou have preserved a resemblance to them — ia 
 the pictures of your predecessors a national likeness may be traced. 
 Between an Irish Parliament under the direct control of an English, 
 and an Imperial Parliament, in Avhich Irish members are overwhelmed 
 by English majorities, tiierc is some distinction, but not much dif- 
 ference to be found. Was Ireland justified in demanding her inde- 
 pendence? Few will deny it. Yet its advocates were aspersed with 
 contumelies as foul as are now poured from high places on the cham- 
 pions of repeal. 
 
 The ti-act of Molyneux was burned by order of the British House 
 of Commons, and the office was performed by an appropriate repre- 
 sentative of the feelings of Englishmen towards the sister country. 
 This proposition was treated as a wretched absurdity, or a base ex- 
 pedient. It was denounced as impracticable, events converted the 
 impossibility into fact. When the Irish Parliament had achieved its 
 independence, how did it employ tlic noble instrument which it had 
 so gloriously won ? Free trade, the independence of the judges, 
 the Habeas Corpus Act, concessions to the Roman Catholics, were 
 the measures associated with independence. The Secretary to the 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 461 
 
 Treasury, Mr. Spring Rice, has cited the authorit}'^ of Mr. Grattan, 
 -for the purpose of showing that Mr. Grattau condemned the pro- 
 ceedings of the Irish Parliament from the year 1782, up to the time 
 of the Union. I could cite the authority of Mr. Grattau on the 
 other side ; but I will not occupy the time of the house with prolix- 
 ities of this sort, nor refer to a multitude of authorities. To one, 
 however, I cannot refrain from adverting, that of Edmund Burke, 
 because it must weigh beyond every otlier, in the mind of the Secre- 
 tary for the Treasury, as Edmund Burke considered England his 
 adopted, and (he had good cause to do so) his dearer country. It 
 is not wonderful that Edmund Burke should have given a prcfei"cnce 
 to England ; "where a man hath his treasure, there also he hath his 
 heart." I shall not molest the house with long extracts ; it is enough 
 to refer to Edmund Burke's speech on conciliation with America, and 
 to his letter to Sir Hercules Langrishe, for glowing descriptions of 
 the rapid and wide advances made by Ireland after 1782. The 
 course adopted by the government is singular, — they tell us in the 
 first place, that all reference to events before the Union is inap- 
 plicable, and that our encomiums on the Irish Parliament are out of 
 place, and afterwards they themselves resort to every petty anecdote 
 connected with our parliament, and disinter from oblivion every 
 derogatory circumstance, to make out a case against us. The argu- 
 ment is this: — the Irish Parliament was often under the influence 
 of the populace — its proceedings were interrupted and controlled, 
 and therefore it ought not to exist. Might I not say, Cromwell 
 broke into this house, bade a rude soldier take away "this bauble" 
 on which I now lay my hand, therefore there ought not to be a 
 House of Commons ! The reasoning against the Irish Parliament is 
 the same. The Secretary for the Treasury has quoted every bad 
 act passed by the Irish — he has quoted every good one passed by 
 an Imperial Parliament. Whj^ did he omit any — the least — men- 
 tion of any one of the benelicial measures enacted by the parliament 
 of his country? I shoidd be justified in opening the Irish Statutes, 
 and going through the entire of its legislation. But this would be 
 a tedious process. To one part only of the legislation of the Irish 
 Parliament shall I call the attention of the house. Many a time has 
 it been said that the Irish Parliament, left to itself, would never 
 carry the Roman Catholic Question. Let us not judge by idle con- 
 
4G2 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ject-urcs of what it was probable it would have done, but In' a ref- 
 erence to what it actually did do. What was the conduct with 
 respect to the Roman Catholics of the Irish and the English Parlia- 
 ments at the .siiuie time ? The English Parliament made some con- 
 cessions, but excluded Roman Catholics from the Universities, from 
 corporations, from the Ijench of magisterial justice, from grand 
 juries, from petty juries, and from the hustings. What, on the 
 other hand, was the conduct of the Irish Parliament? It admitted 
 Roman Catholics to the Universities, to corj)orations, to the magiste- 
 lial bench, to the grand jury box, to the petty jury, and, above and 
 gloriously paramount to all, it conferred upon them the elective 
 franchise — furnished a fulcrum by which Ireland placed a mighty 
 lever — gave the weapon with which the victory of peace Avas 
 achieved — gave that which being conceded, the noble residue of 
 freedom could not be withheld. I shall, by and by, have occasion 
 to compare the conduct of the Imperial Parliament with that of the 
 Irish Parliament, with regard to tlie Catholic Ques.tion. 
 
 We are told that an Irish Parliament would be favorable to sepa- 
 ration. The object of the rebellion was separation. How did the 
 Irish Parliament act? If it co-operated with the conspirators, or 
 connived at their project, there would be some plausibility in the 
 suggestion. But not only was there no party with a leaning to the 
 insurgents, but there was not a man in that assembly who did not 
 concur in the suppression of the revolt ; and it was remarkable that 
 the men who were most devoted to Irish independence, were 
 equall}' attached to connexion with this country. Never did there 
 exist a body which displayed a more genuine and enthusiastic loyal- 
 ty ; and shall that great fact be held in no account? France saw in 
 the Irish Parliament a representative of the intelligence of Ireland, 
 whose moral influence co-operated with military power, and who 
 rallied the nation round the standard of the King, by inculcating the 
 great principle, that allegiance is but a modification of patriotism, 
 and fidelity to our institutions a part of the love of country. Pass 
 to the Union. Of the infiimy of the means by which it was carried, 
 it is unnecessary to say much because the fact is undisputed. But 
 it is said — "of what consequence are the means? Factum valet." 
 Convenient aphorism ! By a judicious application of this canon in 
 the Machiavelian casuistry, there is no atrocity which may not be 
 
KICIIARD LALOR SMEIL. 4(33 
 
 turned to account. Lord Grey would not — God forbid! — huvo 
 ever robbed Irelund of her legislature, but he has no objection to 
 become receiver of her spoliated rights. But let us put the ethics 
 of the question, except so far as they are connected with expedi- 
 ency, out of the case ; yet have they no connexion with expedi- 
 ency? The means have mingled with the effects, because they have 
 generated the feelings which would more than vitiate any good 
 which the Union could produce. From a source so foul, the Irish 
 people think that nothing pure can be derived. They think that no 
 matter over what time it may pass, the current can never run clear. 
 They look back Avith detestation to the venality and the turpitude 
 by which their legislature was bartered — that which is an object of 
 national abhorrence must be prolific of manj' evils, and barren of all 
 good. Some one said that a fault was worse than a crime ; a crime 
 seldom fails to be a fault. The memory of the delinquency makes 
 it a mistake. The consideration of the instrumentality by which 
 the Union was accomplished is not irrelevant ; but let us consider 
 the ,more direct and palpable effects of the measure. They are 
 divisible into two heads, — the fiscal and political. The Secretary 
 for tiio Treasury has appealed to a great number of financial facts, 
 10 sustain the propusition that the Union has produced the pros- 
 perity of Ireland. In 1796 Edmund Burke published his letters on 
 the Begicide Peace. In one of them, like the Secretary for the 
 Treasury, he combines rhetoric and arithmetic together. He refers 
 to the exports and imports, to the official returns respecting the 
 revenue, the customs, taxes, excise, manufactures, and tonnage and 
 all the other materials of fiscal calculation. He concludes that 
 nothing is so useful as war, and calls on England to fight on. But 
 if the inference of Edmund Burke were wrong, is the inference of 
 the member for Cambridge right? Look at Canada. Its prosperity 
 may be demonstrated. Why should not Ireland prosper with a 
 local government as well as Canada? If you effected a Union with 
 Canada, would you not lose the country — would you keep it for 
 three years ? 
 
 The Secretary for the Treasury says, that Ireland prospers because 
 she enjoys a free trade. In the event of repeal would there not be a 
 free trade ? Is it not the interest of both countries that there should 
 not be any commercial restrictions? Ireland consumes £7,000,000 
 
464 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of j'our manufactures — 3"ou consume several millions of her produce. 
 How would it be your interest to restrict her trade, when she affords 
 3'ou your best, nearest, and safest market? Arc not the people of 
 England clamoring for a free trade with France? Would they re- 
 fuse it to Ireland ? I deny — (and I know it is the sentiment of the 
 great body of my countrymen) — that a, repeal of the Union would 
 produce an abolition of the free trade between the two countries. 
 Will the Vice-President of the Board of Trade assert that repeal 
 ought to lead to a cessation of free trade between Ireland and Eng- 
 land, when he n)aintains the utility of free trade with all the world. 
 But, then, it is said that, in consequence of the Union, Ireland has 
 the exclusive market of England. If that has hitherto been the case, 
 how long will you pledge 3'ourselvcs that this advantage shall con- 
 tinue? Will you pledge yourselves that the present corn laws shall 
 stand? Will the English manufacturer concur in such a pledge? 
 and if he will not, what becomes of this argument ? Place the integ- 
 rity of the empire in one scale, and a quartern loiif in the other, and 
 on which side, in the mind of a political economist, will the pre- 
 ponderancy be found? But q,fter all, is it here, in a debate like this, 
 that questions so complicated are to be determined? 
 
 Give me leave to ask of those who have heard the honorable 
 member for Dublin, and who have listened to the member for Cam- 
 bridge, whether the arithmetic of both parties, is not a much fitter 
 subject for investigation in a committee, than for discussion, or 
 rather retorts, and derisions, and invective, and acclamation here? 
 Was Ireland prosperous before the Union ? Mr. Pitt, Mr. Burke, 
 and a crowd of other authorities, have been cited to establish it. 
 But it may be said that the antecedent prosperity of Ireland does 
 not touch the main question. If so, why did the right honorable 
 gentleman think it necessary to advert to it? He has taken from it 
 every quality of impertinence, and given it relevancy and value. 
 To one prominent point in this part of the case I shall apply myself. 
 Indeed, with respect to finance, there is but one observation which 
 1 desire to make, and in that I believe myself to be well founded, 
 for I am borne out in it by the authority of a gentleman Avho was 
 once Chancellor of the Exchequer for Ireland — Sir John Newport; 
 and this opinion is sustained by that of Lord Plunkct. I will not 
 troul^le the house by quoting their opinions at length, but I will give 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. ^65 
 
 the substance of them ; and if anyone doul)ts the accuracy of my 
 statement, I can produce the passages to which I refer. Ireland, at 
 the time of the Union, was charged with the contribution of two- 
 seventeenths to the general expenditure of the two kingdoms. Was 
 that fair? Sir John Newport pronounced it to be most unjust — so 
 did Lord Pluidcet ; but the fact goes further than their authority, 
 for it turned out that Ireland was unable to pay the share she had 
 contracted to contribute. What was the consequence? It was nec- 
 essary to make up the deficiency by successive loans. Where was 
 the money borrowed? In England; and thei'evenue of Ireland was 
 applied to paying the interest on those loans. How many millions 
 were paid by Ireland in consequence of that injustice? Between 
 £4,000,000 and £5,000,000 a year up to 1816. You have got so 
 much, then, of the i-evenue of Ireland, which you ought nelfcr to 
 have received. Has no injustice been done to Ireland in this respect? 
 But you will tell me that you have cured all this by the consolidation 
 of the exchequers of the two countries. You have not ; because at 
 the time of the Union, you agreed that the surplus revenue of Ire- 
 land should be spent in Ireland : there would have been a surplus, 
 but for the charge of two-seventeenths. You consolidated the ex- 
 chequers on account of the excessive charge, and now the whole of 
 our revenue comes to your exchequer. By the return, a clear sur- 
 plus beyond our expenditure appears ; that surplus you receive. 
 
 You talk of British capital flowing into Ireland — you might as well 
 talk of infusing blood into the veins, while you were opening the 
 arteries. The Secretary for Ireland saj's absenteeism existed before 
 the Union. Yes ; but you have aggravated the disease, and taken 
 away the cure. Do you deny that the evil has been augmented? 
 The Secretary for the Treasury tells us that Dublin is more pros- 
 perous. Hear the report of a committee of this bouse, in 1825 : — 
 
 " Your committee feel an earnest hope that the peculiar situation 
 in which the city of Dublin has been placed by the Union will not be 
 lost sight of by this house. Prior to that event, ninet3''-eight Peers 
 and a proportionate number of wealthy Commoners inhabited the 
 same. At present the number of resident Peers does not exceed 
 twelve." 
 
 At the present moment there are not more than two.. Ninety-eight 
 
466 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 resident Peers hefore the Union — :it present two ! The rcjiort of 
 committee contains these additional words : — 
 
 "Thus the effect of the Union has been to withdraw from Dublin 
 many of those who were liliely to contribute most eti'ectnally to its 
 opulence and prosperity." 
 
 The same opinion was expressed by Sir John Newport, on the 
 22ud of April, 1822, in a debate in this house, in which the Kigbt 
 Honorable Secretary to the Treasury took part. 
 
 "Before the Union (said Sir John) the progress of taxation in 
 Ireland had been comp:u-atively moderate, and I am perfectly con- 
 vinced that had parliament, since the Union, pursued the course 
 which wisdom dictated with respect to this object, it would have 
 beei» precisely the reverse of that which they have adopted. It is 
 manifest that one of the evils of Ireland, confessedly prominent in 
 the list of those under which she suffers, is the magnitude and number 
 of her absentee proprietors. By their absence the people are dejirived 
 of those to whom they could with confidence look up." 
 
 Is the absence of the nobility and chief gentry of that country of 
 no account? I admit that some noblemen, like the Duke of Devon- 
 shire, Lords Hertford, Lansdowne, Camden, Fitzwilliam, Es^ex, and 
 others, must remain residents in this country. Some arrangement 
 might be made b}' an Irish Parliament in their regard ; but the 
 necessity of attending the two houses here has caused the aljsence of 
 others, whootherwise would live in Ireland . An Irish Parliament would 
 tax absenteeism. The Secretary for Ireland, the member for Stafford- 
 shire, between whom and the honorable member for Belfast, thei'e 
 last night passed an interchange of parliamentary endearments, spoke 
 of a tax upon the property of absentees as amounting to confiscation. 
 Are the acts of the Irish Parliament void? You would resent a hint 
 touching the invalidity of the Act of Union : extend to other acts the 
 benefit of your doctrine. We have acts of the Irish Parliament 
 (Eichard II. and Henry VIH.), by which the proprietors of estates 
 were subject to a heavy forfeiture during their absence. This prin- 
 ciple of taxation was adopted by an English Parliament when the 
 kings of England had dominions in France, and their sul)jccts 
 preferred residence on their estates in that country. Look at the 
 inconvenience of the tax on the one hand, and the misery of the 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 467 
 
 people of Ireland on the other, and then tell me which ought to 
 weigh most in the consideration of the legislature. 
 
 When you expatiate on the increased prosperity of the country as 
 proved by its exports, do you forget that when converted into money, 
 it is in the palaces, the banquets and saloons of this metropolis, that 
 the fruits of Irish labor are expended ? What is the condition of the 
 mass of the people? The population of Ireland has doubled since 
 the Union. Has her capital increased in the same proportion — and 
 is there not a far greater mass of misery than there was before? 
 " The greater happiness of the greater number " being applied as a 
 test, in what light shall we see the results of the Union to the people, 
 the state of the people? The exports of Ireland, forsooth — go — 
 let the right honorable gentleman take his stand on the quay of the 
 city which he once represented ; let him look on whole fleets 
 upon the Shannon, freighted to the water's edge with grain, the 
 produce of mja-iads of acres, and with flocks and herds innumerable, 
 depastured upon the land on which heaven has rained fertility, and 
 after he shall have contemplated the spectacle on which it does the 
 heart of an economist good to rest, let him turn round and look on 
 the starving peasantry by whom all these materials for absentee 
 splendor have been created — behold the fimiine, the wretchedness, 
 and the pestilence of the Irish hovel, and if he have the heart to do 
 so, let him mock at the calamities of his country, and proceed in his 
 demonstration of the prosperity of Ireland. The mass of the people 
 are in a condition more wretched than that of any nation in Europe ; 
 they are worse housed, worse covered, worse fed than the basest 
 boors in the provinces of Russia ; they dwell in habitations to which 
 your swine would not be committed ; they are covered with rags 
 which your beggars would disdain to wear ; and not only do they 
 never taste the flesh of the animals which crowd into your markets, 
 and while the sweat drops from their brows, they never touch the 
 bread into which their harvests are converted. For you they toil ; 
 for you they delve ; they reclaim the bog, and drive the plough to 
 the mountain's top for you. And where does all this misery exist? 
 In a country teeming with fertility, and stamped with the beneficent 
 intents of God. When the famine of Ireland prevailed; whrn her 
 cries crossed the channel, and pierced your ears, and reached your 
 hearts, the granaries of Ireland were bursting with their contents, 
 
468 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 and wliile a people knelt clown, and stretched out tlicir hands for 
 food, the business of deportation, the absentee tribute was going on. 
 Talk of the prosperity of Ireland ! Talk of the external magnificence 
 of a poorhonse, gorged with misery within. I am glad that I have 
 recollected the poor laws. Wherefore are half this house favorable 
 to an Irish poor law ! Is it not because the people are i-educed to 
 straits at which humanity recoils ? And how does your sympathy 
 with the Irish poor at one moment accord with your expatiations on 
 Irish prosperity at another? But let me be just. I do not accuse 
 the Secretary for the Treasury of being favorable to poor laws. He 
 sees the jDoor laws from the Shannon, as he sees repeal from the 
 Thames. He takes a ti'easury view of the one, and a Mount Trenchard 
 view of the other. We propose repeal — others propose poor laws. 
 What does he suggest? What nostrum will he produce from the 
 Downing-street dispensary of political empiricism ? All that Ireland 
 requires is good government? Has she been well governed? "Yes," 
 says the Secretary of the Treasury. I proceed to the political head 
 of this great question. 
 
 The right honorable gentleman, on Ihis part of the case has spoken 
 with more than his usual talent — which is saying much ; and with 
 more than his usual earnestness — which is saying a good deal. He 
 designates himself as a West Briton. He does himself injustice, 
 for he is more than English. It was said of the English colonist, 
 that he was Ilibernis Ilibernior. He improved upon our indigenous 
 barbarism. British civilization has produced an opposite i-esult, in a 
 proportionate degree of refinement on the mind of the right honor- 
 able gentleman. All the mud of his native Shannon has not only 
 been washed off by his ablutions in the Cam, but he comes more 
 fresh and glossy from the academic water, than those M'ho at their 
 birth were immersed in the classic stream. But did the right hon- 
 orable gentlemen always see the government of Ireland in the same 
 light — or does the configuration, and do the colors of objects depend 
 on the position from which they ai'e seen? There was a time when 
 the right honorable gentleman saw nothing but gloom in the political 
 horizon ; but now every cloud is filled with the radiance of his im- 
 agination, and he beholds nothing but brightness,. gorgeousness, and 
 gold. He has represented the conduct of the Imperial Parliament 
 towards his native country as wise and generous. I shall be able to 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 4(59 
 
 prove from the uniform tenor of the right honorable gentleman's 
 speeches in opjiosition, that until he came into office he regarded the 
 system by which Ireland was governed as fraught with injustice. 
 He has picked from the speeches delivered by the member for 
 Dublin every loose expression, every careless phrase which he could 
 apply to his purposes. Blame us not if in this, as in other particu- 
 lars, we presume to follow your example. Since you rely upon the 
 ebullitions of popular excitement at public meetings, and upon those 
 thoughtless and inconsiderate, declamations which are thrown off 
 in utter recklessness amidst casual gathormgs of the people — since 
 you quote after-dinner orators, and rely upon the rhetoric of the 
 Corn Exchange ; permit us, on the other hand, to refer to 3'our own 
 solemn and reiterated declarations made in your legislative capacity 
 in this house, and to exhibit the enormity of the contradiction that 
 exists between 3'our conduct in otKce and that which j^ou adopted 
 before you arrived at power. How has Ireland been governed since 
 the Union? Whigs of 1834 — how have the forebodings of the 
 Whigs of 1799 been fulfilled? They foretold the result of that vile 
 exchange, that base swap by which Ireland Avas forced to give up the 
 entirety of her legislature for a miserable sixth in that imjoerial co- 
 partnership, and became dependant upon majorities composed of 
 men who care little about the welfare, sympathize less with the feel- 
 ings, and know nothing of the interests of Ireland. Let us see the 
 evidences of British magnanimity, British generosity, and British 
 justice ? The Secretary for the Treasury has gone through a variety 
 of details to establish the undeviating beneficence of an Imperial 
 Legislature. Hear the language (let him listen to it) uttered by 
 himself on the 22d of April, 1822. Thus sjieaks the member for 
 Limerick : — 
 
 " What was the first tribute which the Imperial Parliament of 1801 
 tendered to Ireland in their first notice of the situation of that 
 country after the Union? Their first statute was the Irish JIartial 
 Law Bill." 
 
 On Wednesday the right honorable gentleman recapitulated the 
 acts which the Imperial Parliament had passed for Ireland. He 
 went through acts for lighting and paving the streets — he enlarged 
 on the achievements of pure legislation — he recounted the provis- 
 ions of various statutes on small subjects — but never once alluded 
 
470 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to the questions which touch the heart of the country to the core ; 
 and entirely forgot that, in 1822, he had exchiimed that the renewal 
 of martial law in 1801, was the first piece of legislation adopted by 
 the Imperial Pai'liament with respect to Ireland. But I will not do 
 him the injustice of suppressing the rest of his observations in that 
 remarkable declaration. The right honorable gentlemen went on, 
 and said that the spirit in which the British Parliament legislated for 
 Ii'eland had been in accordance with the principle on which the act 
 establishing martial law was founded. He added — 
 
 "In tracing the histoiy of Irish legislation, both before and since 
 the Union, there appeared as it were, two streams passing through 
 the channel of Parliament. In one flowed acts of strenuous finance, 
 or equally strong coercion — the one with great malice, the other 
 with great power. In the other channel the struggle was made, but 
 made in vain, to procure an examination into the state and condition 
 of the people, in the hope of discovering and applying some remedy 
 for their evils." 
 
 Will the right honorable gentlemen give us a corannttee to exiimiue 
 into them now ? 
 
 "It was curious," he continued, "in tracing these proceedings, to 
 observe with what a singularly felicitous uniformity the channel of 
 coercion always flowed, and that of inquiry was always resisted and 
 impeded." 
 
 Thus spoke the riglit honorable gentlemen in 1822. Now hear his 
 amendment of 1834. See what a metamori^hosis the right honorable 
 gentleman has undergone? Peruse the address in which he sets 
 forth the wisdom of British Icgishition, and reconcile the member 
 for Limerick with the Secretary for the Treasury if 3'OU can. I 
 could quote fifty speeches of the right honorable gentlemen of the 
 same character, but I have not time ; let us turn from him, and in 
 a rapid retrospect, look at the policy pursued by the Imperial Par- 
 liament since the Union. Not a mere hint, not an insinuation 
 Avhispered by a secretary into the ear of a Catholic peer at the Castle, 
 but a pledge was given (the more obligatory because it rested upon 
 honor for its fulfillment), that the Union should be followed by 
 emancipation. How was that pledge redeemed? What evidence 
 was afforded of the liberal and enlightened spirit of the Imperial 
 Legislature ? Panegyrists of the Union try it by its fruits, and look 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 471 
 
 to historical notorieties, as well as to treasury calculations. Mr. 
 Pitt could not carry the question — he was compelled to resign. 
 1801, 1802, 1803 and 1804 passed by. The question was not even 
 introduced ; it would have been treated as repeal is to-night. Henry 
 Grattau himself did not, until 1805, venture to raise his voice in the 
 cause of his country. At length Mr. Fox, in 1805, moved for a 
 committee. The proposition was spurned at : the Whigs came in. 
 The " no popery " howl is raised — the Catholic question is left to 
 the umpirage of a ferocious multitude, and the rights of millions of 
 your fellow-subjects are trampled under foot by the infuriated popu- 
 lace which Protestantism has summoned to its aid. The Whigs are 
 driven from office — not for having proposed emancipation, but for 
 having made the huijiblo suggestion that men who shed their blood 
 for England, should be capable of honor. The new parliament as- 
 sembles. Ireland asked for freedom, and she received the Insurrec- 
 tion Act. lu 1812 an ordinance issues, signed " Wellesley Pole," 
 from the Castle, and the Catholic committee is dispersed. Mr. 
 Saurin tries the Catholic delegates and fails. He mends his hand, 
 packs a jury, and procures a conviction. The jury was packed — 
 the panel was sent marked and dotted fi'om the Castle. Wiio were 
 the loudest to proclaim, and to reprobate the practice by which jus- 
 tice was polluted to its source ? The very men who now see nothing 
 in the government of Ireland Ijut matter for admiration, and persevei'e 
 in the very course whicli they had formerly held up to the execration 
 of the country. In 1814, the Insurrection Act is renewed ; the 
 Whigs hurled the thunders of their eloquence against it. Would 
 that I could here make some pause, in order to lay before the house 
 some of those masterpieces of eloquence in which they held up to 
 indignation the outrage committed on the constitution. But I must 
 hurry on ; seven years go by ; nothing is done for Ireland, aud yet 
 all this while there has been a vast majority of Irish members iu 
 favor of Catholic emancipation. Their remonstrances, their en- 
 treaties for justice were spurned and derided. By whom was Ireland 
 oppressed and degraded? By whom was the penal system (the 
 parent of such a brood of evil) maintained? Englishmen, by you ! 
 and yet, in the face of these facts, an Irishman asks you to pronounce 
 a retrospective panegyric upon the fanaticism by which the measures 
 of thirty years were distinguished. In 1821, George the Fourth 
 
472 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 goes to Ireland ; in our loysilty he finds evidence of our felicity. In 
 1822, Lord Wellesle}' (the present vicero}') recommends the renewal 
 of the Insnrrecti(m Act. It was consistent to send him to administer 
 the coercive bill. No one was more prominent than the Secretary 
 for the Treasury in reprobating the principles on which that uncon- 
 stitutional proceeding was founded. In 1824, the Insurrection Act 
 was again renewed, and again the Whigs declaimed and stormed. 
 In the interval the Catholic Association was created. By whom? 
 Not by the Catholic gentry — not by the men who denounce repeal 
 and repealers — but, with the aid of the jDeople, by a man, who, 
 whatever estimate may be formed of this question in this house, has 
 done great things ; has written his name in ineffaceal)le permanence 
 in the records of his country, and built himself on the liberty of 
 Ireland a monument which will never fall. 
 
 The agitation and organization of Ireland proceeded. In 1825 the 
 Catholic delegates arrived in London. How many of the evils that 
 have since arisen might have been prevented if fhe terms which were 
 tendered by Ireland had not been rejected. Mr. Canning' comes 
 into ofSce, gives up Catholic emancipation, and is denounced for 
 apostacy by Lord Grey. Why did Mr. Caiuiing give up that measure ? 
 Was it from any renegade spirit? It was because he knew it was 
 hopeless to attempt to carry the question in the Imperial Parliament, 
 "which has passed," according to the- Secretary of the Treasury, 
 "so man}' salutary and beneficial measures for the people of Ireland." 
 We were as much at your mercy then as Ave were before 1782. The 
 prejndices of England were insuperable. The Goderich Adminis- 
 tration, Lansdowne, Herries & Co., succeeded Canning. It died 
 in its cradle. At length — (there was one Arthur Wellesley, 
 member for Trim, in the Irish House of Commons, who asserted the 
 necessity of emancipation in 1793) — at length the Didve of Wel- 
 lington consummated in the cabinet that renown which he had ob- 
 tained in the field, and, with the aid of a man who did incalculable 
 services by inestimable sacrifices, gave freedom to 7,000,000 of his 
 fellow-citizens ; but with what injustice was it accompanied? The 
 Irish Parliament bestowed upon the forty-shilling freeholders of Ire- 
 land the elective franchise. It remained for the Imperial Parliament 
 to deprive them of the right. This proceeding was denounced as 
 spoliation. By Avhom? By Lord Brougham, by Lord Grey — the 
 
RICHARD" LALOR SHEIL. 473 
 
 men who would not commit the robbery, but who, when the Kef(n-m 
 Bill came on, refused restitution. Are not these facts? Have I 
 said a word that is not the fact ? And to all this what does the 
 Secretary for the Treasury reply? At the end of almost every 
 fourth sentence in one part of his speech (I was surprised, knowing 
 his command of language and the copiousness of his vocabulary,) 
 the right honorable gentleman exclaimed " nonsense ;" then he cried 
 out "trash," and afterwards "stuff." Ah, sir, there is in this mel- 
 ancholy detail, truth, dismal, disastrous truth. Your delay of eman- 
 cipation was fatal. If you had passed the Catholic Relief Bill years 
 before, none of the results M'hich you so much lament would have 
 been produced. You were wrong ; you know it, and yqt I scarce 
 condemn you for it. I blame the Union, which left the people of 
 Ireland at the mercy of the fanatical passions by which the legisla- 
 ture was controlled. But the Secretary for the Treasury exclaims,. 
 "If the agitators Avould I)ut let us alone, and allow Ireland to be 
 tranquil." The agitators, forsooth ! Does he venture — has he the 
 intrepidity to speak thus? Agitators! Against deep potations let 
 the drunkard rail ; at Crockford's let there be homilies against the 
 dice box ; let every liljcrtine lament the progress of licentiousness 
 when his Majesty's ministers deplore the influence of demagogues 
 and Whigs complain of agitation. 
 
 How did you carry Reform ? Was it not by impelling the people 
 almost to the verge of revolution ? Was there a stimulant for their 
 passions — was there a provocative for their excitement, to which you 
 did not resort? If you have forgotten, do you think that we shall 
 fail to remember your meetings at Edinburgh, at Paisley, at Man- 
 chester, at Birmingham? Did not 300,000 men assemble? Did 
 they not pass resolutions against taxes? Did they not threaten to 
 march on London ? Did not two of the cabinet ministers indite to 
 them epistles of gratitude and of admiration? and do they now dare, 
 have they the audacity, to speak of agitation? Have we not as 
 good a title to demand the restitution of our parliament as the min- 
 isters to insist on the reform of this house? Wherefore should we 
 not adopt the same means to efiect it ? The member for the county 
 of Wexford has had the imprudence to talk of Catholic bishops be- 
 ing treated with disrespect, and of excesses committed by the popu- 
 lace. Bishops ! What, is it only in Ireland that it is a crime to 
 
474 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 assail a bishop ? Aud have the flames of Bristol left no reflection 
 behind ? 
 
 I have demonstrated that at least for twenty-nine years Ireland 
 was misgoverned. Twenty-nine years of agitation, aud at length 
 justice was extorted from an Imperial Parliament ! But since eman- 
 cipation, since the Whigs have come into oiEce, has all gone well? 
 Let us pass over some smaller details — the Alms Bill, the juiy pack- 
 ing, the exclusion of Catholics on tithe questions, the infusion of 
 theology into the police ; let us go to great and essential incidents. 
 I shall dwell on no more than three. In your Reform Bill you 
 adopted population as a standard here ; you did not employ it in 
 Ireland. You gave Wales, with 800,000 people, three additional 
 representatives, eight to Scotland with 2,500,000, and five to Ire- 
 land with her 8,000,000. You did not restore the forty-shilling 
 freeholders. You have left towns in Ireland with 12,000 people 
 without a representative ; and you have left your paltry boroughs 
 here. It was either necessary, or it was not, to pass your Coercion 
 Bill. It was either necessary, or it was not, for the opponents of 
 the Insurrection Act to put upon the statute-book a precedent for 
 tyranny, and to supersede the tribunals of the country with the leg- 
 islation of the Horse-Guards and the judicature of the barrack- 
 yard. If it was unnecessary, it was detestable and atrocious ; and 
 if it was necessary for Lord Grey to introduce a bill which passed 
 ■without dissent in the Lords, and which thei-e were men who sup- 
 port ministers who declared that they would rather die than support 
 it in that shape ; if that was necessary, by whom was the necessity 
 created? You have had Ireland for thirty-three years under your 
 rule ; j^ou have been her absolute and undisputed masters ; and if 
 her condition be deplorable, if atrocities have been perpetrated 
 ■which call for rigorous laws, are you not respgnsible for this disas- 
 trous state of things — and to you, and to your Union, which 
 armed you with power unlimited for good or evil, is it not to be re- 
 ferred? So much for your coercive measiu'e ; but for its severity 
 you made up (did you not?) by your Tithe and Church Bills, your 
 147th clause, and those absurd and cruel experiments — absurd in 
 theory and cruel in result — with which you have endeavored to 
 reconcile that most monstrous of all anomalies — a church of one 
 religion and almost an entire nation of another. 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 475 
 
 I turn to the member for Paisley, and other Scotchmen who 
 appeal to the results of the Scotch Union. Was such an article, as 
 the fifth article of the Act of Union, giving eternity to the Protestant 
 Church, among the terms on which Scotland gave up her legislature? 
 If any attempt had been made to establish episcopacy by her Union, 
 if a mitred pontificate had been inflicted upon her, what would have 
 been the consequences ? She would not have for a moment endured 
 it. Her people would have risen almost to a man against such a 
 Union — to the death they would have resisted it — the country 
 would have been deluged in blood. And if at last England and 
 e23iscopacy had prevailed, they must have reared their altars in a 
 desert, for Scotland would have left them nothing but a wilderness 
 for their worship. 
 
 I cannot sit down without adverting to two points : first, the pro- 
 bable constitution of an Irish Parliament ; sccondl}', the likelihood 
 of separation. As to the first, let the Whigs recollect that, on the 
 Eeform question, it was urged that this house would be filled by 
 men of an inferior station. It was answered, property must prevail ; 
 wherefore should it not prevail in Ireland as well as here ? Is it not 
 manifest that, in a little while after the repeal had been carried, the 
 Irish nation Avould follow the example of all other nations, and select 
 men of influence, from fortune or talents (which give a higher title 
 to respect), as the depositaries of the legislative trust? The qualifi- 
 cation of the Irish voter (£10 a-year rent) , ought surely to secure a 
 highly respectable representation. Besides, observe that if the evil 
 is to take place after repeal, it must take place without it. If Ire- 
 land would then return 300 unworthj' men, she will retui-n 105 of 
 the same character ; and thus j'ou entail on j^ourselves as great an 
 evil as that which you apprehend as a consequence of repeal. The 
 arguments which are urged against r-epeal, were the very same as 
 those which were pressed by Conservatives against reform. They 
 said that a collision would take place between Lords and Commons, 
 and saw as many calamities in that collision, as you foresee in the 
 anticipated disagreements of the Irish and English Parliaments. No 
 man pointed out these consequences with more force than Mr. Can- 
 ning — an authority which the noble lord the Secretary for Foreign 
 Affairs, and the President of the Board of Control, once held in some 
 regard. But was Lord Grey terrified l)y the phantom of revolution ? 
 
47G TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Why should he cxi)cct thut \vc should l)c dismayed by another 
 spectre, which was as huge and hideous in 1800, wiien he looked at 
 it without dismay. Is the argument more valid now than it was 
 then ? It is built on this abstract proposition ; two parliaments can- 
 not amicably co-exist. lie then said they could. He was not a 
 beardless politician at that epoch ; he had already proposed his great 
 plan of Iveform; he was about the ago of the Secretary for the Colo- 
 nics ; had reached the ago of discretion, and ii;id passed the period 
 at which men might bo led away by a juvenile enthusiasm, when the 
 understanding may be obscured by the mists which arise from the 
 boiling emotions of the heart. Lord Grey's assertion is as valid as 
 it was thirty-four years ago ; it is one of those propositions which 
 time cannot impair. 
 
 What was then a soj)hism cannot grow iiilo a reason, as into a 
 sophism a reason cannot degenerate. Let it be borne in your minds 
 that although some of the arguments against a union were founded 
 on temporary and transient circumstances, yet others (like that 
 grounded on the fear of separation) were permanent, and ai-e now 
 just as good as they were a quarter of a century ago. The authority 
 of nunket and Bushe, and Saurin, and, above all, the autiiority of 
 Grattan, is as powerful as it ever was. The Secretary for the 
 Treasury insists that Grattan had changed his mind. His son has 
 proved the contrary. He read his answer in 1810, declaring that he 
 desired the restoration of the Irish Parliament. To what document 
 W'as that answer a response? To Hfi address from the grand juries 
 of Dublin, in which they describe the evils of the Union, and call on 
 Mr. Grattan to employ his great faculties in accomplishing its repeal. 
 Mr. Grattan did not change his mind. But what is the crime of the 
 repealers? This — that tiiey consider Lord Grey a good statesman, 
 when he is old, but a better i)i-ophet when he was young. I blame 
 him not for having altered his opinion ; but I own myself to be sur- 
 prised that he should lavish in the speeches, for the utterance of 
 which he avails himself of the royal enunciation, such unqualified 
 and almost contumelious condemnation of those with Avhom he 
 strenuously coincided when he was upwards of thirty years of age. 
 But have we no better argument than that which Lord Grey so often 
 urged against Mr. Pitt, when he reproached him with a desertion of 
 his former opinions. How stands history? It is asked, wiicn did 
 
KICIIARD LALOR SIIEIL. 477 
 
 two pai'liumeiits long co-exist in friendship? Sliow mo an instance 
 in which 8,000,000 of people in one island submitted to a parliament 
 held in another, and containing such proportions as exist in this 
 assembly. The case of America is obvious ; but look to two strong 
 instances — Sweden and Norway have one king and two parliaments. 
 Since the year 1815, there has been no quarrel between the legisla- 
 tures. Turn to Belgium. Does not the example bear us out? 
 Hear an extract from the declaration of Belgi;m independence. 
 After alleging that the Union was obtained by fraud, the document 
 goes on and states that — 
 
 "An enormous debt and expenditure, the onl}^ portion which Hol- 
 land brought to us at the time of our deplorable Union — taxes 
 overwhelming by their amount — laws always voted by the Dutch 
 for Holland only (and always against Belgium), represented so un- 
 equally in the States-General — the seat of all important establish- 
 ments fixed in Holland — the most ofFcnsive partialities in the dis- 
 tribution of civil and military employments — in a word, Belgium 
 treated as a conquered province, as a colony : everything rendei'ed 
 a revolution inevitable." 
 
 Do you mark this ? You were instrumental in effecting the Union 
 of Belgium and Holland. Lord Castlereagh, who carried the Irish 
 Union, represented you at the Congress in which the diffei'ent ar- 
 rangements with respect to Belgium and Holland were made. You 
 have yourselves recently been parties to that separation which Bel- 
 gium demanded, and you assented to the grounds on which it was 
 required. All the public establishments removed to Holland ! 
 What has become of our Custom House, of our Stamp OfHcc? Our 
 Royal Hospital too, built by a contribution made among the Irish 
 soldiers, raised out of a sixpence which they joyfully gave to provide 
 for them an asylum, that institution, connected with our national 
 pride, associated with our best feelings of country, you, for the sake 
 of some miserable saving, have determined to annihilate. Take 
 warning — you have made experiments enough. Be taught not by 
 the failures of others, but by your own. Go on as you have hitherto 
 IDrocecded, and you will soon find the entire of Ireland united for 
 repeal. A reference has been made to the small number of signa- 
 tures to petitions. If there shall be a million next year, what will 
 you say? "VVe are told that the Irish people do not desire repeal. 
 
478 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Are thirty-eight Irish membei-s out of one hundred and five nothing? 
 What other test do you demand ? The hist election ought to exhibit 
 the truth. The last election verified the prediction which I made to 
 the Chancellor of the Exchequer : I went to him when the Tithe Bill 
 was pending in 1832, — I told him what would happen. I exclaimed, 
 "You are on the eve of a general election; you are driving the 
 Irish to fury by your tithe measures, and the result will be, that on 
 every hustings in the south, the standard of repeal will be planted." 
 It is said that the gentry are against repeal. How fast do the gentry 
 of every country fall into the mass of the peoijle ! They desert one 
 by one, and the moment it is their interest, they combine with the 
 class once designated as the multitude. How soon the populace be- 
 comes the people ! Let a few years go by, Catholic and Protestant 
 will be reconciled — the national mind will become one mass of hot 
 emotion — the same disregard for the interests and feelings of Ire- 
 land will be displayed in this assembly ; and, if there should be an 
 outbreak of popular commotion here — if the prediction of tlie Con- 
 servatives should be fulfilled — and if your alliance with France, 
 which is as unstable as its dynasty, should give way, you may have 
 cause to lament, when lamentation will be unavailing, that to seven 
 millions of Irishmen justice was refused. 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 479 
 
 Orange Lodges, 
 
 Speech in the House oe Commons, August 11, 1835. 
 
 ST is remarkable that the gallant colonel (Verner), the Deputy 
 ^^ Grand Master of Ireland and Viceroy to the Duke of Cumber- 
 f^v* berlaud, has not stated that he was ignorant of the existence of 
 4 Orange lodges in the army. This omission is the more deserv- 
 ing of notice, because he was colonel of the 7th dragoons — because 
 he was examined twice before the committee — and because the sev- 
 eral other functionaries of the Orange body have declared their utter 
 ignorance of that which they ought to have known so well. Inde- 
 pendently of these considerations, it appears b^ a report of the pro- 
 ceedings of the English Grand Lodge, that the gallant colonel was 
 present when (the Duke of Cumberland being in the chair) a reso- 
 lution respecting the establishment of Orange lodges in the army was 
 moved. Is it true that he was present? 
 
 Colonel Verner. — I was never asked, in the committee, whether 
 I knew of the existence of Orange lodges in the army. I now declare 
 that I was utterly ignorant of the fact ; and I do not remember 
 whether I was or was not present when the resolution, to which the 
 honorable gentleman adverts, was carried in the English Grand 
 Lodge. 
 
 Mr. Shell. — How far the answer fits the question let the house 
 judge. It appears that the gallant colonel did attend the English 
 Grand Lodge, on what occasion he does not distinctly recollect — 
 his memory is misty — but it would be important that he should state 
 how far the impression is correct, that Orange lodges have been 
 established in the army with the sanction of the Duke of Cumberland, 
 and by virtue of resolutions, passed when the Orange Grand Lodge 
 was graced by the presence of his Royal Highness ! I turn from the 
 
480 TREASURY OF ELOQUEXCE. 
 
 gallant colonel to the general question. At the commencement of 
 the session I charged the Conservative government with having 
 advanced Orangemen to places of high station, and having given to 
 Orange lodges answers amounting to a recognition of their public 
 usefulness. This motion was not unattended with a salutary effect; 
 immediately after the member, for Kilkenny,* to whom the country 
 is greatly indebted for the disclosures which he has been instrumental 
 in producing, moved the appointment of the committee. On that 
 committee the leading functionaries of the Orange body were placed. 
 And yet it is said that the committee was packed ; but let us see who 
 wei-e the membei's of it: — the honorable members for Siigo and 
 for Cavan wei'e upon it; and there were also Mr. Jackson, Mr. 
 Wilson Patten — I suppose that he is a Conservative — Colonel 
 Wood, Lord Castlereagh, Mr. Nicholl, Sir James Graham — (I really 
 do not know with which party to class him) — Colonel Conolly and 
 Colonel Perceval. I do not think that this selection can lie said 
 to be an unfair one, but it is alleged that the mode in which the 
 witnesses were examined was unjust. The Grand Master, and the 
 Grand Treasurer, and the Grand Secretary were examined — (they 
 are all Grand) — the order of investigation was altogether inverted, 
 and the Orange party were allowed to open the case themselves, and 
 for a number of days none but Orange witnesses were examined. 
 Colonel Verner was twice examined — first on the 7th of April, 1835, 
 and again on the 9th of April. Then came the Reverend Mortimer 
 O'Sullivan — certainly a very competent witness to give evidence 
 with respect to both religions, for with regaixl to one he could in- 
 dulge in the "Pleasures of Memory," and to the other, he, doubtless, 
 looked with the "Pleasures of Hope;" Mr. M. O'Sullivan, the 
 Grand Chaplain, was produced, and was examined on the 13th of 
 April, on the 21st and 2Gth of jNIay, and again on the 27th of May: 
 so many days expended upon theology and the Reverend Mortimer 
 O'Sullivan. Then came Mr. Swan, the Deputy Grand Secretary; 
 next came Mr. Stewart Blacker, the Assistnnt Grand Treasurer, who 
 was examined on the 8th, 10th, I2th, and loth, of June ; next Mr. W. 
 Ward, the solicitor of the Orange body, who was produced to show 
 that they never in any way interfered with the administration of jus- 
 tice ; then again, on the 15th of June came Mr. Mortimer O'Sullivan 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 481 
 
 — ecce iferum Ovisjnnuf^-' — and lastly came ]\Ir. Hugh Baker. Yet 
 it is alleged that there was unfair dealing in the examination of wit- 
 nesses, although every word of the resolutions of the honourable 
 member for Middlesex is founded, not upon the testimony of a 
 party adverse to Orangeism, but upon the testimony of Orangemen 
 supported by the journals and the records they themselves produced. 
 What appears to be the state of Ireland in reference to the Oranse 
 institution, from the evidence adduced by Orangemen themselves? 
 A confederacy exists, exclusively sectarian. It consists of 150,000 
 men ; the members are initiated with a solemn and mysterious ritual 
 — they enter into a compact of religious and political brotherhood 
 
 — signs and pass-words are employed by them for the purposes of 
 clandestine recognition — their jjroceedings are regulated by a code 
 of laws, the most specific and the most minute — they are governed 
 by a great representative assembly called the Grand Lodge of Ireland, 
 consisting of delegates from every part of Ireland — the whole coun- 
 try is divided into departments, in which lodges aiEliated and corre- 
 sponding to each other are established — and this enormous mass of 
 organized Protestantism is in arms, while a Prince of the Blood, not 
 next but near the throne, is at its head ! 
 
 How has this unparalleled institution woi-ked ? Let us enquire what 
 has been its effect with respect to the administration of justice and 
 the peace of the country, and ask how has it been employed as a 
 political engine for the purpose of persecution, and under what cir- 
 cumstances and with what cognizance it has extended itself into the 
 army? The Orange Grand Lodge have defended a series of prose- 
 cutions instituted against the members of this turbulent fraternity, 
 by the crown. An Orangeman, in the streets of Dundalk, strikes a 
 Roman Catholic dead : he is prosecuted by the crown, convicted of 
 manslaughter, and sentenced to two years' imprisonment. His 
 defence was conducted by the Orange body, and the Orange lodges 
 came to a resolution to support him. Certain Orange rioters at 
 Newry were sentenced to sixteen months' imprisonment by a Prot- 
 estant magistrate ; to these malefactors the Grand Orange Lodge 
 extended their pecuniary aid, and they conducted their defence. 
 They not only defended but prosecuted. Three magistrates in 
 Cavan dispersed an Orange procession ; the Grand Orange Lodge 
 determined to institute a prosecution against the civil authorities 
 
482 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 who had the audacity to interfere with them ; thc\' sent down to 
 Cavan their solicitor, and the grand jur}' threw out the bills. At 
 the last Meath election a body of 200 Orangemen, gathered from the 
 adjacent counties, entered the town of Trim. They fill the Court- 
 house ; a dagger is seized in the hand of one of them by the High 
 Sheriff; they spread confusion and dismay, and after having enacted 
 their part, return to the town of Kells. Here they meet a Roman 
 Catholic, and put him to death ; they are jirosecuted, and the Grand 
 Orange Lodge, by a specific resolution, advances money to conduct 
 the defence. An Orangeman is indicted ; in the jurors' box twelve 
 Orangemen are placed ; the magistrates, if the case be tried at 
 quarter sessions, are members of this fatal fraternity ; under these 
 circumstances, what a mockery is the administration of justice ! Sir 
 Frederick Stovin speaks of it as a subject of public ridicule and con- 
 tempt. But fticts are better than opinions. Take the following : — 
 In a prayer-book a notice of Oi'ange assassination is written ; Sir 
 Frederick Stovin and his subordinate, Duff, who was employed in 
 the police, had incurred the displeasure of the Orangemen of Tyrone, 
 and in the praj^er-book belonging to the wife of Mr. Dnif — left in 
 the church that she had been in the habit of attending — an Orange 
 notice, threatening death to Sir Frederick Stovin and to her husband, 
 is written. Almost immediately after a meeting is called at Dun- 
 gannon at which the Lord Lieutenant of the county of Tyrone at- 
 tends, and the Orangemen appear in considerable force, with military 
 music, and invested with their factious decorations. A scene of 
 excitement ensues — shots are discharged — a musket is levelled at 
 Sir Frederick Stovin, and the ball whistles at his ear ; and all this 
 occurs in the pacific province of Ulster. 
 
 What, the house will ask — atrocious as the circumstances may 
 appear — what has all this to do with the administration of justice? 
 At that meeting, attended with so many incidents of a revolting 
 character. Lord Claude Hamilton was made an Orangeman — he was 
 initiated at the house of a publican of the name of Lilburne ; and 
 immediately afterwards he was made a magistrate. In this state of 
 things, what other feeling but one of dismay amongst Roman 
 Catholics, and one of impunity can exist amongst the Orange popu- 
 lation of the country ? I appeal to a fiict again : At the last spring 
 assizes for the county of Armagh, three Orangemen were prosecuted 
 
RK^HARD LALOR SHEIL. 483 
 
 for marching in a procession. Baron PenneMhcr suggested to them, 
 with a view to a mitigation of their sentence, that they ought to 
 express regret for having violated the law. Did they intimate their 
 contrition? Did they declare their determination never to commit a 
 similar outrage on the public peace again ? In open court, and in 
 the face of the judge, these audacious confederates whistled an air, 
 called " The Protestant Boys." And what was the course taken by 
 indignant justice? — what, do you conjecture, was their sentence? 
 Not two years' imprisonment — not one year — not six months. 
 The learned judge tempers justice with mercy, and sentences these 
 presumptuous delinquents to an imprisonment of three weeks. The 
 Dorchester laborers wei-e sentenced to transportation for seven yeare, 
 and the Orange malefactors to an imprisonment for three weeks- 
 But how has the Orange Society affected the peace of the country?' 
 We are told that Ulster is in a state of profound and prosperous^ 
 repose; but by the evidence, what appears? In the broad day, on: 
 the 17th of January last, a body of Orange incendiaries enter a. 
 Eoman Catholic village, called Anagagh, and, in the fiice of the noon- 
 tide sun, set fire to the houses of the Roman Catholic inhabitants; 
 they then retire to a hill called Pinigo, to the number of near 200, 
 form themselves in military array — Sir Frederick Stovin advances 
 at the head of the militar}^ with a piece of artillery, in order to dis- 
 perse them — the magistrate, by whom he is attended, declines giving 
 an order to fire — and the Orangemen, in martial order, and with 
 martial music, bidding and looking defiance, march away. And how 
 are they armed ? With yeomanry muskets. The entire yeomanry 
 force of Ireland is, in fact, eni'oUed in the Orange associations, and 
 when a conflict ensues with the people the consequences are easily 
 foreseen :' witness the slaughters of which they have been guilty, the 
 blood in which they have waded, the horrors which they have perpe- 
 trated : witness Newtownbarry ! How has the Orange institution 
 been employed as apolitical engine? To their declaration of alle- 
 giance a condition is attached. They engage to maintain the throne, 
 so long as by the throne Pi'otestant ascendancy is supported. They 
 expel from their society every member who does not comply with 
 their ordinances at elections. They issue proclamations commanding 
 every Orangeman to jjetition pai-liament for or against specific meas- 
 ures — and the}^ are armed with what must be considered formidable 
 
484 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 instruments of supplication. At the close of the last year it was 
 determined by a cabal that Lord Melbourne should be driven from 
 office. At Hillsborough 75,000 Orangemen are assembled to sustain 
 the Conservative adventurers in their daring and desperate enter- 
 prise, and to prove that tiiey are not the remnant of a despicable 
 faction. But will it be said, "Had they not a right to all this? 
 Had they not the advice of the king to speak out? Had they 
 not a right to petition parliament, and address the crown at 
 Hillsborough?" Be it so. Granting them their prerogative at 
 Hillsborough, what have they to do with Quebec? The house seems 
 startled with the question. It is readily explained. The Orangemen 
 of Ireland have passed resolutions for the extension of their society 
 into Upper and Lower Canada. The Grand Lodge of England have 
 appointed a Grand Secretary to visit the British colonies of North 
 America, with directions to communicate with the Grand Master. 
 Why is this ? Upon what pretence ? For what purpose ? Is their 
 object defensive? What, in God's name, have the Irish or English 
 Orangemen to do with Lower Canada, whose religion is Catholic, 
 whose established church is Catholic, whose legislature is Catholic — 
 for eighteen out of twenty of the inhabitants are Catholics ? Are 
 they not contented with striking the baneful roots of their confed- 
 eracy into the heart of the British empire, but they must extend 
 ramifications across the Atlantic, in order to supply the Xorth Ameri- 
 can colonies with their poisoned fruits ? 
 
 I come to the army, the most important topic. This loyal brother- 
 hood, the guardian of peace, the promoter of tranquilit}^ despite of 
 the notorious rules of the Horse Guards, and in violation of every 
 principle of military discipline, have introduced into the army its 
 secret, its factious and mutinous organization? The fact is beyond 
 all dispute ; but there ai-e circumstances connected with it, which are 
 not a little remarkable. There is, in the code of Orange legislation, 
 an ordinance that all regiments in the army shall be considered as 
 districts. It is the 1.5th rule of 1824. So late as this very year in 
 the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland, a warrant was granted to 
 create a lodge in the army ; and who was in the chair : j\Ir. Crome- 
 lin, the Grand Master of the county of Down. This resolution and 
 the presidency of Mr. Cromelin on the occasion, appear in the appen- 
 dix to the report. But let the house mark the following resolution. 
 
RirilARD LALOR SIIEIL. 485 
 
 " That the next warrant should be granted to the 66th Regiment." 
 Who was it moved that resolution? No ordinary individual — a 
 man, holding, in the Orange body, the highest position, but who 
 began his political life as a Fellow of Trinity College, Dublin, (of 
 which the Duke of Cumberland is chancellor) , who has since figured 
 in Brunswick clubs, and has exhibited, on various occasions, at pub- 
 lic meetings in England, — the Rev. Charles Boytou, the associate 
 of Mr. Mortimer O'Sullivan, the Grand Chaplain of the Orange 
 Grand Lodges, and — mark it ! — the Chaplain to the Earl of Had- 
 dington, the late Lord Lieutenant. But all the functionaries of the 
 Orange body, despite all this, were ignorant of what was going on 
 in the army. The knowledge of some people is wonderful ; but not 
 half so marvellous as the ignorance of others. The next time the 
 honorable gentleman opposite, the Grand Treasurer, late Treasurer 
 to the Ordinance, who was admitted, with the Duke of Wellington, 
 a doctor of common law at Oxford, visits that learned and loyal 
 establishment, I pray of him to revive the old college play of " Igno- 
 ramus ; " the principal characters to be performed hy Alexander 
 Perceval, Henry Maxwell, and His Royal Highness the Duke of 
 Cumberland. His Royal Highness has written a letter. He never 
 heard of Orange lodges in the army — never heard of the orders of 
 1822 and 1829 — of the rule of the Orange body, that every regi- 
 ment shovild be considered a district — of the majority of the Grand 
 Lodge having carried a i-esolution, on a division, to establish 
 Orange lodges in the army — of the printed book of warrants, in 
 which the list of military warrants is contained ; — neither does his 
 Royal Highness recollect having been present when, in 1831, 1832, 
 1833 and 1835, warrants were granted, M'hilst he was in the chair, to 
 military men, and actually a soldier attended as representative of his 
 regiment. His Royal Highness does not bear all this in mind, and 
 is utterly ignorant of the introduction into the army, of the lodges 
 of which he is the Grand Master. Heaven forbid that I should ques- 
 tion the truth of his Royal Highness's allegation ; I fly in the midst 
 of difficulties, which might startle the lielief of men of less accommo- 
 dating credulity than mine. Credo quia impofisible est. But, Sir, 
 there is a consideration of infinite importance connected with his 
 Ro3'al Highness, and independent of his knowledge or his ignorance. 
 Is it befitting that any British sulycct should possess the power of 
 
486 TREASURY OF ELOQUEJTCE. 
 
 which he has made himself the master ? Is it safe that a priuce of 
 the blood should be invested with this portentous authority? He 
 is declared, by the rules of the English Grand Lodge, to be absolute 
 and uncontrollable : he is addressed with a sj^ecies of prophetic greet- 
 ing — "Hail, that shall be king hereafter ! " an aphorism of theology. 
 If that prediction shall be veriiied ; if, by some fatality, England 
 shall be deprived of the princess who is the object of her aflfection 
 and of her hope — that princess who, if maternal virtues be here- 
 ditary, must be wise, and gentle and good — if. Sir, the Imperial 
 Grand Master be fated to be the Sovereign of this vast empire, I trust 
 that by 100,000 Irish Janissaries the throne of Ernest the First will 
 never be surrounded ! 
 
 One, and the most important, of all questions, remains. What 
 are the house and the government to do under the existing facts of 
 the case? That something must be done, is manifest. You cannot 
 tolerate this institution. If you do what will be the result? How 
 will the Eoman Catholic soldiers feel, with whom your army is filled, 
 who have fought your battles, participated in j'our glory, and fur- 
 nished the raw material out of which the standard of victory has 
 been wrought? If, by your connivance, you convert this confeder- 
 acy into a pattern, and if a counter organization shall be formed — 
 if we, the Irish millions, shall enrol ourselves in some analogous 
 organization, if its members shall be admitted with a solemn religious 
 ceremony, if the obligation of a political fraternity shall be inculcated, 
 if signs, and tests, and pass-words shall be employed, if a represen- 
 tative assembly, consisting of deputies from every Irish county shall 
 be held in the metropolis, and subordinate lodges shall be held in 
 every department into which the country shall be subdivided, what 
 will befall? To the vanquished, and to the victors — woe! The 
 gulf of civil warfare will yawn beneath the feet of Ireland, and in the 
 abyss all her hopes will be swallowed. Avert, avert the calamity, 
 which, if I have anticipated, it is only to shudder at its prospects. 
 Save us from these terrible possibilities ! Adopt a measure which, 
 by its timely application, may prevent these terrific results from 
 coming to pass. If I relied upon them less, I should warn them 
 more. I will not tell them that I expect — I know — that they will 
 do their duty. 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 487 
 
 Irish Municipal Bill 
 
 Speech in the House of Cojoions, February 22, 1837. 
 
 ^p|HE right honorable bai-onet (Sir James Graham) began the 
 ^^ speech, in many particurars remarkable, which he has just 
 A^ concluded amidst the applauses of those, whose approbation, 
 H fit one period of his political life, he would have blushed to 
 
 incur, by intimating that he was regarded as a " bigot " on this side 
 of the house. Whether he deserves the appellation by which he 
 has informed us that he is designated, his speech to-night affords 
 some means of determining. I will not call him a bigot, I am not 
 disposed to use an expression in any degree oflensive to the right 
 honorable baronet, but I will presume to call him a convert, who 
 exhibits all the zeal for which conversion is proverbially conspicuous. 
 Of that zeal we have manifestations in his references to pamphlets 
 about Spain, in his allusions to the mother of Cabrera, in his remarks 
 on the Spanish clergy, and the practice of confession in the Catholic 
 Church. I own that, when he takes in such bad part the strong 
 expressions employed in reference to the Irish Church (expressions 
 employed by Protestants, and not by Roman Catholics), I am sur- 
 prised that he should not himself abstain from observations oflensive 
 to the religious feelings of Roman Catholic members of this house. 
 The right honorable baronet has done me the honor to produce an 
 extract from a speech of mine, delivered nearly two years ago at the 
 Coburg Gardens ; and at the same time expressed himself in terms 
 of praise of the humble individual who now addresses you. I can 
 assure the right honorable baronet that I feel at least as much plea- 
 sure in listening to him, as he has the goodness to say that he 
 •derives from hearing me. He has many of the accomplishments 
 
488 TREASURE OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 attributed by Milton to a distinguished speaker in a celebrated coun- 
 cil. He is "in 'act most gi'aceful and humane, his tongue drops 
 manna." I cannot but feel pride that he should entertain so high an 
 opinion of me, as to induce him to peruse and collect all that I say 
 even beyond these walls. He has spent the recess, it appears, ia 
 the diligent selection of such passages as he has read to-night, and 
 ■which I little thought, when they were uttered, that the right honor- 
 able baronet would tliink worthy of his comments. However, he 
 owes me the return of an obligation. The last time I s^joke iu this 
 house, I referred to a celebrated speech of his at Cockermouth, in 
 which he pronounced an eloquent invective against "a recreant 
 Whig ; " and as he found that I was a diligent student of those 
 models of eloquence which the right honorable baronet used formerly 
 to supply, in advocating the popular rights, he thought himself 
 bound, I suppose, to repay me by the citation, which has, I believe, 
 produced less effect than he had anticipated. The right honorable 
 baronet also adverted to what he calls "the Lichiield House com- 
 pact." It is not worth while to go over the same ground, after I 
 have already proved, by reading in the house the speech which has 
 been the subject of so much remark — how much I have been mis- 
 represented ; I never said that there was a "compact;" I did say, 
 and I repeat it, that there was "a compact alliance." Was that the 
 first occasion on which an alliance was entered into ? Was Lichfield 
 House the only spot ever dedicated to political reconciliations .' Has 
 the right honorable baronet forgotten, or has the noble lord (Stanley) 
 who sits beside him, succeeded in dismissing from his recollection, 
 a meeting at Bi'ookes's Club, at which the Irish and English reform- 
 ers assembled, and, in the emergency which had taken place, agreed 
 to relinquish their differences and make a united stand against the 
 common foe ? Does the noble lord forget an admirable speech (it 
 was the best post-prandial oration it was ever my good fortune to 
 have heard) delivered by a right honorable gentleman who was not 
 then a noble lord, and was accompanied by a vehemence of gesture 
 and a force of intonation not a little illustrative of the emotions of 
 the orator, on his anticipated ejectment from office? That eloquent 
 individual, whom I now see on the Tory side of the house, got upon 
 a table, and with vehement and almost appalling gesture, pronounced 
 an invective against the Duke of Wellington, to which, in the 
 
RICHAKD LALOR SHEIL. 489^ 
 
 records of vituperation, few parallels can be found. I shall not 
 repeat what the noble lord then said. 
 
 Lord Stanley — You may. 
 
 Mr. Sheil — No ; my object is not to excite personal animosities 
 among new, but ardent friends. I have no malevolent motive ia 
 adverting to that remarkable occasion. If I have at all referred to 
 it, it is because the right honorable baronet has been sufficiently in- 
 discreet to talk of Lichfield House :■ — ^ let him, for the future, con- 
 fine himself to the recollections of Brookes's, instead of selecting as 
 the subject of his sarcasms the meeting in which that reconciliation 
 took place to which Ireland is indebted for the exclusion of the noble 
 lord opposite, and his associates, from power. The right honorable 
 baronet has been guilty of another imprudence : he has charged Lord 
 Mulgrave with the promotion of Mr. Pigot to a forensic office in 
 Dublin Castle. Mr. Pigot's oflence, it seems, consists in his having 
 been a member of the Precursor Association. Does the right hon- 
 orable baronet recollect where he sits in this house — with whom he 
 is co-operating — with what party he and the noble lord opposite 
 have entered into confederacy — when he makes matters of this kind 
 the groundwork of imputation ? Who were the first men selected 
 for promotion by the Tories? To what association did they belong? 
 Let the honorable baronet look back, and behind him he will see the 
 treasurer, the grand treasurer, of the Orange Association, whom the 
 member for Tamwortli appointed Treasurer of the Ordnance — when 
 his Sovereign placed him atthe head of the government of his coun- 
 try. What are the offences of the National Association, when com- 
 pared with the proceedings of the Orange Institution? Are our 
 proceedings clandestine ? Are figures and symbols resorted to by 
 us? Have we tampered with the army, as the Orange Society has 
 been convicted by a committee of this house of having done ? 
 
 Colonel Perceval — I den}' that the Orange Society tampered with 
 the army. I admit that such warrants were issued. 
 
 Mr. Sheil — I will not dispute with the gallant colonel about a 
 word. If the phrase "tampered" be objected to, I will adopt any 
 word the gallant colonel will do me the favor to suggest, in order to 
 express a notorious and undisputable fact. It was pi'oved beyond 
 all doubt, and even beyond all controversy, that»the Orange Society 
 made the utmost efforts to extend itself into the armj' ; that a nuni- 
 
490 TREASURY OF ELOQUEXCE. 
 
 ber of regimental warrants were issued, and that resolutions were 
 actually passed, at meetings of the society, upon the subject. From 
 this society, the gallant officer, who was one of its functionaries, was 
 selected, in order to place him in the Ordnance ; and, by a curious 
 ■coincidence, having been treasurer to the Orange Institution, he 
 was appointed to the same fiscal office in the Ordnance, to whose 
 treasureship he was raised. How, then, can gentlemen be guilty of 
 the imprudence of talking of Mr. Pigot's apjDointment — (he is a 
 gentleman conspicuous for his talents and high personal char- 
 acter) — when their own party made, within a period so recent, 
 such an appointment as that to which I have reluctantly but un- 
 avoidably adverted. But, Sir, can we not discuss the great measure 
 of municipal reform without descending to such small and transitory 
 considerations as the selection of this or that man for office ? Talk 
 of Lord Mulgrave's government as you will, j'ou cannot deny that 
 his administration has been, beyond all example, successful. He 
 has acted on the wise and obvious policy of adapting the sjiirit of 
 his government to the feelings of the numerous majority of that 
 Irish nation by whom he is respected and beloved. His measures 
 have been founded on the determination to regard the rights of the 
 manj', instead of consulting the factious interests of the few ; and, 
 by the just and wise system on which he has acted, he has efiiectedia 
 complete reconciliation between the government and the people. 
 You speak of his liberating prisoners from gaols : — I disdain even 
 to advert, in rejily, to the comments which have been made on this 
 act of clemency b}' men who are naturally the advocates of incar- 
 ceration. I meet these gentlemen with the broad fact, that the country 
 has, under Lord Midgrave's government, made a great progress to- 
 wards that pacification which I make no doubt that, under his 
 auspices, Ireland will attain. Look to the county which I have the 
 honor to represent, and which has been unhappily conspicuous for 
 the disturbances of which it was once the scene. Mr. Howley, the 
 assistant-barrister for that county — a gentleman whose authority is 
 imimpeachable, and who, by his impartial conduct, his admirable 
 temper, his knowledge, and his talents, has won the applause of all 
 parties — states, in his charge delivered at Nenagh, that there is an 
 end to the savage combats at fairs ; and, in a return made by the 
 •clerk of the crown for the county, it appears that, in every class of 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 491 
 
 crime, there has been, within the hist year, a most extraordinary 
 diminution. This surely is better evidence than tiie assertions made 
 in Tory journals, and adopted by gentlemen whose political interests 
 are at variance with their amiable aspirations for the establishment 
 of order in their countrj^. But, sir, the most remarkable incident 
 to the administration of my Lord Mulgrave has been, its effect upon 
 the great political question which, not very long ago, produced so 
 much excitement in one country, and not a little apprehension in the 
 other. '\A'^ithout having recourse to coercive bills — without resort- 
 ing to a single measure of severity — by impressing the people of 
 Ireland with a conviction that he was determined to do them justice, 
 Lox'd Mulgrave has laid the Repeal question at rest. It is, if not 
 dead, at least deeply dormant ; and, although such a policy as that 
 of the noble lord opposite would soon awaken or resuscitate it again, 
 as long as the principles on which the government of Lord Mulgrave 
 and of the noble lord the member for Yorkshire* is carried on, are 
 adhered to, so long you will find that the people of Ireland will re- 
 main in a relation not only of amity, but of attachment to the 
 administration. It may be asked, how the good results of the 
 policy I have been describing can affect the question before the 
 house? Thus: — the executive has, by its judicious measures, by 
 adapting itself to the political condition of the country, and by its 
 preference of the nation to a faction, completely succeeded. It has 
 held out a model which the legislature ought to imitate. Let the 
 parhament enact laws in the spirit in which the laws, even as they 
 stand, have been carried into effect in Ireland. Let the good of the 
 country, instead of the monopoly of a party, supply the standard by 
 which pai'liament shall regulate its legislation ; and to what the Irish 
 government has so nobly commenced, a perfect and glorious com- 
 pletion will one day be given. 
 
 I turn from the consideration of those topics connected with the 
 existing condition of affairs in Ireland, to the discussion of the 
 broader ground on which the question ought to be debated. I ask 
 you to do justice to Ireland. Every man in this house Avill 
 probably say, that he is anxious to do Ireland justice. But 
 what is justice to Ireland? It will assist us, in investigat- 
 ing that question, to determine, in the first place, what is justice 
 
 * Lord Morpeth. 
 
492 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to England? In this country the Corporation and Test Acts 
 were always regarded as the muniments of the churches and cor- 
 porations, through their effects, as its chief bulwarks. Mr. Canning 
 "U'as so strongly persuaded of this, that in 1827, while he declared 
 himself the advocate of emancipation, he announced his firm resolve 
 to stand by the Protestant corporations, and not to consent to the re- 
 peal of the law which gave them their peculiar character, and con- 
 nected them with the establishment. Those laws were, however, 
 repealed by the member for Tamworth ; he could not help repealing 
 them ; he then began to undergo that process of soft compulsion, in 
 submitting to which he afterwards acquired those habits of useful 
 complaisance — in which we shall furnish him with the strongest 
 motives to persevere. The Test and Corporation Acts having been 
 repealed, still, through the machinery of self-election, the body of 
 the peojile were dejDrived of the practical advantages which ought to 
 have resulted from that repeal. The reformed House of Commons 
 determined to place corporations under jJopular control. The Lords 
 thought it imprudent to resist. No one was found bold enough to 
 state that because a transfer of power would take place from the 
 Tories to the Reformers, therefore corporations should be abolished. 
 Take Liverpool as an example. A transfer of influence has taken 
 place there, to such an extent that, very much to the noble lord's 
 astonishment, his plan for the mutilation of the Word of God has 
 been adopted in the schools under the superintendence of the cor- 
 jiorations. Let us now jiass to L'eland. I will admit for the sake 
 of a gument, that corporations were established to protect the Pro- 
 testant Church ; they would thus rest on the same ground as the 
 Test and Corporation Acts : the latter having been abandoned in 
 England,- and having been followed by corporate reform, the same 
 reasons apply to the relinquishment of the principle of exclusion in 
 Ireland, which is utterly incompatible with the ground on which 
 Catholic Emancipation was acknowledged to have been conceded. 
 "What took place wlicn emancipation was carried ? Was it intimated 
 that we should be excluded from corporations ? The direct contraiy 
 was asserted. " Roman Catholics [said the right honorable member 
 for Tamworth, in the admirable speech in which he acknowledged 
 the gentle violence by which the rights of Ireland were ravished from 
 his reluctant coyness] , Roman Catholics shall be admitted to all cor- 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 493 
 
 porate ofEces in Ireland." This was strong ; l)ut he did more. In 
 the bill framed under his superintendence, two clauses were intro- 
 duced providing for the admission of Catholics into corporations. 
 Was the right honorable gentleman sincere ? Did he intend that to 
 the heart of Ireland, beating as it was with hope, the word of promise 
 should be kept? Who can doubt it? Who can believe that the 
 right honorable baronet would be capable of practising a delusion ? 
 What he did, he did unwillingly ; but he did with honesty whatever 
 he did. His act of enfranchisement was baffled in this regard, and, 
 by a combination among corporators, Catholics were excluded. 
 From that day to this, not a single Roman Catholic — not one — has 
 been admitted into the corporations attached to the metropolis of our 
 country. I boldly ask the right honorable baronet whether he ap- 
 proves of this exclusion, and of the means by which it was effected? 
 Was it not a fraud upon us, and upon the law, by which, clearly and 
 unequivocally, admission into corporations was secured to us? If 
 it was intended that we should not have the benefit of Catholic 
 Emancipation in this particular, it ought, in common candour, to 
 have been told us ; but to pass an act making us admissil)le — to al- 
 low seven years to pass, and permit the law to be frustrated in that 
 interval — and then when a measure is brought forward in order to 
 give us the advantage of that law, to destroy corporations lest we 
 should be admitted — is not consistent with English fairness, with 
 that honest dealing for which you are conspicuous, nor, let me add, 
 with the personal character of the right honorable baronet. Ay, but 
 the church may be injured. Why did you not think of that when 
 emancipation was being carried? Why make your argument in 
 favor of the church posterior to 3'our legislation against it? I call 
 on the right honorable baronet, not only in the name of justice to us, 
 but in the name of his own dignity, as he would preserve that amity 
 with himself which results from the consciousness of honest and noble 
 dealing — I call on him to abandon his party, in adherence to his 
 pledge ; and if, between his politics and his integrity, he must make 
 a choice, I know that he will not hesitate, for a moment, in making 
 his election. 
 
 He fears an injury to the church. This church, by which a single 
 object contemplated in a national establishment has never yet been 
 -attained — this church of yours is made the burden of every speech 
 
494 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 by which the cause of Toryism is sought to bo maintained ; and to 
 every project for the improvement of the countr}^, and the assertion 
 of the people's rights, is presented as an insuperable object. When 
 we call on you to abolish the fatal in^post which keeps the country 
 in a paroxysm of excitement, you cry out, "the Church!" When 
 we bid you rescue the country from the frightful litigation which 
 turns our courts of justice into an arena for the combat of the politi- 
 cal passions, you cry out, " the Church ! " And when we implore 
 you to fulfil your contract at the Union, to redeem 3'our pledge, 
 given with emancipation, to extend to us British privileges, and 
 grant us British institutions, you cry out "the Church ! " The two 
 countries must have the same church, and for that purpose the two 
 countries must not have the same cort^orations ! They are incom- 
 patible, we must then elect between them ; which shall we prefer — 
 the church of one million, or the corporations of seven. What an 
 argument do the auxiliaries of the establishment advance, when they 
 admit that the sacritice of the national rights is necessary for its 
 sustainmcnt. But if this position be founded, wherefoi-e was parlia- 
 mentary reform ever conceded to us? Are we qualified to elect 
 members of the House of Commons, but unfit to elect members of 
 the Common Council? Are we unworthy of being the managers of 
 our own local concerns — while here, in this great Imperial assem- 
 bly, with the legislators of the Bi-itish empire, with the arbiters of 
 the destiny of the noblest nation in the world, we stand on a lofty 
 level ? Never was there any inconsistency comjjarable to this ! I 
 have a right to rise up here, and to demand justice for my country, 
 as representative of the second county in Ireland ; and I am unwoi- 
 thy of being a corporator of Cashel or of Clonmel. I may be told 
 that the Tories resisted the extension of paidiamentary reform to 
 Ireland, and on the very grounds on which they oppose the applica- 
 tion of corporate reform. I must acknowledge it : they did insist 
 that the close boroughs of Ireland were intended as the bulwarks of 
 the Protestant iuterest ; they did contend that a Catholic ascendency 
 Avould be the result of a parliamentary reform ; and they urged with 
 great zeal and strenuousness, that the demolition of the Established 
 Church would be its inevitable consequence. In what a burst of 
 lofty eloquence did the noble lord, who now sits opposite, refute 
 them ! " What ! " lie exclaimed, " deny to Ireland the benefits of the 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 495 
 
 reform you give to England — withhold from Ireland the advantages 
 ■which, at the Union, you pledged yourselves to grant her ! deny her 
 a community in your privileges, and an equal participation in your 
 rigiits ! Then you may i-epeal the Union at once, for you will ren- 
 der it a degrading and dishonorable compact." But I da injustice 
 to that admirable passage ; and as the noble lord may have forgot- 
 ten it, as his recollections may be as evanescent as his opinions, I 
 think it better to read what, from memory, I have imperfectly 
 referred to. The passage will be found in the 17th volume of "The 
 Mirror of Parliament," page 2288. He begins with a panegyric on 
 the Irish members. We were agitators then, just as much as we 
 now are ; we held and professed exactly the same opinions ; we had 
 an association at full work, just as we now have ; but the noble lord 
 did not, at that time, think it judicious to appeal to passages to 
 which he has since addressed himself. The passage runs thus : — 
 
 " We have been told that the English bill does not in any case 
 apply to Ireland, and that the circumstances of the two countries 
 are different : but I am sure that honorable gentleman will iind that 
 the principle of reform is the same, whether it applied to England 
 or Ireland ; and if it be just here, so it must be just there. I would 
 entreat those who advocate the Conservative interests, and who con- 
 sider themselves the supporters of Protestant institutions, to look to 
 the danger to which these institutions will be exposed in Ireland by 
 withholding the privileges which this bill is to confer. If they wish 
 to give Ireland a real, solid, substantial grievance — if they wish to 
 give some handle to excitement, and to present a solid argument for 
 the repeal of the Union — they need only show that, in the British 
 House of Commons, English inte;rcsts are treated in one way, and 
 Irish interests in another, that iu England the government rule by 
 free representation, and by the voice of the people — while in Ire- 
 land that voice is stifled, and the people are shut out from a fair 
 share in the choice of their representatives. I fear that, if we do 
 not concede in a spirit of fairness and justice, agitation will break 
 out in a manner which it has never done before. I cannot conceive 
 anything more clear than that the present measure is only the exten- 
 sion of the principle of the English bill to Ireland. I cannot 
 conceive upon what principle we can refuse to place both countries 
 on an equality, and make the same principle applicable to the 
 
496 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 election of all members of the united Legislature of the British 
 empire." 
 
 The house has heard this passage with surprise ; and although 
 every sentence that I have read has produced a sensation, there is 
 not, in the entire, a sentiment which has called forth more astonish- 
 ment than the reference made to the repeal of the Union, as a result 
 of the denial of equal privileges to the English and to the Irish peo- 
 ple. And here let me turn to the right honorable member for Cum- 
 berland and ask him, what he now thinks of his expostulation with 
 the Irish Attorney-General, on his assertion that injustice would 
 furnish an argument for i-epeal. Did not his noble friend, when in 
 office, when secretary for Ireland, solemnly assert the same thing? 
 I will I'ead the passage again — "If they wish to give Ireland a real, 
 solid, substantial grievance — if they wish to give some handle to 
 excitement, and to present a solid argument for the repeal of the 
 Union — they need onlj' show that in the British House of Com- 
 mons, English interests are treated in one way, and Irish interests 
 in another." This is nobly expressed ; but, in the midst of our 
 admiration of such fine sentiments, founded on such lofty principles, 
 and conveyed in language at once so beautiful and so perspicuous, 
 what melancholy feelings, what mournful reflections arise ! Alas ! 
 that the man who uttered what I have just read, who was capable 
 of feeling and of expressing himself thus, in whom such a union of 
 wisdom and eloquence was then exhibited — alas ! that he should 
 now be separated from his old associates, and that, united to his 
 former antagonists, he should not only act on principles diametri- 
 cally the reverse, but denounce his colleagues, and enter with men 
 whom he formerly represented as the worst enemies of his country 
 into a derogatory league. But, not contented with joining them, 
 in the transports of his enthusiasm he has gone bej'ond them ; and 
 on the first night of this debate, taking up the part of a prophet, 
 when he had ceased to perform that of a statesman, he told the peo- 
 ple of Ireland, in a burst of intemperate prediction, that never — 
 no, never — should the municipal privileges, granted to the people 
 of England, be extended to them. 
 
 Lord Stanley — I never said so. 
 
 Mr. Shcil — Then the noble lord has been grievously misrepi'esented. 
 I acknowledge that I was not present when he spoke, but I was told 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 497 
 
 hy several persons that he had stated that this measure never should 
 he caiTied. 
 
 Lord Stanley — I did not state that the measure never should be 
 carried. I did state that the people of England would not yield to 
 alarm and intimidation, and that the advocates of this measure were 
 taking the tvorst means to effect their object. The honoral)le and 
 learned gentlemen confesses that he was not present when I spoke, 
 and he should therefore be cautious in attributing to me the opinions 
 which he has ascribed to me, in this attack which he has been making, 
 knowing, as he does, that it is out of my power to reply. 
 
 Mr. Shiel — When the noble lord denies the use of certain expres- 
 sions, and disclaims the sentiment conveyed by them, I at once 
 accede to his interpretation of what he said, or rather meant to say. 
 The noble lord observes that I am making an attack on him, knowing 
 that he has no reply. The noble lord is well aware, from experience, 
 that whether he has a right to reply or not, I never have the least 
 dread of him, and that on no occasion in this house, have I ever, in 
 the performance of my duty to my country, shrunk from an encounter 
 with him. He calls my speech an attack on him. I am not pro- 
 nouncing a personal invective against the noble lord. I am not 
 exceeding the limits of fair discussion, or violating either the ordin- 
 ances of good breeding or the rules of this house. I am exhibiting 
 the inconsistencies and incongruities of the noble lord, and stripping 
 his opinions of any value which they may possess, by proving him, 
 at a period not remote, to have acted on, and to have enforced, 
 principles directly opposite to those of which he is now the intolerant 
 advocate. This is the extent of my attack on him. He will, how- 
 «ver, pardon me for suggesting to him, that, if I did assail him with 
 far more acrimony than I am disposed to do, he is the last man in 
 this house who ought to complain. Who is there that shows less 
 mercy to a political adversary ? Who is so relentless in the infliction 
 of his sarcasms, even on his old friends and associates? However, 
 I ought not to feel mvich surprise that he should be so sensitive as he 
 shows himself to be : no man fears an operation so much as a surgeon, 
 and the drummer of a regiment trembles at the lash. But the noble 
 lord mistakes ; it is not an attack from me which he has cause to ap- 
 prehend ; — he bears that within his own bosom which reproaches him 
 far more than I do. But, from his emotions, fx-om his resentments, 
 
498 TREASUKT OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 and from his consciousness, let us turn to something more deserving 
 of regard, and consider how far it is probable that this measure can 
 be successfully resisted. I wish to avoid all minacious intimations, 
 and, therefore, I M'ill not say that it must and shall be cari-ied ; but^ 
 adopting the calmer tone of deliberation, I entreat the noble lord 
 opposite, and the house, to consider what the probabilities are which 
 are connected with this question, and whether it is likely that the 
 demand made by Ireland for justice can be long treated by any branch 
 of the legislature with disregard? 
 
 I assert that Ireland, sustained as she is by the sympathies of a 
 very large portion of the peo2:)le in this country, must prevail in the 
 cause in which her feelings are so deeply engaged, and on whose 
 prosecution she is firmly and unalterably determined. I undertake 
 to jDrove this proposition, and it will certainly be felt to be most 
 important to consider whether it be just ; for if men are once per- 
 suaded that this measure must ultimately be carried, they will feel 
 that it is better to do, at once, what must be done at last, and that 
 discussion ought to cease where necessity has begun to operate. I 
 put the case of Ireland thus : — if the Catholic millions, by their 
 union, by their organization, by their associated power, carried their 
 emanciijation, what is the likelihood of their success in the pursuit of 
 their present objects? If wc forced the right honorable member for 
 Tamworth to yield to us (a man not only of as great eloquence in 
 debate, but of great discretion, of great influence, free from ebullitions 
 of intemperance, and whose personal character entitles him to the 
 confidence of his party), shall we not now overcome any obstacles 
 which the noble lord may present to our progress ? Let him remember 
 that our power is more than trebled, and if, contending with such 
 disadvantages as we had to struggle with, we pi'cvailed, where are 
 the impediments by which our career in the pursuit of what remains 
 to be achieved for the honor of our country, shall be even long 
 retarded ? It behoves the noble lord to look attentively at Ireland. 
 Wherever we turn our eyes, we see the national power dilating, 
 expanding, and ascending : never did a liberated nation spring on in 
 the career that freedom throws open towards improvement with such 
 a bound as we have; in wealth, in intelligence, in high feeling, in 
 all the great constituents of a state, we have made in a few years aa 
 astonishing progress. The character of our country is completely 
 
RICHARD LALOU SHEIL. 499 
 
 chans^ed : we are free, and we feel as if we never bad been slaves. 
 Ireland stands as erect as if she had never stooped ; although she 
 once bowed her forehead to the earth, every mark and trace of her 
 prostration have been effaced. But these are generalities ; thcse.are 
 vaffue and abstract vauntings, without detail. Well, if yon stand in 
 need of specification, it shall be rapidly, but not inconclusively, given. 
 But hold : I was going to point to the first law ofiices in the country, 
 filled by Roman Catholics ; I was going to point to the second 
 judical otfice in Ireland filled by a Roman Catholic ; I Avas going to 
 point to the crowds of Roman Catholics who, in every profession and 
 walk of life, are winning their way to eminence in the walks that 
 lead to affluence or to honor. But one single fact sufiices for my 
 purpose : emancipation was followed by reform, and reform has 
 thrown sixty men, devoted to the interests of Ireland, into the House 
 of Commons. If the Clare election was a great incident ; if the 
 Clare election aflbrded evidence that emancipation could not be 
 resisted, look at sixtj^ of us (what are Longff)rd and Carlow but a 
 realization of the splendid intimations that Clare held out), look, I 
 say, at sixty of us, — the majority, the great majority of the repre- 
 sentatives of Ireland, — leagued and confederated by an obligation 
 and a pledge as sacred as any with which men, associated for the 
 interests of their country, were ever bound together. Thank God, 
 we are here ! I remember the time when the body to which I belong 
 was excluded from all participation in the great legislative rights of 
 which we are now in the possession. I remember to have felt 
 humiliated at the tone in which I heard the cause of Ireland pleaded, 
 when I was occasionally admitted under the gallery of the House of 
 Commons. I felt pain at hearing us represented as humble suppliants 
 for liberty, and as asking freedom as if it were alms that we were 
 soliciting. Perhaps that tone was unavoidable : thank God, it is no 
 longer necessary or appropriate. Here we are, in all regards your 
 equals, and demanding our rights as the representatives of Britons 
 would demand their own. AVe have less eloquence, less skill, less 
 astuteness than tiie great men to whom, of old, the interests of 
 Ireland were confided ; but we make up for these imperfections by 
 the moral port and national bearing that become us. In mastery of 
 diction we may be defective ; in resources of argument wc may be 
 wanting ; we may not be gifted with the accomplishments by which 
 
500 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 persuasion is produced ; but in energy, in strenuousness, in union, 
 in fidelity to our country and to each other, and above all in the 
 undaunted and dauntless determination to enforce equality for Ireland, 
 we stand unsurpassed. This, then, is the power with which the 
 noble lord courts an encounter, foretells his own victories, and 
 triumphs in their anticipation in the House of Commons. Where 
 are his means of discomfiting us ? To what resources does he look 
 for the accomplishment of the wonders which he is to perform? 
 Does he rely upon the excitement of the religious and national 
 prejudices of England ; and does he find it in his heart to resort to 
 the "no Popery" cry ! Instead of telling him what he is doing, I'll 
 tell the country what, thirty years ago, was done. In 1807, the 
 Whigs were in possession of Downing-street, and the Tories were in 
 possession of St. James's Palace, but, without the people, the 
 possession of St. James's was of no avail. The Whigs proposed that 
 Koman Catholics should be admitted to the higher grades in the army 
 and navy. The Tories saw that their opportunity was come, and 
 the "no Popery" cry was raised. There existed, at that time, a 
 great mass of prejudice in England. You had conquered Ireland 
 and enslaved her ; you hated her for the wrongs that j^ou had done her, 
 and despised her, and perhaps justly, for her endurance : the victim 
 of oppression naturally becomes the object of scorn ; you loathed 
 oin- country, and you abhorred our creed. Of this feeling, the Tories 
 took advantage ; the tocsin of fanaticism was rung ; the war-whoop 
 of religious discord, the savage yell of infuriated ignorance, resounded 
 through the countr}-. Events, that ought to have been allowed to 
 remain buried intheoblivionof centuries, were disinterred ; every mis- 
 deed of Catholics, when Catholics and Protestants imbrued their hands 
 alternately in blood, was recalled ; the ashesof the Smithfield fires were 
 stirred, for sparks with which the popular passions might be ignited. 
 The re-establishment of Popery ; the downfall of every Protestant 
 institution ; the annihilation of all liberty, civil or religious, these 
 were the topics with which crafty men, without remorse of conscience, 
 worked on the popular delusion. At public assemblies, senators, 
 more remarkable for Protestant piety than Christian charit}', delivered 
 themselves of ferocious eflusions amidst credulous and enthusiastic 
 multitudes. Then came public abuses, at which libations to the 
 worst passions of human nature were prodigally poured out. " Kally 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 501 
 
 round the King, rally round the church, rally round the religion of 
 your forefathers," these were the invocations with which the English 
 people were wrought into frenzy ; and having, by these expedients, 
 driven their antagonists from ofEce, the Tories passed, themselves, 
 the very measure for which they made their competitors the objects 
 of their denunciation. Are you playing the same game ? If you 
 are, then shame, shame upon you ! I won't pronounce upon your 
 motives : let the facts be their interpreters. What is the reason that 
 a new edition of Fox's Martyrs, with hundreds of subscribers;, and 
 with the name of the Duke of Cumberland at their head, has been 
 announced? Wherefore, from one extremity of the country to the 
 other, in every city, town, and hamlet, is a perverse ingenuity 
 employed, in order to inspire the people of this country with a 
 detestation of the religion of millions of their fellow-citizens. Why 
 is Popery, with her racks, her tortures, and her faggots, conjured 
 up in order to appal the imagination of the English people ? W^hy 
 is perjury to our God, treason to our Sovereign, a disregard of every 
 obligation, divine and human, attributed to us? I leave you to 
 answer those questions, and to give your answers, not only to the 
 interrogatories which thus vehemently, and, I will own, indignantly 
 I put to you, but to reply to those which must be administered to 
 you, in your moments of meditation, by your own heai'ts. But, 
 whatever be your purpose in the religious excitement which you are 
 endeavoring to get up in this country, of this I am convinced, that 
 the result of your expedients will correspond with their deserts, and 
 that as we have prevailed over you before, we shall again and again 
 discomfit you. Yes, we, the Ii-ish millions, led on by men like 
 those that plead the cause of those millions in this house, must (it 
 is impossible that we should not) prevail : and I am convinced that 
 the people of England, so far from being disposed to array themselves 
 against us, despite any remains of the prejudices which are fast 
 passing away in this country, feel that we are entitled to the same 
 privileges, and extend to us their sympathies in this good and glorious 
 cause. 
 
 What is that cause? I shall rapidly tell you. You took away 
 our parliament — you took from us that parliament, which, like the 
 House of Commons of this country, must have been under the 
 control of the great majority of the people of Ireland, and would 
 
502 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 not, and could not, have withheld what you so long refused us. Is 
 there a mau here who doubts that if the Union had not been conceded, 
 we should have extorted emancipation and reform from our own 
 House of Commons? That House of Commons you bought, and 
 paid for your bargain in gold ; aye, and paid for it in the most 
 palpable and sordid form in which gold can be paid down. But, 
 while this transaction was pending, you told us that all distinctions 
 should be abolished between us, and that we should become like 
 unto yourselves. The great minister of the time, by whom that 
 unexampled sale of our legislature was negotiated, held out equality 
 with England as the splendid equivalent for the loss of our national 
 representation ; and, with classical references, elucidated the noble- 
 ness of the compact into which he had persuaded the depositants of 
 the rights of their countrymen to enter. The act of Union was 
 passed, and twenty-nine years elapsed before any effectual measure 
 was taken to carry its i-cal and substantial terms into effect. At last, 
 our enfranchisement was won by our oAvn energy and determination ; 
 and, when it was in progress, we received assurances that, in every 
 respect, we should be placed on a footing with our fellow-citizens ; 
 and it was more specially announced to us, that to corporations, and 
 to all offices connected with them, we should be at once admissible. 
 Pending this engagement a bill is passed for the reform of the cor- 
 porations of this countr}' ; and in every important municipal locality 
 in England, councillors are selected by the people as their represen- 
 tatives. This important measure having been carried here, the Irish 
 people claim an extension of the same advantages ; and ground their 
 title on the Union, on Emancipation, on Reform, and on the great 
 principle of perfect equality between the two countries, on which 
 the security of one country and the prosperity of both must depend. 
 This demand, on the part of Ireland, is rejected ; and that, which to 
 England no one was bold enough to deny, from Ireland you are 
 determined, and you announce it, to withhold. Is this justice? You 
 will say that it is, and I should be surprised if you did not say so. 
 I should be surprised, indeed, if, while you are doing us wrong, you 
 did not profess your solicitude to do us justice. From the day on 
 which Strongbow set his foot on the shore of Ireland, Englishmen 
 were never wanting in protestations of their deep anxiety to do us 
 justice: — even Strafford, the deserter of the people's cause — the 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 503 
 
 renegade Wentwovth, who gave evidence in Ireland of the spirit of 
 instinctive tyranny wliich predominated in his character — even 
 Straflbi'd, while he trampled upon our rights, and trod upon the 
 heart of the country, protested his solicitude to do justice to Ireland. 
 What marvel is it, then, that gentlemen opposite should deal in such 
 vehement protestations? There is, however, one man, of great 
 abilities, not a member of this house, but whose talents and whose 
 boldness have placed him in the topmost place in his party — who, 
 disdaining all imposture, and thinking it the best course to appeal 
 directly to the religious and national antipathies of the people of 
 this country — abandoning all reserve, and flinging off the slender 
 veil by which his political associates affect to cover, although they 
 «annot hide their motives — distinctly and audaciously tells the 
 Irisii people that they are not entitled to the same privileges as 
 Englishmen ; and pronounces them, in any particular which could 
 enter his minute enumeration of the circumstances by which fellow- 
 citizenship is created, in race, identity, and religion — to be aliens 
 — to be aliens in race, to be aliens in country, to be aliens in 
 religion.* Aliens! good God! was Arthur, Duke of Wellington, 
 in the House of Lords, and did he not start up and exclaim, "Hold ! 
 I have seen the aliens do their duty"? The Duke of Wellington is 
 not a man of an excitable temperament. His miud is of a cast too 
 martial to be easily moved ; but notwithstanding his habitual in- 
 flexibility, I cannot help thinking that when he heard his Roman 
 Catholic countrymen (for we are his countrymen) designated by a 
 phrase as oflfensive as the abundant vocabulary of his eloquent con- 
 federate could supply — I cannot help thinking that he ought to have 
 recollected the many fields of fight in which we have been con- 
 tributors to his renown. "The battles, sieges, fortunes that he has 
 
 *Lord Lyndhurst was sitting under the gaUery during Mr. Slieil's speech. Mr. 
 ■Slieil loolced and shooli liis liead indignantly at liim at tiiis part of his speech. The 
 ■effect produced was remarl^able. The whole liouse turned towards Lord Lyndhurst, 
 and the shouts of the ministerialists, encountered by the vehement outcries of the 
 ■Conservatives, continued for minutes. 
 
 The " Times " next morning observed : '" A scene of the Corn-Exchange character 
 occurred in the course of Mr. Sheil'.s speech, when referring to the expressions said 
 to have been used by Lord Lyndhurst with respect to ' aliens.' The honorable 
 member for Tipperary turned towardc the benches allotted to the peers, where Lord 
 Lyndhurst was sitting. This was the signal for the most infuriate yelling from the 
 ministerial benches." — " Times," February 23, 1837. 
 
504 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 passed," ought to have come back upon him. He ought to have 
 remembered that, from the earliest achievement in which he disphiyed 
 that military genius which has placed him foremost in the annals of 
 modern warfare, down to that last and surpassing combat which has 
 made his name imperishable — from Assaye to Waterloo — the Irish 
 soldiers, with whom your armies are tilled, were the inseparable 
 auxiliaries to the glory with which his unparalleled successes have 
 been crowned. Whose were the arms that drove your bayonets at 
 Vimiera through the phalanxes that never reeled in the shock of war 
 before? What desperate valor cliftibed the steeps and filled the 
 moats at Badajos ? All his victories should have rushed and crowded 
 back upon his memorj^ — Vimiera, Badajos, Salamanca, Albuera, 
 Toulouse, and, last of all, the greatest — . Tell me, for you were 
 there — I appeal to the gallant soldier before me (Sir Henry Har- 
 dinge) from whose opinions I diifer, but who bears, I know, a gen- 
 erous heart in an intrepid breast ; — tell me, for you must needs 
 remember — on that day when the destinies of mankind were tremb- 
 ling in the balance — while death fell in showers — when the artillery 
 of France was levelled with a precision of the most deadly science 
 — when her legions, incited by the voice, and inspired by the ex- 
 ample of their mighty leader, rushed again and again to the onset — 
 tell me if, for an instant, when, to hesitate for an instant was to be 
 lost, the " aliens " blenched ? And when at length the moment for 
 the last and decisive movement had arrived, and the valor which had 
 so long been wisely checked, was at last let loose — when, with 
 words familiar, but immortal, the great captain commanded the great 
 assault — tell me, if Catho.lic Ireland, with less heroic valor than the 
 natives of this your own glorious country, precipitated herself upon 
 the foe? The blood of England, Scotland, and of Ireland flowed in 
 the same stream, and drenched the same field. Wben the chill morn- 
 ing dawned, their dead lay cold and stark together; — in the same 
 deep pit their bodies were deposited — the green corn of spring is 
 now breaking from their commingled dust — the dew falls from 
 heaven upon their union in the grave. Partakers in every peril — 
 in the glory shall we not be permitted to participate ; and shall Ave 
 be told, as a requital, that we are estranged from the noble country 
 for whose salvation our life-blood was poured out? 
 

 'mWn: 
 
 IRETON CONDEMNING THE BISHOP OF LIMERICK. 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 505 
 
 The Catholics of Ireland, 
 
 Speech at Penenden Heath, 24th October, 1828. 
 
 I^^ET no man believe that I have come here, in order that I might 
 1^1 enter the lists of religious controversy and engage with any 
 2^ of you in a scholastic disputation. In the year 1828, the 
 I Real Presence does not afibrd an appropriate subject for 
 debate, and it is not by the shades of a mystery that the rights of a 
 British citizen are to be determined. I do not know whether there 
 are many here by whom I am regarded as an idolater, because I con- 
 scientiously adhere to the faith of your forefathers, and profess the 
 doctrine in which I was born and bred ; but if I am so accounted by 
 you, you ought not to inflict a civil deprivation upon the accident of 
 the cradle. You ought not to punish me for that for which I am not 
 ia reality to blame. If you do, you will make the misfortune of the 
 Catholic the fault of the Protestant, and by inflicting a wrong upon 
 my religion, cast a discredit upon your own. I am not the worse 
 subject of my king, and the worse citizen of my country, because I 
 concur in the belief of the great majority of the Christian world ; 
 and I will venture to add, with the frankness and something of the 
 bluutness by which Englishmen are considex'ed to be characterised, 
 that if I am an idolater, I have a right to be one, if I choose ; my 
 idolatry is a branch of my prerogative, and is no business of yours. 
 But you have been told by Lord Winchelsea that the Catholic reli- 
 gion is the adversary of freedom. It may occur to you, perhaps, 
 that his lordship affords a proof in his own person, that a passion for 
 Protestantism and a love of libei'ty are not inseparably associated ; 
 but without instituting too minute or embaiTassing an inquiry into 
 the services to freedom, which in the course of his political life have 
 been conferred by my Lord Winchelsea, and putting aside all per- 
 
506 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 sonal considerations connected with the accuser, let me proceed to 
 the accusation. Calumniators of Catholicism, have you read the 
 history of your country? Of the charges against the religion of 
 Ireland, the annals of England afford the confutation. The body of 
 your common laws was given l)y the Catholic Alfred. He gave you 
 your judges, your magistrates, your high sherifls — (you, sir, hold 
 your office, and have called this great assembly, by virtue of his 
 institutions) — your courts of justice, j'our elective sj'stem, and, the 
 great bulwark of your liberties, the trial by jury. When English- 
 men peruse the chronicles of their glory, their hearts beat high Mith 
 exultation, their emotions are profoundly stirred, and their souls are 
 ardently expanded. Where is the English boy, who reads the story 
 of his great island, whose pulse does not beat at the name of Eunne- 
 mede, and whose natui'C is not deeply thrilled at the contemplation 
 of that great incident, when the mitred Langton, with his uplifted 
 crosier, confronted the tyrant, whose sceptre shook in his trembling 
 liand, and extorted what 3'ou have so justly called the Great, and 
 what, I trust iu God, you will have cause to designate as your ever- 
 lasting Charter? It was by a Catholic Pontiff that the foundation- 
 stone iu the temple of liberty was laid ; and it was at the altars of 
 that religion, which you are accustomed to consider as the handmaid 
 of oppression, that the architects of the constitution knelt down. 
 Who conferred upon the people the right of self-taxation, and fixed, 
 if i)e did not create, the representation of the people? The Catholic 
 Edward the First ; while, iu the reign of Edward the Third, perfec- 
 tion was given to the representative system, parliaments were 
 annually called, and the statute against constructive treason was 
 enacted. It is false, foully, infamously false, that the Catholic reli- 
 gion, the religion of your forefathers, the religion of seven millions 
 of your fellow-subjects, has been the auxiliary of debasement, and 
 that to its influences the suppression of British freedom can, in a 
 single instance, be referred. I am loath to say that which can give 
 you cause to take offence ; but when the faith of my country is made 
 the object of imputation, I cannot help, I cannot refrain, from break- 
 ing into a retaliatory interrogation, and from asking whether th(^ 
 overthrow of the old religion of England was not effected bj' a 
 tyrant, with a hand of iron and a heart of stone ; whether Henry 
 did not trample upon freedom, while upon Catholicism he set his 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHKIL. 507 
 
 foot; and whether Elizabeth herself, the virgin of the Reformation, 
 did not inherit her despotism with her creed ; whether in her reign 
 the most barbarons atrocities vvere not committed; whether torture, 
 in violation of the Catholic common law of England, was not politi- 
 cally inflicted, and with the shrieks of agony the Towers of Julius, 
 in the dead of night, did not re-echo ? And to pass to a more recent 
 period, was it not on the very day on which Russell perished on the 
 scaffold, that the Protestant University of Oxford published the 
 declaration in favor of passive obedience, to which your Catholic 
 ancestors would have laid down their lives rather than have submit- 
 ted? These are facts taken from your own annals, with which every 
 one of you should be made familiar ; but it is not to your own 
 annals that the recriminatory evidence, on which I am di-iven to 
 rel}'', shall be confined. If your religion is the inseparable attendant 
 upon liberty, how does it come to pass that Prussia, and Sweden, 
 and Denmark, and half the German states, should be Protestants, 
 and should be also slaves? You may suggest to me, that in the 
 larger portion of Catholic Europe, freedom does not exist; but you 
 should bear in mind that at a period when the Catholic religion was 
 in its most palmy state, freedom flourished in the countries in which 
 it is now extinct. Look at Italy, not indeed as she now is, but as 
 she was before Martin Luther was born, when literature and libert}'' 
 were associated, and the arts imparted their embellishments to her 
 free political institutions. I call up the memory of the Italian Catho- 
 lic republics in the great cause which I am sufficiently adventurous 
 to plead before you. Florence, accomplished, manufacturing, and 
 democratic, the model of your own municipal corporations, gives a 
 noble evidence in favor of Catholicism ; and Venice, Catholic Venice, 
 rises in the splendor of her opulence and the light of her libert}', to 
 corroborate the testimony of her celebrated sister with a still more 
 lofty and majestic attestation. If from Italy I shall ascend the Alps, 
 shall I not find, in the mountains of Switzerland, the sublime memo- 
 rials of liberty, and the reminiscences of those old achievements 
 which preceded the theology of Geneva, and whicli were performed 
 by men, by whom the ritual of Rome was uttered on the glaciers, 
 and the great mystery of Catholicism was celebrated on the altars 
 which nature had provided for that high and holy woi'ship? But 
 Spain, I may be told, Spain affords the proof that to the purposes of 
 
508 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 despotism her religion has always lent its impious and disastrous 
 aid. That mistalce is a signal one, for when ISpainwas most devoted- 
 ly Catholic, Spain was comparatively free ; her Cortes assumed an 
 attitude nobler even than your own parliament, and told the king, 
 at the opening of every session in which they were convened, that 
 they were greater and invested with a higher authority than himself. 
 In the struggles made by Spaniards, within our own memory, we 
 have seen the revival of that lofty sentiment ; while amongst the 
 descendants of Spaniards, in the provinces of South America, called 
 into existence in some sort by yourselves, we behold no religion but 
 the Catholic, and no government of which the principle is not founded 
 in the supremacy of the people. Eepublic after republic has arisen 
 at your bidding through that immeasurable expanse, and it is scarce 
 an exaggeration to say (if I may allude to a noble passage in one of 
 the greatest writers of our time), that liberty, with' her "meteor 
 standard " unfurled upon the Andes, 
 
 " Looks from her throne of clouds o'er half the world. 
 
 False, I repeat it, with all the vehemence of indignant asseveration, 
 utterly false is the charge habitually preferred against the religion 
 which Englishmen have laden with penalties, and have marked with 
 degradation. I can bear with any other charge but this — to any 
 other charge I can listen with endurance ; tell me that I prostrate 
 myself before a sculptured marble ; tell me that to a canvass glow- 
 ing with the imagery of heaven I bend my knee ; tell me that my 
 faith is my perdition : — and as you traverse the churchyards in 
 which your forefathers are buried, pronounce upon those who have 
 lain there for many hundred years a fearful and appalling sentence : 
 — yes ; call what I regard as the truth not only an error, but a sin 
 to which mercy shall not be extended : — all this I will bear — to all 
 this I will submit — nay, at all this I will but smile : — but do not 
 tell me that I am in heart and creed a slave : — that my countrymen 
 cannot brook ; in their own bosoms they carry the high conscious- 
 ness that never was imputation more foully false or more detestably 
 calumnious. I do not believe that with the passion for true libei-ty 
 a nation was ever more enthusiastically inspired — never were men 
 more resolved — never were men more deserving to be free than the 
 nation in whose oppression, fatally to Ireland and to themselves, the 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 509 
 
 statesmen of England have so madly persevered. What have been 
 the results of that system which you have been this day called 
 together to sustain? You behold in Ireland a beautiful country, 
 ■with wonderful advantages agricultural and commercial — a resting- 
 place for trade on its way to either hemisphere ; indented with 
 havens, watered by numerous rivers ; with a fortunate climate in 
 which fertility is i-aised upon a rich soil, and inhabited by a bold, 
 intrepid, and, with all their faults, a generous and enthusiastic 
 people. Such is Ireland as God made her — what is Ireland as you 
 have made her? This fine country, swarming with a population the 
 ■most miserable in Europe, of whose wretchedness, if you are the 
 authors, you are beginning to be the victims — the poisoned chalice 
 is returned in its just circulation to your lips. Harvests the most 
 abundant are reaped by men with starvation in their faces ; all the 
 great commercial facilities of the country are lost — the rivers that 
 should circulate opulence and turn the machinery of a thousand 
 manufactures, flow to the ocean without wafting a boat or turning a 
 wheel — the wave breaks in solitude in the silent magnificence of 
 deserted and shipless harbors. In place of being a source of wealth 
 and revenue to the empire, Ireland cannot defray its own expenses ; 
 her discontent costs millions of money ; she debilitates and endan- 
 gers England. The great mass of her population are alienated and 
 dissociated from the state — the influence of the constituted and 
 legitimate authorities is gone ; a strange, anomalous, and unex- 
 ampled kind of government has sprung up, and exercises a despotic 
 sway ; while the class, inferior in numbers, but accustomed to 
 authority, and infuriated at its loss, are thrown into formidable 
 reaction — the most ferocious passions rage from one extremity of 
 the country to the other. Hundreds and thousands of men, arrayed 
 with badges, gather in the south, and the smaller faction, with dis- 
 cipline and with arms, are marshalled in the north — the country is 
 like one vast magazine of powder, which a spark might ignite into 
 an explosion, and of which England would not only feel, but, per- 
 haps, never recover from the shock. And is this state of things to 
 be permitted to continue ? It is only requisite to present the ques- 
 . tion in order that all men should answer — something must be done. 
 "What is to be done ? Are you to re-enact the Penal Code ? Are 
 jouto deprive Catholics of their properties, to shut up their schools, 
 
510 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to drive them from the bar, to strip them of the elective fi-ancliise^ 
 and reduce them to Egyptian bondage ? It is easy for some vision- 
 ary in opi^ression to imagine these things. In the drunkenness of 
 sacerdotal debauch men have been found to give vent to such san- 
 guinary aspirations, and the teachers of the Gospel, the ministers of 
 a mild and merciful Redeemer, have uttered in the midst of their 
 ferocious wassails, the bloody orison, that their country should be 
 turned into one vast iield of massacre, and that upon the pile of car- 
 nage the genius of Orange ascendency should be enthroned. But 
 these men are maniacs in ferocitj'', whose appetites for blood j^ou 
 will scarcely undertake to satiate. You shrink from the extirpation 
 of a whole people. Even supjiose that, with an impunity as igno- 
 minious as it would be sanguinary, that horrible crime could be 
 efl'ectcd, then you must needs ask, what is to be done? In answer- 
 ing that question j'ou will not dismiss from your recollection that 
 the greatest statesmen Avho have for the last tit'ty years directed your 
 councils and conducted the business of this mighty emjiire, con- 
 curred in the opinion that, without a concession of the Catholic 
 claims, nothing could be done for Ireland. Burke, the foe to revo- 
 lution — Fox, the asserter of popular right — Pitt, the prop of the 
 prerogative, concurred. With reference to this great question their 
 minds met in a deep confluence. See to what a conclusion you 
 must arrive when you denounce the advocates of Emancipation. 
 Your anathema will take in one-half of Westminster Abbey; and is 
 not the very dust into which the tongues and hearts of Pitt, and 
 Burke, and Fox have mouldered better than the living hearts and 
 tongues of those who have survived them ? If you were to try the 
 question by the authorities of the dead, and by those voices which 
 may be said to issue from the grave, how would j^ou decide? If, 
 instead of counting votes in St. Stephen's, you were to count the 
 tombs in the mausoleum beside it, how would the division of the 
 great departed stand? There would be a majority of sepidchres 
 inscribed with immortal names upon our side. But supposing that 
 authority, that the coincidence of the wisest and of the best in favor 
 of Ireland was to be held in no account, consider how the religious 
 disqualifications must necessarily operate. Can that be a wise 
 course of government which creates not an aristocracy of opulence, 
 and I'ank, and talent, but an aristocracy in religion, and places 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEEL. 511 
 
 seven millions of people at the feet of a few hundred thousand ? Try 
 this fashion of government by a very obvious test, and make the 
 case your own. If a few hundred thousand Presbyterians stood 
 towards you in the relation in which the Irish Protestants stand 
 towards the Catholics, would you endure it? Would you brook a 
 system under which Episcopalians should be rendered incapable of 
 holding seats in the House of Commons, should be excluded from 
 sheriffships and corporate offices, and fi'om the bench of justice, and 
 from all the higher offices in the administration of the law ; and 
 should be tried by none but Presbyterian juries, flushed with the 
 insolence of power and infuriated with all the ferocity of passion? 
 How would you brook the degradation which would arise from such 
 a system, and the scorn and contumelies which would flow from it? 
 Would you listen with patience to men who told you that there was 
 no grievance in all this — that your complaints were groundless, and 
 that the very right of murmuring ouglit to be taken away? Are 
 Irishmen and Roman Catholics so difl^erently constituted from your- 
 selves that they are to behold nothing but blessings in a system 
 which you would look upon as an unendurable wrong? Protestants 
 and Englishmen, however debased you may deem our country, 
 believe me that we have enough of human nature left within us — 
 we have enough of the spirit of manhood, all Irishmen as we are, to 
 resent a usage of this kind. Its results are obvious. The nation is 
 divided into two castes. The powerful and the privileged few are 
 patricians in religion, and trample upon and despise the plebeian 
 Christianity of the millions who are laid prostrate at their feet. 
 Every Protestant thinks himself a Catholic's better ; and every Pro- 
 testant feels himself the member of a privileged corporation. 
 Judges, sherifl's, crown counsel, crown attorneys, jui-ies, are Pro- 
 testants to a man. What confidence can a Catholic have in the 
 administration of public justice? We have the authority of au 
 eminent Irish judge, the late Mr. Fletcher, ivho declared that, in 
 the North, the Protestants were uniformly acquitted, and the Catho- 
 lics were as undeviatingly condemned. A body of armed Orange- 
 men Ml upon and put to death a defenceless Catholic ; they are put 
 upon their trial, and when they raise their eyes and look upon the 
 jury, as they are commanded to do, they see twelve of their brethren 
 in massacre empannelled for their ti'ial ; and, after this, I shall be 
 
512 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 told that all the evils of Catholic disqualification lie in the dis- 
 appointed longing of some dozen gentlemen after the House of 
 Commons ! No ; it is the bann, the opprobrium, the brand, the 
 note and mark of dishonor, the scandalous partiality, the flagitious 
 bias, the sacrilegious and perjured leaning, and the monstrous and 
 hydra-headed injustice, that constitute the grand and essential evils 
 of the country. And you think it wonderful that we should be 
 indignant at all this. You marvel, and are amazed that we are hur- 
 ried into the use of rash and vehement phrases. Have Ave alone 
 forgotten the dictates of charity? — have our opponents been always 
 distinguished by their meekness and forbearance ? — have no exas- 
 perating expressions, no galling taunts, no ferocious menaces, ever 
 escaped from them? Look to the Brunswick orgies of Ireland, and 
 behold not mei'ely the torturers of '98, who, like retired butchers, 
 feel the want of their old occupation, and long for the political 
 shambles again, but to the ministers of the Gospel, by whom their 
 libations to the moloch of faction, in the revelries of a sanguinary 
 ascendancy are ferociously poured out. Make allowances for the 
 excesses into which, with much provocation, we may be hurried, 
 and pardon us when you recollect how, under the same circum- 
 stance, you would, in all likelihood, feel yourselves. Perhaps you 
 will say, that while jou are conscious that we have much to suffer, 
 you owe it to your own safety to exclude us froni power. We have 
 power already — the power to do mischief; give us that of doing 
 good. Disarray us — dissolve us — break up our confederacy — 
 take from the law (the great conspirator) its coml)ining and organi- 
 zing quality, and Ave shall no longer be united by the bad chain of 
 slavery, but by the natural bonds of allegiance and contentment. 
 You fear our possible influence in the House of Commons. Don't 
 you dread our actual influence beyond its precincts ? Catholics out 
 of the House of Commons: we should be citizens Avithin it. It has 
 been sometimes insisted that we aim at the political exaltation of our 
 church upon the ruins of the establishment — that once emancipated 
 we should proceed to btrip your clergy, and to possess ourselves of 
 the opulence of an anti-apostolic and anti-scriptural establishment. 
 Never Avas there a more unfounded imputation. The whole body of 
 the Irish Catholics look upon a wealthy priesthood with abhorrence. 
 They do not desire that their bishops should be invested with ponti- 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 513 
 
 fical gorgeousness. "VYheii a bill was introduced in order to make a 
 small, and no more than a decent provision for the Catholic clergy, 
 did they not repudiate tiie offer, and prefer their honoi'able poverty 
 and the affections of the people to the seductions of the crown? 
 How did the people act ? Although a provision for the priesthood 
 would relieve them from a burden, did they not deprecate all con- 
 nection with power ? The Catholics of Ireland know that if their 
 clergy were endowed with the wealth of the establishment, they 
 would become a profligate corporation, pampered with luxury, 
 swelling with sacerdotal pride, and presenting in their lives a mon- 
 strous contrast with that simplicity and that poverty of which they 
 £ft-e now as well the practisers as the teachers. They know that, in 
 place of being, as they now are, the indefatigable instructors of the 
 peasantr}', their consolers in aflliction, their resource in calamity, 
 their preceptors and their models in religion, their visitors in sick- 
 ness, and their companions at the bed of death ; they would become 
 equally insolent to the humble, and sycophantic to the great — flat- 
 terers at the noble's table and extortioners in the poor man's hovel ; 
 slaves in politics, and tyrants in demeanor, who from the porticoes 
 of palaces would give their instructions in humility ; who from the 
 banquets of patricians would presenile their lessons in abstinence ; 
 and from the primrose path of dalliance would point to the steep 
 and thorny way to heaven. Monstrous as the opulence of the estab- 
 lishment now is, the people of Ireland would rather see the wealth 
 of Protestant bishops increased tenfold, and another million of acres 
 added to their episcopal territories, than behold their pure and 
 simple priesthood degraded from their illustrious humility to that 
 dishonorable and anti-Christian ostentation Avhich, if it were once 
 established, would be sure to characterize their church. I speak the 
 sentiments of the whole body of my countrymen, when I solemnly 
 and emphatically reiterate my asseveration that there is nothing 
 which the Roman Catholic body would regard with more abhorrence 
 than the transfer of the enormous and corrupting revenues of the 
 establishment to a clergy who owe their virtues to their poverty and 
 the attachment of the people to their dignified dependence upon the 
 people for their support. 
 
 I sliould have done ; and yet before I retire from your presence, 
 indulge me so far as to permit me to press one remaining topic upon 
 
514 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 you. I have endeavored to sliow you tliiit you have mistaken the 
 character and political principles of my religion ; I have endeavored 
 to make you sensible of the misei'able condition of my country ; to 
 impress upon you the failure of all the means which have been 
 hitherto tried to tranquillize that unhappy country, and the necessity 
 of adopting some expedient to alleviate its evils. I have dwelt upon 
 the concuri'ence of great authorities in favor of concession ; the little 
 danger that is to be apprehended from that concession, and the great 
 benefit which would arise fnmi religious peace in Ireland. I might 
 enlai'ge upon tliosc benefits, and show you that when factions were 
 reconciled, when the substantial causes of animosity were removed, 
 the fierce passions which agitate the country would be laid at rest*, 
 that English capital would, in all likelihood, flow into Ireland ; that 
 English habits would gradually arise ; that a confidence in the admin- 
 istration of justice would grow up ; that the people, instead of 
 appealing to arms for redress, would look to the public tribunals as 
 the only arl)iters of right ; and that the obstacles which now stand in 
 the way of education would be removed ; that the fierceness of 
 polemics would be superseded by that charity which the Christian 
 extends to all mankind ; that a reciprocal sentiment of kindness 
 would take place between the two islands ; that a real union, not 
 depending upon acts of parliament, but upon mutual interest and 
 affection, would be permanently established; that the empire would 
 be consolidated, and all dangers from the enemies of Great Britain 
 would disappear : I might point out to you, what is obvious enough, 
 that if Ireland be allowed to remain as it now is, at no distant 
 period the natural foes of Great Britain may make that unfortunate 
 country the field of some formidable enterprise ; I might draw a 
 picture of the consequences which would arise if an enormous popu- 
 lation wei'e to be roused into a concurrent and sinmltaneous move- 
 ment, but I forbear from pressing such considerations upon you, 
 because I had much rather rely upon your own lofty-mindedness, 
 than ujion any terrible contingency ; I therefore put it to 3'ou, that 
 independently of every consideration of expediency, it is unworthy 
 of you to persevere in a system of practical religious intolei-ance^ 
 which Roman Catholic states, who hold to you a fine example in this 
 regard at least, have abandoned, I have heard it said that the 
 Catholic religion was a persecuting religion. It was, and so was 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 515 
 
 every other religion that was ever invested with authority. How 
 easily I could retort on you the charge of persecution ; remind you 
 that the eady reformers, who set up a claim to liberty of conscience 
 for themselves, did not indulge others in a similar kixury ; tell you 
 that Calvin, having obtained a theological masterdom in Geneva, 
 offered up the screams of Servetus to the God of mercy and of love ; 
 that even your own Cranmer, who was himself a mart}^, had first 
 inflicted what he afterwards suffered, and that this father of your 
 church, whose hand was indeed a guilty one, had, even in the reio-n 
 of Edward the Sixth, accelerated the progress of heretics to immor- 
 tality, and sent them through fire to heaven. But the truth is, that 
 both parties have, in the paroxyms of religious frenzj', committed 
 the most execrable crimes, and it might be difiicult, if their misdeeds 
 were to be weighed, to adjust the balance of atrocity between them. 
 But Catholics and Protestants have changed, and with the alteration 
 of time we ourselves have undergone a salutary reformation. 
 Through the whole continent religious distinctions have begun to 
 vanish, and freedom of conscience is almost universally established. 
 It is deplorable that England should be almost the only country 
 where such disqualifications arc maintained. In France, where the 
 religion of the state is that of Rome, all men are admissible to 
 power, and no sort of sectarian distinction is instituted by the law. 
 The third article of the French charter provides that every French 
 citizen, no matter of what denomination, shall be capable of holding 
 every office in the state. The Chamber of Deputies is filled with 
 Protestants, who are elected by Eoman Catholics ; and Protestants 
 have held places in the cabinet of France. In Hungary, in the year 
 1791, Protestants were placed by a Roman Catholic government on 
 a perfect level with their fellow-citizens. In Bavaria the same prin- 
 ciple of toleration was adopted. Thus the Catholics of Europe have 
 given you an honorable example, and, while they have refuted the 
 imputation of intolerance, have pronounced upon you a practical 
 reproach. You are behind almost evciy nation in Europe. Protest- 
 ant Prussia has emancipated her Catholic subjects, and Silesia is 
 free. In Germany the churches are used indiscriminately by Pro- 
 testants and Catholics, the Lutheran service, in happy succession, 
 follows the Catholic mass, or the Catholic mass follows the Lutheran 
 service. Thus in every state in Europe the spirit of religious tolera- 
 
516 TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tion has signally advanced, while here, in this noble island, which 
 we are wont to consider the asylum of civil liberty, the genius of 
 persecution has found a refuge. In England, and in England only, 
 deprivations and dishonor are inflicted upon those w^hose conscience 
 inhibits their conformity with the formulas of your worship, and a 
 vast body of Englishmen in this one of your finest counties, are 
 called upon to otier up a gratuitous invocation to the legislature to 
 rivet the fetters of their Catholic fellow-subjects. Do not undertake 
 so ungenerous an ofBce, nor interpose for the low-hearted purposes 
 of oppression. I have heard since I came here that it is a familiar 
 saying, that "the men of Kent have been never conquered." That 
 you never will be vanquished in any encounter where men shall be 
 arrayed in arms against you is my belief and my desire, but while 
 in this regard you will always prove unconquered and unconquer- 
 able, there is one j^iU'ticulsir in which I hope that proof will be 
 afforded that you can be subdued. Be no longer invincible, but let 
 the victory be achieved by yourselves. The worst foes with which 
 you have to contend are lodged in your own breasts — your preju- 
 dices are the most formidable of your antagonists, and to discomfit 
 them will confer upon j-ou a higher honor than if in the shouts of 
 battle you put 3'our enemies to flight. It is over your antipathies, 
 national and religious, that a masterdom should be obtained I)}' you, 
 and you may rest assured that if you shall vanquish your animosities, 
 and bring your passions into subjection, you will, in conquering 
 yourselves, extend your dominion over that country by which you 
 have been so long resisted, your empire over our feelings will be 
 securely established, you will make a permanent acquisition of the 
 aflfectious of Irishmen, and make our hearts your own. 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 517 
 
 Speech in Reply to Mr. M'Clintock. * 
 
 Mr. M'Clintock, a Protestant gentleman of rank and fortune in the county of 
 Louth, having attended a Roman Catholic Meeting, held in the chapel of Dundalk, 
 and delivered a speech containing strictures on the Catholic religion, 
 
 nR. SHEIL rose immediately after Mr. M'Clintock had con- 
 cluded and said, The speech of Mr. M'Clintock (and a more 
 
 E4) singular exhibition of gratuitous eloquence I have never 
 f^ts^: heard) calls for a prompt and immediate expression of 
 
 * gratitude. He has had the goodness to advise us (for he 
 has our interests at heart) to depute certain emissaries from the 
 new Order of Liberators to his Holiness at Rome, for the purpose 
 of procuring a repeal of certain obnoxious canons of the Council of 
 Laterau. If INIr. M'Clintock had not assured us that he was seri- 
 ous, and was not actuated by an anxiety to throw ridicule upon the 
 religion and proceedings of those whom he has taken under his spir- 
 itual tutelage, I should have been disposed to consider him an insid- 
 ious fanatic, who, under the hypocritical pretence of giving us a 
 salutary admonition, had come here with no other end than to fling 
 vilification upon our creed, and to throw contumely upon the per- 
 sons who take the most active pai't in the conduct of our cause. 
 But knowing him to be a person of high rank and large fortune, 
 .and believing him to possess the feelings as well as the station of a 
 gentleman, I am willing to acquit him of any such unworthy pur- 
 pose, and do not believe that his object in addres.sing us, was to 
 offer a deliberate and premeditated insult. He did not, I am sure 
 (for it would be inconsistent with the character which I have ascribed 
 to him) enter this meeting for the purpose of ventiug his bile in our 
 faces, and voiding upon his auditory the foul calumnies against the 
 religion of his countrymen, which furnish the ordinary materials of 
 
518 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 rhetoric in the Bible Societies, of which he is so renowned a mem- 
 ber. He did not come here to talk of the Pope's golden stirrups to 
 a mass of ignorant and unenlightened people, and to turn their belief 
 into ridicule with his lugubrious derision. The topics which he 
 selected were, indeed, singularly chosen, and when he talked of the 
 Order of Liberators, I was disposed to take him for a wag. — But 
 I raised my eyes and looked him in the face, and perceiving a per- 
 son, whose countenance would furnish Cruikshank with a frontis- 
 piece to the Spiritual Quixote, I at once acquitted him of all 
 jiropensities to humour, and could not bring myself to believe it 
 possible that Mr. M'Clintock had ever intended to be droll. At one 
 moment I confess I was in pain for him, for I was apprehensive 
 that the language in which he expressed himself in regard to our 
 clergy, and the forms and habitudes of Popery, would be apt to 
 excite the indignation of a portion of this immense auditory, but 
 the spirit of courtesy prevailed over the feelings of the people, and 
 so far from having been treated with disrespect, he was listened to 
 with more than ordinary indulgence. He excited less of our anger 
 than of our commiseration. I am upon this account rejoiced that 
 he should have undertaken an exploit of this kind. We have given 
 him evidence, at all events, that however intolerant the theory of 
 our religion may appear to him, we are practically forbearing and 
 indulgent. We allowed him to inveigh against the bridle and sad- 
 dle of the Pope, without a remonstrance ; we permitted him to 
 indulge in his dismal merriment, and his melancholy ridicule, with- 
 out a murmur ; he will thei'cfore have derived a useful lesson from 
 his experiment upon the public patience, and when he shall recount 
 to his confederates of the Bible Society his achievements amongst 
 us, he will have an opportunity of telling them that we are far more 
 tolerant of a difference of opinion than the pious auditory which Mr. 
 M'Clintock is in the habit of addressing. I have occasionally 
 attended meetings of the Bible Society, and observed that whoever 
 ventured to remonstrate against the use of the Apocalypse as a 
 Spelling Book, incurred the indignation of the assembly. I remem- 
 ber to have heard it suggested, that the amatory pictures which are 
 offered to the imagination in the Canticle of Canticles, were not 
 exactly fitted to the private meditation of young ladies, when the 
 countenances of the fair auditoi's immediately assumed an expression 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 519 
 
 of beautiful ferocity, and they looked like angels in a passion. 
 Henceforth, however, Mr. M'Cliutock may be able to x-efer to the 
 example of his Roman Catholic auditors in recommending to his 
 pretty votaries at the Bible Society, that meekness and forbearance 
 of which the Roman Catholic ladies have this day afforded a model. 
 In this view the exhibition of Mr. M'Clintock may be considered as 
 likely to be productive of some utility. But, after ^having thus 
 endeavored to convey to him an expression of the gratitude which 
 ■we feel for this interpositiou of his advice, it is right that I should, 
 after giving him every credit for the benevolent sincerity of his 
 motives, exnmine into the details of his admonition, and endeavor 
 to ascertain how far it is judicious upon our part to follow the 
 course which ho has taken on himself to point out ; let me, however, 
 he allowed to make; one preliminary remark. On rising he informed 
 us, that he merely obeyed the impulse of the moment and yielded 
 to the sudden suggestions of the Spirit, in communicating his advice. 
 I was not a little surprised that ho immediately afterwards pro- 
 duced a series of voluminous extracts from the theological history 
 of the Catholic Church, which, together with certain facetious ref- 
 erences to the Cardinals, constituted the substance of his discourse. 
 In any other man I should take this elaborate accumulation of eccles- 
 iastical learning as evidence that he had made some preparation for 
 a, somewhat adventurous enterprise, and that lie had come furnished 
 with a panoply from the armory of heaven. I should have supposed 
 that he had taken some time in collecting so many weapons of celes- 
 tial temper. But Mr. M'Clintock is a peculiar favorite above ; he 
 was supplied, no doubt, with these valuable notes by a preternatu- 
 ral means ; some angelic influence must have been exercised in his 
 favor, and a hand invisible to our profaner eyes, furnished him on 
 the instant with those large extracts from the Canons of the Council 
 of Lateran. 
 
 [Here Mr. M'Clintock rose with some appearance of displeasure, and said that 
 Mr. Shell was misrepresenting him. He stated that he had the notes for some time 
 in his pocket.] 
 
 Mr. Shell — I certainly had understood that Mr. M'Clintock 
 intimated that he had come without preparation to this meeting. I 
 am now, however, to understand that he is not indebted for his 
 
520 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 recondite erudition to any sudden irradiation from heaven, but that 
 he previously accumulated this mass of citations against Popery. 
 Indeed, the external aspect of the document sustains his present 
 allegation, for the " Sybilline leaves" which were produced by him, 
 seemed a little sear and faded. I perceive that Mr. M'Ciintock 
 does not take the remarks which I have presumed to make in very 
 good part. . In the Evangelical Societies where he makes so con- 
 si^icuous a figure, he has it all his own way. He is not much accus- 
 tomed to the collisions of intellect which are incident to popular 
 dcl)ate ; but he must not expect that a person having so much vene- 
 ration as I have for the Pope's bridle and saddle, to which he has 
 adverted with such a pleasant unction, should not return his compli- 
 ment to my religion and give him a few hints upon his own. Mr. 
 M'Ciintock is no ordinary person. He is the imcle of Lord Roden, 
 and the near relative of Lord Oriel ; he is, besides, nearly allied to 
 the Archbishop of Tuam, of Biblical renown, and has obtained no 
 little notoriety by his epistolary controversies with Doctor Curtis. 
 The observations of such a man ought not to be allowed to pass 
 without comment; I shall, therefore, pi-oceed. Mr. M'Ciintock 
 recommends us to procure a repeal of the Canons of the Council of 
 Lateran. I am apprehensive that Mr. M'Ciintock has blinded him- 
 self Avith the dust of those ponderous folios which he must needs 
 have studied, in order to exhibit such a forrago of theology as he 
 has produced to-day. The Councils of Nice, of Constance, of Lat- 
 eran, and of Trent, are as familiar to him as " household words." 
 He has thrown them into what the lawyers call a hotch-potch 
 together. I shall not undertake to follow him through so much 
 dark and mj^sterious erudition ; but, at the same time, I shall grap- 
 ple with the principle upon which his reference to the Councils are 
 founded. He tells us that we ought to procure a repeal of the 
 denunciations against heresy before we can expect emancipation. I 
 beg leave to suggest the propriety of putting Mr. M'Ciintock into 
 Parliament in place of his kinsman, Mr. Leslie Foster, in order to 
 enable him to move for a repeal of the laws against witchci'aft, 
 passed by a Protestant Legislature in the reign of James I. Thus a 
 three-fold object will bo attained. We shall, in the first place, get 
 rid of Mr. Leslie Foster ; in the second place we shall reward Mr. 
 M'Ciintock for his well-meant admonitions ; and in the third place 
 
KICIIARD LALOR SlIEIL. 521 
 
 we shfill afford an opportunity to Mr. M'Clintock of giving the same 
 earnest cxhoi'tations to his fellow-legislators to relieve their religion 
 from the odium with which the enactments of superstition ought to 
 be pursued. But let me put the language of mockery aside, and 
 ask Mr. M'Clintock whether it be not as unjust to charge the Cath- 
 olics of the nineteenth century with edicts passed some centuries 
 ago, as it would be to impute to the Protestant religion the fanati- 
 cal absurdity which dictated the statute agaiust the " feeders of evil 
 spirits." It is perfectly obvious that Mr. M'Clintock has conveyed 
 a charge of intolerance in the shape of advice. He deserves a seri- 
 ous answer. I shall, in the first place, point out the circumstances 
 under which any denunciations against heresy were pronounced by 
 the assembled hiei-archy of the Christian world. I shall show, in 
 the second pjace, that the spirit of Protestantism was, at one period, 
 fully as sanguinary and ferocious as that which Mr. M'Clintock has 
 ascribed to the genius of Popery, in what he might call the night of 
 its darkest domination. And I shall give proof to Mr. M'Clintock 
 in the third place, that while the faith of Eoman Catholics remains 
 unchanged, the principles by which the civil executive enforced an 
 uniformity of creed have been long since abandoned. 
 
 If, like Mr. M'Clintock, I were a reader of Saint Peter without 
 note or comment I might refer him to the second chapter, in which 
 he speaks of "false teachers who shall bring in damnable heresies"; 
 but I know that Mr. M'Clintock has no great relish for St. Peter, or 
 for his successors. The Roman Catholic divines were sufEciently 
 fluent in quoting the authority of the Scriptures, when the State 
 deemed it expedient to call their sanction in aid of the enactments 
 of civil policy. Good warrant for the writ, "de hoBvetico coinburendo," 
 might readily be found iu the Testament, both Old and New. But 
 I thank God that it was never a part of the faith of Roman Catholics, 
 that the light of the Gospel ought to be propagated with the faggot, 
 or that the darkness of heresy ought to be dispelled with the flames 
 of an auto defe. There is a manifest distinction between faith, which 
 consists of a belief in certain religious tenets, and the practical 
 measures by which that faith is sought to be enforced. A belief in 
 transubstantiation is a part of our creed, but the punishment of 
 heresy is a matter not of belief but of regulation, and cannot be said 
 to constitute any portion of the Roman Catholic faith. It is perfectly 
 
522 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 true, that at a period when the Roman Catholic religion was the only 
 form under which Christianity was professed, a system of discipline 
 was adopted, of which the object was to repress innovation, and it 
 ■would be easy to find many plausible arguments among Protestant 
 divines in support of that restraint upon novelties in religion, which, 
 under the pretence of preserving the repose of society, were intro- 
 duced by the lawgivers of a darker age. The intimate connexion 
 between the State and the Church, produced ordinances in the one, 
 which were intended to be the props of the other. By a reciprocity 
 of corruption, they infe.cted each other — statesmen were turned into 
 divines, and divines into statesmen. This was an unnatural trans- 
 formation, and produced the worst results. If we enter into a com- 
 parison of the enormities committed by the Catholics in opposing, or 
 the Protestants in extending the doctrines of the Reformation, per- 
 haps it would be difficult to strike a balance of atrocity between 
 them. If any excuse could be urged (but there can bo none) it 
 might be suggested on the part of the professors of the old i-eligion 
 that they were, to use a legal illustration, in possession of the estate, 
 and opposed to every casual ejector, who came to trespass on their 
 ■exclusive property in heaven. The Protestants who throw imputa- 
 tions on our Church, should consider the position from which their 
 projectiles ai'e flung, and should remember that they live in houses 
 of brittle materials. It is notorious that almost, with the single ex- 
 ception of Melancthon, all the earlier Reformers were infuriated 
 persecutors. After hunting Pojjery down, they turned like mad 
 wolves upon each other. The progress of the Reformation is tracked 
 with fire and bloo.d. It is unnecessary to go through the details of 
 enormity on the Continent, but as Mr. M'Clintock seems to belong to 
 the Calvinistic department of Christianity (I should so collect from 
 his aspect) he will pardon me for referring him to Geneva, that me- 
 tropolis of oi'thodoxy, for illustrations of the peaceful and forbearing 
 spirit with which the Fathers of the Reformed Religion enforced 
 their revelations. They tortured, they emboweled, they consumed 
 with slow fires whoever presumed to question their delegation from 
 heaven. But let us turn to England. It is but a few days since I 
 perused a letter by that martj'r of the Reformation, the detestable 
 Cranraer, in which he writes, that inasmuch as one Fryth did not 
 think it necessary to believe in the corporal presence of Christ in the 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 523 
 
 Sacrament, and held, in this point, much aftei- the opinion of CEco- 
 lampadius, it was necessary to hand him over to the secular power, 
 ""where," as Cranmer says, "he, Fryth, looked every day to go to 
 the fire." Well might he exclaim, " this guilty hand " ; well might 
 the Patriarch of the Reformation, while he was himself perishing at 
 the stake, utter that terrific cry ; but he should have applied it, not 
 to the recantation of his opinions, but to the sanguinary misdeeds to 
 which that hand had given its sanction. If the mother of Fryth had 
 stood beside him, might she not have cried, "Your groans are like 
 the groans of my son, and your screams remember me of his cries." 
 But why refer to Cranmer, when I may resort to the amiable and 
 benevolent Henry, the Father of the English Eeformation. Protes- 
 tants disclaim that celebrated Prince ; but really they should be held 
 responsible for his barbarities, when they impute to us every delin- 
 quency practiced by the professors of our creed. Let them deny it 
 as they will ; if we trace the Protestant religion to its fountain head, 
 however it may have been purified in its progress, we shall find its 
 sources stained with blood. But perhaps Mr. M'Clintock will say, 
 that it pleased Providence to choose an imworthy instrument, in the 
 ferocious Henry, for the accomplishment of its sacred purposes ; and 
 that when we find the cradle of their religion rocked in murder, 
 adultery, and incest, we see an exemplification of the tendency of 
 Heaven to deduce good from ill. It must be confessed, that Provi- 
 dence displayed a somewhat fantastic and capricious taste in choosing 
 an execrable tyrant for the execution of his holy designs. It may 
 he said, that the light only dawned in the mind of Henr}' ; that the 
 Spirit did not visit him in its fullest illumination ; and that although 
 the morning of the Reformation was dark and gloomy, and many a 
 bloody cloud attended the ascending luminary, yet that in a little 
 ■while the truth appeared in all its glory, and spread into the full 
 splendor of day. Well, let me pass at once to the 27th of Elizabeth, 
 by which it was enacted, that " every Romish Priest should be hanged 
 until he was half dead, then he should have his head taken off, and 
 his body cut in quarters ; that his bowels should be drawn out and 
 burned, and his head fixed upon a pole in some public place." What 
 will Mr. M'Clintock say to this? Does he think the charge of intol- 
 ei'ance is justly confined to the religion of Rome? I will not pursue 
 the spirit of persecution through the variety of legislative enactments 
 
521: TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 in which it is exemplified. What need I do more than refer to the 
 Penal Code enacted in this country, by which the son was incited to 
 revolt against the father, and parricide was converted into a sort of 
 political duty by the law. It was of this code that Sir Toby Butler 
 said, "It is enough to make the hardest heart bleed to think on't." 
 It would be an almost endless labor to go through all the proofs, with 
 which history may be said to teem, of the ferocious spirit by which 
 sectarian power has been almost uniformly displayed. I can readily 
 produce gibbet for gibbet against Mr. M'Clintock ; and the only dif- 
 ference between us would be, that Catholics had a larger field for the 
 exercise of that unfortunate tendency, which appears to belong to 
 the nature of man. The Protestants, however, made good use of 
 their time. The truth is, both parties are to blame, and should 
 avoid this recriminating retrospect. How much more wise it would 
 be of Mr. M'Clintock, instead of referring us to the Council of La- 
 teran, to refer his fellow-believers to the progi-ess of events, to the 
 universal diifusion of intelligence, and the material change which 
 the religion both of Catholics and of Protestants has undergone. 
 The sphere of human knowledge has advanced, and the Catholic 
 Church has been carried along in the universal progression. Our 
 faith is the same, but our system of ecclesiastical govenimcnt is 
 wholly changed. Persecution cannot be considered as an ingredient 
 of a man's creed. It may, indeed, be the result of his principles, 
 but cannot be considered as of the essence of his belief. It were 
 wiser for Mr. M'Clintock to look at the declarations of the Catholic 
 Universities, denying the abominable doctrines imputed to us, — to 
 the recent protest of the Catholic Bishops of Ireland, and to the oath 
 which every Eoman Catholic takes, than to the moth-eaten volumes 
 with which he has been replenishing his mind. Let him beware of 
 these studies — "the insect takes the color of the leaf upon which it 
 feeds," and I know of no worse color than the black letter repertories, 
 of theology which have supplied liis intellectual nourishment. But 
 let us go bej'Ond protests, and oaths, and declarations, and come to 
 facts. The liberality of Catholics is not confined to mere speculation. 
 Look at Hungary, where, for upwards of forty years, all distinctions 
 between Protestant and Catholic have been abolished. Mr. M'Clin- 
 tock has, en passant, inveighed against Charles X. and the Jesuits. 
 Poor gentleman, he has the same fear of the Jesuits as Scrub in the 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 525 
 
 play, who rushes out in agony of terror, and exclaims, " Murder ! 
 robbery ! the Fope and the Jesuits ! " It is not my office to defend 
 the intellect of Charles X. I believe that if the brains of Protestant 
 and Catholic royalty were to be weighed, the scales would be found 
 in a state of complete equipoise. I hardly think that the Guelphs 
 would weigh the Capets to the beam, and if the head of his Eoyal 
 Highness the Duke of York were to be examined by Professor Spur- 
 zbeim, he would, probably, find in it an equally faithful exemplifica- 
 tion of his theory. On the head of the Duke of Cumberland, 
 indeed, some bumps, as they are technically called, might be dis- 
 covered, which the ghost of Selis should be conjured to explain. 
 But a truce to laughter. Protestants complain of the intolerant 
 spirit of the French law. In the first place the Huguenots are pro- 
 vided with churches at the jaublic expense. In the Rue St. Honore, 
 in Paris, they have a splendid place of worship given them by the 
 State, and their clergy are not only paid as well, but much better, 
 than the Eoman Catholic ecclesiastics. They receive one-third more. 
 Let Mr. M'Clintock look to the French charter, and he will find 
 that by the third article, " all Frenchmen are equally admissible to all 
 civil and military employments," and by the fifth, " each individual is 
 allowed to profess his religion with an equal freedom, and obtains 
 for his form of worship, the same protection." But all these argu- 
 ments, derived both from reason and from ftict, have no weight, as 
 long as we consider the Pope infallible. Mr. M'Clintock informs us, 
 that no human being is exempt from frailty, and refers to King David, 
 and the interesting story of Bathsheba. He has also quoted the 
 uxorious propensities of his son. 
 
 Mr. M'Clintock seems well versed in the Old Testament, and 
 apjiears well qualified to make elegant extracts of its more enticing 
 incidents for the meditation of young ladies. They would make a 
 neat volume, especially if adorned with prints, and some fair devotee 
 well skilled in drawing should be applied to, to throw her imagina- 
 tion into the pencil, and furnish illustrations. A pretty subject that 
 of David and Bathsheba, to which Mr. M'Clintock has adverted. 
 He passed with much rapidity of transition to his holiness, and I own 
 I expected a few anecdotes of the Borgina family, to beguile the 
 tedium of debate. However, he confined himself to the equestrian 
 habitudes of his holiness. I beg to apprise Mr. M'Clintock that I, 
 
526 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 for one, do not consider the Pope infallible, nor is such an opinion 
 entertained in our church. Roman Catholics indeed believe that 
 truth resides in their church, as most people believe their own to be 
 the best religion. Mr. M'Chntock will allow me to interpret the 
 Scriptures as I think proper. St. Paul and he diifer, indeed, on 
 that head, as St. Paul condemns "private interpretation." But I 
 meet Mr. M'Clintock on his own ground, and tell him that I find 
 texts in Scripture which, according to my private construction, war- 
 rant a belief in the infalhbility of the church. I may be wrong, but 
 I deduce that position from the Scriptures, and the first use I make 
 of them is, to bow down my judgment to the church. I need not 
 repeat the te-xt : "Thou art Peter." "Lo, I will be with you to the 
 end of time," and so forth. I by no means insist on Mr. M'Clintock 
 adopting my construction, but upon his own principles, he must not 
 quarrel ^Yith the inference which I draw from the Eible. I have as- 
 much right to draw that conclusion from the Bible as he has to 
 believe in his election from eternity, which he derives from the same 
 source. Why, then, should I be debarred of my civil rights for 
 believing that truth must reside somewhere, and for choosing to give 
 it a residence in the Catholic church, instead of the bottom of a well. 
 At all events, the arguments on my side are plausible enough to 
 have imposed on many great and good men, and I must be pardoned 
 for following, like Mr. M'Clintock, my own vagary in religion. 
 There is, in my mind, this difference between Mr. M'Clintock and 
 myself. I believe the church to be infallible, and he believes him- 
 self to be so. 
 
 Mr. M'Clintock — Not at all. 
 
 iMr. Shell — I shall show Mi'. M'Clintock that this conclusion is 
 the necessary consequence of his premises. If every Protestant is 
 entitled to draw his religion from the Bible, it follows that he must 
 be capable sy to do. If he be capable so to do, he must be enlight- 
 ened by heaven, and if enlightened by heaven, as God does not lead 
 us astra}', he must be infallible. A member of the Bible Society 
 gives the Scriptures to his child, and desires him to make out his 
 faith from them. "Here, (ho saj^s), my sweet little divine, is the 
 Book of Life, do not attend to what the priests and cardinals tell 
 you, but study the Trinity by yourself; investigate the mystery of 
 the Incarnation, and solve the prophetical problems of the Apocalypse ; 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 527 
 
 and, my clear boy, if ever you are in want of amusement, read the 
 pleasant story of David and Bathsheba, and the other instructive 
 anecdotes which you will find interspersed in this holy book ; God 
 will preserve j'our imagination from taint, and fill with his divine 
 grace every little theologian of thirteen. And now good bye, and 
 go and play with the gospel at 'hide and go seek.'" So much for 
 divinity in its teens. But seriously speaking, if the boy be not 
 infallible, why give the Bible to the boy? It comes to this : I am 
 for corporate, and Mr. M'Clintock for individual infallibility. I 
 prefer the decrees of councils ; he prefers the rhapsodies of conventi- 
 cles. I like the religion of Pascal, and Fenelon, and Bossuet, and 
 Arnaud, while Mr. M'Clintock and the ladies of Dublin have a pre- 
 dilection for the new apostle of the Gentiles — Baron Munchausen 
 Katerfelto Ferdinand Mendcz Pinto Wolff, formerly of Monmouth 
 street, London, lately of the Propaganda in Rome, and now Chief 
 Propagator to the Ladies' Auxiliary Bible Society, Dublin. Kirwan 
 used to say, that the teachers of new religions were like the soldiers 
 who tore the seamless garment of our Saviour to pieces. This con- 
 verted Hebrew, after selling old clothes thi'ough Germany, comes 
 hawking some shreds of new-fashioned Christianity in Dublin. The 
 fellow's name and aspect reminds me of Dryden's description of the 
 
 fanatics : 
 
 Move haughty than the rest, the Wolffish race — 
 Appear with belly gaunt and famished face — 
 Never was so deformed a beast of grace. 
 
 I commend Mr. M'Clintock to this worthy missionary from Syria, 
 of whose infallibility and fidelity in the commemoration of his own 
 wonders, I presume he makes no question, and gives him a decided 
 preference to Prince Hohenloe. Good heaven ! to what a pitch 
 fanaticism has arrived ! An ignorant Israelite arrives in Dublin, 
 defies all the doctors of the Church of Rome, in the world, to meet 
 him in intellectual combat, directs that answers should be inclosed 
 from all the universe to Mr. Hogan, of York street, and is forthwith 
 encompassed with all the rank and beauty of Dublin. Warren, with 
 his blacking, is nothing to this ; and Ingleby, "the emperor of con- 
 jurors," who defied every other juggler, sinks into miserable diminu- 
 tion before this master of celestial legerdemain. But, sir, enough 
 of these topics, which are very foreign from those on which I had 
 
528 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 intended to address you. Mr. M'Clintock has broken in upon the 
 ordinary course of our discussions, and has, perhaps, enlivened this 
 meeting with some diversity of matter. I hope we shall often see 
 bim amongst us, and that some of his associates of the Bible Society 
 will do us the favor to accompany him ; for, although we are greatly 
 surpassed by them in the riches of diction, extent of acquirement, 
 grace of elocution, and power of reasoning, yet the truth upon our 
 side almost renders us their match. Having spoken thus much, I 
 shall not enter into any of the subjects suggested by your resolu- 
 tions, but shall content myself with simply stating, that for the vote 
 of thanks you have given me for my professional exertions at the 
 election, to the success of which you are pleased to say that I con- 
 tributed, I am deeply grateful. 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 529 
 
 Speech on the Duke of York. 
 
 '^i HAVE waited until tho chair had been left, and the meeting of 
 1^ the Association had terminated, in order to introduce a suliject 
 
 f which, as it is of a purely political nature, I refrained from 
 mentioning during the discussions of the Association, lest it 
 should give them a character of illegality, and expose me to the 
 imputation of having violated the law. 1 refer to the recent obser- 
 vations which have been made in the London papers upon the 
 report of a speech of mine at a public dinner. I hope that I shall 
 not be considered guilty of an overweening egotism, in drawing the 
 attention of the individuals who happen to be assembled here to 
 what may appear to relate to myself. But the topics on which I 
 mean to addi'ess you are of public as well as of personal interest. 
 The truculent jocularity and the spirit of savage jest which have 
 been ascribed to me, in expatiating on the infirmities of an illus- 
 trious person, have been regarded as characteristic of the moral 
 habitudes of the body to which I belong. Thus, my vmdication 
 (for I dp not rise to make an apology) extends beyond myself. Yet 
 let me be permitted to suggest, that it is most unliiir to impute to a 
 whole people the feelings or the sentiments of any single man. The 
 Catholics of Ireland have been repeatedly held responsible for the 
 unauthorised and unsanctioned language of individuals. Every 
 ardent expression, every word that ovei-flows with gall, every phrase 
 uttered in the suddenness of unpremeditated emotion, are converted 
 into charges against seven millions of the Irish people. It is deal- 
 ing rather hardly with us, to make a loose after-dinner speech, (the 
 mere bubble of the mind,) thrown off in the heedlessness of con- 
 viviality, a matter of serious accusation against a whole community. 
 I am not endeavoring to excuse myself upon any such plea as the 
 Bishop of Kilmore might resort to, in extenuating his late oration in 
 
530 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Cavan ; on the contrary, I am prepared to show the circumstances 
 ■which, in my mind, gave warrant to what I said. Bnt I deprecate 
 the notion that the language employed either by myself or by any 
 other individual should be held to represent the opinions of the 
 Irish Catholics. It has been stated that laughter was produced by 
 an el)ullition of disastrous merriment. I will suppose that some two 
 or tlu'ce dozen of individuals in an obscure country town, did not 
 preserve the solemnity with which any allusion to the maladies of 
 an illustrious person ought to have l)een received, yet it is wholly- 
 unjust to hold the Irish Catholics responsible for their lack of sensi- 
 bility. Having said this much, in order to rescue my fellow-labor- 
 ors in the cause of emancipation from any responsibility for individual 
 demerit, I shall proceed to state what, in my judgment, affords a 
 justification of the language employed upon the occasion to which I 
 refer. I shall not deny that I entertain a solicitude upon this sub- 
 ject. It is affectation on the part of any man to say that he holds 
 the censure of the press in no account. I cannot but be sensible 
 that I am, from my comparative \vant of personal importance, more 
 exposed to the injurious consequence of such a sinmltaneous assault. 
 But I do not complain ; whoever intermeddles in public proceeding* 
 must be prepared for occasional condemnation. It is one of the 
 necessary results of notoi-icty, and I submit to it as a portion of my 
 fate. I shall not, therefore, insinuate that thei'e is any mock senti- 
 mentality in the amiable indignation with which the writers of the 
 Whig journals have vented their censurrs upon what ttiey call the 
 barbarous hilarity of an after-dinner harangue. I will not say that 
 it is easy to procure a character for high sentiment by indulging in 
 a paroxysm of editorial anger. Nay, I will give the gentlemen who 
 have put so much sentiment into type credit for sincerity, and with- 
 out attempting to retaliate, without referring them to their own 
 comments upon the illustrious immoralities of the distinguished 
 person to whom I have alluded, I shall state the grounds of which I 
 conceive that I have been unjustly assailed. It is right that I should 
 at once proceed to mention exactly what took place. The chairman 
 of the meeting in question deviated from the ordinary usage at 
 Roman Catholic dinners, and, in compliance with what, from his 
 inexperience, he considered to be a sort of formula of convivial 
 loyalty, proposed the health of a man who is an object, to use the 
 
RICHARD LALOR SHEIL. 531 
 
 mildest phrase, of strong national disrelisli. This, I confess, excited 
 my indignation. I felt indignation, and where is the man who has 
 one drop of manly blood in his heart, who would not feel indigna- 
 tion at being called on to offer a public homage to the individual 
 ■who "has an oath in heaven" against his country. I was tempted 
 at first to remonstrate in the language of violent reproof against 
 such an obnoxious toast, and I own that I felt it difficult to restrain 
 the emotious which, in common with every Roman Catholic, I enter- 
 tain towards the man who is the avowed and devoted antagonist of 
 Ireland. I recollected, however, that the chairman had done no 
 more than comply with what he conceived to be a mere form, and I, 
 therefore, preferred a mockery of the sentiment to any solemn 
 denunciation. To the toast the expression of a hope was annexed,, 
 that with the restoration of health his feelings towards this countrj'^ 
 should undergo an alteration. "My gorge rose" at the notion of ss 
 man whose hereditary obstinacy has been confirmed by an adjura- 
 tion of his God, becoming a valetudinarian convert to liberal opin- 
 ions. The transition from anger to derision is an easy one, and I 
 could not help indulging in tlie luxury of scorn (for it is not without 
 its gratification,) and in the spirit of a gay malevolence, but not of 
 heartless ridicule, I stated that I did not despair of seeing a consum- 
 mation of the pious aspirations in which I had been called to join, 
 when I recollected that protestations in politics might be as flcetino- 
 as those in love, and that as ''Jove laughs at lover's perjuries," I 
 apprehended an unfortunate stability in "so help me God !" It was 
 not unnatural that in this mood of unpremeditated mockery I should 
 make citations from certain celebrated epistles, where vows of ever- 
 lasting attachment were succeeded by infidelities of so much infeli- 
 citous renown. The report of what I said was not full, and although 
 I do not affect to say that the expressions imputed to me were not 
 used, yet they are presented to the public eye without much con- 
 comitant matter, which would show them in, perhaps, a different 
 light. I am sorry that the references to those celebrated letters 
 were omitted. The following were among the passages to which I 
 alluded, and which I think will bear me out — "How can I sufB- 
 ciently express to my sweetest, my darling love, the deh'ght which 
 her dear, her pretty letter gave me — millions of thanks for it, my 
 angel. Doctor O' delivered your letter. He wishes much to 
 
532 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 preach before royalty, and if I can put hira in the way of it I will. 
 What a time it appears to me, my darling, since we parted, and how 
 impatiently I look forward to next Wednesday night. God bless 
 you, my dear love ; ah ! believe me, even to my last hour, yours, 
 and yours alone." Thus, you perceive, that his atfection was sealed 
 with as strong a vow as his antipathy. The next letter .gives vent 
 to still more impetuous emotions. " How can I express to my dar- 
 ling love my thanks for her dear, dear letter. Oh ! my angel, do 
 me justice, and be convinced that thei'e never was a woman adored 
 as you are. There are still, however, two whole nights before I 
 shall clasp my dear angel in my arms. Claverlng is mistaken, my 
 dear, in thinking there are any new regiments to be raised. (There- 
 by hangs a tale.) Thanks, my love, for the handkerchiefs, which 
 ai'e delightful, and I need not, I trust, assure you of the pleasure I 
 feel in wearing them, and thinking of the dear hands who made 
 them for me. Adieu, my sweetest love, until the day after to-mor- 
 row ; and be assured, that until my last hour, I shall remain yours, 
 and yours alone." It would be doing injustice to the celebrated 
 writer of these exotic effusions if I did not add that his recommenda- 
 tion of an Irish divine was fully justified by the result, for the 
 "Morning Post" mentions that while the doctor, with the Irish 
 Omega in his name, was preaching, the father of the illustrious 
 individual was very attentive, and his mother and sisters were 
 melted into tears. There is an amusement of a demi-literary kind, 
 commonly called " cross rcadincf." I have sometimes put the " so 
 help me God" oration into juxtaposition with the amatory lucubra- 
 tions from which I have given a few extracts, and the reading stood 
 thus: "It was connected with the serious illness of one now no 
 
 more. Doctor O' wishes much to preach before royalty. I 
 
 have never seen any reason to regret or change the line which I 
 then took." "Oh ! my angel, do me justice, and be convinced that 
 there never was a woman adored as you are — there are still , how- 
 ever, two whole nights before I can clasp my angel in my arms." 
 I feel very strongly on the whole subject — " ten thousand thanks, 
 my love, for the handkerchiefs, which are delightful." Here he 
 became sensibly affected. " I have been brought up all my life in 
 these principles, and be assured that, to my last hour, I shall ever 
 remain yours, and yours alone, 'so help me God ! '" This amalga- 
 
RICHARD LALOR SIIEIL. 533 
 
 mation of his passions and his politics, in which his vices and his 
 virtues are fused together, presents his character in a just light. 
 But I should lay aside the language of derision. Why have I made 
 these references to transactions, which l)ut for his relentless anti- 
 pathies to 013' country, I should readily have forgotten? It is not 
 in the spirit of wanton malignity and inglorious revenge. It is for 
 the purpose of recalling to the commentators upon myself the period 
 at which that illustrious person was an object of as much aversion in 
 England as he is in Ireland at this day. It is for the purpose of 
 branding his protestations about conscience with all the scorn which 
 they merit; it is in order to exhibit, in their just light, his appeals 
 to heaven ; to put his morality into comparison with his religion, 
 and to tear off the mask by which the spirit of oppression is sought 
 to be disguised. Conscience, forsooth ! It is enougb to make one's 
 blood boil to think on't ! That he who had publicly and in the open 
 common day thrown off every coverlet of shame — who had wal- 
 lowed in the blackest stye of profligate sensuality, an avowed and 
 ostentatious adulterer, whose harlot had sustained herself by the ' 
 sale of commissions, and tiu-ned footmen into brigadiers ! that he — 
 yet hot and reeking from the results of a foul and most disgraceful 
 concubinage — should, without sense or memory or feeling, before 
 the eyes of the whole empire, with the traces of his degradation 
 still fresh upon him, pi-esume to call upon the name of the great 
 and eternal God, and in all the blasphemy of sacrilegious cant, dedi- 
 cate himself with an invocation of heaven to the everlasting opres- 
 sion of my country ! This it is that sets me, and every Irish 
 Catholic, on fire. This is it which raises, excites, inflames, and 
 exasperates ! This it is that applies a torch to our passions. This 
 it is that blows our indignation into flame. And it is this which, in 
 the eyes of men, who stand the cold spectators of our sufferings and 
 yield us a fastidious sympathy in our wrongs, makes us appear fac- 
 tious, virulent, and ferocious. This it is which makes them think 
 that our mouths are foaming with raljid froth, and that there is 
 poison mixed with madness in our fangs. I will furnish our antag- 
 onists with expressions of condemnation : I will assist their vocabu- 
 lary of insult — I will allow them to heap contumel}' upon contumely, 
 and reproach upon reproach, and I will oidy answer, that if they 
 were similarly situated, tliey would feel with the same poignancy 
 
534 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 and speak with the same turbulent virulence as ourselves, — I will 
 only say, in the language of the great master of human nature — 
 
 "You should not speak of what you cannot feel." 
 
 They cannot feel our condition, or appreciate our injuries to their 
 full extent, I cannot say the same thing of the illustrious person 
 to whom I have alluded. He has been placed in circumstances some- 
 what analogous. Good God ! that such a man should tell us that 
 we labor under no privation, and are subject to no wrong ! What 
 were his own feelings — how did his heart beat when he was driven 
 by the loud and reiterated cries of the English people, from his 
 high office ! We are told by him that an exclusion from the honors 
 of tile State is no substantive injury. Did he forget his own letter to 
 the House of Commons, in which he offered up an act of contrition 
 for the consequences of his impure connection, and, acknowledging 
 that his heart was almost broken, resigned his office ! Did tlie sac- 
 rifice cost him no pang? Did the oblation which he made to the 
 public feeling awake no painful sensation in his mind? Did not his 
 cheek burn, and was not his face turned into scarlet, when he took 
 the pen with a trembling hand (for it must have trembled) and signed 
 the instrument of his resignation ! What a palsy must have seized 
 his arm when he let the truncheon fall ! And if in that dreadful 
 crisis he felt a deep agony of heart, should he not make some allow- 
 ance for those who, for no other cause than a conscientious adherence 
 to the religion m which they were born and trust to die, are excluded 
 from those honors which are accessible to every other class of British 
 subjects? What, then, is the charge against me? That I have not 
 enough of Joseph Surface in my character to express a wish that the 
 great obstacle to my liberty should not be removed ! My crime is, 
 that I am not a hypocrite so base, as to allow a public libation to his 
 name to pass without a comment. It was extorted from me, and my ob- 
 servations were not dictated by any cold and delilierate malice towards 
 the individual, but by the feeling of distaste which the announcement 
 of such a toast produced in my mind. The sarcasm was directed to 
 the sentiment and not to the man. With respect to the individual 
 himself, I doubt not that in private life he is not destitute of good 
 qualities. It is said that he is a person of honor, and of a kindly 
 disposition. This I am not inclined to controvert ; and it would be 
 
KICIIARD LALOR SIIEIL. 535 
 
 an injustice not to add, that in many particulars, in his official 
 capacity, he is entitled to praise. Diligence, punctuality, and an 
 attention to the interests of the inferior class of persons, who are 
 placed under his superintendence, are among his merits. But what 
 compensation does good nature afford for the denial of liberty? The 
 mistakes of men in his condition are equivalent in their consequences 
 to acts of deliberate criminality. Imbecility of understanding, and 
 obstinacy of character, generate as many evil results as depravity of 
 disposition, and, if I may employ the phrase, tyranny of heart. If 
 I have adverted to conduct, which, in a court, is called foll}^ but 
 which in lower departments of society is called vice, it is not that I 
 am anxious to exaggerate those weaknesses wjiich exposed him to 
 ridicule, into enormity. The absurdities in love, into which he fell, 
 should rest in oblivion, if ho did not, by talking of the pain to which 
 the royal conscience would be exposed, provoke a contrast l)etween 
 his life and his protestations, and make us tear open the tattered 
 curtains of concubinage, in order to draw arguments against him from 
 an adulterous bed. Who, we inevitably ask, is the man who appeals 
 to heaven ? Who is the man that entreats the house to consider the 
 torture of conscience in which the sovereign is thus placed? Who 
 is it that lifts up his hands and exclaims, "so help me God"? Is he 
 a man of pure and unblemished life ? Is he a man of bright and 
 immaculate morality ? Is he a man .distinguished for his fidelity to 
 his pecuniary contracts, and who never allowed his humble creditors 
 to be the victims of a licentious prodigality ? These are the inter- 
 rogatories which this appeal to Almighty God necessarily forces upon 
 us. We are rendered astute in the detection of errors, by the 
 anxiety to find fault, and look into the life of such a person with 
 a microscopic scrutiny. It is much to be regretted that he has ex- 
 hibited a solicitude to l)e hated b}"^ the Irish people. He has lost no 
 opportunity to gather about his name the antipathies of this country. 
 Witness his having accepted the office of Grand Master of an illegal 
 association of men, combined together for the oppression of their 
 fellow-countrymen, and who, perverting the word of God into the 
 signal of massacre, employed as a motto of their sanguinary institu- 
 tion, " Thy foot shall be steeped in the blood of thine enemies, and 
 the tongue of thy dog shall be red with the lapping thereof." Is it, 
 then, to be expected, that, for the ex-Grand Master of an Orange 
 
536 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Lodge we should entertain much tenderness and anxiety, or that any 
 man who has taken the active part which I have, in Catholic afTuirs, 
 should allow his name, when held up as an object of sympathy, to 
 pass without some reprehensive comment? I do not exult in any 
 corporal suffering which he may endure. If he suffers pain, and it 
 were in my power to alleviate it, I should obey the instincts of my 
 nature, and, dismissing my political detestations, bear him relief. 
 But if I am asked M'hether I should desire to see the misfoi'tunes of 
 my country prolonged, I answer, " the liberty of Ireland is too dear." 
 He is, beyond all doubt, the great obstacle to concession. What, 
 then, do our opponents expect from us? If they require that excess 
 of Christian philosophy, which should teach us to offer up our orisons 
 for the degradation of our country, they ask too much. What would 
 Catholic Emancipation produce ? It would promote a whole people 
 to their just level in the State ; it would create tranquillity, and open 
 the sources of national wealth in a land which is impoverished by 
 its distractions ; it would bind us in harmony together, and put an 
 end to those dissensions by which we are rent asunder, and by which 
 all the charities of life are blasted ; it would remove that spirit of 
 animosity and virulence which tills the hearts of men with the worst 
 passions, and makes them turn with an emulation of hatred upon each 
 other ; it would, in one word, produce a great and permanent national 
 reconciliation, and fix the stability of the British empire upon an 
 everlasting foundation. These would, in my mind, be the glorious 
 results of Catholic Emancipation ; and I am only speaking the feel- 
 ing of the whole Irish people, when I avow that I do not desire the 
 perpetuation of the chief impediment that stands in its way, and thus- 
 obstructs a consummation which every lover of his country must most 
 devoutly wish. 
 
SELECT SPEECHES 
 
 / 
 
 Right Hon. Henry Grattan. 
 
 [637] 
 
^ x^5 
 
 y/. 
 
 .A. 
 
 HON 
 
 HENRY 
 
 GRATTAN 
 
Declaration of Irish Rights, 
 
 April 19, 1780. 
 
 On this clay came on the most important subject that had ever been discussed in 
 the Irish Parliament, — the question of independence — the recovery of that legis- 
 lative power, of which, for centuries, Ireland had been so unjustly deprived. 
 
 Her right to make laws for herself, was first afl'ected by the act of the 10th of 
 Henry the Seventh, in a parliament, held at Drogheda, before the then Deputy, Sir 
 Edward Poynings. It was there enacted that no parliament should be hoklen in 
 Ireland, until the Lord-lieutenant and Privy Council should cei'tify to the King 
 under the great seal of Ireland, the causes, considerations, and acts that were to 
 pass ; that the same should be affirmed by the King and council in England, and his 
 license to summon a parliament be obtained under the great seal of England. This 
 ■was further explained by the 3d and 4th of Philip and Mary, whereby any change or 
 alteration in the form or tenor of such acts to be passed after they were returned 
 fi'om England, was prohibited. Thus, by these laws the English privy council got 
 the power to alter or suppress, and the Irish parliament were deprived of the power 
 to originate, alter, or amend. 
 
 By these acts were the legislative rights of Ireland Invaded : her judicial rights, 
 however, remained untouched, till, in 1688, a petition and appeal was lodged with 
 the House of Lords of England, from the English society of the new plantation of 
 Ulster, complaining of the Irish House of Lords, who had decided in a case between 
 them and the Bishop of Derry. Upon this the English House of Lords passed an 
 order declaring, that this appeal was coram non judice. To this order fourteen 
 reasons and answers were written by the celebrated Molyneux, and the appeal gave 
 rise to his famous work, entitled "The Case of Ireland," which excited the hostility 
 of the English House of Commons, and" was burned by the hands of the common 
 ■faangman ! The Irish House of Lords then asserted their rights, passed resolutions, 
 and protested against the English proceedings ; thus matters remained until 1703, 
 when came on the case of the Earl and Countess of Meath against the Lord Ward, 
 who were dispossessed of their lands by a pretended order of the House of Lords in 
 England, on which the Irish House of Peers adopted the former resolutions, assert- 
 ing their rights, and restored possession to the Earl and Countess. In 1703, the 
 appeal of Maurice Annesley was entertained in England, and the decree of the Irish 
 House of Lords was reversed; and the English House of Lords had recourse to the 
 authority of the Barons of the Exchequer in Ireland to enforce their order; the 
 Sheritr refused obedience; the Irish House of Lords protected the Sheriff, and 
 agreed to a representation to the King on the subject. This produced the arbitrary 
 Jict of the 6th of George the First, which declared, that Ireland was a subordinate 
 
540 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 and dependent kingdom; that the King, Lords, and Commons of England had' 
 power to make Laws to bind Ireland ; that the House of Lords of Ireland had no 
 jurisdiction, and that all proceedings before tliat Court were void. Under this act, 
 and to such injustice, the Irish nation were compelled to submit, until the spirit of 
 the present day arose, and that commanding power which the armed volunteers gave 
 to the country, encouraged the people to rise unanimously against this nsurped^and 
 tyrannical authority. The efforts of the nation to obtain a free trade, the compliance- 
 of the British Parliament with that claim; the British act passed inconsequence 
 thereof, which allowed the trade between Ireland and the British colonies and plan- 
 tations in America and the West Indies, and the British settlements on the coast of 
 Africa, had raised the hopes of the Irish people. The resolutions and proceedings 
 of the volunteers, and the answers to their addresses by the patriotic members, had 
 still further roused the people to a sense of their rights and their condition, and the 
 hour was approaching which was to witness the restoration of their liberty. Mr. 
 Grattan had, on a preceding day, given notice that he would bring forward a meas- 
 ure regarding the rights of Ireland ; and in pursuance of that notice he rose and 
 spoke as follows : 
 
 ^^IR, I have entreated an attendance on this day, that you might,. 
 |@ in the most public manner, deny the claim of the British Par- 
 
 f"" liament to make law for Ireland, and with one voice lift up 
 3'our hands against it. 
 
 If I had lived when the 9th of William took away the woollea 
 manufacture, or when the Gth of George the First declared this 
 country to be dependent, and subject to laws to be enacted by the 
 Parliament of England, I should have made a covenant with my own 
 conscience to seize the first moment of rescuing my country from the 
 ignominy of such acts of power; or, if I had a son, I should have 
 administered to him an oath that he would consider himself a person 
 separate and set apart for the discharge of so important a duty ; upon 
 the same principle I am now come to move a declaration of right, 
 the first moment occurring, since my time, in which such a declara- 
 tion could be made with any chance of success, and without ao-ora- 
 vation of oppression. 
 
 Sir, it must appear to every person, that, notwithstanding the 
 import of sugar and export of woollens, the people of this country 
 are not satisfied — something remains ; the greater work is behind ; 
 the pul)lic heart is not well at ease. To promulgate our satisfaction ; 
 to stop the throats of millions with the votes of Parliament ; to 
 preach homilies to the volunteers ; to utter invectives against the 
 people, under pretence of affectionate advice, is an attempt, weak, 
 suspicious and inflammatory. 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 54I 
 
 You cannot dictate to those whose sense you are entrusted to 
 represent ; your ancestors, who sat within these walls, lost to Ireland 
 trade and liberty ; you, by the assistance of the people, have re- 
 covered trade, you still owe the kingdom liberty ; she calls upon 
 you to restore it. 
 
 The gi'ound of public discontent seeins to be, " we have gotten 
 commerce, but not freedom" : the same power which took away the 
 export of woollens and the export of glass, may take them away 
 again ; the repeal is partial, and the ground of repeal is upon a 
 principle of expediency. 
 
 Sir, expedient is a word of appropriated and tyrannical import ; 
 expedient is an ill-omened word, selected to express the reservation 
 of authority, while the exercise is mitigated ; expedient is the ill- 
 omened expression of the Repeal of the American stamp-act^ Eng- 
 land thought it expedient to repeal that law ; happy had it been for 
 mankind, if, when she withdrew the exercise, she had not reserved 
 the right ! To that reservation she owes the loss of her American 
 empire, at the expense of millions, and America the seeking of liberty 
 through a sea of bloodshed. The repeal of the woollen act, similarly 
 circumstanced, pointed against the principle of our liberty, present 
 relaxation, but tyranny in reserve, may be a subject for illumination 
 to a populace, or a pretence for apostacy to a courtier, but cannot be 
 the subject of settled satisfaction to a freeborn, an intelligent, and an 
 injured community. It is therefore they consider the free trade as a, 
 trade lie facto, not de jure, a license to trade under the Parliament 
 of England, not a free trade under the charters of Ireland, as a 
 tribute to her strength ; to maintain which, she must continue in a 
 state of armed preparation, dreading the approach of a general peace, 
 and attributing all she holds dear to the calamitous condition of the 
 British interest in every quarter of the globe. This dissatisfaction, 
 founded upon a consideration of the liberty we have lost, is increased 
 when they consider the opportunity they are losing ; for if this nation, 
 after the death-wound given to her freedom, had fallen on her knees 
 in anguish, and besought the Almighty to frame an occasion in which 
 a weak and injured people might recover their rights, prayer could 
 not have asked, nor God have furnished, a moment more opportune 
 for the restoration of liberty, than this, in which I have the honor 
 to address you. 
 
542 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 England now smarts under the lesson of the American war ; the 
 doctrine of Imperial legislature she feels to be pernicious ; the- 
 revenues and monopolies annexed to it she has found to be untenable ; 
 she lost the power to enforce it ; her enemies are a host, pouring' 
 upon her from all quarters of tlie earth ; her armies are dispersed ; 
 the sea is not hers ; she has no minister, no ally, no admiral, none in 
 whom she long confides, and no general whom she has not disgraced ; 
 the balance of her fate is in the hands of Ireland ; you are not only 
 her last connection, you are the only nation in Europe that is not her 
 enemy. Besides, there does, of late, a certain damp and spurious 
 supineness overcast her arms and councils, miraculous as that vigor 
 which has lately inspirited yours ; — for with you everything is the 
 reverse ; never was there a parliament in Ireland so possessed of 
 the confidence of the people ; you are the greatest political assembly 
 now sitting in the world ; you are at the head of an immense army ; 
 nor do we only possess an unconquerable force, but a certain 
 unquenchable public fire, which has touched all ranks of men like a 
 visitation. 
 
 Tuni to the growth and spring of your country, and behold and 
 admire it ; where do 3^ou find a nation who, upon whatever concerns 
 the rights of mankind, expresses herself with more truth or force, 
 jjerspicuity or justice? not the set phrase of scholastic men, not the 
 tame unreality of court addresses, not the vulgar raving of a rabble, 
 but the genuine speech of liberty, and the unsophisticated oratory of 
 a free nation. 
 
 See her military ardor, expressed not only in 40,000 men, con- 
 ducted by instinct as they were raised by inspiration, but manifested 
 in the zeal and promptitude of every 3'oung member of the growing 
 community. Let corruption tremble ; let the enemy, foreign or 
 domestic, tremble ; but let the friends of liberty rejoice at these 
 means of safety and this hour of redemption. Yes ; there does exist 
 an enlightened sense of rights, a young appetite for freedom, a solid 
 strength, and a rapid fire, which not only put a declaration of right 
 ■vvithiu your power, but put it out of your power to decline one. 
 Eighteen counties are at your bar ; they stand there with the compact 
 of Henry, with the charter of John, and with all the passions of the 
 people. "Our lives are at your service, but our liberties — we 
 received them from God ; we will not resign them to man." Speak- 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 543 
 
 ing to you thus, if you repulse these petitioners, you abdicate tlie 
 privileges of Parliament, forfeit the rights of the kingdom, repudiate 
 the instruction of your constituents, bilge the sense of your country, 
 palsy the enthusiasm of the people, and reject that good which not a 
 minister, not a Lord North, not a Lord Buckinghamshire, not a Lord 
 Hillsborough, but a certain pi-ovidential conjunctui-e, or rather the 
 hand of God, seems to extend to you. Nor are we only prompted 
 to this when we consider our strength ; we are challenged to it when 
 we look to Gi'eat Britain. The people of that country are now 
 waiting to hear the Parliament of Ireland speak on the subject of 
 their liberty : it begins to be made a question in England whether 
 the principal persons wish to be free : it was the delicacy of former 
 parliaments to be silent on the subject of commercial restrictions, 
 lest they should show a knowledge of the fact, and not a sense of the 
 violation ; you have spoken out, you have shown a knowledge of the 
 fact, and not a sense of the violation. On the contrary, you have 
 returned thanks for a partial repeal made on a principle of power ; 
 you have returned thanks as for a favor, and your exultation has 
 brought your charters as well as your spirit into question, and tends 
 to shake to her foundation your title to liberty : thus you do not 
 leave your rights where you found them. You have done too much 
 not to do more ; you have gone too far not to go on ; you have 
 brought youi-selves into that situation, in which you must silently 
 abdicate the rights of your country, or publicly restore them. It. is 
 very true you may feed your manufacturers, and landed gentlemen 
 may get their rents, and you may export woollen, and may load a 
 vessel with baize, serges, and kerseys, and you may bring back 
 again directly from the plantations, sugar, indigo, speckle-wood, 
 beetle-root, and pauellas. But liberty, the foundation of trade, the 
 charters of the land, the independency of Parliament, the securing, 
 crowning, and the consummation of everything are yet to come. 
 "Without them the work is imperfect, the foundation is wanting, the 
 capital is wanting, trade is not free, Ireland is a colony without the 
 benefit of a charter, and you are a provincial synod without the 
 privileges of a parliament. 
 
 I read Lord North's proposition ; I wish to be satisfied, but I am 
 controlled by a paper, I will not call it a law, it is the sixth of George 
 the First. [The paper was read.] I will ask the gentlemen of the 
 
.544 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 long robe is this the law ? I ask them whether it is not practice ? I 
 appeal to the judges of the land, whether they are not in a course of 
 declaring that the Parliament of Gi"eat Britain, naming Ireland, binds 
 her? I appeal to the magistrates of justice, whether they do not, 
 from time to time, execute certain acts of the British Parliament? 
 I appeal to the officers of the army, whether they do not fine, confine, 
 and execute their fellow-subjects by virtue of the Mutiny Act, an 
 act of the British Parliament ; and I appeal to this House whether a 
 country so circumstanced is free. Where is the fi-eedom of trade? 
 where is the security of propcrtj^? where is the liberty of the people? 
 I here, in this Declamatory Act, see my country proclaimed a slave I 
 I see every man in this House enrolled a slave ! I see the judges of 
 the realm, the oracles of the law, borne down by an unauthorized 
 foreign power, by the authority of the British Parliament against the 
 law ! I see the magistrates prostrate, and I see Parliament witness 
 of these infringements, and silent (silent or employed to preach 
 moderation to the people, whose liberties it will not restore) ! I 
 therefore say, with the voice of 3,000,000 of people, that, notwith- 
 standing the import of sugar, beetle-wood, and panellas, and the 
 export of woollens and kersej'^s, nothing is safe, satisfactory, or 
 honorable, nothing except a declaration of right. What ! are you, 
 with 3,000,000 of men at your back, with charters in one hand and 
 arms in the other, afraid to say you are a free people ? Are you, 
 the greatest House of Commons that ever sat in Ireland, that want 
 but this one act to equal that English House of Commons that passed 
 the Petition of Right, or that other that passed the Declaration of 
 Right, are you afraid to tell that British Parliament you ai'e a free 
 people? Are the cities and the instructing counties, who have 
 breathed a spirit that would have done honor to old Rome when 
 Rome did honor to mankind, are they to be free by connivance? 
 Are the military associations, those bodies whose origin, progress, 
 and deportment have transcended, equalled at least, anything in 
 modern or ancient story — is the vast line of northern army, are they 
 to be free by connivance? What man will settle among you? 
 Whei'e is the use of the Naturalization Bill ? What man will settle 
 among j'ou? who will leave a land of liberty and a settled govern- 
 ment, for a kingdom controlled b}' the Parliament of another country, 
 whose liberty is a thing by stealth, whose trade a thing by permission, 
 
IIENEY GRATTAN. 545 
 
 ■whose judges deny her charters, whose Parliament leaves everything 
 at random ; where the chance of freedom depends upon the hope that 
 the jury shall despise the judge stating a British act, or a rabble stop 
 the magistrate executing it, rescue your abdicated privileges, and 
 save the constitution by trampling on the government, by anarchy 
 and confusion. 
 
 But I shall be told, that these are groundless jealousies, and that 
 the principal cities, and more than one half of the counties of the 
 kingdom, are misguided men, raising those groundless jealousies. 
 Sir, let me become, on this occasion, the people's advocate, and 
 your historian ; the people of this country were possessed of a code 
 of liberty similar to that of Great Britain, but lost it through the 
 weakness of the kingdom and the pusillanimity of its leaders. 
 Having lost our liberty by the usurpation of tiie British Parliament, 
 no wonder we became a prey to her ministers ; and they did plun- 
 der us with all the hands of all the harpies, for a scries of years in 
 ^very shape of power, terrifying our people with the thunder of 
 Great Britain, and bribing our leaders with the rapine of Ireland. 
 The kingdom became a plantation, her Parliament deprived of its 
 privileges, fell into contempt ; and, with the legislature, the lajv, 
 the spirit of liberty, with her forms vanished. If a war broke out, 
 as in 1778, and an occasion occurred to I'cstore lil)erty and restrain 
 rapine. Parliament declined the opportunity ; but, with an active 
 servility and treml)ling loyalty, gave and granted, without regard to 
 the treasure we had left, or the rights we had lost. If a partial 
 reparation was made upon a principle of expediency. Parliament 
 did not receive it with the tranquil dignity of an august assembly, 
 but with the alacrity of slaves. 
 
 The principal individuals, possessed of gi'eat property but no inde- 
 pendency, corrupted by their extravagance, or enslaved by their 
 following a species of English factor against an Irish people, more 
 afraid of the people of Ireland than the tyranny of England, pro- 
 ceeded to that excess, that they opposed every proposition to lessen 
 profusion, extend trade, or promote liberty ; they did more, they 
 supported a measure which, at one blow, put an end to all trade ; 
 they did more, they brought you to a condition which they them- 
 selves did unanimously acknowledge a state of impending ruin ; 
 they did this, talking as they are now talking, arguing against trade 
 
546 TREASUEY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 as they now argue against liberty, threatening the people of Ireland 
 ■with the power of the British nation, and imploring them to rest 
 satisiied with the ruins of their trade, as they now implore them to 
 remain satisfied with the wreck of their constitution. 
 
 The people thus admonished, starving in a land of plenty, the 
 victim of two Parliaments, of one that stopped their trade, the other 
 that fed on their constitution, inhabiting a country M'here industry 
 was forbid, or towns swarming with begging manufacturers, and 
 being obliged to take into their own hands that part of government 
 which consists in protecting the subject, had recourse to two meas- 
 ures, which in their origin, progress, and consequence, are the most 
 extraordinary to be found in any ago or in any country, viz., a com- 
 mercial and military association. The consequence of these meas- 
 ures was instant : tlie enemy that hung on your shores departed, the 
 Parliament asked for a free trade, and the British nation granted 
 the trade, but withheld the freedom. The people of IreUuid are, 
 therefore, not satisfied ; they ask for a constitution ; they have the 
 authority of the wisest men in this House for what they now 
 demand. What have these walls for this last century, resounded? 
 The usurpation of the British Parliament, and the interference of 
 the privy council. Have we taught the people to complain, and do 
 we now condemn their insatiability, because they desire us to 
 remove such grievances, at a time in which nothing can oppose 
 them, except the very men by whom these grievances were acknowl- 
 edged ? 
 
 Sir, we may hope to dazzle with illumination, and we may sicken 
 with addresses, but the public imagination will never rest, nor will 
 her heart be well at ease — never I so long as the Parliament of 
 England exercises or claims a legislation over this country : so long 
 as this shall be the case, that very free trade, otherwise a perpetual 
 attachment will be the cause of new discontent ; it will ci-eate a 
 pride to feel the indignity of bondage ; it will furnish a strength to 
 bite your chain, and the liberty withheld will poison the good com- 
 municated. 
 
 The British minister mistakes the Irish character : had he intended 
 to make Ireland a slave, he should have kept her a beggar ; there is 
 no middle policy ; win her heart by the restoration of her right, or 
 cut off the nation's right hand ; greatly emancipate, or fundamentally 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 54.7 
 
 destroy. We mny talk plausibly to Englaud, but so long as she 
 exei'cises a power to bind this country, so long are the nations in a 
 state of war ; the claims of the one go against the liberty of the 
 other, and the sentiments of the latter go to oppose those claims to 
 the last drop of her blood. The English opposition, therefore, are 
 right ; mere trade will not satisfy Ireland — they judge of us by 
 other great nations, by the nation whose political life has been a 
 struggle for liberty ; they judge of us with a true knowledge of, 
 and just deference for, our character — that a country enlightened 
 as Ireland, chartered as Ireland, armed as Ireland, and injured as 
 Ireland, will be satisfied with nothing less than liberty. 
 
 I admire that public-spirited merchant (Alderman Horan), who 
 spread consternation at the Custom-house, and, despising the exam- 
 ple which great men afforded, determined to try the question, and 
 tendered for entry what the Britisli Parliament prohibits the subject 
 to export, some articles of silk, and sought at his private risk the 
 liberty of his country ; with him I am convinced it is neccssaiy to 
 agitate the question of right. In vain will you endeavor to keep it 
 back, the passion is too natural, the sentiment is too irresistible ; 
 the question comes on of its own vitality — you must reinstate the 
 laws. 
 
 There is no objection to this resolution, except fears; I have 
 examined your fears ; I pronounce them to be frivolous. I might 
 deny that the British nation was attached to the idea of binding 
 Ireland ; I might deny that England was a tyrant at heart ; and I 
 might call to witness the odium of North and the popuhu-ity of 
 Chatham, her support of Holland, her contributions to Corsica, and 
 the charters communicated to Ireland ; but ministers have traduced 
 England to deljase Ireland; and politicians, like priests, represent 
 the power they serve as diabolical, to possess with superstitious 
 fears the victim whom they design to plunder. If England is a 
 tyrant, it is j^ou have made her so : it is the slave that makes the 
 tyrant, and then murmurs at the master whom he himself has con- 
 stituted. I do allow, on the subject of commerce, England was 
 jealous in the extreme, and I do say it was commei'cial jealousy, it 
 was the spirit of monopoly (the woollen trade and the act of navi- 
 gation had made her tenacious of a comprehensive legislative 
 authority), and having now ceded that monopoly, there is nothing 
 
548 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 in the way of yonr liberty except your own corruption and pusil- 
 lanimity ; and nothing can prevent your being free except your- 
 selves. It is not in the disposition of England ; it is not in tho 
 interest of England; it is not in her arms. What! can 8,000,000 
 of Englishmen, opposed to 20,000,000 of French, to 7,000,000 of 
 Spanish, to 3,000,000 of Americans, reject the alliance of 3,000,000 
 in Ireland? Can 8,000,000 of British men, thus outnumbered by 
 foes, take upon their shoulders the expense of an expedition to 
 enslave you? Will Great Britain, a wise and magnanimous coun- 
 try, thus tutored by experience and wasted by war, the French 
 navy riding her Channel, send an array to Ireland, to lev3' no tax, 
 to enforce no law, to answer no end whatsoever, except to spoliate 
 the charters of Ireland and enforce a barren oppression? What! 
 has England lost thirteen pi'ovinces? has she reconciled herself to 
 this loss, and will she not be reconciled to the liberty of Ireland? 
 Take notice, that the very constitution which I move you to declare, 
 Great Britain herself offered to America : it is a very instructive 
 proceeding in the British history. In 1778 a commission went out, 
 with powers to cede to the thirteen provinces of America, totally 
 and radically, the legislative authority claimed over her by the 
 British Parliament, and tho Commissioners, pursuant to their 
 powers, did offer to all, or any, of the American States, the total 
 sun-ender of the legislative authority of the British Parliament. I 
 will read you their letter to the Congress. [Here the letter was 
 read, surrendering tho power as aforesaid.] What ! has England 
 offered this to the resistance of America, and will she refuse it to 
 the loyalty of Ireland? Your fears then are nothing but an habitual 
 siil)jngation of mind ; that sul)jngation of mind which made you, at 
 first, tremble at every great measure of safety ; which niMde tho 
 principal men amongst us conceive the commercial association wnuld 
 be a war ; that fear, which made them imagine the military associa- 
 tion had a tendency to treason ; which made them think a siiort 
 money-bill would be a public convulsion ; and yet these measures 
 have not only proved to be useful but are held to be moderate, and 
 the Parliament that ad()i)ted them, praised, not for its unanimity 
 onl}', l)nt for its temper also. You now wonder that you suhuiilted 
 for so many years to the loss of the woollen trade and the depriva- 
 tion of ihc glass trade ; raised above j'our former abject state in 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 549 
 
 commerce, you arc ashamed at your past pusillanimity ; so -when 
 you have summoned a boldness which shall assert the liberties of 
 your country — raised by the act, and reinvested, as you will be, in 
 the glory of your ancient rights and privileges, you will be surprised 
 at yourselves, who have so long sulimittcd to their violation. Mod- 
 eration is but a relative term; for nations, like men, are only safe 
 in proportion to the spirit the}^ put forth, and the proud contempla- 
 tion with which they survey themselves. Conceive )'ourselves a 
 plantation, ridden by an oppressive government, and everything 
 you have done is but a fortunate phrenzy : conceive yourselves to 
 be wliat you are, a great, a growing, and a proud nation, and a 
 declaration of right is no more than the safe exercise of your indu- 
 bital)le authority. 
 
 But, though you do not hazard disturbance by agreeing to this 
 resolution, you do most exceedingly hazard tranquillity l)y rejecting 
 it. Do not imagine that the question will be over when this motion 
 shall be negatived. No ; it will recur in a vast variety of shapes 
 and diversity of places. Your constituents have instructed you in 
 great numbers, with a powerful uniformity of sentiment, and in a 
 stj'le not the less awful because full of respect. They will find 
 resources in their own virtue if they have found none in yours. 
 Public pride and conscious liberty, wounded by repulse, will find 
 ways and means of vindication. You are in that situation in which 
 every man, every hour of the day, may shake the pillars of the 
 state ; every court may swarm with the question of right ; every 
 quay and wharf with prohibited goods ; what shall the Judges, what 
 the Commissioners, do upon this occasion? Shall they comply with 
 the laws of Ireland, and against the claims of England, and stand 
 firm where you have capitulated? shall they, on the other hand, not 
 comply, and shall they persist to act against the law? will you 
 punish them if they do so? will 30U proceed against them for not 
 showing a spirit superior to your own? On the other hand, will 
 you nut punish them? Will you leave liberty to be trampled on 
 by those men? Will you bring them and yourselves, all constitu- 
 ted orders, executive power, judicial power, and parliamentary 
 authority, into a state of odium, impotence, and contempt : trans- 
 ferring the task of defending public right into the hands of the 
 populace, and leaving it to the judges to break the laws, and to the 
 
550 TREASURE OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 people to assert them? Such would be the consequence of folse 
 moderation, of irritating timidity, of inflammatory palliatives, of the 
 weak and corrupt hope of compromising with the court, before you 
 have emancipated the country. 
 
 I have answered the only semblance of a solid i-eason against the 
 motion ; I will i-emove some lesser pretences, some minor impedi- 
 ments ; for instance, first, that we have a resolution of the same 
 kind already on our Journals, it will be said ; but how often was the 
 great charter confirmed ? not more frequently than your rights have 
 been violated. Is one solitary resolution, declarator}' of your right, 
 sufiicicnt for a country, whose history, from the beginning unto the 
 end, has been a course of violation? The fact is, every new breach 
 is a reason for a new repair ; every new infringement should be a 
 new declaration ; lest charters should be overwhelmed with prece- 
 dents to their prejudice, a nation's right obliterated, and the people 
 themselves lose the memory of their own freedom. 
 
 I shall hear of ingratitude : I name the argument to despise it and 
 the men who make use of it : I know the men who use it are not 
 grateful, they are insatiate ; they are public extortioners, who would 
 stop the tide of public prosperity, and turn it to the channel of their 
 own emolument : I know of no species of gratitude which should 
 prevent my country from being free, no gratitude which should 
 oblige Ireland to bo the slave of England. In cases of robbery and 
 usurpation, nothing is an object of gratitude except the thing stolen, 
 the charter spoliated. A nation's liberty cannot, like her treasures, 
 bo meted and parcelled out in gratitude : no man can be grateful or 
 liberal of his conscience, nor woman other honor, nor nation of her 
 liberty : there are certain unimpartable, inherent, invaluable pi'oper- 
 ties, not to be alienated from the person, whether body politic or 
 body natural. With the same contempt do I treat that charge which 
 says, that Ireland is insatiable ; saying, that Ireland asks nothing 
 but that which Great Britain has robbed her of, her rights and priv- 
 ileges ; to say that Ireland will not be satisfied with liberty, because 
 she is not satisfied with slavery, is folly. I laugh at that man who 
 supposes that Ireland will not be content with a free trade and a free 
 constitution ; and would any man advise her to be content with 
 less? 
 
 I shall bo told that we hazard the modification of the law of Poyu- 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 551 
 
 ings and the Jud<jes' Bill, and the Habeas Corpus Bill, and the 
 Nullum Tempos Bill ; but I ask, have you been for years begging 
 for these little things, and have not you yet been able to obtain 
 them? and have you been contending against a little body of eighty 
 men in Priv}' Council assembled, coilvocating themselves into the 
 image of a parliament, and ministering your high office ? and have 
 you been contending against one man, an humble individual, to you 
 a Leviathan — the English Attorney-general — who advises in the 
 case of Irish bills, and exercises legislation in his own person, and 
 makes your parliamentary deliberations a blank, by altering j-our 
 bills or suppressing them? and have you not yet been able to con- 
 quer this little monster ! Do you wish to know the reason? I will 
 tell you : because you have not been a parliament, nor your country 
 a people. Do you wish to know the remedy? — be a parliament, 
 become a nation, and these things will follow in the train of your 
 consequence. I shall be told that titles are shaken, being vested by 
 force of English acts ; but in answer to that, I observe, time may be 
 a title, acquiescence a title, forfeiture a title, but an English act of 
 parliament certainly cannot : it is an authority, which, if a judge 
 would charge, no jury would find, and which all the electors in Ire- 
 land have already disclaimed unequivocally, cordially, and univer- 
 sally. Sir, this is a good argument for an act of title, but no 
 argument against a declaration of right. My friend who sits above 
 me (Mr. Yclverton), has a Bill of Confirmation; we do not come 
 unprepared to Parliament. I am not come to shake property, but 
 to confirm property and restore freedom. The nation begins to 
 form ; we are moulding into a people ; freedom asserted, property 
 secured, and the army (a mercenary baud) likely to be restrained by 
 law. Never was such a revolution accomplished in so short a time, 
 and with such public tranquillity. In what situation would those 
 men who call themselves friends of constitution and of government 
 have loft you? They would have left you without a title, as they 
 state it, to your estates, without an assertion of your constitution, or 
 a law for j-our army ; and this state of unexampled private and pub- 
 lic insecurity, this anarchy raging in the kingdom for eighteen 
 months, these mock moderators would have had the presumption to 
 •call peace. 
 
 I shall be told, that the judges will not be swayed by the resolu- 
 
552 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tion of this House. Sir, that the judges will not be borne down by 
 the resolutions (jf Parliament, not fonndcd in law, I am willing ta 
 believe ; but the resolutions of this House, founded in law, they will 
 respect most exceedingly. I shall ahvays rejoice at the independent 
 spirit of the distributors of the law, l)ut must lament th:it hitherto 
 they have given no such symptom. The judges of the British nation, 
 ■when they adjudicated against tlie laus of tiiat countrj^ pleaded pre- 
 cedent and the prostration and profligacy of a long tribe of subservi- 
 ent predecessors, and were punished. The judges of Ireland, if they 
 should lie called upon, and should plead sad necessity, the thraldom 
 of the times, and above all, the silent fears of Parliament, they, no 
 doubt, will be excused: but when your declai'atinns shall have pro- 
 tected them from their fears ; when 3'ou shall have emboldened the 
 judges to declare the law according to the charter, I make no doubt 
 they will do their duty ; and your resolution, not making a new law, 
 but giving new life to the old ones, will be secretly felt and inwardly 
 acknowledged, and there will not be a ju<lgo who will not perceive, 
 to the innermost recess of his tribunal, the truth of your charters and 
 the vigor of your justice. 
 
 The same laws, the same charters, communicate to both king- 
 doms, Great Britain and Ireland, the same rights and privileges ; 
 and one privilege above them all is that communicated by ISIagna 
 Charta, by the 25th of Edward the Third, and by a multitude of other 
 statutes, "not to be bound by any act except made with the arch- 
 bishops, bishops, earls, barons, and freemen of the commonalty," 
 viz., of the parliament of the realm. On this right of exclusive 
 legislation are founded the Petition of Riglit, Bill of Right, Rev- 
 olution, and Act of SettUinent. The King has no other title to 
 his crown than that which you have to your liberty ; both are 
 founded, the throne and your freedom, upon the right vested in 
 the subject to resist by arms, notwithstanding their oaths of al- 
 legiance, any authority attempting to impose acts of power as 
 laws, whether that authority be one man or a host, the second 
 James, or the British Parliament ! 
 
 Every argument for the House of Hanover is equally an argu- 
 ment for the liberties of Ireland : the Act of Settlement is an act 
 of rebellion, or the declaratory statute of the 6th of George th& 
 First an act of usurpation ; for both cannot be law. 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 553 
 
 I do not refer to doubtful history, but to living record ; to 
 common charters ; to the interpretation England has put upon 
 these charters ; an interpretation not made by words only, l)ut 
 crowned by arms ; to the revolution she had formed upon them, 
 to the king she has deposed, and to the king she has established; 
 and above all, to the oath of allegiance solemnly plighted to the 
 House of Stuart, and afterwards set aside, in the instance of a 
 grave and moral people absolved by virtue of these very charters. 
 
 And as anything less than liberty is inadequate to Ireland, so 
 is it dangerous to Great Britain. We are too near the British 
 nation, we are too conversant with her history, we are too much 
 fired by her example, to be anything less than her equal ; anything 
 less, we should be her bitterest enemies — an enemy to that power 
 which smote us with her mace, and to that constitution from whose 
 blessings we were excluded : to be ground as wo have been by the 
 British nation, bound by her parliament, plundered by her crown, 
 threatened by her enemies, insulted with her protection, while we 
 returned thanks for her condescension, is a system of meanness and 
 misery Avhich has exjiired in our determination, as I hope it has in 
 her magnanimity. 
 
 There is no policy left for Great Britain but to cherish the remains 
 of her empire, and do justice to a country who is determined to do 
 justice to herself, certain that she gives nothing equal to what she 
 received from us when we gave her Ireland. 
 
 With regard to this country, England must resort to the free prin- 
 ciples of government, and must forego that legislative power which 
 she has exercised to do mischief to herself; she must go back to 
 freedom, which, as it is the foundation of her constitution, so it is 
 the main pillar of lier empire ; it is not merely the connection of the 
 crown, it is a constitutional annexation, an alliance of liberty, which 
 is the true meaning and mystery of the sisterhood, and will make 
 both countries one arm and one soul, rcplenishiug from time to time, 
 in their immortal connection, the vital spirit of law and liberty from 
 the lamp of each other's light ; thus combined by the ties of common 
 interest, equal trade and equal liberty, the constitution of both 
 countries may become immortal, a new and milder empire may arise 
 from the errors of the old, and the British nation assume ouce more 
 her natural station — the head of mankind. 
 
55i TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 That there ai'e precedents against us 1 allow — acts of power I 
 would call them, not precedent ; and I answer the English pleading 
 such precedents, as they answered their kings when they urged pre- 
 cedents against the liberty of England : Such tilings are the weak- 
 ness of the times ; the tyranny of one side, the feebleness of the 
 other, the law of neither ; we will not be bound l)y them ; or rather, 
 in the words of the declaration of right, " no doing judgment, pro- 
 ceeding, or anywise to the contrary, shall be brought into precedent 
 or example."' Do not then tolerate a power — the power of the 
 British Parliament over this land, which has no foundation in utility 
 or necessity, or empire, or the laws of England, or the laws of Ire- 
 land, or the laws of nature, or the laws of God, — do not suffer it to 
 have a duration in your mind. 
 
 Do not tolerate that power which l^lasted you for a century, that 
 power wiiich shattered your loom, banished your manufacturers, 
 •dishonored your peerage, and stopped the growth of your people ; 
 do not, I say, be bribed by an export of woollen, or an import of 
 sugar, and permit that power which has thus withered the land to 
 remain in your country and have existence in your pusillanimity. 
 
 Do not suffer the arrogance of England to imagine a surviving 
 hope in the fears of Ireland ; do not send the people to their own 
 resolves for liberty, passing by the tribunals of justice and the high 
 oourt of parliament ; neither imagine that, by any formation of apol- 
 ogy, you can palliate such a commission to your hearts, still less to 
 your children, who will sting you with their curses in your grave for 
 having interposed between them and their Maker, robbing them of 
 an immense occasion, and losing an opportunity which you did not 
 ore.ate, and can never restore. 
 
 Hereafter, when these things shall be history, your age of thral- 
 dom and poverty, your sudden resurrection, commercial redress, and 
 miraculous armament, shall the historian stop at liberty, and observe 
 — that here the principal men among us fell into mimic trances of 
 gratitude — they were awed by a weak ministry, and bribed by an 
 «mpty treasury — and when liberty was within their grasp, and the 
 temple oi)ened her folding doors, and the arms of the people 
 ■clanged, and the zeal of the nation urged and encouraged them 
 on, that they fell down, and were pi'ostituted at the threshold. 
 
 I might, as a constituent, come to your bar, and demand my lib- 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 555 
 
 erty. I do call upon you, by the laws of the land and their violation, 
 by the instruction of eighteen counties, by the arms, inspiration, 
 and providence of the present moment, tell us the rule by which 
 we shall go, — assert the law of Ireland, — declare the liberty of the 
 land. 
 
 I will not be answered by a public lie, in the shape of an amend- 
 ment; neither, speaking for the subject's freedom, am I to hear of 
 faction. I wish for nothing but to breathe, in this our island, in 
 common with my fellow-subjects, the air of liberty. I have no 
 ■ambition, unless it be the ambition to break your chain, and contem- 
 plate your glory. I never will be satisfied so long as the meanest 
 cottager in Ireland has a link of the British chain clanking to bis 
 rags ; he may be naked, he shall not be in iron ; and I do see the 
 time is at hand, the spirit is gone forth, the declaration is planted; 
 and though great men shall apostatize, yet the cause will live ; and 
 though the public speaker should die, yet the immortal fire shall 
 outlast the organ which conveyed it, and the breath of liberty, like 
 the word of the holy man, wiU not die with the prophet, but survive 
 him. 
 
556 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Philippic Against Flood. 
 
 October 28, 1783. 
 
 f^yiT was said "that the pen would fall from the hand, and the foetus 
 J^ of the mind would die unborn,"* if men had not a privilege to 
 f maintain a ri";ht in the Parliament of Ensland to make law for 
 Ireland. The affectation of zeal, and a burst of forced and 
 metaphorical conceits, aided l)y the acts of the press, gave an alarm 
 which, I hope, was momentary, and which only exposed the "arti- 
 fice of those who were wicked, and the haste of those who were 
 deceived. 
 
 But it is not the slander of an evil tongue that can defame me. I 
 maintain my reputation in public and in jn-ivate life. No man, who 
 has not a bad character, can ever say that I deceived ; no countrj' can 
 call me a cheat. But I will suppose such a public character. I will 
 suppose such a man to have existence ; I will begin with his charac- 
 ter in his political cradle, and I will follow him to the last state of 
 political dissolution. 
 
 I will suppose him, in the first stage of his life, to have been 
 intemperate; in the second, to have been corrupt; and in the last, 
 seditious ; that, after an envenomed attack on the persons and mea- 
 sures of a succession of viceroys, and after mucii declamation against 
 their illegalities and their profusion, he took office, and became a 
 suppenler of Government, when the profusion of ministers had 
 greatl}' increased, and their crimes multiplied beyond example : when 
 your money bills were altered without reserve by the council ; when 
 an embargo was laid on your export trade, and a war declared against 
 the liberties of America. At such a critical moment I M'ill suppose 
 this gentleman to be corrupted by a great sinecure office to muzzle 
 
 *Mr. Flood's expression. 
 
HENRY GKATTAN. 557 
 
 his declamation, to swallow his invectives, to give his assent and vote 
 to the ministers, and to become a supporter of Government, its mea- 
 sures, its embargo, and its American war. I will suppose that he was 
 suspected by the government that had bought him, and in consequence 
 thereof, that he thought proper to resort to the arts of a trimmer, the 
 last sad refuge of disappointed ambition ; that, with respect to the 
 constitution of his country, that part, for instance, which regarded 
 the mutiny bill, when a clause of reference was introduced, whereby 
 the articles of war, which were, or hereafter might be, passed in 
 England, should be current in Ireland without the interference of her 
 Parliament; when such a clause was in view, . I will suppose this 
 gentleman to have absconded. Again, when the bill was made per- 
 petual, I will suppose him again to have absconded. But a ^year and 
 a half after the Inll had passed, then I will suppose this gentleman to 
 have come forward, and to say, that your constitution had been de- 
 stroyed by the perpetual bill. AVith regard to that part of the con- 
 stitution that relates to the law of Poynings, I will suppose the 
 gentleman to have made many a long, very long, disquisition before 
 he took office, but, after he had received office, to have been as silent 
 on that sul)ject as before he had been loquacious. That, when nion^'y 
 bills, under color of that law, were altered year after year, as in 1775 
 and 1776, and when the bills so altered were resumed and passed, I 
 will suppose that gentleman to have absconded or acquiesced, and to 
 have supported the minister who made the alteration ; but when ho 
 was dismissed from office, and a member introduced a bill to remedy 
 this evil, I will suppose that this gentleman inveighed against the 
 mischief, against the remedy, and against the person of the intro- 
 ducer, who did that duty which he himself for seven jears had 
 abandoned. With respect to that part of the constitution which is 
 connected with the repeal of the Gth of George the First, when the 
 adequacy of the repeal was debating in the House, I will suppose 
 this gentleman to make no kind of objection ; that he never named 
 at that time, the word renunciation ; and that, on the division on 
 that subject, he absconded ; but, when the office he had lost was 
 given to another man, that then he came forward and exclaimed 
 against the measure ; nay, that he went into the public streets to 
 canvass for sedition, that he became a raml)ling incendiary, and 
 endeavored to excite a mutiny in the volunteers against an adjust- 
 
558 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ment between Great Britain and Ireland, of liberty and repose, 
 which he had not the virtue to make, and against an administra- 
 tion who had the virtue to free the country without buying the 
 members. 
 
 With respect to commei'ce, I will suppose this gentleman to have 
 supported an embargo which lay on the country for three years, and 
 almost destroyed it; and when an address in 1778, to open her trade 
 was jiropounded, to remain silent and inactive ; and with respect to 
 that other part of her trade, which regarded the duty on sugar, 
 when the merchants were examined in 1778 on the inadequate pro- 
 tecting duty, when the inadequate duty was voted, when the act 
 was recommitted, when another duty was proj)osed, when the bill 
 returned with the inadequate duty substituted, when the altered bill 
 was adopted, on every one of those questions I will suppose the 
 gentleman to abscond : but a year and a half after the mischief was 
 done, he out of office, I will suppose him to come forth, and to tell 
 his country, that her trade had been destroyed by an inadequate 
 duty on English sugar, as her constitution had been ruined by a 
 perpetual mutiny bill. With relation to throe-fourths of our fellow- 
 sul)jects, the Catholics, when a bill was introduced to grant them 
 rights of property and religion, I will suppose this gentleman to 
 have come forth to give his negative to their pretensions. In the 
 same manner I will suppose him to have opposed the institution of 
 the volunteers, to which we owe so much, and that he went to a 
 meeting in his own county to prevent their establishment ; that he 
 himself kept out of their associations ; that he was almost the only 
 man in this House that was not in uniform ; and that he never was a 
 volunteer until he ceased to be a placeman, and until he became an 
 incendiary. 
 
 With regard to the liberties of America, which were inseparable 
 from oui's, I will suppose this gentleman to have been an enemy 
 decided and unreserved ; that he voted against her liberty ; and 
 voted, moreover, for an address to send 4,000 Irish troops to cut 
 the throats of the Americans ; that he called these butchers "armed 
 negotiators," and stood with a metaphor in his mouth and a bribe 
 in his pocket, a champion against the rights of America, the only 
 hope of Ireland, and the only refuge of the liberties of mankind. 
 
 Thus defective in every relationship, whether to constitution, com- 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 55f) 
 
 merce, toleration, I will suppose this man to have added much pri- 
 vate improbity to public crimes; that his probity was like his 
 patriotism, and his honor on a level with his oath. He loves to 
 deliver panegyrics on himself. I will interrupt him, and say : Sir, 
 you are much mistaken if you think that your talents have been as- 
 great as j^our life has been reprehensible ; you began your parlia- 
 mentary career with an acrimony and personality which could liave 
 been justified only by a supposition of virtue : after a rank and 
 clamorous opposition you became on a sudden silent; you were 
 silent for seven years : you were silent on the greatest questions, 
 and you were silent for money ! In 1773, while a negociation was 
 pending to sell your talents and your turbulence, you absconded 
 from your duty in parliament, you forsook yoin* law of Poynings, 
 you forsook the questions of econoraj', and abandoned all the old 
 themes of your former declamation ; you were not at that period to 
 be found in the House ; you were seen, like a guilty spirit, haunt- 
 ing the lobby of the House of Commons, watching the moment in 
 which the question should bo put, that you might vanish ; yon were 
 descried with a criminal anxiety, retiring from the scenes of your 
 past glory ; or yon were perceived coasting the upper benches of 
 this House liUc a bird of prey, with an evil aspect and a sepulchral 
 note, meditating to pounce on its quarry. These waj'S — they were 
 not the ways of honor — you practised pending a negotiation which 
 was to end either in your sale or your sedition : the former taking 
 place, you supported the rankest measures that ever came before 
 Parliament; the embargo of 1776, for instance. "O fatal embargo, 
 that breach of law and ruin of commerce ! " You supported the 
 unparalleled profusion and jobbing of Lord Harcourt's scandalous 
 ministry — the address to support the American war — the other 
 address to send 4,000 men, whom j'ou had yourself declared to be 
 necessary for the defence of Ireland, to figtt against the liberties of 
 America, to which you had declared yourself a friend ; — you. Sir, 
 who delight to utter execrations against the American commissioners 
 of 1778, on account of their hostility to America; — you. Sir, who 
 manufocture stage thunder against Mr. Eden, for his anti-American 
 principles ; — you. Sir, whom it pleases to chant a hymn to the im- 
 morlal Hampden ; — you, Sir, approved of the tyranny exercised 
 against America; — and you, Sir, voted 4,000 Irish troops to cut 
 
560 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the throats of the Americans fighting for their freedom, fighting for 
 your freedom, fighting for the great principle, liberty ; but yon found 
 at last (and this should be an eternal lesson to men of your craft 
 and cunning), that the king had only dishonored you; the Court 
 had bought, but Avould not trust you; and having voted for the 
 worst measures, you remained for seven years the creature of 
 salari/, without the confidence of Government. Mortified at the 
 discovery, and stung by disappointment, you betake yourself to 
 the sad expedients of duplicity ; you try the sorry game of a trim- 
 mer in your progress to the acts of an incendiary ; you give no 
 honest support either to the Government or the people ; 3'ou, at the 
 most critical period of their existence, take no part, you sign no 
 non-consumption agreement, you arc no volunteer, you oppose no 
 perpetual nnitiny bill, no altered sugar bill ; you declare that j'ou 
 lament that the declaration of right should have been brought for- 
 ward ; and observing, with regard to prince and people, the most 
 impartial treachery and desertion, you justify the suspicion of your 
 Sovereign by betraying the Government, as you had sold the peo- 
 ple : until at last, by this hollow conduct, and for some other steps, 
 the result of mortified ambition, being dismissed, and another per- 
 son put in j'our place, you fly to the ranks of the volunteers, and 
 canvass for mutiny : you announce that the country was ruined by 
 other men during that period in which she had been sold by you. 
 Your logic is, that tlic repeal of a declaratory law is not the repeal 
 of a law at all, and the eficct of that logic is, an English act afl'ect- 
 ing to emancipate Ireland, by exercising over her the legislative 
 authority of the British Parliament. Such has been your conduct, 
 and at such conduct every order of your fellow-subjects have a right 
 to exclaim! The meix-hant may say to you — the constitutionalist 
 may say to you — tlie American may say to you — and I, I now say, 
 and say to your beard : Sir, you are not an honest man. 
 
 Mr. Flood rose to rcpl3-, but after having proceeded some length in his defence, 
 he fell so much out of orilcr, that the Speaker interfered. He declared how much 
 pain he had suflered in permittiny; this contest to proceed, and that nothing but 
 the calls of the House to hear the two members, should have made him sit so long 
 silent. He requested Wr. Flood would sit down, with which request he complied, 
 and shortly after retired. The speaker issued his warrant to apprehend the parties, 
 and Mr. Flood was shortly after taken into custody. The House then directed that 
 search should be made for Mr. Grattau; and the parties were bound over. It was 
 then moved that the motion of Sir Henry Cavendish be taken into consideration, 
 immediately after a report be made from the committee of accounts ; and it passed 
 in the afllrmative. 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. ggj 
 
 Commercial Propositions. 
 
 August 12, 1785. 
 
 |OWEVER, lest certiin glosses slioukl seem to go unanswered, - 
 ^^ I shall, for the sake of argument, waive past settlements, and 
 combat the reasoning tjf the English resolutions, the address, 
 His Majesty's answer and the reasoning of this day. It is 
 here said, that the laws respecting commerce and navigation should 
 be similar, and inferred that Ireland should subscribe the laws of 
 England on those subjects ; that is the same law, the same legisla- 
 ture. But this argument goes a great deal too far : it goes to the 
 army, for the mutiny bill should be the same ; it was endeavored to 
 be extended to the collection of your revenue, and is in train to be 
 extended to your taxes ; it goes to the extinction of the most invalu- 
 able part of your parliamentary capacity ; it is a union, an incipient 
 and creeping union; a virtual' union, establishing one will in the 
 general concerns of commerce and navigation, and reposing that will 
 in the Parliament of Great Britain ; a union where our Parliament 
 preserves its existence after it has lost its authority, and our people 
 are to pay for a parliamentary establishment, without any proportion 
 of parliamentary representation. In opposing the right honorable 
 gentleman's bill, I consider myself as opposing a union in limine, 
 and that argument for union which makes similarity of law and com- 
 munity of interest (reason strong for the freedom of Ireland!) a 
 pretence for a condition which would be dissimilarity of law, because 
 extinction of constitution, and therefore hostility, not community of 
 interest. I ask on what experience is this argument founded ? Have 
 you, ever since j'our redemption, refused to preserve a similarity of 
 law in trade and navigation ? Have you not followed Great Britain 
 in all her changes of the act of navigation during the whole of that 
 
562 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 unpalatabic business, the American war? Have you not excliicled 
 the cheap produce of other plantations, in order that Irisli poverty 
 might give a monopoly to the dear produce of tlic British colonies? 
 Have you not made a better use of your liberty than Great Britain 
 did of her power? But I have an objection to this argument, 
 stronger even than its want of foundation in reason and experiment ; 
 I hold it to be nothing less than an intolerance of tlie parliamentary 
 constitution of Ireland, ti declaration that the fall and free external 
 legislation of the Irish Parliament is incompatible with the British 
 empu'e. I do acknowledge that by 3'oiir extei-nal power, you might 
 discompose the harmony of the empire, and I add that by your powei- 
 over the parse, you might dissolve the state : but to the latter you 
 owe your existence in the constitution, and to the former, your au- 
 thority and station in the empire: this argumenl, tlicrcfore, rests 
 the connection upon a new and a false principle, goes directly against 
 the root of Parliament, and is not a difficulty to be accommodated, 
 but an error to be eradicated ; and if any body of men can still think 
 that the Irish constitution is incompatible with the British empire — 
 doctrine which I abjure as sedition against the connection ; but if 
 any body of men are justified in thinking that the Irish constitution 
 is incompatible witli the British empire, perish the empire ! live the 
 constitution ! Eeduced by this false dilemma to take a part, my 
 second wish is the British empire, my first wish and boundcn duty 
 is the liberty of Ireland. 
 
 But we are told this imperial power is not only necessary for Eng- 
 land, but safe for Ireland. What is the present question? what but 
 the abuse of this very power of regulating the trade of Ireland by 
 the British Parliament, excluding you and including herself by virtue 
 of the same words of the same act of navigation? And what was the 
 promovent cause of this arrangement? what but the power you are 
 going to surrender — the distinct and independent external authority 
 of (he Irish Parliament, coijipctent to question that misconstruction? 
 What is the remedy now proposed? — the evil. Go back to the 
 Parliament of England. I ask again, what were the difficulties in 
 the way of your eleven propositions? what but the jealousy of the 
 British manufacturers on the subject of trade? And will you make 
 them your parliament, and that too forever, and that too on the sub- 
 ject of their jealousy, and in the moment they displayed it I I will 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 563 
 
 suppose tlmt jealousy realized ; that you rival them in sonio market 
 abroad, and that tliey petition their Parliament to impose a regula- 
 tion which shall affect a tonnage which you have and Great Britain 
 has not : how would you then feel yonr situation, when you should 
 be oliliged to register all this? And how would you feel your deg- 
 radation, vfhcn you should sec your own manufacturers pass yon by 
 as a cypher in the constitution, and deprecate their ruin at the bar 
 of a foreign parliament ! Whence the American war? Whence the 
 Irish restrictions ? Whence the misconstruction of the act of navi- 
 gation? Whence but from the evil of suffering one country to regu- 
 late the trade and navigation of another, and of instituting, under tho 
 idea of general prdtectress, a proud domination, which sacrifices the 
 interest of the whole to the ambition of a part, and arms the little 
 passions of the monopolist with the sovereign potency of an Imperial 
 Parliimient : for great nations, when cursed with unnatural swa}', fol- 
 low but their nature when they invade ; and human wisdom has not 
 better provided fr)r human safety tlian by limiting the principles of 
 human power. The surrender of legislature has been likened to cases 
 that not unfrequently take place between two equal nations, covenant- ■ 
 iugto suspend, in particular cases, their rcspecti\-c legislative powers 
 for mutual lienefit ; thus Great Britain and Portugal agree to suspend 
 their legislative power in favor of the wine of the one and the woollen 
 of the other ; but if Portugal had gone fartlier, and agreed to sub- 
 scribe the laws of England, this covenant had not been a treaty, but 
 conquest. So Great Britain and Ireland may covenant not to raise 
 high duties on each other's manufactures ; but if Ireland goes farther, 
 and Cijvenants to subscribe British law, this is not a mutual suspen- 
 sion of the exercise of legislative power, but a transfer of the power 
 itself from one country to another, to be exercised by another hand. 
 Such covenant is not reciprocity of trade ; it is a surrender of the 
 government of ^^our trade, inequality of trade, and inequality of con- 
 stitution. I speak", however, as if such transfer could take place ; 
 but in fact it could not : any arrangement so covenanting is a mere 
 nullity ; it could not bind you, still less could it bind your succes- 
 sors ; for a man is not omnipotent over himself, neither are your 
 parliaments omnipotent over themselves, to accomplish their own 
 desti'uction, and propagate death to their successors. 
 
 There is in these cases a superior relationship to our respective 
 
504: TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 creators — God and the community, which, in the instance of the 
 individual, arrests the hand of suicide, and in that of the political 
 body, stops the act of surrender, and maiies man the means of pro- 
 pagation, and parliament the organ to continue liberty, not the 
 engine to destroy it. However, though the surrender is void, there 
 are two ways of attempting it ; one, by a surrender in form, the 
 other, by a surrender in substance ; appointing another parliament 
 your substitute, and consenting to be its register or stamp, by vir- 
 tue of which to introduce the law and edict of another land, to clotlie 
 with the forms of your law foreign deliberations, and to preside over 
 the disgraceful ceremony of your own abdicated authority. Both 
 methods are equally surrenders, and both are wholly void. I speak 
 on principle, the principle on which you stand — your creation. 
 We, the limited trustees of the delegated power, born for a particu- 
 lar purpose, limited to a particular time, and bearing an inviolable 
 relationship to tire people who sent us to parliament, cannot break 
 that relationship, counteract that purpose, surrender, diminish, or 
 derogate from those privileges we breathe but to preserve. Could 
 the Parliament of England covenant to subscribe your laws ? could 
 she covenant that young Ireland should command and old England 
 should obey? If such a proposal to England were mockery, to 
 Ireland it cannot be constitution. I rest on authority as well as 
 principle — the authority on which the revolution rests — Mr. Locke, 
 who, in his chapter on the abolition of government, sa_ys : " that 
 the transfer of legislative power is the abolition of the state, not a 
 transfer." Thus, I may congratulate this House and mj'self that it 
 is one of the blessings of the British constitution that it cannot per- 
 ish of rapid mortality, nor die in a da}^ like the men who should 
 protect her. Any act that would destroy the liberty of the people 
 is dead-born from the M'omb. Men may put down the public cause 
 for a season, but another year would see old Constitution advance 
 the honoi's of his head, and the good institution of Parliament slink- 
 ing off the tomb to rcasccnd, in all its pomp, and pride, and i)Ieni- 
 tude, and privilege ! 
 
 Sir, I have stated these propositions and the bill as a mere trans- 
 fer of external legislative authority to the Parliament of Great 
 Britain, but I have understated their mischief; they go to taxation ; 
 taxes on the trade with the British plantations, taxes on the pro- 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 565 
 
 clnce of foreign plantations, taxes on some of the produce of the 
 United States of North America ; they go to port duties, such as 
 Great Britain laid on America ! The mode is varied, but the prin- 
 ciple is the same. Here Great Britain talces the stamp of the Irish 
 Parliament ; Great Britain is to prescribe, and Ireland is to obey ! 
 We anticipate the rape by previous surrender, and throw into the 
 scale our honor as well as our liberty. Do not imagine that all 
 these resolutions are mere acts of regulation ; they are solid, sub- 
 stantial revenue, a great part of your additional duty. I allow the 
 bill excepts rum and tobacco ; but the principle is retained, and the 
 operation of it only kept back. I have stated that Great Britain 
 may by these propositions crush your commerce, but I shall be told 
 that the commercial jealousy of Great Britain is at an end : but are 
 her wants at an end? are her wishes for Irish subsidy at an end? 
 No; and they maybe gratified 1)y laying colony duties on herself, 
 and so raising on Ireland an imperial revenue to be subscribed by 
 onr Parliament, without the consent of our Parliament, and in des- 
 pite of our people. Or, if a minister should please to turn himself 
 to a general excise — if wishing to relieve from the weight of fur- 
 ther additional duties the hereditary revenue now alienated — if 
 wishing to relieve the alarms of the English mnnufacturers, who 
 complain of our exemption from excises, particularly on soap, can- 
 dles, and leather, he should proceed on those already registered 
 aiticles of taxation, he might tax you by threats, suggesting that if 
 you refuse to raise an excise on yourself, England will raise colony 
 duties on both. See what a mighty instrument of coercion this bill 
 and these resolutions ! Stir, and the minister can crush you in the 
 name of Great Britain; he can crush your imports; he can crush 
 your exports ; he can do this in a manner peculiarly mortifying, by 
 virtue of a clause in a British act of Parliament, that would seem to 
 impose the same restrictions on Great Britain ; he can do this in a 
 manner still more offensive, by the immediate means of your own 
 Parliament, who would be then an active cypher and notorious 
 stamp in the hands of Great Britain, to forge and falsify the name 
 and authority of the people of Ireland. 
 
 I have considered your situation under these propositions with 
 respect to Great Britain : see what would be your situation with 
 respect to the crown. You would have granted to the King a per- 
 
GGO TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 petual money bill, or a money bill to continue as long as the Par- 
 liament of Great Britain shall please, with a covenant to increase it 
 as often as the British Parliament shall please. By the resolntions 
 a great part of the additional duty would have been so granted ; the 
 trade of the country is made dependent on the Parliament of Great 
 Britain, and the Crown is made less dependent on the Parliament 
 of Irchmd, and a code of prerogative added to a code of empire. 
 If the merchant, after this, should petition you to lower 3'our duties 
 on the articles of trade, you answer, "trade is in covenant." If your 
 constituents should instruct you to limit the bill of sup])ly, or piissu 
 short money bill, you answer, "the purse of the n.ition, like her 
 trade, is in covenant." No more of six mouths' monc}' bills ; no 
 more of instructions from constituents ; Ihat connection is broken 
 by this bill. Pass this, you have no constituent ; you arc not the 
 X'cprescntativc of the people of Ireland, but the register of the Bri- 
 tish Parliament, and the equalizer of British duties. 
 
 In order to complete this chain of power, one link, I do acknow- 
 ledge, was wanting — a perpetual revenue bill, or a covenant from 
 time to time to renew the bill for the collection thereof. The twen- 
 tieth resolution, and this bill founded upon it, attain that olyect. 
 Sir, this House rests on thi'cc pillars: your power over the annual 
 mutiny bill ; your power over the annual additional duties ; your 
 power over the collection of the revenue. The latter power is of 
 great consequence, because a great part of our revenues is granted 
 forever. Your ancestors were slaves ; and for their estates, that 
 is, for the act of settlement, granted the hereditary revenue, and 
 from that moment ceased to be a parliament. Kor was it till many 
 years after that parliament revived ; but it revived, as 3"ou under 
 this bill would continue, without parliamentary power. Every evil 
 measure derived argument, energy, and essence from this unconsti- 
 tutional fund. If a country gentleman complained of the expenses 
 of the Crown, ho was told a frugal government could go on without 
 a parliament, and that we held our existence by withholding the 
 discharge of our duty. However, though the funds were granted 
 forever, the provision for the collection was inadequate ; the smug- 
 gler learned to evade the penalties, and parliament, though not neces- 
 sary for granting the hereditary revenue, became necessary for its 
 collection. Here then wo rest on three pillars : the annual mutiny 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 567 
 
 bill, tlie annual additional supply, and the annual collection of the 
 revenue. If you remove all these, this fabric falls ; remove any one 
 of them, and it totters; for it is not the mace, nor the chair, nor 
 this dome, but the dclil)erate voice i-esident therein, that constitutes 
 the essence of parliament. Clog your deliberations, and you are no 
 longer a parliament, with a thousand gaudy surviving circumstances 
 of show and authorit}'. 
 
 Contemplate for a moment the powers this bill presumes to per- 
 petuate — a perpetual repeal of trial by jury ; a pcrpetutd repeal of 
 the great charter ; a j;)erpetual writ of assistance ; a perpetual felony 
 to strike an exciseman ! 
 
 The late Ciiief-Baron Burgh, speaking on the revenue bill, ex- 
 claimed : "You give to the dipping rule what you should deny to 
 the sceptre." 
 
 All the unconstitutional powers of the excise we ai'e to perpetu- 
 ate ; the constitutional powers of Parliament wc are to abdicate. 
 Can we do all this? can we make these bulky surrenders, in dimi- 
 nution of the power, in derogation of the pride of parliament, and 
 in violation of those eternal relatitmships which the body that repre- 
 sents should bear to the community which constitutes? 
 
 The pretence given for this unconstitutional idea is weak indeed : 
 that, as the benefits arc permanent, so should be the compensation. 
 But trade laws are to follow their nature, revenue laws to follow 
 their's. On the permanent nature of commercial advantages depends 
 the faith of trade ; on the limited nature of revenue laws depends 
 the existence of parliament. But the error of argument arises from 
 the vice of dealing. It is a market for a constitution, and a logic, 
 applical)le to barter only, is applied to freedom. To qualify this 
 dei'eliction of every principle and power, the surrender is made 
 constitutional : that is, the British market for the Irish constitution 
 — the shadow of a market for the sul)stance of a constitution ! You 
 are to reserve an option, trade or liberty ; if you mean to come to 
 the British market, you must pass under the British yoke. I object 
 to this principle in every shape, whether you are, as the resolution 
 was first worded, directly to transfer legislative power to the British 
 parliament ; whether, as it was afterwards altered, you are to cove- 
 nant to subscribe her acts ; or whether, as it is now softened, you 
 are to take the chance of the British mai'ket so long as you waive 
 
568 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the blessings of the British constitution — terms dishonorable, derog- 
 atory, incapable of forming the foundation of any fair and fi-iendiy 
 settlement, injurious to the political morality of the nation. I 
 Avould not harbor a slavish principle, nor. give it the hospitality of a 
 night's lodging in a land of liberty. Slavcr}"^ is like any other vice 
 — tolerate, and you embrace. You should guard your constitution 
 by settled maxims of honor, as well as wholesome rules of law ; and 
 one maxim should be, never to tolerate a condition which trenches 
 on the privilege of parliament, or derogates from the pride of the 
 island. Liberal in matters of revenue, practicaltle in matters of 
 commerce ; on these subjects I would l)e inexoral)ie. If the genius 
 of old England came to that bar with the British constitution in one 
 hand, and in the other an oftcr of all that England retains, or all 
 that she has lost of commerce, I should turn my back on the latter, 
 and pay my obeisance to the blessings of her constitution ; for that 
 constitution will give you commerce, and it was the loss of that 
 constitution that deprived you of commerce. Why are you not now 
 a woollen country? because another country regulated j'our trade. 
 Why are you not now a country of re-export? because another 
 country regulated your navigation. 
 
 I oppose the original terms as slavish, and I oppose the condi- 
 tional clause as an artful way of introducing slavery, of soothing a 
 high-spirited nation into submissi<m by the ignominious delusion, 
 that she may shake off the yoke when she pleases, and become once 
 more a free people. The direct unconstitutional proposition could 
 not have been listened to, and therefore resort is had to the only 
 possible chance of destroying the liberty of the people, by holding 
 lip the bright reversion of the British constitution, and the specula- 
 tion of future liberty, .as a consolation for the present submission. 
 But would any gentleman here wear a livery to-night, because he 
 might lay it aside in the morning? or would this House substitute 
 another, because next year it might resume its authority, and once- 
 more become the Parliament of Ireland? I do not believe w© shall 
 get the British, but I do not want to make an experiment on the 
 British market, by making an experiment likewise on the constitu- 
 tion and spirit of the people of Ii-eland. But do not imagine, if you 
 shall yield for a year, you will get so easily clear of this inglorious 
 experiment ; if this is not the British market, why accejDt the adjust- 
 
^E^^lY grattan. 569 
 
 ment? and if it is, the benefit thereof may take away your delilier- 
 ate voice. You will be bribed out of your constitution l)y your 
 couimcrce : there are two ways of talking awa}' free will, the one by 
 direct compulsion, the other by establishing a prepollent motive. 
 Thus, a servant of the Crown may lose his free will, when he is to 
 give his vote at the liazard of his office : and thus a parliament 
 would lose its free will, if it acted under a conviction that it exer- 
 cised its deliberate function at the risk of its commerce. No ques- 
 tion would stand upon its own legs, but each question would involve 
 every consideration of trade, and, indeed, the whole relative situa- 
 tion of the two countries. I beseech you to consider that situation, 
 and contemplate the powers of your own country, before you agree 
 to surrender thcni. Recollect tliat you have now a right to trade 
 with the British piantatinns, i.i certain I'.rticlcs, without reference to 
 British duties ; that j'ou have a right to trade with the British plan- 
 tations in every other article, subject to the British duties; that you 
 have a right to get clear of each and of every part of that bargain ; 
 that you have a right to take the produce of foreign plantations, 
 subject to your own unstipulated duties ; that you have a right to 
 cai'ry on a free and unqualified trade with the United States of 
 North America ; that you have a riglit to carry on an experimental 
 trade in countries contiguous to which Great Britain has established 
 her monopolies : the power of trade this, and an instrument of 
 power and station, and authority, of the Bi-itish empire ! Consider 
 that you have likewise a right to the exclusive supply of your own 
 market, and to the exclusive reserve of the rudiment of your manu- 
 factures ; that you have an absolute dominion over the public purse 
 and over the collection of the revenue. 
 
 If you ask me how you shall use these powers, I say : For Ire- 
 knd, with due regard to the Hritish nation. Let them be governed 
 by the sjiirit of concord, ;jnd with fidelity to the connection. But 
 when the mover of the bill asks me to surrender those powers, I am 
 astonished at him. I have neither ears, nor eyes, nor functions, to 
 make such a sacrifice. What ! that free trade, for which we exerted 
 every nerve in 1779 ; that IVee constitution, for which we pledged 
 life and fortune in 1782! Our lives are at the service of the em- 
 pire ; but our liberties ! No : we received them from our Father 
 which is in Heaven, and we will hand them down to our children I 
 
570 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 But if gentlemen can entertain a doubt of the mischief of these prop- 
 ositions, arc they convinced of their safct}' — the safety of giving 
 up the government of your trade? No; the mischief is prominent, 
 but the advantage is of a most enigmatical nature. Have gentlemen 
 considered the subject? have they traced even the map of the coun- 
 tries, the power or freedom of trading with whom they are to sur- 
 render forever? Have they traced the map of Asia, Africa, and 
 America? Do they know the French, Dutch, Portuguese, and 
 Spanish settlements? Do they know the neutral powers of those 
 countries, their produce, aptitudes, and dispositions? Have they 
 considered the state of North America — its present state, future 
 growth, and every opportunity in tlic endless succession of time at- 
 tending that nurse of commerce and asylum of mankind? Are they 
 now competent to declare on the part of themselves and ail their 
 posterit}", that a free trade to those regions will never, in the etiiux 
 of time, be of any service to the kingdom of Ireland? If they have 
 information on this subject, it must be by a communication with 
 Ood, for they liavc none with man : it must be Inspiration, for it 
 cannot be knowledge. In such circumstances, to subscribe this 
 agreement, without knowledge, without even tiie aflcctation of 
 knowledge, when Great Britain, with all her experience, and every 
 means of information from East Indies, West Indies, America, and 
 with the official knowledge of Ireland at her feet, has taken six 
 months to deliberate, and has now produced twenty resolutions, 
 with a history to each, amounting to a code of empire, not a system 
 of commerce : I say, in such circumstances, for Ireland to su])scribe 
 this agreement, Avould be infatuation — an infatuation to which the 
 nation could not be a party, but would appear to be concluded, or 
 indeed huddled, with all her posterity, into a fallacious airangcmcnt, 
 by the influence of the Crown, without the deliberation of Parlia- 
 ment or the consent of the people ! This would appear the more 
 inexcusable, because we are not driven to it; adjustment is not in- 
 dispensable ; the great points have been carried ! An inferior ques- 
 tion al)out the home market has been started, and a commercial 
 fever artiticially raised; but while the great points remain undis- 
 turbed, the nations cannot be committed ; the manufacturers applied 
 for protecting duties, and have failed ; the minister offered a system 
 of reciprocity, and succeeded in Ireland, but has failed in England; 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 571 
 
 he makes you another offer, inconsistent with the former, which 
 offer the English do not support, and the Irish deprecate. 
 
 Wc can go on ; we have a growing prosperity, and as yet an ex- 
 emption from intolerable taxes ; we can from time to time regulate 
 our own commerce, cherish our manufactures, keep down our taxes, 
 and bring on our people, and brood over the growing prosperity of 
 young Ireland. In the mean time we will guard our free trade and 
 free constitution, as our only real resources ; they were the struggles 
 of great virtue, the result of much perseverance, and our broad l)ase 
 of public action ! We should i-ecollect that this House may now, 
 with peculiar propriety, interpose, because j'ou did, with great zeal 
 and success, on this very subject of trade, bring on the people ; and 
 you did, with great prudence and moderation, on another occasion, 
 check a certain description of the people, and you arc now called 
 upon by consistency to defend the people. Thus mediating between 
 extremes, you will preserve this island long, and preserve her with 
 a certain degree of renown. Thus faithful to the constitution of the 
 country, you will command and insure her tranquility ; for our best 
 authority with the people is protection afforded against the ministers 
 of the Crown. It is not public clamour, but public injury that should 
 alarm you ; your high ground of expostulation with your fellow-sub- 
 jects has been your services ; the free trade 3'(ju have given the mer- 
 chant, and the free constitution you have given the island ! IMakc 
 your third great effort — preserve them, and with them preserve un- 
 altered your own calm sense of public right, the dignity of the ])ar- 
 liamcnt, the majesty of the peoj^le, and the powers of the island! 
 Keep them unsullied, uncovenanted, uncircumscribed, and unstipen- 
 diary ! These paths are the paths to glory, and, let me add, these 
 ■ways are the ways of peace : so shall the prosperity of your country, 
 though without a tongue to thank you, yet laden with the blessings 
 of constitution and of commerce, bear attestation to your services, 
 and \vait on your progress with involuntary praise ! 
 
572 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Anti-Union Speeches. 
 
 Januaky 15, 1800. 
 
 Mr. Egan had just risen to speak, when Mr. Grattiin entered the House, supported 
 (in couseqiience of illness) by Mr. W. B. Ponsonby and Mr. Artluir Moore.* He 
 took the oaths and liis seat, and after Mr. Egan had conchided, in consequence of 
 illness being obliged to speak sitting, lie addressed the House as follows : — 
 
 ^^pIR, The gentleman who spoke last but one (Mr. Fox) has spoken 
 1^^ the pamphlet of the English minister — I answer that minister. 
 |V He has published two celel)ratecl productions, in both of which 
 \, he declares his intolerance of the constitution of Ireland. He 
 concurs with the men Avhom he has hanged, in thinking the con- 
 stitution a grievance, and differs from them in the remedy only ; 
 they proposing to substitute ti republic, and he proposing to sub.sti- 
 tute the yoke of the British Parliament ; the one turns rebel to the 
 King, the minister a rebel to the constitution. 
 
 We have seen him inveigh against their projects, let us hear him 
 in defence of his own. He denies in the face of the two nations ti 
 public fact registered and recorded ; he disclaims the final adjustment 
 of 1782, and he tells you that this final adjustment was no more than 
 an incipient train of negotiation. The sottleraent of which I speak 
 consists of several parts, ever}' part a record, establishing on the 
 whole two grand positions. First, the admission of Ireland's claim 
 to be legislated for by no other parliament I)nt that of Ireland. 
 Secondly, the finality imposed upon the two nations, regarding all 
 constitutional projects affecting each other. On the admission of 
 
 * The reporters who have transmitted the account of the debates of tlio day, 
 state, " Never was beheld a scene more solemn; an indescribable emotion seized 
 the House and gallery, and every heart heaved in tributary pulsation to the name, 
 virtues, and the return to parliament of the founder of the constitution of 17S2; the 
 existence of which was then the subject of debate." 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 573 
 
 that claim, the first tracts of this adjustment are two messages sent 
 by his majesty to the parliaments of the different countries, to come 
 to a final adjustment, in order to remove the discontents and jeal- 
 ousies of the Irish ; the second, the answer of the Parliament of 
 Ireland to His majesty's message, declaring, among other causes of 
 discontent and jealous}', one great, capital, principal, and fundamental 
 cause, namely, the interposition of the Paidiament of Great Britain 
 in the Icgishitive regulation of Ireland, accompanied with a solemn 
 protest against that interposition, and with a claim of right on the 
 part of Ii'eland — not of the Parliament of Ireland only, but of the 
 people of the realm, whose ancient and unalienable inheritance it 
 was stated in that address to ])e — a perpetual exemption against the 
 interference of the Parliament of Great Britain, or that of any other 
 Parliament, save only the King, Lords, and Commons of Ireland. 
 The third part of this adjustment was a resolution voted by the two 
 British Houses of Parliament, in consequence of said address trans- 
 mitted by His Majesty for their consideration. There were two 
 resolutions transmitted ; the first, that the 6th of George I., con- 
 taining the claim of interference by the British Parliament, sliould 
 be repealed; tlie second, that the connection between the countries 
 should be placed by mutual consent, on a solid and permanent 
 foundation. The third part of the covenant was, the address of the 
 two Houses of the Irish Parliament upon the consideration of these 
 tw'O resolutions ; which address does, among other things, accept of 
 the proposition contained in the first resolution, and does expressly 
 reject the second ; for it says, that we conceive the resolution for 
 unqualilicd and unconditional repeal of the Gth of George I. to be a 
 measure of consummate wisdom. 
 
 I di'Bw that address, and I introduced those words expressly to 
 exclude any subsequent qualifications or limitations, affecting to clog 
 or restrain the operations of that repeal and the plenitude of the 
 legislative autiiority of the Irish Parliament. The address adds the 
 clause of finality ; for instance, that, gratified in these particulars 
 which it states, no " constitutional question between the two nations 
 will any longer exist." 
 
 The next part was the measure adopted by the English Parliament 
 upon the consideration of this address ; and in that measure they ac- 
 cede to that address entirely and unequivocall}' ; they embrace our 
 
574 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 proposition of unconditional and unqualified repeal ; and they accord- 
 ingly introduce a bill for that purpose ; and thus they close the final 
 adjustment; our address, though no partof their resolutions, becom- 
 ing part of their covenant ; as their bill of repeal, though no part of 
 our acts, became part of our treaty. 
 
 Another instrument in the transaction is the address to His Excel- 
 lency the Lord-Lieutenant, touching the finality of this measure, in 
 which are these words : " We have seen this great national arrange- 
 ment established on a basis which secures and unites the interests of 
 both kingdoms ; the objects we have been laboring for have been 
 accomplished." 
 
 The next is the declaration of the Irish government, touching the 
 finality of that arrangement, "convince the people that every cause 
 of past jealousy and discontent is finally removed, and that both 
 countries have pledged their good faith to each other, and that their 
 best security will be their inviolable adherence to this compact." 
 There are two other parts which are material ; the resolution of the 
 Irish House of Commons, the 18th of June, declaring in substance 
 that the question was not now to be opened, and that the business 
 was done, and in these words, that leave to bring in a bill of right 
 was refused, because the right of legislation in the Irisii Parliament 
 in all cases had been already asserted by Ireland, and fully and 
 finally and irrevocably acknowledged by Great Britain. 
 
 The next instrument was an address to His Majesty, to beseech 
 him to appoint a day of public thanksgiving for tlie accomplishment 
 of these great olijects, as well as for his victories. Thus it appears 
 that whatever idea might have been conceived in the second resolu- 
 tion of the 17th of Alay, 1782, it was totally and entirely aban- 
 doned. The minister of that time probably intended to make the 
 best bargain he could for England, and therefore conceived it eligible 
 to condition and qualify the acknowledgment of the indejocndency of 
 the Irish Parliament by certain provisions respecting navigation, 
 etc. ; but finding that the Irish Parliament would accept of nothing 
 but the unqualified and unconditional repeal, he dropped the fruit- 
 less idea. I cannot presume to state his sentiments, but I can state 
 that the Irish proposition of unqualified and unconditional repeal, re- 
 jecting the idea of further measures, was adopted in England by her 
 Parliament, which embraced the Irish proposition of unqualified and 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 575 
 
 unconditional repeal of the Gth of George I., and did repeal it ac- 
 cordingly without qualitication, condition, or limitation. 
 
 I l)c<i; leave to mention two facts, which, thongh not recorded, are 
 not forgotten ; the one is a declaration by Lord Lansdowne, then 
 secretary of state, that the repeal of the Gth George I. was the only 
 measure he meant to propose ; the other was a declaration by the 
 representative of the Irish government, in the Irish House of Com- 
 mons, made after our address of the 27th of May, that no measures 
 were mteuded to be grounded on the second English resolution of 
 May 17th. I remember the question to have been asked and so 
 answered. 
 
 I think I have now shown, from the records quoted, that the argu- 
 ment of the minister is against the express letter, the evident mean- 
 ing and honest sense of this final settlement, and I beg leave to 
 repeat that finality was not only a part of the settlement, but one of 
 its principal objects. The case is still stronger against him ; finality 
 was the jirincipal object of his country, as legislative independency 
 was the obj; ct of ours. Ireland wished to seize the moment of her 
 strength for the establishment of her liberties ; the court of England 
 wished to conclude the operations of that sirength and bind its 
 progress. The one country wished to establish her liberty, the other 
 to check the growth of demand ; I say the growth of demand ; it was 
 the expression of the time. The court of England came, therefore, 
 to an agreement with this country, namely, to establish forever the 
 free and independent existence of the Irish Parliament, and to pre- 
 serve forever the unity of empire. The former by the above- 
 mentioned adjustment, the latter by the clause of finality to that 
 adjustment annexed, and by precluding then, and at all times to 
 come, the introduction of any further constitutional questions in 
 either country, affecting the connection which was to rest under 
 solcum covenant, inviolaI)lc, impregnable, and invincible to the in- 
 trigue or ambition of cither country, founded on the prudent, the 
 profound, the liberal, and the eternal principle of unity of empire 
 and separation of parliament. 
 
 I might, however, waive all this, and yet the minister would get 
 nothing. I might allow, contrary to common sense, that final adjust- 
 ment, as proposed by His Majesty, means incipient negotiation. I 
 will suppose, contrary to truth, to public faith, public honor, and 
 
57G TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 common policy, that the councils of Great Britain at that time meant 
 to leave the Irish constitution open to the encroachments of the Brit- 
 ish Parliament, and the British empire open to the cnt-roachmenls of 
 the Irish vohinteer ; tliat is, that she meant to expose the solidity of 
 her- empire, in order to cheat the Irish, first, of their opportunity, 
 and afterwards of their constitution ; and yet he has gained nothing 
 by these preposterous concessions, because he must allow thr.t the 
 arrangement did proceed to certain articles of covenant, and the first 
 article on the part of England excludes his Union, being the assent 
 of the Pailiament of Great Britain to the requisition of the peo[)le of 
 Ireland, which was to I)c exempted in all times to come from the in- 
 terference of British Parliaments, and to have established over them 
 no other legislature whatever, save only that of the King, Lords, 
 and Commons of Ireland. Admitting, then, the ridiculous idea of 
 ulterior measures to follow final adjustment, a Union could not be 
 one of them. It is hardly necessary to mention that he has beeii 
 minister ever since that period ; that during the whole of that time 
 he never ventured to name Union as one of those measures ; not in 
 1783, Mhcn a bill was brought in by the ministry ; not in 1785, when 
 be introduced his celebrated propositions, and slated the second 
 resolutions of the 17th of May, 1782, to comprehend, not the consti- 
 tution, but the commer'ce of both countries; not in the administra- 
 tion of 17t5 ; not, in short, until he had reduced this country by a 
 train of calamitous measures, to religious divisions, to the condition 
 of a conquest, such as she was when the Parliament of England, at 
 the close of the last centur}', took away her trade, and in the middle 
 of the present took away her constitution. 
 
 The minister proceeds; he impeaches the constitution of 1782; 
 from disavowing an arrangement so adjusted at tlnit time, and an 
 adjustment so concluded, he advances, and calls that adjustment a 
 miserable imperfection ; after fifteen years' panegyric, and when ho 
 has a great army in Ireland, he has made that discover^s and 
 instead of a constitution which established peace in Ireland, he 
 revives a principle which produced war in America; namely, that 
 two independent legislatures are incomi)atible. This was the lan- 
 guage of Lord North's sword in the colonies ; this is the language 
 of Mr. Pitt's sword in Ireland : and this doctrine of imperial legis- 
 lature Avhich lost Great Britain America, and which Great Britain 
 
HENRY GEATTAN. 577 
 
 surrendered to Ireland, takes once more its bloody station in the 
 speeches of the minister, in defiance of faith, and in contempt of 
 •experience. It seems as a British Parliament is disposed to surren- 
 der its liberties to the court, the court is disposed to advance its 
 domination over all the British connections; similarity of constiiu- 
 tions is no longer the bond of connection ; all are to be swallowed 
 up, according to this doctrine, in one imperial parliament, whose 
 powers increase as the boundaries of the empire contract and the 
 spirit of her liberties declines. 
 
 "You abolished," says he, "one constitution, but you forgot to 
 form another." * Indeed ! What ! docs he mean that we should 
 have demolished an usurpation, in order to mangle a constitution? 
 Does he mean that we should have overset the tyranny of one pMriia;- 
 ment to mangle another? Does he mean that we should have taken 
 away the usurped and tyrannical powers of the legislature of Eng- 
 land, in order to restore those usurped and tyrannical powers to that 
 very legislature ? In what brandies ? His propositions have stated 
 them ; commerce, etc., the very branches in which they had been by 
 that very legislatui'e, most oppressively and egregiously, obstinately, 
 and transcendently abused. Most certainly the conductors of that 
 settlement on the part of Ireland, did not think proper so to restore 
 the gi'ievance of a foreign legislation, and so to limit the powers of 
 a domestic one. The minister has given in his speech the reason. 
 "All the great branches of trade (by which he must mean the linen 
 trade, the plantation trade, and the import trade) are ascribed to 
 the liberality of England, not to covenant." I deny it ; but as 
 ministers may deny covenants, it seemed prudent to reserve the 
 powers of parliament, and accordingly the Irish legislature retains 
 full and ample resources, under the settlement of that tinie, to 
 incline the counsels of England to reinember and observe her com- 
 pacts with our countiy, should the British minister be disposed to 
 forget them ; thus the parliament of Ireland can so regulate her in- 
 tercourse with other countries for colonial produce, so regulate her 
 right to an East India trade, and so adjust her channel trade, as to 
 secure a preference in the English market for her linens, and for a 
 ■direct intercourse with the British plantations. Was Ireland to 
 retain those powers with a view to annoy ? No ; but she was to 
 ♦ Mr. Pitt's speech. 
 
578 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 retain them, and to retain tliem, lest Great Britain, instigated by 
 some minister, might be induced to exercise once more those very 
 powers of annoyance with which now the right honorable gentleman 
 threatens Ireland ; in short, lest Great Britain should retain all her 
 poAvers of molestation, and Ireland should surrender all her powers 
 of retaliation. The classic minister must know, Tacitus has told 
 bim, that between the powerful and the impotent there can be no 
 peace ; the powers I speak of were powers of peace ; they were 
 powers of protection ; they were the great reserves of the Irish Par- 
 liament, to secure the trade of Ireland and the harmony of the 
 empire ; the wisdom of the reserve, such a minister as he is was born 
 to establisi). Strange ideas this minister entertains of the constitu- 
 tion of an Irish Parliament. It should be incompetent, it should be 
 onuiipotent ; incompetent to regulate the commerce of the country, 
 omnipotent to give away her constitution : it finds its omnii)otence 
 in his mind when it abdicates its trust. 
 
 The minister proceeds : he specifies his objections to this settle- 
 ment of 1782 ; the case of regency is one, and war is another. 
 Facts are against him in both. He states that it was accident alone, 
 meaning the recovery of his Majesty, that preserved the identity of 
 the executive power at the time of the regency ; he misstates that 
 fact totally and entirely ; it was not accident, namely, the recovery 
 of the King, that preserved the identity of the executive powers ; 
 that identity was preserved amply, carefully, and aficctionately, by 
 the determination of the Irish Parliament in choosing for their regent 
 the heir apparent of the Crown, already designated and determined 
 upon, though not in form invested, by the Parh'ament of Great 
 Britain. The Parliament of Ireland provided in that event not only 
 for the preservation of the monarchical principle, but for tiie preser- 
 vation of the connection likewise, and adhered to liis countr}', 
 though they did not link themselves to his party. The principle 
 that came under the consideration of the Irish Parliament was three- 
 fold, — the principle of monarchy, the principle of connection, and 
 the principle of party. With regard to the two first, they concurred 
 with the Parliament of England ; they chose as regent tlie next in 
 succession to the Crown, and they chose him after, and not before, the 
 Parliament of Great Britain had signified, with the minister at their 
 head, their determination to appoint him, and in so doing they fol- 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 579 
 
 lowed faithfully tlie spirit of the act of annexation of the crown, 
 which forms between the two countries their bond and connection, 
 but a bond and connection through the medium of monarchy. I am 
 stating the spirit of that act. I say, the act of annexation, and so 
 the bill of 1782, altering and amending the act of Poynings, and 
 ordaining that Irish bills shall be sent to the King, look to the 
 bond and connection of these islands through the medium of mon- 
 archy. A British republic never was in the contemplation of either ; 
 but an English monarchy, and no other form of government, was 
 present to the conceptions of both, either giving thereby the royal 
 house, who are the monarchs of Ireland as well as of Great Britain, 
 a double security, and the throne upon which they sit a double root. 
 I sa}' the Parliament of Ireland did adhere to the principles of 
 British connection, and did unite with them the safe and the pre- 
 scribed principles of monarchical government. They did concur 
 with the Parliament of England in the choice of a regent, in the 
 person of his Eoyal Highness the Prince of Wales. But with 
 regard to the third principle, namely, the principle of party, they 
 diiu-rcd ; the Parliament of England tlunking proper to incumber 
 the regent with extraordinary limitations, and that of Ireland judg- 
 ing it more eligible to leave him in full exercise of all the execu- 
 tive powers. It therefore rejected a motion of delay, knowing the 
 object of that motion was to postpone the appointment until the then 
 Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland should have formed a formidable faction 
 confedei'atcd against the future goveriunent. In short, the Parlia- 
 ment of Ireland did not think it proper to appoint a regent with less 
 than regential power, and to constitute in opposition a minister with 
 great portions of regal authority. Hence, perhaps, this Union ; 
 hence, perhaps, the visitation of calamitous government which has 
 befallen Ireland ever since. One of the minister's instruments in 
 this country has confessed it; he has said, in one of his speeches 
 published b}' his authority, that all the misfortunes of this country 
 sprung from that resentful period. But who is it that reproaches 
 Ireland upon this subject, most injuriously and unjustly, with the 
 crime of availing herself of the opportunity afforded by the most 
 calamitous event that visited the health of our sovereign? it is that 
 very minister who published that opportunity in the broadest and 
 most unqualified resolution ; who told the parliament of both coun- 
 
580 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tries, that they were perfectly competent to supply, in that melan- 
 choly moment, the deliciency in the executive magistrate by any 
 method which they thought proper; that is, who told the British 
 Houses they were competent to establish a temporary republic; and 
 told the Irish Houses, of course and by necessary inference, that 
 they were competent to establish a temporary republic, and to 
 accomplish a temporary separation. To have declined the oppor- 
 tunity is called the ambition of one parliament; to have proclaimed 
 the opportunity, is called the moderation of the minister. His par- 
 tizans in this country went furtiier ; he maintained the power of the 
 British convention to bind Ireland : — 
 
 lUe impiger hausit 
 Spuraautem patoram et pleuo proluit se auro. 
 
 According to the two opinions, the two Houses of the British Parlia- 
 ment could overturn the British monarchy and Irish constitution. 
 
 The minister proceeds ; he states a second instance, namel}', that 
 of war. Hei'e, again, the fact is against him ; the Parliament of 
 Ireland have, ever since their emancipation, concurred with England 
 on the subject of war ; but tiiey have concurred, with this remarkable 
 difi'erence, that, before their emancipation, their concurrence was 
 barren, and since their emancipation it has been productive. Imme- 
 diately on the settlement of that emancipation in 1782, they voted a 
 sum for British seamcri, and on the apprehension of a war with Spain 
 in 1730, they voted another; and in the present war, under Lord 
 Fitzwilliam's administration, they voted a third ; so much more bene- 
 ficial are the wild offerings of liljcrtjs than the squeczings, and evisce- 
 rations, and excruciations of power. But all this is lost uijon the 
 minister; fact and bounty make no impression on hiui; he has 
 against both a fallacious argument and hungiy speculation. 
 
 He thinks that he foresees that the Parliament of Ireland may dissent 
 from that of Great Britain on the subject of war. lie iuiows that 
 peace and war are in the department of the King, not of Parliament ; 
 he knows that, on u proclamation by His Majest}', Ireland is in a 
 state of war, of course, and without the assent of the Houses of 
 Parliament ; he knows th it the supply of that war depends not on the 
 Parliament of Ireland, but of Great Britain ; and therefore the inlcr- 
 ference of the Parliament of Ireland on that subject is little more 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 581 
 
 than the declaration of a sentiment. Now, the declaration of a sen- 
 timent on such a subject is only valuable as it is the sentiment of the 
 nation ; and the concurrence of Ireland in British wars can only be 
 the sentiment of the nation as the constitution of the nation: that is 
 to say, the rights of Ireland, as claimed by herself, to be exempted 
 from the legislative authority of a British Parliament, are tendered, 
 regarded and protected by the Briiish empire. It is not the Isle of 
 Ceylon, the Cape of Good Hope, the Mysoi-c country, nor the domin- 
 ions of Tippno, nor yet the feathers of her western wing, that 
 engage the attention or interests of Ireland ; it is her own freedom and 
 constitution: it is our own idea of that internal freedom and constitu- 
 tion, not such as British ministers, who have invaded that constitution, 
 shall hold forth ; nor such as English or Scotch metaphysicians, who 
 made chains for America, and called them her constitution, and 
 who are ready now to cast links for Ireland ; but that constitution 
 which she herself, Ireland, feels, comprehends, venerates and claims ; 
 such as she herself expressed in her convention at Dungannon, and 
 through all her counties and cities, and in every description and 
 association of people, and afterwards in full parliament claimed, ear- 
 ned, registered and recorded ; it is for the preservation of this con- 
 stitution that she is interested in British wars. She considers the 
 British empire a great western barrier against invasion from other 
 countries ; invasion on wliat? invasion on her liberties, on her rights 
 and privileges ; invasion on self-legislation, the parent and protect- 
 ress of them all. She hears the ocean protesting against separation, 
 but she hears the likewise protesting against Union ; she follows, 
 therefore, her physical destination, and obeys the dispensations of 
 Providence, when she protests, like that sea, against the two situa- 
 tions, both equally unnatural, separation and union. 
 
 On these principles, I suppose the dissent of Ireland, on the sub- 
 ject of war, highly improbable, as it is uninstanced; but I should 
 attribute like the minister, infallibility to those councils that engage 
 their country in a war, should I suppose the dissent of Ireland on 
 such a sul J3ct at all times to be fatal. Happy had it been for his 
 Majesty, happy had it been for his glory and renown in all time to 
 come, had not the Parliament of Ireland, in an American war, cursed 
 him with her concurrence ! What could the tutelary angel of Eng- 
 land have done more, if that angel had been Minerva, and that 
 
582 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Minerva sat in Parliament; wliat, than to have advanced against tho 
 councils of that time the shield of her displeasure? Looking hack 
 to the wars in which Great Britain has been engaged, I slionid there- 
 fore suggest that she is in less danger from the hesitation of Ireland 
 than from the precipitation of Great Britain. In this part of his 
 argument the minister is weak, but in his remedy he is not only weak, 
 but mischievous. He proposes, by taking away our powers of dis- 
 sent, to withdraw our motive of concurrence, and, to secure our 
 silence, forfeits our affection ; he foresees an improbable event ; of 
 that event he greatly' exaggerates tho danger, and provides a remedy 
 which makes that danger not only imminent, but deadly. 
 
 I will put this question to my country ; I will suppose her at (ho 
 bar, and I will ask her : Will you fight for a Union as you would for 
 a constitution? Will you tight for that Lords and that Conmions, 
 who in the last century took away your trade, and in the present 
 your constitution, as for that King, Lords and Commons, \vho have 
 restored both? Well, the minister has destroyed this constitution ; 
 to destroy is easy; the edifices of the mind, like the fabrics of 
 marble, require an age to build, but ask only a minute to precipi- 
 tate ; and, as the fall of both is an effort of no time, so neither is it 
 a business of any strength ; a pickaxe and a common laborer will 
 do the one — a little lawyer, a little pimp, a wicked minister tho 
 other. 
 
 The constitution, which, with more or less violence, has been tho 
 inheritance of this country for GOO years ; that modus (enendi parlia- 
 meuluin, which lasted and outlasted of Plantagenet the wars, of Tudor 
 the violence, and of Stuart the systematic falsehood ; the condition 
 of our connection — yes — the constitution he destroys — is one of 
 the pillars of the British empire. He may walk round it and round 
 it, and the more he contemplates, the more must he admire ; such a 
 one as had cost England of money millions and of bloo'd a deluge — 
 cheaply and nobly expended ; whose restoration Lad cost Ireland her 
 noblest eflbrts, and was the habitation of her loya]t3' ; we arc accus- 
 tomed to behold the kings of these countries in the keeping of par- 
 liament ; I say of her loj^alty as well as of her liberty, where she had 
 hung up the sword of the volunteer, her temple of fame, as well as 
 of freedom ; where she had seated herself, as she vainly thought, in 
 modest security and in a long repose. 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 583 
 
 I hnvc done with the pile which the minister batters. I eomc to 
 the Bal)el which he builds ; and as he throws down without a princi- 
 ple, so docs he construct without a foundation. This fabric he calls 
 a Union, and to this his fabric there are two striking objections : 
 first, it is no Union : it is not an identification of people, for it 
 •excludes the Cati'.olics ; secondly, it is a consolidation of the Irish 
 legislatures, that is to say, a merger of the Irish Parliament ; and 
 incurs every objection to a Union, without obtaining the only object 
 which a Union professes: it is an extinction of the constitution, and 
 an exclusion of the people. Well ! he has overlooked the pco[)le as 
 he has overlooked the sea. I say ho excludes the Catholics, and ho 
 destro3-s their best chance of admission — the relative consequence. 
 Thus he reasons, that hereafter, in a course of time (he does not say 
 when), if they behave tiiemselvcs (he does not say how), they may 
 see their subjects submitted to a course of discussion (he does not 
 say with what result or determination) ; and as the ground for this 
 inane period, in which he promises nothing, and in which, if he did 
 jjromise much, at so remote a period he could perform nothing, unless 
 he, like the evil he has accomplished, be immortal — for this inane 
 sentence, in which he can scarcely be said to deceive the Catholic, or 
 suffer the Catholic to deceive himself, ho exhibits no other ground 
 than the physical inanity of the Catholic body accomplished by a 
 Union, which, as it destroys the relative importance of Ireland, so it 
 destroys the relative proportion of the Catholic inhabitants, and thus 
 tliey become admissible because they cease to be anything. Hence, 
 according to him, their brilliant expectation: "You were," say his 
 advocates, and so imports his argument, "before the Union as three 
 to one, 3'ou will be by the Union as one to four." Thus he founds 
 their hopes of political power on the extinction of physical conse- 
 •qnence, and makes the inanity of their body and the nonentity of 
 their country the pillars of their future ambition. 
 
 The Catholics of the city of Dublin have come forth in support of 
 the constitution. I rejoice at it. They have answered their enemies 
 by the best possible answer — by services. Such answer is more 
 than refutation — it is triumph. The man who supports and pre- 
 serves parliament qualifies ; the path of glory leads on to privilege ; 
 ■"enjoy with me, if you please; without me, if you be illiberal ; but 
 by me certainly ; and at all events enjoy the parliamentary constitu- 
 
584 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 tioii of your country." This is to defend the tower, this is to leap 
 upon the wrecii, this is to sit beside the country in her sick bed ; if 
 she recover, there is a long ;uid bright order of days before her, and 
 the Catholics will have contributed to that event ; if she perish, they 
 will have done their utmost to save her ; they will have done as an 
 honcsi m;ui ought in such an extreme case — they will iiave flung out 
 their last setting glories, and sunk witii their country. 
 
 The minister, by liis first plans, as detailed by his advocates, not 
 only banished the Catholics from parliament, but banished the Prot- 
 estants from it likewise, for he banished them from a due represen- 
 tation therein ; he struck off one half of the county representatives, 
 and preserved the portion of boroughs as two to one. Thus he dis- 
 posed of the question of Catiiolic emancipation and parliamentary 
 reform, by getting rid of both forever; thus did he build his first 
 plan of Union upon the abuses both of church and state, and reformed 
 ncitiur; religious monopoly or borough monopoly, he continued ta 
 exclude the Catholic from parliament ; and he continued to shut out 
 both Protestant and Catholic from a due and effectual parliamentary 
 representation. lie shut out Protestant ascendancy as well as Cath- 
 olic participation : and in the place of both, constituted borough 
 ascendancy in perpetual abuse and dominion. He reformed the- 
 British Parliament Ijy nearly sixty Irish borough members ; he 
 reformed the Irish Parliament by 558 Englisii and Scotch members j 
 and on this mutual misrepresentation, constituted an imperial legis- 
 lature. There was no gr. at effort of ability in all this ; much felicity 
 of mischief, no expenditure either of time or talent. There was 
 nothing in the scheme which was grand, nothing which was deep,. 
 nothing which was comprehensive; he demolished an old insti- 
 tution at the same time that he preserved old abuses, and put 
 himself at their head, and entailed them on posterity, like a com- 
 mon disorder, to be continued through what he calls a pa- 
 rental parliament. Such a plan was too desperate, as far as 
 relates to the proportion of comities and boroughs. I under- 
 stand it is in part abandoned, and well it may, because, whether 
 these representatives bo in a greater or lesser proportion borough 
 members, they will be the host of administration, and not the repre- 
 sentatives of the people. He takes 100 members, many of whom are 
 removed by the nature of their election from the influence of repre- 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 585 
 
 seiilation ; all of whom, hy i-cm()\'al from their country, are with- 
 drawn from that of sympathy, from that of opinion. He changes 
 the sphere, not only of their action, hut of tlieir character and of 
 their sensations. How cinno the Irish Parliament, with all its bor- 
 ough members, in 1779, to demand a free trade — in 1782, to demand 
 a free constitution ? Because it sat in Ireland ; because they sat ill 
 their own country ; and because at tiiat time they had a country ; 
 because, however influenced as many of its members were by places,^ 
 however uninfluenced as man}'^ of its mem!)ers were by pojjular 
 representation, yet Avere they influenced by Irish sympathy. They 
 did not like to meet every hour faces that looked shame upon them r 
 they did not like to stand in the sphere of their own infamy ; thus- 
 they acted as the Irish absentee at the very same time did not act ; 
 they saved the countiy because they lived in it, as the others aban- 
 doned ihc country because the}*^ lived out of it. 
 
 I will not say that one hundred Irish gentlemen will act ill, where 
 any man would act well ; but never was there a situation in which 
 they had so much temptation to act ill, and so little to act well ; 
 gnat expense and consequent distresses ; no support from the voice 
 of an Irish public ; no check ; they will be in situation a sort of 
 gentlemen of the empire ; tliat is to sa^-, gentlemen at large, absent 
 from one country, and unelccted by the other — suspended between 
 both, and belDUging to neither. The sagacious English Secretary 
 of State has foretold this: "What advantage," says he, "will it be 
 to the talents of Ireland, this opportunity in the British em})ire thus- 
 opened?" That is what we dread. The market of St. Stephen 
 opened to the individual, and the talents of the country, like its 
 property, dragged from the kingdom of Ireland to be sold in London ; 
 these men, from their situation (man is the child of situation), their 
 native honor may struggle ; but from their situation, they will be 
 adventurers of the mostexpensive kind ; adventurers with pretensions, 
 dressed and sold, as it were, in the shrouds and grave-clothes of the 
 Irish Parliam' nt, and playing for hire their tricks on her tomb, the 
 only repository the minister will allow to an Irish Constitution, the 
 image of degradation, and the representatives of nothing. 
 
 Come, he has done much ; he has destroyed one constitution ; ho 
 Las corrupted another; and this corrupted constitution he calls a 
 parental representation. I congratulate the country on the new 
 
586 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 baptism of what was onco called the representative body of tho 
 nation. Instead of the plain, august language of the constitntion, 
 wc arc here saluted willi the novel and barbaric phraseology of 
 empire. Witli this change of name we perceive a transfer of obliga- 
 tion, converting the duty of the delegate into the duty of tlio 
 constituent, and the inheritance of the people into the inlieritance of 
 their trustees. 
 
 AVell, this assembly, this Imperial Parliament, what arc its 
 elements? Irish absentees, who have forsaken their country, and 
 a British Parliament tiiat toolj away the constitution. Docs he say 
 that sucli a parliament will have no prejudices against Ireland? Let 
 him look to his speeches; a capital understanding, a comprclicnsivc 
 knowledge, and ii transcendent eloquence ; hear him with all tlicsc 
 powers .speak on the subject of Ireland, whether it be the conduct of 
 her aduiiuistratiou, tho character of her people, her commerce, or 
 her covenants, or her constituticni, and he betrays an ignorance tiiat 
 would dishonor an idiot. Docs he wish for further instances ? Let 
 him look to the speeches of his agents in Ireland ; speeches made and 
 publisiied for the palate and prejudices of the English court: what 
 description of men have they not traduced, what patriotic atliicve- 
 mcnt have they not dcj)rccatcd, what honest character have they not 
 belied? Does he look for further instances? Let him turn to his 
 ■catalogue: what notorious apostate whom he has not honored? 
 what impudent defamer of the rights and character of Ireland that 
 he has not advanced? On the other hand, what man that made a 
 stand for her liberties whom he has not dismissed? Mv. Fitzgerald, 
 ■Sir John Parnell, who had supported his government long, rei'uscd 
 to abandon their country and their honor, and were innnediatcly told 
 they were no longer tit for the service of government. Mr. Foster, 
 who had supported his administration long, held up his shield for 
 that parliament of which he is the natural advocate, and was imme- 
 diately honored by the enmity of the court, and a personal attack on 
 his character and consistency. 
 
 Lord Fitzwilliam, an Englishman, a friend to the war, a strenuous 
 advocate for order and regular government, with a character that is 
 purity itself, entertained for Ireland a fatal aflcction, and by that one 
 •offence, cancelled all his long and splendid catalogue of virtues, and 
 %vas dismissed accordingly. 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 587 
 
 A legislature, the parent of both countries, ho talks of; a legisla- 
 ture, as far as relates to Ireland, free from the influence of vicinity, 
 of sympathy. The Isle of Man is all that (free from the influence 
 of opinion, free from the influence of duty, directed by prejudices, 
 and unincumbered by knowledge). In order to judge what this 
 parental legislature would be, let us consider what the British 
 Parliament has been, and lot us compare that Parliament, for this 
 purpose with the legislature of Ireland. In this con)parison I do not 
 mean to approve of all the parliaments that have sat in Ireland : I 
 left the former parliament, because I condemned its proceedings ; 
 but I argue not like the minister, from the misconduct of one parlia- 
 ment against the being of parliament itself. 1 value that parliamentary 
 constitution by the average of its benefits ; and I affirm that tho 
 blessings prcicured by the Iiish Parliament in the last twenty years, 
 arc greater than all the blessings afforded by British Parliaments to 
 Ireland for the last century : greater even than the mischiefs inflicted 
 on Ireland by British Parliaments ; greater than all the blessings 
 procured by those parliaments for their own country within that period. 
 "Within that time the legislatures of England lost an empire, and 
 the legislature of Ireland recovered a constitution. 
 
 Well, wo have done with this parental parliament; and now we 
 come to the bribes which he holds out. And, first, he begins with 
 tho church. To the Protestant church he promises perpetual secu- 
 rity ; to tho Catholic church his advocates promise eventual salary; 
 and both hold out to the f()rn)er commutation of tithes. 
 
 "With respect to the Protestant church, whatever may be his 
 wishes in favor of ils duration, he takes the strongest measures to 
 accomplish its destruction ; for ho attempts to disgrace it to all 
 eternity. He is employing, or his agents are employing, several of 
 its members to negotiate away the constitution, and ,to mendicate 
 addresses transferring to another country the parliament and legis- 
 lative power of their own; disfranchising the very people by whom 
 the church is fed, and deserting the holy mission of God to fulfil 
 this profligate mission of the minister. Give up your country, says 
 tho minister ; give up your character, and bo immortal. 80 said 
 Charles the First to his church ^vhon he prostituted the Gospel, and 
 regiinonted the clergy into battalions against the constitution, and 
 overturned the church by its own intiimy. 
 
588 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 At the same time that the minister eiide.ivors to take away the 
 authority of one church, his advocates tell you that he proposes to- 
 give salaries to another ; that is, they tell you that he proposes to 
 bribe the Catholic clergy, it they will betray the constitution. In 
 whatever form of religion our pious court contemplates the Almighty,, 
 it ever occurs to convert Him to some diabolical purpose. The 
 Catholics had been accused pretty liberally of disloyalty by those 
 very advocates who now seem to think it proper to reward their 
 imputed treasons against the king, provide d they shall be followed 
 lip by real treasons against the peo]ile. I do not believe, I never 
 did believe, the general charges made against the Catholics ; I do 
 not dispntc, I never did dispute, the propriety' of giving salaries to 
 their clergy ; but it should be salaries, not bribes — salaries for the 
 exercise of their religious duty, and not wages for the practice of 
 l)olitical apostacy. According to. this plan, the Catholic religion, it 
 would seem, disqualified its followers to receive the blessings of the 
 constitution ; but the priest's hostilities to that constitution qualify 
 him to ]'eceivc a salary for the exercise of that very religion which 
 is at once punished by civil disal)ility and encouraged by ecclesias- 
 tical provision; as good Catholics they are disqualified, and as bad 
 citizens they are to bo rewarded. 
 
 The minister proceeds : ho proposes his third bribe, namely, the 
 abolition of tithes. You observe, such a proposal does not seem to 
 form part of his Union, but is an offer kept back to be regulated, 
 modified, and qualified, when the Union is passed, and the consider- 
 ation is given. I approve of a modus as a compensation for tithe, 
 but I do not approve of it as a compensation for parliament ; Mhen I 
 proposed that measure, and was opposed by men by whom I could 
 only be opjiosed, and could not be answered, I was told by the king's 
 ministers that commutation of tithe was the overthrow of the church. 
 Couple the project of the minister now with the argument of his 
 agents then, and the combined idea amounts to this, that it is pru- 
 dent to overturn the church, provided at the same lime you overturn 
 the constitution ; but the fact is, that the argument at that time was 
 false, and the proposal at this time is fallacious; the arguincrjt had 
 for its object personal calumn}' ; and the proposal, national extinction. 
 
 The minister has not done with bribes ; whatever economy he 
 shows in argument, here he has been generous in the extreme. 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 589 
 
 Parson, priest (I think one of hi^ advocates hints the Presbyterians) 
 are not forgotten ; and now the mercantile body are all to be bi'ibed, 
 that all may be ruined. He holds oat commercial benefits for political 
 annihilation ; he offers j'ou an abundance of capital, but first he 
 takes it away ; he takes away a great portion of the landed capital 
 of the country by the necessarj' operation of Union ; he will give 
 you, however, commercial capital in its place ; but first he will give 
 you taxes. It seems it is only necessary to break the barriers of 
 liberty, and the tides of commerce will flow in of coiu-se ; take away 
 her rival in landed cai)ital, and then commercial capital advances, 
 ■without fear. Conmierce only wants weight, i. e., taxes, it seems, 
 in order to run with new spirit. He not only finds commerce in the 
 retreat of landed capital, but he finds corn also. His whole speech 
 is a course of surprises ; the growth of excision, the resource of in- 
 cumbrance, and harvests sown and gathered by the absence of the 
 proprietors of the soil and of their property. All these things are 
 to come. When? He does not toll you. Where? He does not 
 tell you. You take his word for all this. I have heard of a banker's 
 bill of exchange. Bank of England's notes. Bank of Ireland's notes; 
 biit a prophet's promissor}' note is a newtrafiic; all he gets from 
 Ireland is our solid loss ; all he promises are visionary, distant, and 
 prophetic advantages. He sees, I do not, British merchants and 
 British capital sailing to the provinces of Conuanght and Muustcr ; 
 there they settle in great multitudes, themselves and families. He 
 mentions not what description of manuf icturers ; who from Birming- 
 liam ; who from Manchester; no matter, he cares iiot; he goes on 
 asserting, and asserting with great ease to himself, and without any 
 obligation to fact. Imagination is the region in which he delights 
 to disport; where he is to take away y^ur parliament, where he is 
 to take away 30ur final judicature, where he is to increase your 
 taxes, where he is to get an Irish tribute, there he is a plain, direct, 
 matter-of-fact man ; but where he is to pay you for all this, there he 
 is poetic and prophetic ; no longer a financier, but an inspired ac- 
 countant. Fancy gives her wand ; Amalthca takes him by the 
 hand ; Ceres is in her train. 
 
 The English capitalist, he thinks, will settle his family in the 
 midst of those Irish Catholics, whom he does not think it safe to admit 
 into parliament ; as subjects he thinks them dangerous ; as a neigh- 
 
590 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 boring multitiulc snfc. The En^<ili.sh inaniifacturcr will make this- 
 distinction ; he will dread them as individuals, and confide in them 
 as a body, and settle his family and his property in the midst of 
 them : he will therefore, the minister supposes, leave his ccjal mines, 
 leave his machinery, leave his comforts, leave his habits, conquer his- 
 prcjudices, and come over to Ireland to meet his taxes and miss his^ 
 constitution. They did not do this when the taxes of Ireland were 
 few; we Avcre indeed told they would, as we arc now told. They 
 did not do this when there was no military government in Ireland. 
 However, as prejudices against the country increase, he supposes 
 commercial confidence may increase likewise. Tiiere is no contra- 
 dicting all this, because arguments which reason does not suggest, 
 reason cannot remove; besides, the minister in all this does not 
 argue, but foretell. Now you can scarcely answer a prophet ; yoix 
 can only disl)clieve him ; his arguments are false, but his inspi- 
 ration may be true ; appearances, however, are against them ; 
 for instance, a principal ground of complaint in Ireland is a mis- 
 application of landed capital, or the diversion of it to other countries 
 from the cultivation of Ireland, where great tracts remain either 
 totally neglected or superficially imi)roved ; where the tenantry have 
 not capital, and the land can be reclaimed only by the employment 
 (and a very rational employment it would be) of part of the rent aris- 
 ing therefrom, on the soil which produced it, improving, however, 
 gradually smee the establishment of our free constitution, which con- 
 tains in itself the power of checking the evil I speak of, and which, 
 by adding to the consequence of the country, will naturally diminish 
 the number of absentees, comparatively aided as it must be by the 
 growth of English taxes, unless by a Union we adopt those taxes in 
 Ireland. How does he remedy this disorder ? He finds a great absen- 
 tee draught ; he gives you another; and having secured to you two 
 complaints, he engages to cure both. Another principal cause of 
 complaint, is another effect arising from the non-residence of Irish 
 landlords, whose presence on their own estates is necessary for the 
 succor as well as the improvement of their tenantry ; that the peas- 
 ant may not perish for want of medicine, of cordial and of cure, 
 which they can only find in the administration of the landlord, who 
 civilizes them and regulates them in the capacity of a magistrate, 
 while he husbands and covers them in that of a protector, improving 
 
HENRY GRATTAN 591 
 
 not only them, but himself, by the exercise of his virtues, as well as 
 the dispensation of his property, drawing together the two orders of 
 society, the rich and poor, until each may administer to the other, 
 and civilize the one by giving, and the other by receiving; so that 
 aristocracy and democracy may have a head and a body ; so that 
 the rich may bring on the poor, and the poor may strengthen the 
 rich; and both contributing to the strength, order and beauty of 
 the state, may form that pillar of society where all below is strength 
 and all above is grace. How does his plan accomplish this? He 
 withdraws their landed gentlemen, and then improves Irish man- 
 ners by English factors ; but I leave his trifling, and come to his 
 threats. 
 
 As lie offered before a trade which he had not to give, so now he 
 menaces to withdraw a trade which he cannot take away ; his threat 
 is founded on a monstrous assertion, that our principal branches of 
 con)mcrce are due to the liberality of England. 
 
 Liberality of England to Irish conniierce ! Where arc wc to look 
 for it? In v,hat part of the century? For near one hundred years 
 (it is a long time), the minister himself disclaims the illiberal policy 
 of his country. Is it at the close of this century; for instance, in 
 His JMajcst3''s speech from the throne in the year 1775, where he is 
 advised to signil'y his intention to maintain the principle of American 
 taxation over all his dominions? Or is it in the embargo of the 
 sami; period? Or is it in the tea tax imposed on Ireland by the 
 British Parliament about the period of 1779? Or will he say this 
 liberality appears in the mockery of those bills, in which England 
 affeclcd to relieve the distresses of Ireland? Was it in the English 
 act, giving tlie Irish a power to catch whales, or in that other bill, 
 permitting the Irish to plant tobacco? Or was it in 1778 that this 
 liberality made his appearance? No : for I remember in that period, 
 sup|)orting an address for the extension of Irish commerce ; and I 
 remember also being opposed and defeated by the immediate inter- 
 positi(m of the Crown. It is not then in the period of 1778 that we 
 are to look for this liberality. Was it in the period 1779, the time of 
 the short money bill, of the non-colisumptiou agreement, and of the 
 Irish requisition of free trade? 
 
 Here is the liberality of England ; she was just then, she was lib- 
 eral never; and she was just to you then, because you were then 
 
592 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCf:. 
 
 just to yourself; she has been faithful siuce ; I for oue shall ))c sat- 
 isiied with her lidclity and justice, and on these occasions I acknowl- 
 edge both. Are there any furtiier instances in which we are to look 
 for English justice in the subject of Irish trade? Yes ; there is an- 
 other, in 1793, on the subject of the re-export. An attempt had 
 been made to carry that point for Ireland in 1786, contained in two 
 resolutions which I moved as an amendment to the navigation act, 
 which has been charged to Ireland as a favor, but which was in fact 
 jobbed to tlie British ministry by him who made the charge, and 
 sold without any clause of equality and reciprocity. But afterwards 
 in 1793, a re-export bill passed in Great Britain in fiivor of Ireland, 
 exactly at the time when the charter of the East India Company ex- 
 pired, and an Irisii bill ^vas necessary and did pass to secure her 
 monopoly for a limited time : such is the history of British conces- 
 sion. Now look at the tariff, or see what has been tlie result; 
 greatly in favor of England. Under the head of home manufacture 
 and colonial produce, in favor of England ; under the head of raw 
 material, the produce of their respective countries, al)ove two mil- 
 lions in favor of England. Under the head of foreign articles, a 
 great balance in favor of England. Add to this an absentee rental 
 of considerably above a million, and 3'ou will find there is a sum of 
 above four millions anmiall}', in which Ireland administers to Great 
 Britain, and pours herself, as it were, abundant!}^ and without re- 
 serve into the British dominion. 
 
 This is the trade tlie minister threatens to alter, and thinks he 
 threatens not Great Britain, but Ireland. Here he will have some 
 difficulty; and first, the covenant of 1779. He denies that cove- 
 nant ; he says, that all the great commercial advantages of Ireland 
 are to be ascribed to the liberality of the British Parliament, and not 
 to the Irish Parliament. Wherever he meets an Irish covenant, he 
 gives it no quarter. I will state the fact, and let the public judge. 
 In October, 1779, an address passed the Irish Commons, containing 
 a requisition for a free trade : it was followed by a motion declaring 
 that the Irish Commons would not, for the present, grant new taxes ; 
 it was followed by a limitation of the act of supply to the duration 
 of six months only. It was considered in England, and attended 
 with resolutions moved by the then minister, purporting to repeal 
 certain restrictive acts on the free trade of Ireland, and to grant a 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 593 
 
 ■direct intercourse between Ireland and his Majesty's plantations, 
 sul)jcct to equality of duty. These resolutions were considered in 
 the Parliament of Ireland;* they were voted satisfactory. A long 
 money bill was then passed, and new taxes were then granted in 
 ■consideration thereof, and this he calls no covenant. He has denied, 
 at seems, the linen covenant ; ho has denied this commercial covenant 
 of 1779 ; and he has denied the constitutional covenant of 1782 ; and 
 having disclaimed the obligation of three treaties, he now proposes 
 a fourth, in which he desires you to give up j-our parliament to 
 secure his faith in time to come. T argue in a different manner : I 
 argue from his disposition to dispute the validity of covenant to the 
 necessity of the existence of parliament — an Irish parliament — tiie 
 guarantee of those covenants, which has the power to preserve the 
 obligation, or resources to retaliate. Docs the minister, when he 
 talks of an eleemosynary trade, recollect how the Irish Parliament 
 •could affect the East India Company by discontinuing the act of 
 1793, granted but for a limited time? Docs he recollect how she 
 ■could affect the British West India monopoly by withdrawing her 
 exclusive consumption from the British plantations? Does he recol- 
 lect how we could affect the navy of England by regulations regard- 
 ing our Irish provisions? Does he recollect how we could affect her 
 empire by forming commercial intercourse with the rest of the world ? 
 But let not this depend upon idle threats, threats which never should 
 have been advanced on our side, if they had not been first most im- 
 prudently introduced on his. I say, let not the argument rest on 
 threats, but let it rest on the past experiment; the experiment has 
 been made ; we got our trade by our resources and our parliament ; 
 ■we will keep our trade by affection and by covenant. But should a 
 British minister choose to despise those tciuires, we have another ; 
 ■we can keep our trade by the means by which wc have obtained it, 
 — our iiarliamcnt, our resources. 
 
 He speaks of the linen trade. On this subject, indeed, he has 
 been answered, as he has upon the others, b}' the argument and by 
 the experiment ; the ai'gument which proves that the bounty on 
 linen was not granted for the sake of Ireland, and that Irish linen 
 sells itself. But suppose his reasoning in this case to be as true as 
 it is fallacious, what does it amount to? That his country robbed 
 * Seo the resolutious and the law expressing the condition auci covenant. 
 
594 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Ireland of her free trade in the last century, and gave her, in the 
 place of it, the export of one solitary manufacture, depending on 
 the charity of England ; and now he proposes to rob Ireland of that 
 manufacture, unless Ireland consents to be robbed of her parlia- 
 ment ! He has no other ground of triumph l)ut the disgrace and 
 disiionor of his country ; however, her case is better than he has 
 stated it; and that is proved by the experiment; for in 1779, Me 
 were encountered by the same threats on the same subject ; we 
 despised those threats ; we put the question to a trial ; we entered 
 into a non-consumption agreement ; we demanded a free trade ; the 
 free trade we obtained ; the linen trade we preserved. 
 
 What we cannot reconcile to your interests, he affects to recon- 
 cile to your honor. He, the minister, "his budget with corruption 
 crammed," proposes to you to give up the ancient inheritance of 
 your country ; to proclaim an utter and blank incapacity, and to 
 register this prpclamation of incapacity in an act which inflicts on 
 this ancient nation an eternal disability : and he accompanies these 
 monstrous proposals by undisguised terror and unqualified bribery, 
 and this he calls no attack on the honor and dignity of the 
 kingdom. 
 
 The thing he proposes to buy, is what cannot be sold — lib- 
 erty ! For it, he has nothing to give ; evci-ytliing of value which 
 you possess, you obtained under a free constitution ; part with it, 
 and you must be not only a slave but an idiot. 
 
 His propositions not only go to your dishontir, but they arc built 
 upon nothing else : he tells you, it is his main argument, (hat you 
 are unfit to exercise a free constitution : and ho affects to prove it 
 by the experiment. Jacobinism grows, says he, out of the very 
 state and condition of Ireland. I have heard of parliament im- 
 peaching ministers; but hero is a minister impeaching parliament ; 
 he does more — he impeaches the parliamentary constitution itself: 
 the abuses in that constitution he has protected ; it is only its being 
 that he destroys; on what ground? Your exports since your 
 emancipation, and under that parliamentary constitution, and in 
 a great lucasure by that parliamentary constitution, have nearly 
 doubled ; connnercially it has worked well. Your concord with 
 England since the emancipation, as far as it relates to parliament 
 oa the subject of war, has been not only approved, but has been 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. rc)~ 
 
 productive ; imperially, therefore, it has worked well. What then 
 does the minister in tact object to? That you have supported him ; 
 that you have concurred in his system ; therefore he proposes to the 
 people to abolish the parliament, and to continue the minister. He 
 does more — he proposes to you to substitute the British Parliament 
 in your place, to destroy the body that i-estored your liberties, and 
 to restore that body which destroyed them. Against such a prop- 
 osition, were I exp'iring on the floor, I should beg to utter my last 
 breath, and record my dying testimony. 
 
 May 26th, 1800. 
 
 Mr. Grattan observed that the bill before the House was full of 
 inaccuracies, but inaccuracy was the least of the objections ; it did 
 indeed refer to a schedule for duties which were not there set forth, 
 and which were not yet passed ; it did indeed recite a bill to have 
 passed both Houses of Parliament which was at that very moment in 
 debate before tlie Houseof Lords ; and it did describe that very bill 
 by the name of an act of Parliament (saying that when the act, 
 namely, a bill which had only passed one house, had the royal assent, 
 should pass), offending against parliamentary propriety and legal 
 phraseology with its various and great improprieties, the evident 
 marks of haste and carelessness. But all these are lost in the fatal 
 principle of ruin and extinction which the bill contains, whose enact- 
 ing clauses are two ; first that there shall be a distinct and separate 
 council, and secondly, that there shall not be a pai'liament. 
 
 That is to say, that you are to have not what is miscalled a Union, 
 still less a union and a constitution of liberty, but a subordinate 
 Irish government without the control of an Irish parliament ; the 
 inferiority, the expense, the patronage, of a second and secondary 
 government, with all those distinctions which attend separate estab- 
 lishments of finance and I'evenue, with a separate system of trade, 
 M"ith a different interest for money, and a distinct code of law. This 
 breach of compact, for such I must call it — this surrender of liberty, 
 for it is nothing less— this transfer of the powers of the country to 
 Great Britain — (what powers have ycju over India? precisely as 
 much as you retain over Ireland) — this introduction of an innovation 
 consisting of a separate Irish government without an Irish parlia- 
 
596 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ment, is made at a time of national debility and division, the result 
 of a rank and vicious system of government, formed to corrupt the 
 upper order and divide and inflame the louver, and to deprive both 
 of their liberty ; such as one part of the present British cabinet ab- 
 jured, and declaring that the}' took oiEcc principally to reform, did 
 grcatlj' confirm and aggravate ; at a time too of martial law, admitted 
 under the plea of necessity, but with great effect to depress and in- 
 timidate, not rebellion but assertion; not the spirit of insurrec- 
 tion, but the si)irit of constitution, which would have also spoken 
 more decidedly (and yet very decidedly it has spoken notwith- 
 standing). 
 
 At a time, I say, when government was possessed of dictatorial 
 power, and at a time when a spirit of innovation was abroad, M-hich 
 has been adopted by the ministers of the Crown, who thus aflbrd 
 their example to overturn the throne by overturning the constitution, 
 and teach the Jacobin, if he wanted to be taught, to make war on 
 the rights of kings by making a Jacobinical war on the rights of the 
 people ; the power given them to preserve the settled state of order, 
 they use to introduce a new order of things, and make government 
 a question of strength, not of opinion; they run the chance of future 
 anarchy in order to establish present despotism ; they go into the 
 very excesses they condemn, and arc the bad example they depre- 
 cate ; they tell the people practically and eflcctuall}' that there is a 
 faction not less daring and destructive than the rankest democracy ; 
 a faction which, under the color of supporting government, would 
 eradicate the great fundamental and ancient principles of public se- 
 curity, as cfi'cctually, as ambitiously, and as sediiiously as its rival 
 the Jacobin, who is only guilty of an opposite excess, and Avho is 
 likely to follow and march through the public breach which the slaves 
 of despotism have made in the fundamental laws of the land for the 
 entrance of the two extremes in succession, Tyraimy that takes the 
 lead, and Anarchy that follows. 
 
 If the principle of this bill be innovation, the terms of it are 
 innovation likewise; the alteration in our system of cnmmcrco is 
 innovation ; the alteration in our system of revenue is innovation. 
 The bill teems with everything that is exceptionable. They talk 
 to you, indeed, as if liberty surrendered you were to break down 
 under the weight of commercial acquisition ; they talk to you, indeed, 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 597 
 
 as if for liberty surrendered you were to carry off an immense por- 
 tion of English revenue ; and one million a year in war, paid by 
 England in all distresses, was to glad and console you, and much 
 silly and empty sound of that kind was rung in your ears. But what 
 is the act ? that the terms of the Union arc aggravations of the Union ; 
 the principal conditions are heavy contributions. Your financial 
 conditions arc dangerous experiments, and both such as you are 
 perfectly competent to make, provided yon arc disposed to do so 
 much mischief to yoxiv country. The revenue, or the financial 
 returns set out, with the surrender of an availing revenue of £100,000 
 a j'car, arising from the export of the raw material and the import of 
 the manufacture, that to the best possible revenue which a nation 
 can continue, it adds the creation of a deficit of £95,000 a year, the 
 interest to pay a loan of one million and a half to be paid for the 
 purchase of lioroughs ; that is, from one to two hundred thousand 
 pounds a year, to be supplied l)y new taxes. The terms go on and 
 propose a proportion of two to fifteen as the future contribution of Ire- 
 land ; they do this Vv-itliout any data Avhatsoever which can warrant 
 such a proposition. The data which are now before you, but which 
 were not before _you when you passed the resolution, and when tiiat 
 proposition was laid, are unintelligible to the gentlemen to whom 
 those data are fiu-nished. Their papers, for instance, state the value of 
 the consumption of the country in certain articles, by which they 
 afl'cct to ascertain its opulence, to be so much ; and other papers, 
 which are also before the IIousc, state tlie value to be so much less. 
 In the instance of tea, of tobacco, and some other articles, the value 
 of the goods consumed is returned by one-third, in some cases by 
 oric-half, more than the value of the same kind of goods imported. 
 The diflcrence may be rcconcilcable, but it is not reconciled, and the 
 House votes now tiic proportion of the contribution which is founded 
 on thdsc very papers, withf)ut waiting for, without demanding ex- 
 planation. Suppose the cause, partly at least, of the apparent in- 
 congruity is that in one set of papers they are valued subject to 
 freight and tax, and in another set exempt from both. When the 
 minister proceeds to value the ability of the country to pay taxes, he 
 presents you with papers containing the value of the great articles, 
 with tile charge of freight and taxes embodied ; but when he pro- 
 ceeds to state the balance of trade between England and Ireland, he 
 
598 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 presents papers in which the freight and t;'.x arc omitted ; thus coals 
 (it is one among other instances) are valned at the pit mouth, and 
 thus an apparent balance of trade is created in j'our favor, about 
 £800,000 more than the fact; so that by the double operation you 
 arc overrated in commerce and overrated in revenue. I say, there- 
 fore, that in iixing the proportion of relative contribution, as far as 
 that pi'oportion affected to found itself on the comparative consump- 
 tion of the respective kingdoms, jou had vo data. 'When first 
 you voted that proportion by way of resolution, you had not even 
 papers ; the niajority of this House took the word of the minister, 
 without papers or documents, and on that word voted a twenty 
 years' contribution. Since you proceeded by way of bill, a member 
 on this side of the House called for papers ; the papers are returned 
 incongruous and unexplained, and now you vote the data which you 
 do not understand, as before you voted without any data whatever. 
 I speak of the comparison on the articles of consumption ; let us see 
 whether you have better information on the comparison formed on 
 the impoi'ts and exports. Here papers are submitted, but here the 
 inland trade is omitted ; it is calculated to amount in Britain to 
 £12,000,000 per annum ; here also the re-export trade is omitted. 
 It is valued at £11,000,000 per annum in Britain; in Ireland 
 £133,000,000 ; in the year ending January, 1799, it is valued at 
 £14,000,000 in Britain. In the minister's calculation of national 
 wealth, to ground a tax on national income, it was included, I ap- 
 prehend, as a distinct substantive source of wealth ; and if it wero 
 just to comprehend it with a view to impose a tax, it is equally just 
 to comprehend it with a view to ascertain a proportion ; it is carried 
 on by a distinct capital ; it produces a distinct revenue ; it is by itself 
 a great trade ; and it is almost the only ono of some great commer- 
 cial nations — Holland for instance. It is a greater evidence and 
 greater source of wealth to make other nations pay for your industry 
 added to that of other countries, than out of the fruits of your in- 
 dustry to pay for the industry of those countries. 
 
 But without inquiring farther into this head, without inquiring 
 whether it be just to proceed on an average of three years, when it 
 appears from a document, almost published under the name of Sir. 
 Rose, that the imports and exports of Britain, in the year 1798, 
 were not £73,000,000 but £80,000,000, and the re-export not 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 599 
 
 £11,000,000, but £14,000,000; while our trade is said to have 
 -declined, inasmuch as our revenue is said to have fallen £800,000 ; 
 without inquiring into t.liis, I say, that the papers before you prove 
 your contribution to be unjust ; they set forth the imports and ex- 
 ports of Britain, for the three years, to have bceu £73,000,000 ; on 
 that they form the proportion of two to fifteen ; now there should be 
 added to that £73,000,000, £G, 000,000 per annum, which Britain 
 receives from the Indies and from Ireland ; £4,000,000 from the 
 former, and £800,000 interest for public money lent ; and near 
 £2,000,000 in rent from the latter ; this £2,000,000 is to be taken 
 from the imports and exports of Ireland, and to be added to those 
 of Britain, which will make a propoi'tion not of ten to seventy- 
 three, but of about eight to seventy-nine. Thus it follows, that 
 Avhatcvor difficulty you may have in pronouncing the proportion of 
 contribulion, 3-ou can have no difficulty in pronouncing that the con- 
 tribution you have ascertained is unjust and fallacious ; and 3'ou can 
 discover its injustice and fallacy by the very papers on which you 
 have formed it ; those papers ascertaining the proportion you have 
 voted, by the omission of £0,000,000 of British annual income. 
 Thus has this House, under the direction of the minister, over- 
 charged this country in contribution, having no sufficient evidence 
 to estimate its contribution, but having complete evidence to im- 
 peach that contribution which it now imposes. And what is this 
 contribution? It is valued at about £4,800,000 in war, in addition 
 to the interest of your debt, which is about £140,000 per annum; 
 that is, equal to the charge of your establishment, four times greater 
 than any past war establishment ; a charge equal to the support of 
 128,000 soldiers, which is near eight times as much as you paid in 
 former wars : so that you are to multiply your charge for the loss of 
 jour parliament ; or rather, you arc to pay the tribute of the slave ; 
 before this, you raised the supply of freemen; — a charge, I say, 
 which, if for troops to be kept in the country, establishes a military 
 government as complete as in Russia; and wdiich, if for troops out 
 of the country, will not leave you a guinea ; which will, therefore, 
 render you a slave or a bankrupt ; a military province of England, 
 or a beggar — indeed both : for though I do not think the means of 
 this country are unequal to every necessary expense, j'et I do think 
 they are inadequate to that contributary expense which the Union 
 
(500 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 stipuiiifcs. I do think they are unequal to a war conti-il)ution of 
 £4,800,000 per annum ; and I think the Jittenipt will exhaust this 
 countiy, at the same time that it enslaves her. Color it as you 
 please, she will pay more than she is able ; and she will pay for a 
 force, not to protect, but to eiishnc. 
 
 Do we know that the balance of our trade ^vith all the world is 
 but half a niilliiiu in our favor, and that this half million is to supply 
 the absentee drain of above two millions, which is to be greatly 
 increased by the oiteratiun of the Union, l)y which we are to pay 
 nut only absentee representation, but absentee establishment? Do 
 wc know that even now, when we borrow about £8,000,000 per 
 annum from England, the exchange is greatly against us? Do wo 
 know, that at this very moment, the revenue has fallen £800,000? 
 
 — a fall which could only be occasional, if your constitution wero 
 suffered to continue ; but, if the Union and its new drain, contribu- 
 tions, discontents, military government, and military luaxims shall 
 succeed, is ominous and alarming. Knowing all these, what have 
 we done? We have overrated our country in wealth, to overrate- 
 her in contribution, to apply that contribution to the maintenance of 
 a military, to take away her liberty. I speak of the jjroposed war 
 establishment. What is the proposed peace establishment? — one- 
 third greater than past peace establishments. Why one-third 
 greater? The increased pay of 15,000 men, the peace establishment 
 of a militia of 17,000 men, the skelctcm of the yeoman corps, will 
 not account for an increase of one-third, namely, of half a million. 
 No ground whatever has been laid for it, except, indeed, a certain, 
 hint that it may be expedient to mention. In piMiee, an army iu 
 Ireland of 20,000 — we understand that perfectly —an Union army 
 
 — a military establishment in peace; and a rebellion establishment 
 in war : in fact, an army not for the people of Ireland, but put upon 
 them, not to protect them, but to protect the i)rojccts of the minister 
 against them. 'Tis true, it has been said, that England will pay 
 this additional expense; but what is that? The English minister 
 will make his country assist in the subjugation of the Irish by force 
 of arms; there is no great compliment in this: l)ut rely on it, that 
 Ireland, like every enslaved country, Avill ultimately be compelled 
 to pay for her own subjugation ; robbery and taxes ever follow con- 
 quest ; the country that loses her liberty, loses her revenues. 
 
HENEY GRATTAN. 601 
 
 Iiut, if the terms of the financial part of the Union were as liene- 
 ficial as they are injurious, it would be of little moment; for there 
 is an article, that whenever the minister shall raise the debt of 
 Ireland to an amount which shall be as the jn-oportion of two to 
 fifteen in relation to the permanent debt of England (in three j'cars 
 of war they tell you they will do it), then you arc to be taxed as 
 much as England. Considering then the terms of the Union, as far 
 as they relate to revenue, they amount to a continuation of the 
 double establishment, an increase of the separate establishments, 
 and a military government, with a prospect of soon succeeding to 
 the full taxes of England. 
 
 As to conmierce, the terms are short .and simiilc — to ab.ate those 
 duties which you thought necessary for the protection of yonr manu- 
 factures ; that's all ! Are ihc manufacturers of glass, of iron-ware, 
 are the brewers, the hosiers, the saddlers, the manufacturers of 
 cotton, obliged to you for that? Did they petition parliament for 
 it? have they not petitioned parliament against it? Who is it then 
 that calls for it? The Irish manufacturer? — No. The Irish con- 
 sumer? — No. The Irish Parliament? — No. Who then? — The 
 British minister, who does not indeed petition, but exacts it of the 
 Irish Parliament, who, at the same time, are called on to surrender 
 themselves, their power, .and their being. All duties below ten per 
 cent, to be taken off; all duties above it to be reduced to that stand- 
 ard for twenty years, and theu to be abolished in lolo. Calico is 
 respited for a few years. Why do you deprive calico of the advan- 
 tage of being unprotected for those few years? Why; but because 
 it is of no advantage, but the contrary ; and you have thought it 
 a matter of mercy to let the persons engaged in that trade gradually 
 withdraw. Here is the commercial benelit, the commerce which wo 
 are to get fin* our constitution ; fen- 3H)u do not say, that it is a 
 material privilege to be permitted to export to England onv cotton 
 and woollen cloth. Would it be a great privilege to permit England 
 to export Burgundy into France? Even the privilege of importing 
 wool, the British minister has told J'ou, will be of no use to you; 
 he is, I believe right ; there is nothing he gives, there is nothing in 
 trade which he can give, that will be of any use to you. I do not 
 pretend to decide whether these advantages will prove the ruin of 
 3'our manufacturers ; but I do venture to decide, that they will not 
 
€02 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 he of any use to them. Besides, what arc the commercial terms? 
 Such as you conlcl give yourselves without an Union, if you did not 
 think them mischievous; what, then, are tiie terms, financial and 
 commercial? The increase of j'our taxes of incumbrance, and the 
 jibatcment of your duties of protection ; a surrender, not a compen- 
 sation ; evidences of conquest ; such terms as a nation must expect 
 that surrenders her constitution. 
 
 From the bad terms which attend the Union, I am naturally led 
 to the foul means by which it has been obtained — dismissals from 
 office — perversions of the place bill — sale of peerage — purchase 
 of I)oroughs — appointment of sheriffs with a view to prevent the 
 meetings of freemen and freeholders for the purpose of expressing 
 their opinions on the subject of a Legislative Union — in short, the 
 most avowed corruption, threats, and stratagems, accompanied by 
 martial hiw, to deprive a nation of her liberty ; and so vciy great 
 and beneficial have been the efforts, that His Majesty's ministers 
 have actually resorted to a partial dissolution </f parliament at the 
 very time they declined to resort to a general election ; the sense of 
 parliament and people was against them ; they change, therefore, 
 the parliament without recurring to the peoi)le, but procure a 
 number of I'cturns, exceeding their present majority, from private 
 boroughs, vacated with a view to return a court member, who should 
 succeed a gentleman that would not vote for the Union ; here, then, 
 is a parliament made b}^ the minister, not the jjcople ; and made for 
 the question. Under these circumstances, in opposition to the 
 declared sense of the country, has been passed a measure imposing 
 on the people a new coiistitutii>n, and subverting the old one. 
 
 Tiie good consequences of this measure iiave been boldly prophe- 
 sied ; I own I see them not. Tranquillity arising from the suppres- 
 sion of parliament ; manufacturers flourishing from the want of 
 protection, these excellent cousecjuences are, at best, but problemat- 
 ical ; the ceasing of political topics with the ceasing of the assembly 
 wherein they might be regularly or decorously deliberated, is v.n 
 expectation very pious, jjcrhaps, but very fond and very presump- 
 tuous. Do you seriously think that when 3'ou take away the forms 
 of liberty, you take away tlic spirit of libert}'? Do you tliink, fur 
 instance, that the Catholic will become insensible to the privileges of 
 a free constitution, because a Protestant Parliament has renounced 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. (503 
 
 them? Do jou think Protestant and Catholic will become insensible 
 to the necessity of representation, because they lost their freedom by 
 the want of it? Do you think that a minister, that any set of men 
 in league with a minister, can, with the institution, sink, smother, 
 and put out the very essence, soul, and light of libertj'? It may bo 
 so; I do not believe it. Eecollect again, that this tranquillity and 
 tliis commerce predicted to follow the Union, are, at best, paradoxi- 
 cal and remote ; but that the evil consequences predicted are imme- 
 diate and certain, namely, the war contribution of near £5,000,000, 
 the diminution of your landed capital, the absence of your landed 
 proprietors, the abatement of your protecting duties, the surrender 
 of a solid revenue, the increase of ^-our benelit by a borough loan, 
 and the subversion of your constitution. Those gentlemen who, 
 for what they call tranquillity, in their speculations, are ready to 
 sacrifice the labors, the honor, and the freedom of their country, 
 may find that they have lost the liberty, but have not secured the 
 repose. Let me add, that the most decided friends, who deserve 
 respect, have not gone farther than to say, that its consequences 
 cannot be foreseen. 
 
 The minister of Britain (Mr. Pitt) has spoken again in its favor. 
 His iirst speech is a record of inanity ; the merit of his second is, to 
 liave abandoned the defence of the first. The inundation of capital 
 from the increase of absentees, the visit of Fnitish manufacturers 
 from the increase of taxes, the abatement of i)rotccting duties, and 
 the diminution of the number of consumers, civilization arising from 
 the absence of the gentry, from the corruption of ihe higher orders 
 (never was minister more profligate), from the debasement of the 
 lower order by the application of terror, civilization arising from the 
 regular pi'actices of administration to destroy public virtue, and to 
 render the evils base and false of every order and degree. The 
 political blessings arising from these causes, which overflowed in the 
 first speech, have, in the minister's sccdiid speech, prudentlj^ and 
 considerately, like any other folly of the day, vanished and evapo- 
 rated. Argument seems to have taken a new post; it is no longer 
 industry of the manufacturer, it is now a more pleasurable plan ; 
 luxury and consumer ; such has been the turn of talk and trifling here. 
 "England will furnish everytiiing for money; she will take your 
 rent, and suj)piy manufactures for your acconnnodation ; what signi- 
 
(JOi TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 fics wliicli country supplies the article, since yon are one people?" 
 In the same way it is said : " What signifies the number of Irish rep- 
 resentatives, since yon are one people? and, therefore, let them be- 
 so fcAV as to bo merged in the representation of Great Britain." 
 Again, it is said: "What signifies where the army is quartered, 
 wiiethcr in ISritain or in Ireland, since you are one people?" and, 
 therefore, let the troops be in Ireland, and the manufactures he in 
 Great Britain ! 
 
 Tlie advantages predicted in revenue, like those in commerce, 
 vanish also ; the magnificent million of the speech of the Irish Secre- 
 tary, docs not appear in the second oration of the British minister. 
 He had indeed assumed a certain air of astonishment at the surmise,^ 
 that Ih'ilain sought to obtain revenue from other countries. He suf- 
 fered his minister hei-e to go a little farther, and to teach us to think 
 that Englimd was impatient to get rid of revenue ; that her turn now 
 was to buy up constitutions; that she had l)ecome a chapn)an and 
 dealer in liberty, and was willing to pay Ireland for her parliament, 
 half a million in peace, and one million per annum in ^vav. I 
 doubted the fact, for I had not forgotten the American war ; I had 
 not forgotteu the American Stamp Act; I had not forgotten Mr. G. 
 Greiiviiic's pamplilet, containing a proposal to tax Ireland as well as 
 America; I had not forgotten the proposal of the present minister ot 
 England, contained in one of the propositions of 1785, namely, that 
 the surplus of the hereditary I'evenue should go to England. When, 
 therefore, the same minister, in a state of tenfold distress, disclaimed 
 revenue, and when the minister here averred that England was ta 
 pay a contribution to Ireland, I did not believe either; but when the 
 former now disavows the latter, and, in his second speech as printed, 
 he is made to say, that Ireland is to pay pretty much what she does 
 now ; that is to say, not as the minister here said, a million less, but 
 above fcmr times as much as she paid in any former war, and many 
 times as much as she is able, and such an expense as the rebellion, 
 not the war, produced ; I say, when the minister sets forth such as 
 our contribution hereafter, he does renounce all benefits predicted in 
 finance, with as much candor as he abandons all benefits predicted in 
 commerce, to result from his fatal measure of Union. His second 
 speech, in short, deserts the boast of beneficial terms, and coiitincs 
 itself to errors and misrepresentations of another kind, which are 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. (305 
 
 there to bo found in very great abundance. Ho sets forth that the 
 Irish constitution is the cause of our misfortunes.; his friends have 
 stated the same thing, and have said, that they cannot administer the 
 country on her revenues or under her constitution ; and suih an 
 argument in him and in them is modestly urged to banish the parlia- 
 ment.and to retain the ministry. Never was it known in a country 
 that i-etaincd a trace of liberty, that a minister of the Crown Mas 
 suflered to impeach the constitution of the reahn. Suppose ho were 
 to say : — 
 
 "I cannot administer a monarchical constitution ; therefore l)anisli 
 the king;" or, "I cannot administer an aristocratic constitution; 
 therefore banish the house of Lords." What, in fact, docs the min- 
 ister say, Avho uses tliis argimieut, but that his system M"as a griev- 
 ance, as was predicted by part of his colleagues, wlio said they toolc 
 office to reform it ; that it was not fit for a free people ; that it would 
 produce a civil war; that the public sale of honors, that his noiori- 
 ous attempts to pack parliament, that the violence of some of iiis 
 agents in this country, that his selection of pers(nis for Irish affairs, 
 who were nither panders than politicians, would aid the growth ot 
 French principles, and produce insurgency? Let us, however, c'ivc 
 the minister every advantage ; let us receive his charge, and try the 
 constitution. He will please to show by what act she produced tlic 
 rebellion; the mere co-existence of a constitution and a rel)t'llion 
 docs not convict the former; it Avill be necessary for the accuser to 
 specify facts, and it will be necessary for him to show, tirst, tliat 
 these facts sprung out of parliament ; second, that these facts pro- 
 duced the rel)clli()n. His friends have advanced two facts, the 
 reform of parliament, and the emancipation of the Catholics ; but it 
 will be recollected, that parliament was not tlic autlior of cither of 
 these questions, and it will be recollected also, that in the report of 
 the two Houses, formed by the friends of the minis! er, it is declared, 
 that neither of these questions was the cause of the rebellion, for 
 there it is said, that neither of these questions was an oi)jcct to the 
 people. Thus is the constitution acquitted, and acquitted by the 
 very ministry who prefer the charge. They have conliiicd their 
 charge to tw"o questions; and tluy have declared these (juestions 
 did nut interest the people; and these questions, it is known, did 
 not spring from the parliament. 
 
606 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 They have affected to try the constitution. Let us now try them ; 
 and I ask whether their own measures might not have caused the 
 rebellion? AV'hether the sale of peerages, as notoriously took place 
 in 1789 and 1790, by the then ministers of the crown, for the pur- 
 pose of procuring seats in the commons for tbe dependents of the 
 Castle, might not have destroyed in Ireland the credit of J3ritish 
 government? 
 
 I ask, whether the attempt to pack the Irish Parliament, as was 
 notoriously practised in 1789 and 1790, by the then minister of the 
 crown in Ireland, might not have sunk the credit of British govern- 
 ment? I ask, whether the profligate avowal of that profligate prac- 
 tice by a profligate minister of the crown, might not have sunk the 
 credit of British government? I ask not, whether the introduction 
 of the question of Parliamentary Reform could have sunk the credit 
 of British government ; but I do ask, whether the introduction and 
 the apostacy from that question, might not have helped to sink the 
 credit of British government? I ask, whether the introduction of 
 the Catholic question in Great Britain in 1792 ; whether the opjiosi- 
 tion given to the Catholic franchise by the Irish government in 
 1792 ; whether the assent given to the petition for that franchise by 
 the English ministry in 1793 ; whether the abuse and Billingsgate 
 accompanying that assent, and uttered by the Irish ministry at that 
 time ; whether the adoption of the pretensions of the Catholics by 
 the English ministry at the close of 1794 ; whether the rejection of 
 those pretensions, and the recall of a lord-lioutennnt, because with 
 the ministry's knowledge and acquiescence he honored those preten- 
 sions ; whether the selection of persons for distinguished trust, who 
 had distinguished themselves by a perpetual abuse of the Iiish, and 
 who were notoriously hostile, and who since have acknowledged 
 their hostility by a conspiracy against the parliamentarj' constitution 
 of their country ; I ask, I say, Avhether such a conduct, so incoher- 
 ent, so irritating, so violent, so temporizing, so corrupt, might not 
 Lave very much aided the efforts of France in sinking the character 
 of British government? I ask those questions, and I do say, if ever 
 the causes of the late rebellion shall be dispassionately discussed, the 
 great, originating, and fundamental cause, will be found in the aver- 
 sion of His Miijesty's ministry to the independency of the Irish Par- 
 liament, and their efforts to subvert the same. 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. (J07 
 
 We follow the minister. In defence of his plan of Union, he tells 
 us the number of Irish representatives in the British Parliament is of 
 little consequence. This <loctriue is new, namely, that between two 
 nations the comparative influence is of no moment. According to 
 this, it would be of no moment what should be the number of tho 
 British Parliament. No, says the minister ; the alteration is to bo 
 limited to the Irish Parliament ; the number and fabric of the British 
 is to remain entire, unaltered, and unalterable. Wliat now becomes 
 of the argument of mutual and rccipi'ocal change? or what does the 
 new argument avow, but what we maintained and the court denied, 
 that tlie Union was, with respect to Ii'clnnd, a mergerof her parliament 
 in the legislature of the other, without creating any materitd alteration 
 therein, save as far as it advanced thd influence of the crown, dii'ect 
 or indirect. 
 
 The minister goes on, and supposes one hundred Irish will be suffi- 
 cient, because he supposes any number would be sufficient ; and he 
 supposes any number Avould be sufficient, because the nations are 
 idcnlifled. Thus he speaks, as if identification was at once a cause 
 to flow from representation, and an event whiqh peceded it. You 
 arc one people, such is his argument, because you are represented, 
 and what signifies how, or, indeed, whether you be represented? 
 But the fact is, that you are identified (if you be identified, which I 
 den}) in the single point of representation, and that representation 
 is absorbed in the superior numbers of the English Parliament, and 
 that apparent identification is, of coui'se, lost, while you remain a 
 distinct country, distinct in interest, revenue, law, finance, com- 
 merce, government. Suppose Yorkshire governed by a lord-lieu- 
 tenant and by a diflerent code of law, she would not be a part of 
 England, but a province of Great Britain ; 1)ut now the martial law 
 of Scotland must be the martial law of Englajid ; and therefore the 
 constitutional sympathy of England defends and renders the number 
 of her representatives less essential ; but the martial law of -Ireland 
 is not the martial law of England ; the military government of Ire- 
 land is not the military government of England, and therefore the 
 constitutional sympathy of England docs not defend Ireland, but, 
 on the contrar}', the imperial jealousy of England endangers Ireland, 
 and has taught the councils of Britain to think that our servitude is 
 our safety. 
 
COS TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 "It is matter of no moment what arc the nnml)cr of Irish repre- 
 sentatives, provided that they be sufEcient to state the wants, and 
 watch over the interest of their country." So do the public prints 
 make the minister speak. Why! three men are sufEcient for that 
 purpose — one man could do it — a irentleman seated at the bar could 
 do it ; the American agents did that l>ef(>re the American war. But 
 the minister is made to add another provision, which makes his doc- 
 ti'inc less answerable in point of meaning, leaving it without anj- 
 meaning at all — "provided that the numbers be sufEcient to protect 
 the rights of the country." But, indeed, Mhen he afterwards ex- 
 plains what protection those rights ai-e to receive, then he sets j'our 
 mind at case — pi'otectiou against Jacobinism ; that's the only point, 
 and that could bo accomplished without a single representative — 
 without a parliament ; an absolute monarch could do that ; martial 
 law will do that ; James the Second would have done it. But are 
 there no popular rights ? Is liberty gone out of the calendar ? Order, 
 government, they are indispensable, but are they the whole? This 
 is new doctrine in these coiuitries, very familiar to a minister, but 
 very fatal to a free people. He confines the purposes of Irish repre-- 
 sentation to two objects ; first, watching and stating, which only re- 
 quires one representative ; secondly, protection against Jacobinism, 
 which requires no representative whatever. He then proceeds to 
 ask himself a question extremely natural after such reasoning; what 
 security has Ireland? He answers, with great candor, honor. Eng- 
 lish honor. Now, when the liberty and security of one country 
 depend on the honor of another, the latter may have much honor, 
 but the former can have no liberty. To depend on the honor of 
 another country, is to depend on (he will ; and to depend on the Avill 
 of another country, is the definition of slavery. "Depend on my 
 honor," said Charles the First, when he trifled about the petition of 
 right : " I will trust the people with the custody of their own liberty, 
 but I will trust no people with the custody of any liberty other than 
 their own, whether that people be Eome, Athens, or Britain." 
 
 Observe how the minister speaks of that countiy which is to de- 
 pend hereafter on British honor, which, in his present power, is, in 
 fact, his honor. " We had to contend with the leaders of the Prot- 
 estants, 'enemies to government;' the violent and inflamed spirit of 
 the Catholics ; the disappointed ambition of those who would ruin 
 
, HENRY GRATTAN. GO!) 
 
 the country becauye they could not ho the rulers of it." Behold the 
 character he gives of tlie enemies of the Union, namely, of twentj^- 
 onc counties convened at public meetings by due notice ; of several 
 other counties tiiat have petitioned ; of most of the great cities and 
 towns, or indeed of almost all the Irish, save a very few mistaken 
 men, and that body whom government could influence. Thus the 
 minister utters a national proscription at the moment of his projected 
 Union : he excludes by personal abuse from the possibility of iden- 
 tification, all the enemies of the Union, all the friends of the parlia- 
 mentary constitution of 1782, that great body of the Irish, he abuses 
 them with a petulance more befitting one of his Irish ministers, than 
 an exalted character, and infinitely more disgraceful to himself than 
 to them ; one would think one of his Irish railers had lent him their 
 vulgar clarion to bray at the people. 
 
 This union of parliaments, this proscription of people, he follows 
 by a declaration wherein he misrepresents their sentiments as he had 
 before traduced their reputation. After a calm and mature conside- 
 ration, the people have pronounced their judgment in favor of an 
 Union ; of which assertion not one single syllabic has any existence 
 in fact, or in the appearance of fact, and I appeal to the petitions of 
 twenty-one counties publicly convened, and to the other petitions of 
 other counties numerously signed, and to those of the great towns and 
 cities. To affirm that the judgment of a nation is erroneous may 
 mortify, but to affirm that her judgment against is for; to assert that 
 she has said aye when she has pronounced no; to affect to refer a 
 great question to the people ; finding the sense of the people, like 
 that of the parliament, against the question, to force the question ; 
 to affirm the sense of the people to be for the question ; to affirm 
 that the question is persisted in because the sense of the people is for 
 it ; to make the falsification of her sentiments the foundation of her 
 rnin and the ground of the Union ; to affirm that her parliament, 
 constitution, liberty, honor, j'l'operty, are taken away by her own 
 authority; there is, in such artifice, an effrontery, a hardihood, an 
 insensibility, that can best be answered by sensations of astonishment 
 and disgust, excited on this occasion by the British minister, whether 
 he speaks in gross and total ignorance of the truth, or in shameless 
 and supreme contempt for it. 
 
 The constitution may be for a time so lost ; the character of the 
 
610 TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 country cannot be lost. The ministers of the crown will, or may 
 perhaps at length find that it is not so easy to put down for ever an 
 ancient and respectable nation, by abilities, however great, and by 
 power and by corruption, however irresistible ; liberty may repair her 
 golden beams, and with redoubled heat animate the country ; the cry 
 of loyalty will not long continue against the principles of liberty ; 
 loyalty is a noble, a judicious, and a capacious principle ; but in 
 these countries loyalty, distinct from liberty, is corruption, not 
 loyalty. 
 
 The cry of the connection will not, in the end, avail against the 
 principles of liberty. Connection is a wise and a profound policy ; 
 but connection witliout an Irish Parliament, is connection without its 
 own principle, without analogy of condition, without the pride of 
 honor that should attend it; is innovation, is peril, is subjugation — 
 not connection. 
 
 The cry of disaffection will not, in the end, avail against the 
 principles of liberty. 
 
 Identification is a solid and imperial maxim, necessary for the 
 preservation of freedom, necessary for that of empire; but, without 
 union of hearts — with a separate government, and without a sepa- 
 rate parliament, identification is extinction, is dishonor, is conquest 
 — not identification. 
 
 Yet I do not give up the country : I see her in a swoon, but she 
 is not dead ; though in her tomb she lies helpless and motionless, 
 still there is on her lips a spirit of life, and on her cheek a glow of 
 beauty — 
 
 " Thou art not conquered; beauty's ensign yet 
 Is ci'imson iu thy lips and in thy cheelis, 
 And death's pale flag is not advanced there." 
 
 While a plank of the vessel sticks together, I will not leave her. 
 Let the courtier present bis flimsy sail, and carry the light bark of 
 his faith with every new breath of wind : I will remain anchored 
 here with fidelity to the fortunes of my country, faithful to her 
 freedom, faithful to her fall. 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. 611 
 
 Invective Against Corry, 
 
 February 14th, 1800. 
 
 |AS the gentleman done ? Has he completely done ? He was 
 WM unparliamentary from the beginning to the end of his speech. 
 *7f There was scarce a word he uttered that was not a violation 
 J. of the privileges of tlie House ; but I did not call him to 
 order — why? because the limited talents of some men render it 
 impossible for them to be severe without being unparliamentarj'. 
 But before I sit down I shall show him how to be severe and parlia- 
 mentary at the same time. On any other occasion I should think 
 myself justifiable in treating with silent contempt auything which 
 miglit fall from that honorable member ; but there are times when 
 the insignificance of the accuser is lost in the magnitude of the accu- 
 sation. I know the difficulty the honorable gentleman labored 
 under when he attacked me, conscious that, on a comparative view 
 of our characters, public and private, there is nothing he could say 
 which would injure me. The public would not believe the charge. 
 I despise the falsehood. If such a charge were made by an honest 
 man, I would answer it in the manner I shall do before I sit down. 
 But I shall first reply to it when not made by an honest man. 
 
 The right honorable gentleman has called me " an unimpeachcd 
 traitor." I ask, why not "traitor," unqualified by any epithet? I 
 will tell him ; it was because he dare not. It was the act of a cow- 
 ard, who raises his aim to strike, but has not courage to give the 
 blow. I will not call him villain, because it would be unparliamen- 
 tary, and he is a privy counsellor. I will not call him fool, because 
 he happens to be Chancellor of the Exchequer. But I say he is one 
 who has abused the privilege of parliament and freedom of debate to 
 the uttering language, which, if spoken out of the House, I should 
 
612 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 answer only witli a blow. I care not how high his situation, how 
 low his characler, how contemptible his speech ; whether a privy 
 counsellor or a parasite, my answer Avould be a blow. He has 
 charged me with being connected with the rebels : the charge is 
 utterly, totally, and meanly false. Does the honorable gentleman 
 rely on the report of the House of Lords for the foundation of his 
 assertion ? If he docs, I can prove to the committee there was a 
 physical impossibility of that repoi't being true. But I scorn to 
 answer any man for my conduct, whether he be a political coxcomb, 
 or whether he brought himself into power by a false glare of courage 
 or not. I scorn to answer any wizard of the Castle throwing himself 
 into fantastical airs. But 'if an honorable and independent man 
 were to make a charge against me, I would say : " You charge me 
 with having an intercourse with the rebels, and you found your 
 charge upon what is said to have appeared before a committee of the 
 Lords. Sir, the report of that committee is totally and cgregiously 
 irregular." I will read a letter from Mr. Nelson, who had been 
 examined l)efore that committee ; it states that what the report 
 represents him as having spoken, is notiohat he said. [Mr. Grattan 
 here i-eada letter from Mr. Nelson, denying that he had any connec- 
 tion with Mr. Grattan as charged in the report ; and concluding 
 by sa3'ing, " never was misrejiresenlatlon more vile (han that ^jm< into 
 my moulli by the rejiort."'] 
 
 From the situation that I held, and from the connections I had in 
 the city of Dublin, it was necessary for me to hold intercourse with 
 various descriptions of persons. The right honorable member might 
 as well have been charged with a participation in the guilt of those 
 traitors ; for he had communicated with some of those very jiersons 
 on the subject of parliamentary reform. The Irish government, 
 too, were in communication with some of them. 
 
 The riglit honorable member has told me I desei'ted a profession 
 where wealth and station wei'e the reward of industry and talent. If 
 I mistake not, that gentleman endeavored to obtain those rewards 
 by the same means ; but he soon deserted the occupation of a barris- 
 ter for those of a parasite and pander. He fled from the labor of 
 study to flatter at the table of the great. He found the lord's parlor 
 a better sphere for his exertions than the hall of the Four Courts ; 
 the house of a great man a more convenient way to jiower and to 
 
HENRY GRATTAN. G13 
 
 place ; and that it was easier for a statesman of middling talents to 
 sell his friends, than for a lawyer of no talents to sell his clients. 
 
 For mj'self, whatever corporate or other bodies have said or done 
 to me, 1 from the bottom of my heart forgive them. I feel I have 
 done too much for my country to be vexed at them. I would rather 
 that they should not feel or acknowledge what I have clone for them, 
 and call me traitor, than have i-eason to say I sold them. I will 
 always defend myself against the assassin ; but with large bodies it 
 is different. To the people I will bow : they may be my enemy — 
 I never shall be theirs. 
 
 At the emancipation of Ireland, in 1782, I took a leading part in 
 the foundation of that constitution which is now endeavored to be 
 destroyed. Of that constitution I was the author ; in that constitu- 
 tion I glory ; and for it the honorable gentleman should bestow 
 praise, not invent calumny. Notwithstanding my weak state of 
 body, I come to give my last testimony against this Union, so fatal 
 to the liberties and interests of my country. I come to make com- 
 mon cause with these honorable and virtuous gentlemen around me ; 
 to try and save the constitution ; or if not to save the constitution, 
 at least to save our characters, and remove from our graves the foul 
 disgrace of standing apart while a deadly blow is aimed at the inde- 
 pendence of our country. 
 
 The right honorable gentleman says I fled from the country after 
 exciting reljellion, and that I have returned to raise another. No 
 such thing. Tlie charge is false. The civil war had not commenced 
 when I left the kingdom ; and I could not have returned without 
 taking a part. On the one side there was the camp of the rebel ; 
 on the other, the camp of the minister, a greater traitor than that 
 rebel. The stronghold of the constitution was nowhere to be found. 
 I agree that the reljel who rises against the government should have 
 suffered ; but I missed on the scaffold the right honorable gentleman. 
 Two desperate parties were in arms against the constitution. The 
 right honorable gentleman belonged to orie of those parties, and 
 deserved death. I could not join the rebel — I could not join the 
 government — I could not join torture — I could not join half-hang- 
 ing — I could not join free quarter — I could take part with neither. 
 I was therefore absent from a scene where I could not be active 
 without self-reproach, nor indifferent with safety. 
 
614 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Many honorable gentlemen thought differently from me : I respect 
 their opinions, but I keep my own ; and I think now, as I thought 
 then, that the treason of the minister against the liberties of the people 
 was infinitely worse than the rebellion of the 2:)eople against the 
 minister. 
 
 I have returned, not as the right honorable member has said, to 
 raise another storm ; I have returned to discharge an honorable 
 debt of gratitude to my country, that conferred a great reward for 
 past services, which, I am proud to say, was not greater than my 
 desert. I have returned to protect that constitution, of which I was 
 the pai-ent and the founder, from the assassination of such men as 
 the honorable gentlemen and his unworthy associates. They are 
 corrupt ; they are seditious ; and they, at this very moment, are in 
 a conspiracy against their country. I have returned to refute a 
 libel as false as it is malicious, given to the public under the appella- 
 tion of a report of a committee of the Lords. Here I stand ready 
 for impeachment or trial ; I dare accusation. I dety the honorable 
 gentleman ; I defy the government ; I defy their whole phalanx ; let 
 them come forth. I tell the ministers I will neither give them 
 quarter nor take it. I am here to lay the shattered remains of my 
 constitution on the floor of this House in defence of the liberties of 
 my country. 
 
SPEECHES, 
 
 Daniel O'Connell, M. P. 
 
 [615] 
 
Speech at Limerick, I812 
 
 Ip FEEL it my duty, as a professed agitator, to address the 
 f^ meeting. It is merely in the exercise of my office of agitation, 
 l^r" that I think it necessary to say a fewwords. For any purpose 
 i of ilkistration or argument, further discourse is useless : all 
 the topics which the present period suggested, have been treated of 
 ■with sound judgment, and a rare felicity of diction, by my respected 
 and talented friend (Mr. Eoche) ; all J shall do is, to add a few 
 observations to what has fallen from that gentleman ; and whilst I 
 sincerely admire the happy style in which he has treated those sub- 
 jects, I feel deep regret at being unable to imitate his excellent 
 discourse. 
 
 And, tirst, let me concur with him in congratulating the Catholics 
 of Limerick on the progress our great cause has made since we were 
 last assembled. Since that period our cause has not rested for sup- 
 port on the cftbrts of those alone who were immediately interested ; 
 no, our Protestant brethren throughout the land have added their 
 zealous exeiiions for our emancipation. They have, with admirable 
 patriotism, evinced their desire to conciliate by serving us, and I am 
 sure I do but justice to the Catholics, when I pi'oclaim our gratitude, 
 as written on our hearts, and to be extinguished only with our lives. 
 
 Nor has the support and the zeal of our Protestant brethren been 
 vain and baiTcn. No, it has been productive of great and solid ad- 
 vantages ; it has procured, for the cause of religious liberty, the 
 respect even of the most bigoted of our opponents ; it has struck 
 down English prejudice ; it has convinced the mistaken honest ; it 
 has terrified the hypocritical knaves : and finally, it has pronounced 
 for us, by a great and triumphant majority, from one of the branches 
 of the legislature, the distinct i-ecognition of the propriety and the 
 necessity of conceding justice to the great body of the Irish people. 
 
 (617) 
 
(318 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Let us, therefore, rejoice in our mutual success ; let us rejoice in 
 the near approach of freedom ; let us rejoice in the prospect of soon 
 shaking off our chains, and of the speedy extinction of our griev- 
 ances. But above all, let us rejoice at the means by which these 
 happy effects have been produced ; let us doubly rejoice, because 
 they afford no triumph to any part of the Irish nation over the other 
 — that they are not the result of any contention among ourselves ; 
 but constitute a victory, obtained for the Catholics by the Protest- 
 ants — that they prove the liberality of the one, and require the 
 eternal gratitude of the other — that they prove and promise the 
 eternal dissolution of ancient animosities and domestic feuds, and 
 afford to every Christian and to every patriot, the cheering certainty 
 of seeing peace, harmony, and benevolence prevail in that country, 
 ■where a wicked and perverted policy has so long and so fatally 
 jDropagated and encouraged dissension, discord, and rancor. 
 
 We owe it to the liberality of the Irish Protestants — to the zeal of 
 the Irish Presbyterians — to the fi-iendly exertion- of the Irish Quak- 
 ers ; we owe, to the cordial re-union of every sect and denomination 
 of Irish Christians, the progress of our cause. Tliey have i)i-ocured 
 for us the solemn and distinct promise and pledge of the House of 
 Commons — they almost obtained for us a similar declaration from 
 the House of Lords. It was lost by the petty majority of one — it 
 was lost by a majority, not of those who listened to the absurd 
 prosings of Lord Eldon, to the bigoted and turbid declamation of 
 that English Chief Justice, whose sentiments so forcibly recall the 
 memor}^ of the star-chamber ; not of those who were able to com- 
 pare the vapid or violent folly of the one partj^ with the states- 
 man-like sentiments, the profound arguments, the splendid eloquence 
 of the jNIarquis Wellesley. Not of those who heard the i-easonings 
 of our other illustrious advocates ; but by a majority of men who 
 acted upon preconceived opinions, or, from a distance, carried into 
 effect their bigotry, or, perhaps, worse propensities — who availed 
 themselves of that absurd jirivilcge of the peerage, Avhich enables 
 those to decide who have not heard — which permits men to pro- 
 nounce upon subjects they have not discussed — and allows a final 
 determination to precede argument. 
 
 It was not, however, to this privilege alone, that our want of suc- 
 cess was to be attributed. The very principle upon which the present 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. (519 
 
 administration has been formed, was brought into immediate action, 
 and with success ; for, in the latter periods of the present reign, 
 «very administration has had a distiuct principle upon which it was 
 formed, and which serves the historian to explain all its movements. 
 Thus, the principle of the Pitt administration was — to deprive the 
 people of all share in the government, and to vest all power and au- 
 thority in the crown. In short, Pitt's views amounted to unqualified 
 despotism. This great object he steadily pursued through his ill- 
 starred career. It is true he encouraged commerce, but it was for 
 the purposes of taxation ; and he used taxation for the purposes of 
 •corruption ; he assisted the merchants, as long as he could, to grow 
 rich, and they lauded him ; he bought the people with their own 
 money, and they praised him. Each succeeding day produced some 
 new inroad on the constitution; and the alarm which he excited, by 
 reason of the I)lood3' woi-kings of the French revolution, enabled him 
 to rule the land with uncontrolled swaj^ ; he had bequeathed to his 
 successor the accumulated power of the crown — a power which 
 must be great, if it can sustain the nojientities of the present admin- 
 istration. 
 
 The principle of Pitt's administration was despotism ; the principle 
 of Perceval's administration was peculating bigotry — bigoted pecu- 
 lation ! In the name of the Lord he plundered the people. Pious 
 and enlightened statesman ! he would take their money only for the 
 good of their souls. 
 
 The principle of the present administration is still more obvious. 
 It has unequivocally disclosed itself in all its movements — it is 
 simple and single — it consists in falsehood. Falsehood is the bond 
 and link that connects this ministry in office. Some of them pretend 
 to be our friends ; you know it is not true ; they are only our worse 
 enemies for the hypocrisy. They declare that the Catholic question 
 is no longer opposed by the cabinet — that it is left to the discretion 
 of each individual retainer. The fact is otherwise — and their 
 retainers, though not commanded, as formerly, are carefully advised 
 to vote against us. 
 
 The minister. Lord Castlereagh, is reported to have said in the 
 House of Commons, that in the year 1797 and 1798, there was no 
 torture in Ireland, to the knowledge of government ! Is it really 
 possible that such an assertion was used ? You hear it with aston- 
 
620 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ishment. All Ireland must sliudcler, that any man could be found 
 thus to assert. Good God ! of what materials must that man be made 
 who could say so ? I restrain my indignation ; I withhold all ex- 
 pressions of surprise ; the simple statement that such an assertion 
 was used, exceeds, in reply, the strongest language of reprobation. 
 But there is no man so stupid as not to recognize the principle which 
 I have so justly attributed to this administration. 
 
 What ! No torture ! Great God ! No torture ! Within the walls 
 of your city was there no torture? Could not Colonel Verckcr have 
 informed Lord Castlcrcagh, that the lash resounded in the streets 
 even of Limerick, and that the human groan assailed the wearied ear 
 of humanity ? Yet I am ready to give the gallant colonel every 
 credit he deserves ; and, therefore, I recall to your grateful recollec- 
 tion tlie day when he risked his life to punish one of the instruments 
 of torture. Colonel Vcreker can tell whether it be not true, that iu 
 the streets of your city, the servant of his relation, Mrs. Rosslewen, 
 ■was not tortured — whether he was not tortured first, for the crime 
 of having expressed a single sentiment of compassion, and next 
 because Colonel Vereker interfered for him. 
 
 But there is an additional fact which is not so generally known, 
 which, perhaps. Colonel Vcreker himself does not know, and which 
 I have learned from a highly respectable clergyman, that this sad 
 victim of the system of torture, which Lord Castlereagli denied, was, 
 at the time he was scourged, in an infirm state of health; that the 
 flogging inflicted on him deprived him of all understanding, and that 
 within a few months he died insane, and without having recovered a 
 shadow of reason. 
 
 But why, out of the myriads of victims, do I select a solitary 
 instance? Because he was ix native of your city, and his only 
 offence an expression of compassion. I might tell you, did you not 
 alread}' know it, that in Dublin there were, for weeks, tiiree 
 permanent triangles, constantly supplied with the victims of a 
 promiscuous choice made by the army, the yeomanry, the police 
 constables, and the Orange lodges ; that the shrieks of the tortured 
 must have literally resounded in the state apartments of the 
 Castle ; and that along by the gate of the Castle yard, a human 
 being, naked, tarred, feathered, with one ear cut ofl", and the blood 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. ' g21 
 
 streaming from his lacerated back, has been hunted by a troop of 
 barbariaus ! 
 
 AVh}'' do I disgust you with these horrible recollections ? You 
 want not the proof of the principle of delusion on which the present 
 administration exists. In your own afi'airs you have abundant evi- 
 dence of it. Tlie fact is, that the proxies in the Lords would never 
 have produced a majority even of one against Lord Wellesley's 
 motion, but for the exertion of the vital principle of the administra- 
 tion. The ministry got the majority of one. The pious Lord Eldon, 
 ■with all his conscience and his calculations, and that immaculate dis- 
 tributor of criminal justice, Lord Ellenborough, were in a majority 
 of. one. By what holy means think you? Why, by the aid of that 
 which cannot be described in dignified language — by the aid of a lie 
 
 — a false, positive, palpable lie ! 
 
 This manoeuvre was resorted to — a scheme worthy of its authors 
 
 — they had perceived the effects of the manly and dignified resolu- 
 tions of the 18th of June. These resolutions had actually terrified 
 our enemies, whilst they cheered those noble and illustrious friends 
 \vho had preferred the wishes and wants of the people of Ireland to 
 the gratification of jxiltry and disgraceful minions. The manoeuvre — 
 the scheme, was calculated to get rid of the efiiect of those resolu- 
 tions, nay, to turn their force against us, and thus was the pious 
 fraud effected. 
 
 There is, you have heard, a newspaper, in the permanent pay of 
 peculation and corruption, printed in London, under the name of 
 the "Courier," a paper worthy the meridian of Constantinople, at 
 its highest tide of despotism. This paper was directed to assert the 
 receipt of a letter from Dublin, from excellent authority, declaring, 
 I know not how many peers, sons of peers, and baronets had retract- 
 ed the resolutions of the 18th of June ; that those resolutions were 
 carried by surprise, and that they had been actually rescinded at a 
 subsequent meeting. 
 
 Never did human baseness invent a more gross untruth ; never 
 did a more unfounded lie fall from the father of falsehood ; never 
 did human turpitude submit to become the vehicle of so " glaring " 
 a dereliction from truth. But the " Courier" I'eceived its pay, and 
 it was ready to earn the wages of its prostitution. It did so — it 
 published the foul falsehoods with the full knowledge of their false- 
 
622 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 hood ; it published them in two editions, the day before and the day 
 of the debute — at a period when inquiry was useless — when a con- 
 tradiction from authority could not arrive ; at that moment this base 
 trick Avas played, through the intervention of that newspaper, upon 
 the British public ! 
 
 Will that public go too far when they charge this impure strata- 
 gem on those whose purposes it served ? Why, even in this coun- 
 try, the administration deems it necessary to give, for the support 
 of one miserable paper, two places — one of live, and the other of 
 eight hundred a year — the stamp duty remitted — the proclama- 
 tions paid for .as advertisements — and a permanent bonus of one 
 thousand pounds per annum ! If the bribe here be so high, what 
 must it be in England, where the toil is so much greater? And, 
 think you, then, that the "Courier" pul)lished, unsanctioned by its 
 paymasters, this useful lie? 
 
 I come now to the next stage in the system of delusion ; it is 
 that which my friend, Mr. O'Neil, has noticed. He has powerfully 
 exposed to you the absurdity of crediting the ministerial news- 
 papers, when they informed j'ou that the member for Limerick had 
 stated in the House of Commons, that the commercial interests of 
 Limerick were opposed to the Catholic claims. Sir, for my part, I 
 entirely agree with Mr. O'Neil ; I am sure Colonel Vereker said no 
 such thing; he is a bravo man, and, therefore, a man of truth; he 
 is probably a pleasant friend, and he has those manly traits about 
 him which make it not unpleasant to oppose him as an enemy ; I 
 like the candor of his character, and our opposition to him should 
 assume the same frankness, and openness, and perfect determina- 
 tion. He well knows that a great part of the commercial interests 
 of Limerick is in the hands of the Catholics — that the Quakers of 
 Limerick, who possess almost the residue of trade, are friendly to 
 us, and that, with the exception of the "tag, rag, and bob-tail" of 
 the corporation, there is not to be found amongst the men who 
 ought to be his constituents a single exception to liberality. 
 
 There remains another delusion ; it is the darling deception of 
 this ministry — that which has reconciled the toleration of Lord 
 Castlcreagh with the intolerance of Lord Liverpool ; it is that 
 which has sanctified the connection between both, and the place- 
 procuring, prayer-mumbling Wilberforce ; it consists in sanctions 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL, 623 
 
 and securities. The Catiiolics may be emancipated, say ministers in 
 public, but they must give securities ; by securities, say the same 
 ministers in private, to their supporting bigots, we mean nothing 
 definite, but something that shall certainly be inconsistent with the 
 Popish religion — nothing shall be a security which they can possi- 
 bly concede — and we shall deceive them and secure you, whilst we 
 carry the air of liberality and toleration. 
 
 And can there be any honest man deceived by the cant and cry 
 for securities ? — is there any man that believes that there is safety 
 in oppression, contumely, and insult, and that security is necessary 
 against protection, liberality and conciliation? — does any man 
 really suppose, that there is no danger from the continuance of 
 unjust grievance and exasperating intolerance ; and that security is 
 wanting against the effects of justice and perfect toleration? Who- 
 is it that is idiot enough to believe that he is quite safe in dissension,, 
 disunion, and animosity ; and wants a protection against harmony,, 
 benevolence, and charity ? — that in hatred there is safety — in affec- 
 tion, ruin? — that now, that we are excluded from the constitution, 
 we may be loyal — but that if we were entrusted, personally, in its 
 safety, we shall wish to destroy it? 
 
 But this is a pitiful delusion : there was, indeed, a time, when 
 " sanctions and securities " might have been deemed necessary — 
 when the Catholic was treated as an enemy to man and to God — 
 when his property was the prey of legalized plunder — his religion 
 and its sacred ministers the object of legalized persecution ! — when, 
 in defiance and contempt of the dictates of justice, and the faith of 
 treaties — and I attest the venerable city in which I stand, that 
 solemn treaties were basely violated — the English faction in the 
 land turned the Protestant into an intolerant and murderous bigot, 
 in order that it might, in security, plunder that very Protestant and 
 oppress his and our common country ! Poor neglected Ireland ! 
 At that period, securities might be supposed wanting; the people 
 of Ireland — the Catholic population of Ireland were then as brave 
 and as strong, comparatively, as they are at present ; and the coun- 
 try then afforded advantages for the desultory warfare of a valiant 
 peasantry, which, fortunately, have since been exploded by increas- 
 ing cultivation. 
 
 At the period to which I allude, the Stuart family were still ia 
 
G24: TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 existence ; they possessed a strong claim to the exaggerating alle- 
 giance and unbending fidelity of the Irish peof)le. Every right that 
 hereditary descent could give the royal race of Stuart, they pos- 
 sessed — in private life, too, they were endeared to the Irish, because 
 they were, even the worst of them, gentlemen. But tlicy had still 
 stronger claims on the sympathy and generosity of the Irish : they 
 had been exalted and were fallen — they had possessed thrones and 
 kingdoms, and were then in poverty and humiliation. All the 
 enthusiastic sympathies of the Irish heart were roused for them — 
 and all the powerful motives of personal interest bore, in the same 
 channel, the restoration of their rights — the triumph of their reli- 
 gion, the restitution of their ancient inheritances, would then have 
 been the certain and immediate consequences of the success of the 
 Stuart family in their pretensions to the throne. 
 
 At the period to which I allude, the Catholic clergy wore bound 
 by no oath of allegiance ; to be a dignitary of the Catholic church in 
 Ireland was a transportable felony — and the oath of allegiance was 
 so intermingled with religious tenets, that no clergyman or layman 
 of the Catholic persuasion could possibly take it. At that period, 
 the Catholic clergj'^ were all educated in foreign countries, under 
 the eye of the Pope, and within the inspection of the house of 
 Stuart. From fifty-eight colleges and convents on the Continent 
 did the Catholic clergy repair to meet, for the sake of their God, 
 poverty, persecution, contumely, and, not unfrequently, death in 
 their native land. They were often hunted like wild beasts, and 
 never could claim any protection from the law ! That — that was a 
 period when securities might Avell have been necessary — when 
 sanctions and securities might well have been requisite. 
 
 But what was the fact? what was the truth which history vouches? 
 Wliy, that the clergy and laity of the Irish Catholics, having once 
 submitted to the new government — having once plighted their ever 
 unbroken faith to King William and his successors — having once 
 submitted to that great constitutional principle, that in extreme 
 cases the will of the people is the sole law, that in extreme cases the 
 people have the clear and undoubted right to cashier a tyrant, and 
 provide a substitute on the throne — the Irish Catholics, having 
 fought for their legitimate sovereign, until he, himself, and not they, 
 fled from the strife — adopted, by treaty, his English successor, 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 625 
 
 though not his heir, transferred to that successor, and the inheritors 
 of his throne, their allegiance. They have preserved their covenant ; 
 with all the temptations and powerful motives to disaffection, they 
 fulfilled their part of the social contract, even in despite of its viola- 
 tion by the other party. 
 
 How do I prove the continued loyalty of the Catholics of Ireland 
 under every persecution ? I do not appeal for any pi'oofs to their 
 own records, however genuine — I appeal merely to the testimony of 
 their rulers and their enemies — I appeal to the letters of Primate 
 Boulter, to the state-papers of the humane and patriotic Chestertield. 
 I have their loj^alty through the admissions of every secretary and 
 governor of Ireland, until it is finally and conclusively put on record 
 by the legislature of Ireland itself. The relaxing statutes expressly 
 declare, that the penal laws ought to be repealed — not from motives 
 of policy or growing liberality, but (I quote the words) "because of 
 the long-continued and uninterrupted loyalty of the Catholics." This 
 is the consummation of my proof, and I defy the veriest disciple of 
 the doctrine of delusion to overturn it. 
 
 But as the Catholics were faithful in those dismal and persecuting 
 periods — when they were exasperated by the emaciating cruelty of 
 barbarous law and wretched policy ; as they were then faithful, 
 notwithstanding every temporal and every religious temptation and 
 excitement to the contrary, is it in human credulity to believe my 
 Lord Castlereagh, when he asserts that securities are now necessary? 
 Now that the ill-fated house of Stuart is extinct — and had it not 
 been extinct I should have been silent as to what their claims were 
 — now that the will of the people and the right of hereditary succes- 
 sion are not to be separated ; now that the Catholic clergy are 
 educated in Ireland, and are all bound by their oaths of allegiance to 
 that thi'one and constitution which, in the room of persecution, gives 
 them protection and securit}' ; now that all claims upon forfeited 
 property are totally extinguished in the impenetrable night of 
 obscurity and oblivion; now that the Catholic nobility and gentry 
 are in the enjoyment of many privileges and franchises, and that the 
 full particiiDation of the constitution opens upon us in close and 
 cheering prospect, shall we be told that secui'itics are now expedient, 
 though they were heretofore unnecessary ? Oh ! it is a base and 
 dastardly insult upon our understandings, and on our principles, and 
 
(326 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 one which each of us would, iu private life, resent, as in public wo 
 proclaim it to the contempt unci execration of the universe. 
 
 Long as I have trespassed on jou, I cannot yet close : I have a 
 word to address to you upon your own conduct. The representativa 
 for your city, Colonel Vereker, has openly opposed your liberties ; 
 he has opposed even the consideration of your claims. You ai-e 
 beings, to be sure, with human countenances and the limbs of men, 
 but you are not men, the iron has entered into your souls and 
 branded the name of slave upon them, if you submit to be thus 
 trampled on ! His opposition to you is decided; meet him with a 
 similar, and, if possible, a superior hostility. You deserve not 
 freedom, you, citizens of Limerick, with the monuments of the valor 
 of 3'our ancestors around you ; you are less than men, if my feeble 
 tongue be requisite to rouse you into activity. Your city is, at 
 present, nearly a close borough ; do but will it, and 3'ou make it 
 free. 
 
 I know legal olistacles have l)een thrown in your way ; I know 
 that, for months past, the Recorder has sat alone at the sessions ; 
 that he has not only tried cases, in the absence of any other magis- 
 trate, which lie is not autharized by law to do, but that he has solely 
 opened and adjourned the sessions, which, in my opinion, he is 
 clearly unwarranted in doing ; he has, by this means, I know, delayed 
 the registry of your freeholds, because two magistrates are necessary 
 for that purpose : I have, however, the satisfaction to tell you, that 
 the Court of King's Bench will, in the next term have to determine 
 on the legality of his conduct, and of that of the other charter 
 magistrates, who have banished themselves, I understand, from the 
 Sessions Court, since the registry has been spoken of! They siiall 
 be served with the regular notices ; and, depend upon it, this scheme 
 cannot long retai'd you. 
 
 I speak to you on this subject as a lawj^er — you can l)est judge 
 in what estimation my opinion is amongst you — but such as it is, I 
 pledge it to you, that you can easily obviate the pi'esent obstacles to 
 the I'cgistry of your freeholds. I can also assure you that the con- 
 stitution of your city is perfectly free ; that the sons of freemen, and 
 all those who have served an apprenticeship to a freeman, are all 
 entitled to their freedom, and to vote for the representation of your 
 city. 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 627 
 
 I can tell you more : that if you bring your candidate to a poll, 
 your adversary will be deprived of any aid from non-resident or 
 occasional freemen ; we will strike off his list the freemen from Gort 
 and Gal way, the freemen from the band, and many from the battalion 
 of the city of Limerick militia. 
 
 In short, the opening of the borough is a matter of little difficulty. 
 If 3'ou will but form a committee, and collect funds, in your opulent 
 city, you will soon have a repi'csentative ready to obey your voice ; 
 you cannot want a candidate. If the emancipation bill passes next 
 sessions, as it is so likely to do, and that no other candidate oifers, 
 I myself will bring your present number to the poll. I probably 
 will have little chance of success, but I will have the satisfaction of 
 showing this city, and the county, what the freeborn mind might 
 achieve if it were properly seconded. 
 
 I conclude by conjuring you to exert yourselves ; waste not j'our 
 just resentments in idle applause at the prospect I open to you; 
 let not the feeling of the moment be calumniated as a hasty ebul- 
 lition of anger ; let it not be transitory, as our resentments gen- 
 erally are, but let us remember ourselves, our children and our 
 country ! 
 
 Let me not, however, close, without obviating any calumny that 
 may be flung upon my motives. I can easily pledge myself to you 
 that they are disinterested and pure — I trust they are more. My 
 object in the attainment of emancipation is in nothing personal, save 
 in the feelings which parental love inspires and gratifies. I am, I 
 trust, actuated by that sense of Christianity which teaches us that 
 the first duty of our religion is benevolence and universal charity ; 
 I am, I know, actuated by the determination to rescue our common 
 country from the weakness, the insecurity, which dissension and 
 religious animosity produce and tend to perpetuate ; I wish to see 
 the sti-ength of the island — this unconquercd, this unconquerable 
 island — combined to resist the mighty foe of freedom, the extin- 
 guisher of civil liberty, who rules the Continent from Petersburgh to 
 the verge of the Irish bayonets in Spain. It is his interest, it is a 
 species of duty he owes to his family — to that powerful house which 
 he has established on the ruins of the thrones and dominations of 
 Europe — to extinguish, forever, representative and popular govern- 
 ment in these countries ; he has the same direct intent which the 
 
(328 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Konum general had to invade our beloved country — " lit libertas 
 veluti et coiispectu." His power can be resisted only by com- 
 bining 3'our physical force with your enthusiastic and undaunted 
 hearts. 
 
 There is liberty amongst you still. I could not talk as I do, of 
 the LiveriDOols and Castlereaghs, of his court, even if he had the 
 folly to employ such things — I wish he had ; you have the protection 
 of many a salutary law — of that palladium of personal liberty, 
 the trial by jury. I wish to ensure your liberties, to measure your 
 interests on the present order of the state, that we may protect the 
 very men that oppress us. 
 
 Yes, if Ireland be fairly roused to the battle of the country and 
 of freedom, all is safe. Britain has been often conquered : the 
 Romans conquered her — the Saxons conquered her — the Nor- 
 mans conquered her — in short, whenever she was invaded, she 
 was conquered. But our country was never subdued; we never 
 lost our liberties in battle, nor did we ever submit to armed con- 
 queroi's. It is true, the old inhabitants lost their country in piece- 
 meal, by fraud and treachery ; they relied upon the faith of men, 
 who never, never observed a treaty with them, until a new and 
 mixed race has sprung up, in dissension and discord ; but the Irish 
 heart and soul still predominate and pervade the sons of the oppress- 
 ors themselves. The generosity, the native bravery, the imiate 
 fidelity, the enthusiastic love of whatever is great and noble — those 
 splendid characteristics of tiie Irish mind remain as the imperishable 
 relics of our countrj-'s former greatness — of that illustrious period, 
 when she was the light and the glory of barbarous Europe — when 
 the nations around sought for instruction and example in her numer- 
 ous seminaries — and when the civilization and religion of all 
 Europe were preserved in her alone. 
 
 You will, my friends, defend her — j'ou may die, but you cannot 
 yield to any foreign invader. Whatever be my fate, I shall be 
 happy, whilst I live, in reviving amongst you the love and admira- 
 tion of your native land, and in calling upon Irishmen — no matter 
 how they may worship their common God — to sacrifice every con- 
 temptible prejudice on the altar of their common country. For 
 myself, I shall conclude,' by expressing the sentiment that throbs 
 in my heart — I shall express it in the language of a young bard of 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 629 
 
 Erin, and my beloved friend, whose delightful muse has the sound 
 of the ancient minstrelsy — 
 
 " Still slialt thou be my midnight dream — 
 Thy glory still my waking theme ; 
 And ev'ry thought and wish of mine, 
 TJnconquered Erin, shall be thine I " 
 
630 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Speech 
 
 In the British Catholic Association, on the Defeat of the 
 Emancipation Bill. 
 
 May 26th, 1825. ' 
 
 Ski^HE measure of which we complained is of too recent a date, 
 ^^ the injury which wc have sustained is yet too fresh, too gall- 
 ^ ing in its effects, to allow my reason to assume the ascendant 
 ™ over my feelings, and to give my judgment time to operate 
 on, and influence the tenor of my reflections. I shall nevertheless 
 be as respectful in my allusions, and as moderate in the remarks I 
 have to ofier, as the overboiling fervency of my Irish blood will 
 permit. By rejecting that bill which the Commons had sent up to 
 them for their concurrence and approval, the House of Lords has 
 inflicted a vital injury on the stability of English power, and on 
 Irish feelings and Irish honesty. They, however, would not be cast 
 down by that injury. The Catholics were sometimes in derisioa 
 termed "Roman." I am a Catholic, and proud am I to say that in 
 one thing at least I am a Eoman — I never will despair. But on 
 what is this boastful assertion founded? Why should I say that 
 which I feel has not reason or sound policy to support it? Where 
 now, I would ask, is there a rational hope for a Catholic? Where 
 shall I look for consolation under the present great and serious dis- 
 appointment? Am I to look back? Alas ! there is nothing cheer- 
 ing in the events which have for some time past met us on the way 
 to success and dashed our hopes to the earth. Does history furnish, 
 any grounds for the supposition that those who have been found 
 incapable of maintaining their plighted faith, and preserving the 
 terms of a great national contract, will now, in the hour of success, 
 be induced to yield any reason, any inducement to us to proceed in 
 the course we have adopted? Is this, I would ask, the example 
 
O'CONNELL'S MONUMENT, GLASNEVIN CEMETERY. 
 
DANIEL 0-<_ONNELL. 53I 
 
 the Irish Catholics gave, when they had ou two occasions come into 
 power? Did they, in the reign of Mary, seek by retaliation to 
 avenge the blood of their slaugiitered ancestors ? No ! thank God, 
 they did not ! and that at least was one triumphant consideration. 
 Not one drop of Protestant blood had been shed — not one particle 
 of Protestant property had been then sacrificed. In the reign of 
 James 11, the Catholics again came into ^^ower, and their conduct 
 was marked by the same spirit of forbearance. I have heard it 
 justly stated in the House of Commons — no, I must not say that, 
 but I saw it in the newspapers, in the powerful speech of Mr. 
 Twiss, which was distinguished alike for vigor of thought, strength 
 of reasoning, and historical accuracy, that in the reign of James 
 there were but fourteen Protestants in the House of Commons, and 
 eight or ten in the House of Lords ; the rest were Catholics. Were 
 Protestants excluded from it by law? No, the peojalc retiu'ned both 
 Protestants and Catholics ; and no one then stood up to say that a 
 man should not be permitted to sit in parliament unless he heard 
 Mass and attend auricular confession. No, no, it was left to their 
 enemies to say that Catholics should not be admitted there, for the 
 sacrifice of the Mass was impious and idolatrous. 
 
 Mr. O'Connell then attended to a statement made by Mr. Daw.son, who tlioiight 
 fit to attribute persecution to the Irish Catholics in the reigu of the second James, 
 ou the authority of Archbishop King, who was I'efuted by Rev. Dr. Leslie, aud yet, 
 in 1825, is quoted in parliament to convict the Catholics of Ireland. He next 
 entered into a brief history and defence of the Irish Catholic Association, and 
 reprobated the penal act which extinguished that body. 
 
 I call on the Catholics of England to co-operate with those of Ire- 
 land for the repeal of this act, for it is a step to return to the old 
 penal law ; and how can I tell the people of Ireland they ought to 
 be tranquil, aud not ferment in their hearts that black stuff which 
 makes political discontent mischievous — that fire suppressed, that 
 explodes only the more dangerouslj' on account of the compression 
 that has withheld it? How can I tell the people of Ireland to hope, 
 when they see this unprincipled, disastrous measure has been ad(j[)ted ? 
 I confess I do find ground for hope in the things called arguments 
 which are employed against ns, if I had not seen any in the records 
 of ancient history, in the violation of ti'eaties, and the recent case 
 of the suppression of the Catholic Association. I begin with the 
 
(332 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 first in dignity, the keeper of the King's English conscience; for 
 the King, mj lord, has three consciences — he has an English con- 
 science, and the keeper of it is a liberal, and turns to the liberal side 
 of it; he has an Irish conscience, and I hope the keeper of it will 
 soon be a liberal person, and he will turn to the liberal side of it; 
 and his Majesty, my lord, has a Hanoverian conscience ; that con- 
 science is in his own keeping ; it has no contradicting colors or dif- 
 ering sides — it is all liberality and justice. Who cannot see that 
 the guilt of refusing that to us which the King personally gives to 
 his Hanoverian sulijects, lies in the miserable machinery of a bor- 
 oughmongering administration, which prevents the King from doing 
 justice to all ? 
 
 There were two other objections against us. I thank the quarter 
 from wliicli they come : I thank him sincerely for the first of them, 
 for I must unafl'ectedly admit its truth and justice, and I will abide 
 the event of it fairlj^ It was this : if you emancipate the Catholics, 
 said the Lord Chancellor, you must equally give liberty of conscience 
 to all classes of Dissenters. I thank you heartily, my Lord Eldou ; 
 that is exactly what we say ; our petition is that ; we do not come 
 before parliament, making a comparison of theological doctrines : we 
 revere our own ; we are not indifierent to them : we know their 
 awful importance, but we say liberty of conscience is a sacred right. 
 [A voice from the crowd : " You have it."] I thank the gentleman 
 "whose voice I hear. You, my Lord Duke, possess liberty of con- 
 science. Are you not the premier peer of England — could anyone 
 deprive you of that right? Could the King upon his throne, or the 
 Chancellor on his bench, make any decree against it, if your con- 
 science permitted? There is such a liberty of conscience as that 
 alluded to in Spain, where eveiy man is at liberty to be of the relig- 
 ion of the ruling power ; but now that Ferdinand is returned, no 
 man is allowed to dissent from that religion : and I'et me not be 
 brought to prefer the Cortes to him. They trod upon the Church, 
 and threw away the people, and deserved to lose their power. The 
 Dissenters have it not, for neither Smith, of Norwich, nor Wilks, 
 the Secretary of that excellent Association for Liberty of Conscience 
 (who puljlished in their own, my creed on that subject), they could 
 not fill an office in any corporation, for the moment they were jiro- 
 posod, the opposite candidate would tell them. "You have not 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. . 633 
 
 taken the sacramental test," and the election would be void, and the 
 candidate who had fewest votes would be returned. This was good 
 and fair reason to hope that the principle is calculated, in spite of 
 miserable bigotry and individual acrimony, to make its way all over 
 England. The liberal portion of the Dissenters are with us. I find, 
 therefore, reason to hope. Liberty of conscience is our principle, 
 and even in despair I would retain it ; for I am confident that force 
 may make hypocrites, but not true believers ; it may compel out- 
 ward profession, but it is not in man's power to change the heart ; 
 and because I know that force is always resorted to by him that 
 thinks he has the worst of the argument. But, for my part, being 
 conscientiously convinced of the superiority of the Catholic i-eligion 
 over every other — and putting it to this awful test of sincerity, that 
 I know an eternitj' depends on it — with that awful conviction, all I 
 ask of my Protestant brethren, who believe their own religion to be 
 the best, is, that they would give the same practical proof of their 
 conviction of its supei'iority. Let them give their religion what I 
 ask for mine — a clear stage and no favor, and let the advantage be 
 decided by conscientious men and Lhe will of the eternal God. 
 
 Another argument of the Lord Chancellor was — it seemed, 
 indeed, rather a word than an argument — that this was a Protestant 
 constitution, and the words "Protestant constitution " came out very 
 frequently. This was rather an assertion than an argument, and it 
 has this defect as an asertion, that it happens, my lord, not to be 
 true. There are four descendants amongst the Catholic nobility of 
 the day of the barons who extorted Magna Charta from a t3'rant. It 
 was Catholics who instituted the hereditary succession in the House 
 of Lords as a separate House : it was Catholics who instituted the 
 representation of the people in the House of Commons : it was 
 Catholics who instituted trial by jury, standing as a shield between 
 the people and power, making the administration of the law a domes- 
 tic concern, and preventing any man giving a false and flagitious ver- 
 dict to-day in favor of despotism, lest he himself should be the victim 
 the next. Are not these ingredients in the constitution ? I would 
 not forget the treason law of Edward IIL, which is the perfection of 
 wisdom in that respect, for many and many a victim would have 
 been sent out to pi-emature death and destruction but for the advan- 
 tage of that Catholic statute of Edward HI. ; and whenever despotism 
 
(534 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 has ruled over this countiy, the first step that has been taken, from- 
 time to time, and it was one which immediately followed the Refor- 
 mation, was to repeal that Catholic statute, and deprive the people of 
 its benefits. We have it now ; but though we have it now through 
 its being restored by a Protestant parliament, it was drawn up by 
 Catholic hands, it was passed by Catholic votes, it was signed by a 
 Catholic King, and will Lord Eidon tell me that the treason law, the 
 trial by jury, the House of Lords, and the otEce of Cbanccllor, too, 
 are no portions of this Protestant constitution ? If that oflice did not 
 exist, I suspect that the Protestantism of the Chancellor would not 
 be so extremely vivid as it is at present. The seals he bears, the 
 mace wliich is carried before him, were borne by, and carried before 
 many and many a Catholic bishop ; and the first layman who held 
 them was the martyred Sir Thomas More, who, as it was well said 
 in parliament, left the office with ten pounds in his pocket ; a Catho- 
 lic example to the present Protestant Chancellor. 
 
 Protestant constitution ! What is it, if money be not one of the 
 valuable concci'ns of the constitution? Will the Chancellor say it is 
 not? If the constitution be Protestant, let the Protestants pay the 
 tithes and the taxes ; let them pay the church rates and the Grand 
 Jury cess for us in Ireland. If it be a Protestant constitution let it 
 be so entirely : let us not have to fight their battles or pay their 
 taxes. This is the admirable and inimitable equity of the Lord 
 Chancellor. Here is the keeper of a conscience for j'ou ! Here is a 
 distributor of equity. It shall be Protestant to the extent of every- 
 thing that is valuable and useful : to the extent of everything that 
 is rewarding and dignified ; for everyplace of emolument and author- 
 ity, and everything that elevates a man, and is thj i-ecompense of 
 legitimate ambition. To this extent it shall be Protestant ; but for 
 the burdens of the state ; for the shedding of human blood in defence 
 of the throne ; for all that bears on a man, even to the starvation of 
 his family by the weight of taxation which so few are able to pay in 
 this country, and by which so many have been reduced to poverty in 
 Ireland (for have I not seen the miserable blanket, and the single 
 potato pot, sold by the tax gatherer in my native country ?) Oh, 
 shall I, I say, be told that for all that is useful the constitution shall 
 be Protestant, and that it shall cease to be so the moment there is 
 anything of oppression, money-making, grinding, or taxation? I^ 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 635; 
 
 it just to take the entire value and give no valuable consideration in 
 return ? Is it just to accept lul)or and pay no wages ? Is this equity 
 in the High Coui't of Chancery ? From your tribunal I appeal to 
 the living God, who shall judge us all, and in His presence I proclaim 
 the foul iniquity, the barefaced injustice of loading us with all the 
 burdens of the state, and keeping us from its advantages. 
 
 After the Chancellor I would refer to the speech of a Right Rever- 
 end Bishop, which was said to have been sonorous, musical and 
 well delivered — highly pleasing to his party. It reminded him of a 
 story told by Addison, who heard a lady in a carriage utter a loud 
 scream, and supposing her suflering under some violence or injury, 
 inquired what was the matter, and was told nothing ; but the lady 
 had been told she had a fine voice, and had been showing it by 
 screaming. She only wished to make an exhibition. The bishop, 
 too, was only screaming, and had formerly screamed the other way. 
 The first part of his speech, as I read it in the newspaper, was a good 
 essay on disinterestedness ! We were called interested, selfish ; but 
 would the Right Reverend Bisliop explain how it was that he had 
 formerly been favorably disposed towards the Catholics till he be- 
 came tutor to the Earl of Liverpool's nephew, and that then all at 
 once a change was effected in his mind. He is young— there are a 
 great many other bishops, and he was certainly fortunate in his 
 chance, for he adopted, if not a better, yet more enriching faith. It 
 might be b}' a miracle — for a Protestant bishop might work miracles 
 as well as Prince Hohenlohe— it might be by a miracle that the new 
 light broke in on tbe bishop just at the right time ; that he was kept 
 in darkness to a certain hour, and then was suddenly made to see 
 the danger, and to turn from a friend to an enemy. I have no ob- 
 jection to fair enmity, but the Bishop of Chester's enmity was not 
 fair. In his speech he had quoted a part of a speech of Doctor 
 Dromgoole ; I believe, too, from what I recollect, that the bishop 
 quoted an exaggerated version, and he stated that this speech had 
 been approved of by the Catholic Association and by all the Cath- 
 olic priests, and at Rome. I heard this with great asttniishment, 
 for, in fact. Doctor Di'omgoole's speech was the only one I ever 
 recollected which had been condemned at a public meeting. 
 
 It had been pronounced late in the evening. I was not present, 
 or the sun would not have gone down on it unreproved — and on the 
 
636 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 next day an extraordinaiy meeting of the Catholic Board was sum- 
 moned, and the speech condemned. He called the Protestant faith 
 a novelty, and it was stated to him that whatever opinions he chose 
 to discuss among theologians, he must not insult the Protestants. 
 Where the Bishop of Chester learned that this speech had been ap- 
 proved of at Eome I do not know, but I suppose it might be by the 
 same vivacity of fancy and the same energy of imagination from 
 which he learned that the speech had been approved of in Ireland. 
 I arraign him of inventing it. If the Catholic bishops who were 
 examined before the lords, — if Doctor Murray, the sanctity of whose 
 life was displayed in the suavity of his mannei-s, and who was the 
 mildest of all Christians — if Doctor Doyle, whose understanding was 
 as vigorous as bis manners were simple, who possessed an exhaust- 
 less store of knowledge, and whose gigantic intellect could readily 
 ■convey them to the mind of every other man ; if these prelates in 
 their examination had invented anything like this against the Pro- 
 testants, though he revered them as the representatives of those 
 Christian bishops who had first established tlie Catholic Faith in Ire- 
 land ; if the Lord Bishop of Chester could point out to him any- 
 thing in their evidence similar to the invention he had alluded to, I 
 will at once brand them as calumniators. I will not say anything of 
 this kind to the Bishop of Chester, because I do not belong to the 
 same church with him ; but if he will point out to me anything so false 
 in their evidence, I will tell the Irish bishops they are liars and 
 calumniators, and that they have broken the commandment, for they 
 had borne false witness against their neighbor. I would, however, 
 say no more of the Bishop of Chester's speech ; but if any more 
 positive proof of its error were wanting, he had only to turn over 
 the Dublin Evening Post for half an hour, and he would find the 
 "whole proceedings of the meeting at \vhich Dr. Dromgoole's speech 
 was censured. 
 
 Mr. O'Connell here took occasion to eulogize Mr. Canning, Mr. Plunliett and 
 Mr. Brownlow, and contrasted tlie conduct of the latter with that of the Marquis 
 of Anglesea. 
 
 The contrcist I was going to ofier, and that which would alone 
 make us despair, if I did not know my countrymen better, is that of 
 the noble and gallant deserter, the Marquis of Anglesea. He said. 
 
DANIEL O'COJsNELL. (J37 
 
 now was the time to fight. But, most nohle Marquis, we are not 
 going to fight at all, and above all things, most noble Marquis, we 
 are not going to fight now, under favor. This may be your time to 
 fight — you may want us to fight ere long with you, as you wanted 
 us before — your glories and your medals, and your dignities, and 
 your titles, were bought by the young blood of Catholic Ireland. 
 We fought. Marquis of Anglesea, and you know it well — we fought, 
 aud j-ou are Marquis — if we had not fought with you, your island 
 of Anglesea would ere this have shrimk into a ealjbage garden. Aud 
 where would now have been the mighty conqueror of Europe : he, 
 who had talent to command victory, and judgment to look for servi- 
 ces, and not creeds to reward men for merits, and not for professions 
 of faith ; where would he have been if Ireland had not stood by you ? 
 I myself have worn, not only the trappings of woe, but the emblems 
 of sincere mourning, for more than one galhuit relative of mine who 
 have shed their blood under your commands. We can fight — we 
 will fight when England wants us. But we will not fight against her 
 at present, and I trust we will not fight for her at all until she does 
 us justice. 
 
 But, most noble Marc^uis, though }our soldiers fjught gallantly 
 and well with you, iu a war which they were told was just and 
 necessary, are 30U quite sure the soldiers will fight in a crusade 
 against the unarmed and wretched peasantry of Ireland? Your 
 speech is published; it will, when read iu Armagh, and the neigh- 
 boring counties, give joy, and will be celebrated in the next Orange 
 procession ; and again, as before. Catholic blood will be shed; but, 
 most noble Marquis, the earth has not covered all the blood that has 
 been so shed ; it cries yet for vengeance to heaven, and not to man ; 
 that blood may yet bring on an unfortunate hour of retribution ; and 
 if it do, what have you to fight with ? Count you on a gallant army ? 
 There are English gentry amongst its oflScers, the sons and descend- 
 ants of those who wielded the sword for liberty, never to strike down 
 to slavery their fellow men. English chivalry will not join with you, 
 most noble Marquis of Anglesea : and though you have deserted her 
 and taken the prudent side of the Commandei--in-Chief, yet, gallant 
 Marquis, I think you have reckoned without your host. 
 
 Let me tell you this story, sir. I am but an humble individual. 
 It happened to me, not many months ago, to be going through Eng- 
 
(538 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 land; my family were in a carriage, on the box of which I was 
 placed; there came up on the road, eight or ten sergeants and cor- 
 porals, with two hundred and fifty recruits. I perceived at once the 
 couutenauces of my unfortunate countrymen laughing as the}' went 
 along, for no other reason than because they were alive. They saw 
 me, and some of them recognized me ; they instantly burst from 
 their sei'geants and corporals, formed round my carriage, and gave 
 me thi'ee cheers, most noble JMarquis. Well, may God bless them, 
 wherever they are, poor fellows ! Oh, you reckon without your host, 
 let me tell you, when you think that a British army will trample on 
 a set of petitioners for their rights — beggars for a little charity, who 
 are looking up to you with eyes lifted, and hands bent down. You 
 will not fight us now, most noble Marquis; and let me tell you, if 
 the battle comes, you shall not have the choice of j'our position 
 either. 
 
 But though he is an excellent soldier, the Marquis is a special bad 
 logician — no blame to him ; for, in the same speech, he said he was 
 still for Catholic emancipation, and would return to us as soon as he 
 ■was certain that emancipation was consistent with Protestant ascend- 
 ancy. Ascendancy forsooth ! Catholic emancipation supposes 
 universal equalization of civil eligibility, and it cannot consist with 
 the ascendancy of any party. The Marquis is ready to open the 
 window to us as soon as he is sure the sun will not shine thi-ough it. 
 I am not afraid of his sword. Still less do I feel in peril from his 
 logic. The King of Prussia, when the Saxons left him, one fine morn- 
 ing, said, "Let them go against us, it is better that all the enemy 
 should be together, and all our friends together also." I make a 
 pi'esent of you to our opponents, most noble Marquis. Him who thus 
 deserted us, and hallooed in the ranks of those whose cry was 
 religious dissensions, — him have I contrasted with the true genuine 
 Protestant Christian, who, firm in his own opinion, w'as the enemy 
 of the Catholics, so long as he believed them to be the enemies of 
 liberty, I'eligious and civil ; but who, the moment he was convinced 
 that they were equally its friends as himself, became our supporter, 
 and set the glorious golden example of a perfect sacrifice of all that 
 little pride and jealousy which attach to a change of genuine opinion 
 — him have I contrasted with Mr. Brownlow, who, be it ever re- 
 membered, stood by no Commander-in-Chief, and who can only 
 
DANIEL OCONNELL. 639 
 
 expose himself in injury and expense, by a sacrifice to principles 
 which the Marquis of Angelsea may admire, but cannot aflbrd pos- 
 sibly to imitate. 
 
 Mr. O'Connell then proceeded to panegyrize the public exei'tions of Sir Francis 
 Burdett, Lord Nugent, and the Earl of Donoughraore; and passed some severe 
 sarcasms on Sir T. Lethbridge and Mr. Banks, senior. 
 
 There was one speech more on which I will say a few words — it 
 was the speech of Lord Liverpool. I have never read a polemical 
 speech of the noble lord till that. The noble lord seemed to have 
 been employed in a manner quite becoming a great statesman ; dis- 
 regarding the course which our ancient enemy, France, was pursuing : 
 not thinking that she was daily increasing her armies : that she was 
 creating an efficient navy ; that she was rapidly paying off her debt ; 
 that titheless France was daily improving her resources, and getting 
 rid of the burdens which the war had left on her ; that she was building 
 a large class of frigates, and appeared as if inclined, on some fit op- 
 portunity, to dispute with us once more the empire of the seas. Of 
 all these facts the noble lord seemed heedless ; they were perhaps 
 beneath the notice of his gxeat mind. He did not calculate on the 
 rising generation of America, that country in Avhich alone the Irish 
 Catholic has fair play. He did not appear to consider in what time 
 a westerly wind, which would shut us up in the channel, would waft 
 a fleet to the shores of Ireland, perhaps at some period of distress- 
 aud discontent, when arms and not men might be wanting. All 
 these were subjects below the consideration of Lord Liverpool's 
 great mind. He was busied with one of much greater importance 
 to the state. He was engaged in polemical discussions about auricular 
 confession and penance, and the mode of administering the sacrament ; 
 .and as the result of his studies in those impoi-tant matters, he poured 
 forth a rich and luscious discourse on an admiring audience. In the 
 course of that speech, the noble lord read tlie House of Commons no 
 very gentle lecture for having presumed to send up such a bill. Here 
 was another great reformer. It had been said, perhaps untruly, that 
 the great majority of the House were sent into their places by several 
 members of the Peers : if that were true, it might perhaps account 
 for the scolding given for having passed a bill not approved by their 
 masters. Be that however as it might, the House of Commons were 
 
(3J-0 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 scolded — perhaps they deserved it. The noble lord had expressed 
 nn opinion, that the religion of several millions of his fellow-subjects 
 was such, as to render them unfit for the enjoyment of civil rights 
 to the same extent as the Protestant. What new light was it that 
 broke upon the noble Earl's mind, so as to produce this impression, . 
 so opposite to that which he seemed to feel only one year before ? 
 
 The noble Earl appeared to hold a very different opinion of the 
 Irish people last year. On the 8th of April, 1824, he was reported 
 to have said in his place in the House, speaking of the Irish, 
 "that whatever they may be in their own country, I say of them 
 in this, that there does not exist, on the face of the globe, a 
 more industrious, a more honest, or more kindly-disposed people. "^ 
 Surely they have not changed their religion since then ; and if, 
 in 1824, that religion could make them "honest, industzious, and 
 kindly-disposed,"' why should it be urged as a ground for exclu- 
 sion from the full enjoyment of the rights of British subjects in 
 1825? What other use would a statesman make of religion but 
 to instill morality and public order? The noble Earl went on in 
 the same speech to say, "I think it material to bear this testi- 
 mony in their favor, because whatever may be the evils of Ire- 
 land, and from whatever source they may proceed, it is impossible 
 for any man to imagine that they arise from any defect in the 
 people. We may boldly assert that it is impossible to finda 
 more valuable class of j^eople in any country in the world." And 
 3'et it was this most valuable class of persons that the noble Earl 
 in his late address would condemn to eternal exclusion from the 
 full benefits of the constitution. Did the noble Earl imagine that 
 the drivelling nonsense of Dr. Duigenan, which he had kept bot- 
 tled up for seven or eight years, and now drew forth to treat 
 the British nation, would drive a people such as he had described 
 from their purpose? Let the honest lord stand forth and defend 
 his consistency. He had made that speech from which he had 
 just given the extract in 1824 ; the second speech was made in 
 1825. In the interim the Duke of York had made his declara- 
 tion of eternal hostility to the great question of emancipation. 
 The Bishop of Chester was not the only convert which that speech 
 had made. The noble Earl, to use a vulgar adage, "knew how the 
 cat jumped." Oh, my Lord Duke, with what pleasure will this 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 641 
 
 speech of my Lord Liverpool and that of his Royal Highness of York 
 be received at the meeting of the allied Sovereigns — those mighty 
 despots who, tyi'anuical as they are, still respect the consciences of 
 their subjects ? What joy will they not feel at reading this wise 
 effusion of England's prime minister? They will in their hearts say, 
 "Let it go forth, it will work for our views." They will add: 
 ^'Kockites, keep your spirits — 
 
 ' Durate et vosmet rebus servate secundis.' " 
 
 Or, as Cromwell said, "'Trust in the Lord and rest on your 
 pikes.' Matters are going on in the way that you and we and the 
 •enemies of England's peace could wish." Such would be the senti- 
 ments of all who were envious of England's power, and jealous of 
 that freedom by which she acquired it. Their feelings on this sub- 
 ject would not be less gratified when they read, if they could believe 
 it, the calculation made by Mr. Leslie Foster, showing that the 
 population of Ireland was less by two millions than it was generally 
 considered. That honorable gentlemen, who was the more fit to be 
 the head pedagogue of a large school, than at the head of a respect- 
 able county (a situation by the way in which the votes of Catholics 
 had helped to place him), had come to parliament with his primer 
 and his multiplication table, and endeavored to show that the Catho- 
 lics of Ireland wei-e not so numerous by two millions as was gene- 
 rally believed. He began by counting the number of children that 
 attended some of the charit}' schools, and then taking the number of 
 parents that each child had, which was easy to ascertain; but he 
 omitted to consider how many children each set of parents had, 
 which in Ireland might perhaps be more difficult. He also omitted 
 to notice the number of children that never attended at those schools ; 
 but the result of his calculation was, that the Catholics were less by 
 two millions than their advocates stated them to be. 
 
 I have heard of killing off by computation by Captain Bobadil ; 
 but this beat Bobadil quite out. However, the error was not too 
 gross for the party to which it was addressed, for the noble Earl 
 swallowed it, Bobadil and all. What, I beg calmly to ask, would 
 be the effect of the noble lord's deniuiciation of perpetual exclusion, 
 upon the four or five millions of Catholics which Mr. Leslie Foster had 
 left? (for he would admit for the moment that they were reduced 
 
642 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 two millions without the aid of Lord Anglesea's broadsword.) They 
 were told they could not be free while the Protestant church estab- 
 lishment existed, for that their entire emancipation was incompatible 
 with the safety of that establishment, was this not in eflect putting- 
 every man, woman and child of the five millions of Catholics in hos- 
 tihty to that church ? I beg most distinctly to deny the justice of 
 the assumption on which this argument of exclusion was founded. 
 The Catholics did not wish to see the Protestant church subverted. 
 I would solemnly declare, that I would rather perish than see the 
 Protestant church subverted and my own church substituted in its 
 place. 
 
 The learned gentleman, after adverting to the petitions from England in favor of 
 a repeal of the assessed taxes, which amounted to about three millions, proceeded 
 to observe, that that sum and much more might be saved to this country, by merely 
 doing an act of justice to the Irish people. 
 
 Ireland now costs this country four millions a year more than her 
 revenue produced. Let justice be done — let peace and content be 
 brought about by this act of just concession, and Ireland, instead of 
 being a burden to England, will prove a rich source of wealth and 
 strength to the empire. Capital will flow into the country, her 
 resources for its employment would become known, the facilities for 
 every kind of commerce which her ports afforded would ensure a 
 flow of wealth to English capitalists — the only persons who can 
 take advantage of them — an advantage which they were deterred 
 from seeking by the present unsettled state of the country. See 
 what sources of annoj^ance, of war and bloodshed AYales and Scot- 
 land were, until they were incorporated in one government with 
 England, and until their inhabitants were fully admitted to all the 
 advantages of the constitution as British subjects, while they now 
 contribute much to the strength of the empire. Why should not 
 the same attempt be made with respect to Ireland? Is she to be 
 forever excluded from the full benefits of the constitution ? Before 
 I conclude, I beg to notice a paper which had within these four days 
 been circulated with great assiduity by the enemies of emancipation. 
 One of those papers I now hold in my hand. It called on all friends 
 of the Protestant religion to read some extracts which it contained 
 from the Journal des Debats, and to pause Ijefore they gave any 
 
DANIEL O CONNELL. 043 
 
 support to the prayer of the Catholics. I will briefly state the 
 nature of the case meutioned in the extracts, in order to show the 
 gross injustice of founding upon it any charge against the Catholics. 
 In the department of Aisne, an application was made by some Prot- 
 estants for the erection of a Protestant church and the appointment 
 of a minister of their religion to officiate in it. Now by the law of 
 France the government is obliged in any place where there are five 
 hundred Protestants residing, to erect a church for them, and to 
 provide a minister to officiate in it. That clergyman was paid one 
 hundred pounds a year, while a Catholic curate officiating for a sim- 
 ilar number of Catholics, received only eighty pounds a year. The 
 reason was that a Protestant clergyman might have a wife to main- 
 tain, while a Catholic had not. The application was refused, not 
 because it was intended to discourage the Protestant religion, but 
 because the number of Protestants making application did not 
 amount to one-luilf the number for which the law authorized the 
 building of a church — and this was the gross instance of religious 
 oppression of which such loud complaints were heard in this coun- 
 try ! What would have been said if there were three hundred 
 Protestants li\ing in one parish and onlj^ one Catholic, and that 
 those three hundred were not only obliged to provide a place of 
 worship for themselves, but also to build, at their entire expense, 
 a church for the use of one Catholic ? AVould not all England ring 
 with outcries against the injustice of the act ? And yet an act of 
 this description, with the exception that the parties were placed in 
 situations the reverse of what he had described, had just occurred 
 in Ireland. 
 
 A petition was a short time ago presented to the House of Com- 
 mons, from three hundred Catholic inhabitants of a parish in Ire- 
 land, the name of which would sound very harsh in English ears, 
 and which could with difficulty be pronounced by English lips, the 
 parish of Aghado. The petitioners stated that they were the only 
 inhabitants of the parish except one, and that one was a Protestant ; 
 that there was no Protestant church in the parish, but that the Prot- 
 estant inhabitant had the use of a pew in a neighboring parish church, 
 and they complained of being called upon to bear the expense of 
 building a church for that one Protestant. "What, he repeated, would 
 h;ive been said if the petitioners happened to be Protestants, and the 
 
644 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 one inhabitant a Catholic? But because they were Catholics, it was 
 passed over as a matter of course, and not a word was heax-d about 
 the oppi'cssion of the case. 
 
 Another subject on which a great outcry has been raised, was 
 lately started in a French journal, the " Constitutionnel." It 
 appeared that a chui'ch at Nerac had been in possession of a Pro- 
 testant congregation since 1804. This church had originally belonged 
 to the Convent of St. Clare. In the French revolution, when the 
 axe and the guillotine were in daily use against the ministers and 
 professors of religion, the nuns were turned out upon the world, and 
 the convent church was used as a storehouse. In this situatioti it 
 continued until 1804, when it was given to a Protestant congregation, 
 with no other title of gift or purchase than the mere proces verbal 
 which assented to the application which had been made for it. Not 
 loug back the Convent of St. Clare was restored, and not unnatu- 
 rally, the nuns applied for the church which had originally belonged 
 to them. A regular legal proceeding was commenced for its recov- 
 ery, and the members of the Protestant congregation, not being able 
 to prove a good title, were obliged to give it up. For this, however, 
 the " Times " and " Chronicle," and other liberal journals, were quite 
 enraged ; their very types seemed to fly about in a passion. But 
 what was there in the case to call for such angry comment? 
 
 It was said that the cure of Nerac made use of some very illiberal 
 expressions on the occasion of regaining possession; if he did, there 
 was no man connected with the " Times " or " Chronicle " Avho would 
 more readily condemn any such expression than he would. Let it, 
 however, be recollected , that the charge made was the charge of an 
 enemy. It was made by a party of the old Jacobin school — of 
 those whose friends had succeeded in overthrowing the altar of 
 France for a time, and now, Avhen i-eligion was restored, would wish 
 to hold up its ministers to contempt or reproach. I think the charge, 
 coming from such a quarter, ought not to be entitled to au}^ more 
 weight than an idle calumny which might be found against himself 
 in the John Bull of this town. 
 
 Suppose during the power of Cromwell — that scriptural Chris- 
 tian, with texts in his mouth and sword in his hand — suppose that 
 rough commander were to have bestowed a Protestant ciiurch on a 
 Catholic congregation, or on any of the various sects of Christians 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 645 
 
 (I speak without disrespect of any) which swarmed through the land 
 in his day, and suppose, on the restoration, it was to be claimed, 
 and a legal process instituted for its recovery, would the decision of 
 that claim, in favov of the original owners, be a proof of bigotry or 
 oppression in the Church of England ? Why then should that be 
 called bigotry in one case, which would be an act of justice in the 
 other? Talk of bigotry in France from Catholics to Protestants! 
 In that country both were alike eligilile to places of trust and power 
 in the state ; but whoever heard in any of their public assemblies — 
 in the Chamber of Deputies — of u Lethbridge or an Tnglis getting 
 up in his place and reviling with coarse epithets the religion of his 
 Protestant fellow-subjects? (By the way, I intended to make a few 
 remarks on the Index Expurgatorius of Sir H. Inglis, but I forgive 
 him.) To those who talked of Catholic bigotry, I would say, let the 
 Catholics of this country be placed on the same terms of equality 
 with their Protestant brethren, as the Protestants of France are, with 
 respect to their Catholic fellow-subjects, and I would rest perfectly 
 satisfied. 
 
 I fear I have trespassed too long on the patience of the meeting, 
 but there were one or two points more on which I would say a word. 
 The bill which the Lords had rejected was accompanied part of the 
 way in the other House, with two measures called its wings. Those 
 measures were condemned b\' some who were friendly to the great 
 question ; but the Catholics of Ireland were not the authors of those 
 measures ; they were no party to their origin. Of that bill, which 
 went to make a provision for the Catholic clergy, I would say, 
 that the clergy desired no such provision. They are content to 
 serve their flocks for the humble pittance which they now 
 receive. The rewards to which they looked for their inces- 
 sant and valuable labors, are — let every hair of the Bishop of 
 Chester's wig stand on end at hearing it — not of this but of another 
 world. It is not the Catholics who desire those measures. They 
 are sought for by the Pi'otestants, who look upon them as some 
 sort of security ; and the Catholics are disposed to make some sacri- 
 fice to honest prejudices, by acceding to that which they did not 
 approve. It was this feeling which produced those measures, and 
 brovight on that ridiculous scene of one of his Majesty's ministers 
 strongl}' objecting to the " wings," while another was eagerly flap- 
 ping them on, until, like the tomb of Mahomet, the Catholic bill 
 
64G TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 hung suspended between the two counteracting influences. As to 
 the second bill, respecting the forty shilling freeholders, it is one 
 ■which I cannot approve. I am too much of a reformer, and of that 
 class called "radical," to wish for any such alteration. I did assent 
 to it only because it was considered that Protestants desired it. I 
 would much i-athcr have emancipation without it. They are now, 
 however, gone by, and I hope they will never again make their ap- 
 pearance — certain it is, I shall never wish for them, unless they are 
 earnestly desired by the Protestants. 
 
 I now, my lord Duke, take my leave ; I fear I have exhausted the 
 patience of this meeting. I am grateful for the attention with which 
 I have been heard ; I have spoken under feelings, j^erhaps, of some 
 irritation — certainly under those of deep disappointment. A crowd 
 of thoughts have rushed upon me, and I have given utterance to 
 them as they arose, without allowing my judgment a pause as to 
 which I should select and which restrain. I now go back to my own 
 country, where I expect to find a feverish restlessness at having in- 
 sult added to our injuries. Our enemies — perhaps I ought to say 
 opponents — have otfered this insult; they have barbed with dis- 
 grace, the dart of death. It will be impossible not to expect a 
 degree of soreness at the way in which our claims have been met — 
 at this additional insult. It is impossible not to feel disappointed at 
 the manner in which we have seen Lord Liverpool truckle to the 
 nonsense about the coronation oath [some person here said No, no]. 
 I repeat it, he did ; and my conviction is that all we heard reported 
 of him in the newspapers was dictated from that quarter. We shall 
 now return to Ireland, and there advise our countrymen to be pa- 
 tient — to bear the further delay of justice with calmness, but not 
 to relax their fair, open, and legitimate efforts in again seeking for 
 their rights. They have put down one association ; I promise to 
 treat them to another. They shall trench further on your lib- 
 erties — they shall dive deeper into the vitals of the constitution 
 before they drive us from our purpose. We shall go on, but it will 
 be without auger or turbulence. In that steady course we will con- 
 tinue to use all legitimate means to accomplish our object, until 
 English good sense shall overcome bigotry in high stations — shall 
 put down intolerance in persons great in office — until the minister 
 bo driven back to the half honesty which he before j^ossessed, or to 
 that retirement which he rigidly deserves. 
 
O'CONNELL REFUSING TO TAKE THE OATH. 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 647 
 
 Speech on the Treaty of Limerick, 1826. 
 
 On submitting to the Catholic Association, in 1826, the draft of a petition to 
 (parliament, asking that the provisions of the Treaty of Limerick be carried into 
 ■effect, Mr. O'Connell spoke as follows : 
 
 |kI^HE question is narrowed to a single point, and to any one 
 ■^im reviewinof the facts \vl 
 
 phich history presented, it was impos- 
 
 fsible to deny that the treaty has been foully and flagitiously 
 violated. The penal code was a violation of it, and while a 
 particle of that code remains, so long the solemn compact entered 
 into between the English government and the Irish people is a dis- 
 graceful monument of British perfidy. That treaty was a solemn, 
 deliberate and authorized agreement. It was signed by bishops and 
 commanders, and it was signed by Ginkle, who had the command 
 of his government to give even better terms than it insured, and to 
 make peace on any conditions, no matter how favorable to the people 
 of Limerick, and of course to the whole people of Ireland. Who 
 is it, who looks at history, that can be surprised that the wish to 
 eflfect a peace should exist on the part of the English? At the time 
 •of the war England was split into parties and dissensions. William 
 had the adherence of the Whigs to his cause, but the Tories, who 
 were the more numerous, though not so powerful, were arrayed 
 against him. The Tories were like the cowardly Orange faction of 
 the present day ; they were mean and dastardly, and took especial 
 care to keep themselves from every enterprise in which their per- 
 sons would be endangered. The Scotch highhuiders, a brave, hardy, 
 and chivalrous race, who were Catholics, were devoted to the house 
 of Stuart, and so were those of the lowlands too. The Calviuists 
 of that country were in the same situation with the Irish of the 
 present day ; their consciences were oppressed — their religious 
 liberty was restricted. They fought however in the field for their 
 
Q^Q TREASURY OF ELOQUENiE. 
 
 religion. Their efforts, tilthough courageous and adventurous, were 
 not suited to the meelv spirit of Christianity. I would not fight for 
 religion, because religion does not inculcate nor sanction such an 
 act ; but for my civil rights, I trust in God, there is no man who 
 has a more sincere regard for their value, or who would make 
 greater sacrifices and efforts for their defence. In England there 
 were many enemies against William, and his situation was precari- 
 ous. In Ireland his prospects were bad and discouraging : the Irish 
 forces, though in part unsuccessful, were not discomfited, and they 
 were learning those rules of discipline, without which an army is no 
 more than a mob. The battle of the Boj'ne was lost not by the in- 
 feriority of the Irish forces, but by the paltry, pitiful cowardice of 
 James. He only appeared once in the battle on that day. He 
 made only one appeal, and that was when the soldiery of England 
 were being cut down by the trooj^s of Ireland under Hamilton — then 
 he exclaimed, "O spare my English subjects?" Like another Duke 
 of York he took up his position in the rear, and the races of the 
 Helder had a glorious prototype in the races of the Boyne. "Change 
 generals," exclaimed the gallant Eegan, in the evening when the bat- 
 tle was done, "Change generals, and we will fight the battle over 
 again ! " Three thousand were wounded in that battle and but three 
 hundred were taken prisoners ! How illustrative of the humanity 
 of the conquerors ! Still Clare was open, and its batteries were in 
 possession of the Irish. The fortifications of Limerick were yet at 
 their command — French succors were daily expected — the war 
 between England and France was already declared — and with such 
 opposition, were it not for the treaty of Limerick, William would 
 have been driven back into Holland, if even there he would have 
 found a refuge from the French. The winter was fast approaching. 
 His armies consisted of some Dutch and some Brandenlnirg troops, 
 and some that were called Irish on whom no reliance was placed r 
 they were the Enniskillen and Londonderry regiments. Oh ! what 
 regiments these were ! Schomberg, in speaking of them, was only 
 puzzled to decide which of the two regiments was more thievish, 
 because both the regiments were much less remarkable for their 
 valor than for their propensity to rob and steal. Their officers were 
 peasants — plebeians who had advanced themselves by their base- 
 ness, and like the Orangemen of the present time, they were for- 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. (J4 > 
 
 midable only to an unarmed people. It was not unlikely tbat ?.i-. 
 Dawson was the descendant of one of these peasants. The pleasure 
 he felt in reverting to those times might probably be thus accounted 
 for. This Mr. Dawson, who, if he were not a clerk in office, would 
 not be worthy of contradiction, asserts many extraordinary things 
 respecting this country. He felt no interest in preserving its char- 
 acter, because, like his brother Orangemen, he was not indiirenous 
 to the soil. They must certainly be exotics, for if half their venom 
 was natural, the influence of St. Patrick would be efiectual in ban- 
 ishing the reptiles from among us. But the reptile still lives, and 
 here are its hisses. 
 
 Mr. O'Connell here took up a printed report of Mr. Dawson's speech. 
 
 Mr. Dawson tells us that the history of Ireland is a mere waste — 
 not a spot in it to vary the dismal scene but Londonderry, that fur- 
 nished the robbers to Marshal Schomberg, "Let us trace," says he, 
 "its dark and bloody progress. When a foreign foe invaded, it 
 shrunk at the foot of an insignificant couquerer." And this is what 
 Mr. Dawson said of a country to which he boasts of belonging. Let 
 me tell him this country was never beat. It was by Irishmen she 
 was always ruined. Their treachery and disunion were the cause 
 of her defeat. Four-fifths of the Irish troops joined the Cromwel- 
 lian invaders under Dermot, and it was to their desertion, and not 
 to the superior arms of her enemies, that her conquest was attribut- 
 able. Mr. Dawson proceeded — "continued insurrection, intestine 
 wars, bloody massacres, treacherous treaties." Treacherous trea- 
 ties 1 Come forward, Mr. Dawson, with your native host of Orange- 
 men, and prove infraction of one single treaty on the part of the 
 Irish. I ask but one. But he takes care to make the charge gene- 
 ral. Oh ! that is the way in which libels and malignant imputations 
 are uttered and circulated ; for he knows he cannot substantiate it. 
 " Verscdin- in generalibus." Oh ! how fatally true the Irish were to- 
 their treaties may be read in that of Limerick. The treaty was 
 signed before communication was had to the other part of the army, 
 which were, Mr. Chairman, under the command of an ancestor of 
 your own. Before it was completed, the French fleet with men and 
 arms arrived at Dingle. Some i\rgued that the treaty was not bind- 
 ing — that it had been agreed upon only in the South. What was 
 
()50 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the reply? "We know we are not bound by the treaty, but Irish 
 honor is pledged, and never shall we stain it." And well did they 
 observe it. They dismissed the French troops — they admitted their 
 enemies. They relied on English faith and Orange honor, and 
 the consequence, the natural consequence, Avas that they were duped. 
 But I turn on Mr. Dawson and say to him — you accuse us of violat- 
 ing treaties, if you cannot show me one you are a slanderer. And I 
 turn on him again and say— shoAV me one solitary treaty that England 
 has ever performed towards us, and I will forgive her all the rest. 
 No, sir, from the time the first footstep of the Saxon polluted our 
 land, down to the last, and not least flagrant breach of faith at the 
 execrable Union, I defy him to show me one compact between Eng- 
 land and this country, that has not been treacherously and basely 
 broken. The description of a treaty with the Irish, given by Clar- 
 endon, shows that the intention, at the moment of entering into 
 them, was to delude and betray us. Next, Mr. Dawson says: "A 
 systematic combination against the introduction of the arts and 
 blessings of peace are (with those qualities he before stated) to be 
 found in mournful succession throughout the lapse of centuries." 
 Really, this is very, very heartrending. They first take away our 
 possessions, our rights, our wealth, and every incentive to labor and 
 industry, and then one of that very faithless and base ci'ew who be- 
 trayed us, an underling of a minister, is sent to thwart and irritate 
 -us — to charge us Avith the effects of their own perfidy, and to re- 
 mind us of the blessings we have lost by being the victims of their 
 diabolical deceit. 
 
 " During five or six centuries," says Mr. Dawson, " the history of 
 Ii'cland presents not one single fact to claim the admiration or even 
 the respect of posterity." The blundering bigot then, with a classic 
 affectation, asks : "Where can we look for one green spot to cheer 
 us in our gloomy pilgrimage ? " Oh, hear this Orange bigot asking 
 for a green spot ! I was reading at the very time I received the 
 newspaper with Mr. Dawson's speech, a passage in a Avork which 
 has been ever and is still looked up to as a high authority on the 
 subject of which it treats. It is an account of the injuries and mas- 
 sacres of the Irish in 1641, by Dr. Curry, and there the occurrence 
 to which I allude is to be found. Many, innumerable instances 
 ■could be drawn from tlie historians of the times in Avhich Mr. Daw- 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 651 
 
 son's ignorance delights to revel, not of one fact, but of hundreds 
 of facts, calculated to elevate the character of the Catholics of Ire- 
 laud. Speaking of the county of Mayo, the historian says: "In 
 this county few murders were committed by either side, though the 
 libel saith, that about two hundred and fifty Protestants were mur- 
 dered, whereof at Belluke two hundred and twenty ; whei'eas not 
 one person was murdered there, which the now Lady of Montrath can 
 witness ; her ladyship and Sir Robert Hanna, her father, with many 
 others, being retreated thither for security, were all conveyed safe 
 to Manor Hamilton. And it is observable that the said lady and the 
 rest came to Mr. Owen O'Rorcke's, who kept a garrison at Druma- 
 heir, for the Irish, before they came to Manor Hamilton, whose 
 brother was prisoner with Sir Frederick Hamilton. And the said 
 Mr. O'Rorcke, having so many persons of quality in his hands, sent 
 to Sir Frederick to enlarge his brother, and that he would convey 
 them all safe to him. But Sir Frederick, instead of enlarging his 
 brother, hanged lum the next day, which might have well provoked 
 the gentleman to revenge, if he had not more humanity than could 
 be well expected upon such occasions, and in times of so great con- 
 fusion; yet he sent them all safe when they desired." Yes, he sent 
 them all safe when they desired. He did what he ought to do, har- 
 rowed as his heart must have been at the atrocious outrage that had 
 been committed by his rash and ferocious enemy. He did what an 
 Irish gentleman did do, and does do — he spurned at cruelty. He 
 was not goaded, even by the example set him, into an imitation of 
 barbarity. His honor stifled his sense of injurj'. I will give that 
 fact to Mr. Dawson, and let him make the most of it, in classic ful- 
 minations against the Catholics of Ireland. Let Mr. Dawson read 
 this fact, and if ho persist in aspersing his native land after the peni- 
 sal of it — if he should then impugn the chivalrous generosity — 
 the humanity — the virtues of Ireland, I will only say, that if Ire- 
 land has produced generous hearts and dispositions, she has also 
 produced monsters and anomalies, M'hich have turned what was 
 intended to be one of the gardens of the world into the pitiful 
 pelting province that she is at this moment ! 
 
 Mr. Dawson had said that the object of James H. was to establish 
 the Catholic religion both in England and Ireland, and with it 
 unlimited despotism. This was a false assertion ; he did no more 
 
(552 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 than to prDclaim toleration, and this was enough for the Dawsons of 
 the day to expel him from the throne. The prosecution of the seven 
 bishops I now condemn, and if I had lived in the day of the occur- 
 rence I would have condemned it then. Mr. Dawson says, that in 
 order to effect the purpose of establishing an unlimited despotism in 
 Ireland, James proceeded to remodel the civil establishments, and 
 he accordingly displaced every Protestant who held an office in the 
 administration of justice, and filled up the place of chancellor, chief 
 judges, puisne judges, privy councellors, sheriffs, magistrates, and 
 even constables, with Catholics. Talking of constables reminds me 
 of the Dublin corporation ; that immaculate body once petitioned for 
 the removal of Mulvaney, the scavenger, from his functions, because 
 he was, contrary to law, a Papist ! Oh, what a relentless spirit I 
 They would not allow a Papist to fill even the dirtiest office of the 
 state. It is asserted by Mr. Dawson, that all the judges appointed 
 by James were intolerant. This is false ; James nominated only 
 three judges — Nugent, Lord Eiverston, Sir Stephen Rice, and Dal3\ 
 Would to God all Judge Dalj^s were like him. He never raised 
 himself to the bench by destroying the interests of his country. He 
 never devoted his leisure hours to calumniating his wretched, ragged 
 countrymen ! All three individuals nominated by James to the 
 bench, were remarkable for their purity and pei'fection. They are 
 quoted by Protestant writers as the models of judicial knowledge and 
 purity. It was related of Eice that he gambled his property, and 
 this was the only blemish that ever sullied his reputation. They 
 lived in troubled times and they survived them. They did not fly, 
 as they would have done if they had been guilty of a crime or a 
 dereliction of duty. They lived honored and respected, and they 
 descended to their graves without taint or reproach, having served 
 their King well, and I trust having served their God better. Oh ! 
 it is only Orange bigotry that could ransack the very graves to find 
 matei'ials of insult ; but in this instance, as in every other, it has 
 failed, and I defy it to the proof. Mr. Dawson had alleged it as a 
 charge, that it was enacted by James that three fellows of the 
 University were prohiljited from meeting together. Even if it were 
 so, how did the enactment differ from the enactments usual in all 
 cases of civil commotion. What was this act intended to prevent but 
 a Protestant insurrection? Flagrante belln, it is provided that there 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 653 
 
 shall be no meetiugs of persons who might conspire lo cause a public 
 tumult, and this which is now practised — nay, which is carried to 
 an unparalleled extent in Ireland under the present government, is 
 charged as a crime upon James. But it should not be forgotten that 
 by the repeal of that act of settlement, the monarch himself was a 
 sufferer to an immense amount. The passing of that act, however, 
 might not be justified, but decidedly any act that would tend to 
 subvert it would be unjust. Transfers and conveyances had been 
 made to such an extent, that it would be an unjustifiable crime to 
 disturb them. I have been accused of recommending the repeal of 
 the act of settlement, and I dare say I will now be accused of 
 recommending it. But as a proof of my sincerity in defending it, I 
 ■will say that if that act wei'e annulled I would be comparatively a 
 beggar. My property hangs upon its continuance. The property 
 of my two brothers, who are both indeijendent, hangs upon the same 
 title. What then have I to gain by a change? Mr. Dawson had 
 complained of the attainder of two thousand six hundred Protestants 
 by James. But what was there in that, worthy of reprobation. 
 Those attainted men had tied the country ; they were told that if 
 they did not come back witiiin a certain period they would be 
 attainted. They did not return and they were attainted. Why 
 should they not ? They were attainted because they were enemies 
 of the King ; and if they were not enemies of the King, they were 
 Ijase cowards, for they ran away when their country needed their 
 assistance in its cause. In Athens it was the law that every man 
 who was neutral was criminal — "He who is not for us is against 
 us." And shall it be said that those who fled from their country 
 when she needed their energies on her behalf, were not deserving of 
 obloquy and punishment ? 
 
 Mr. Dawson had said that the parliament of James was Catholic. 
 I admit the fact. But let Mr. Dawson sho\v me any act of their 
 doing that can shake their purity and honesty ! Let him show me 
 an act even proposed for the purpose of oppressing the consciences 
 of Protestants ! No, the parliament of that day sat in friendship 
 with a few Protestants, and their Bill of Rights was more extensive 
 even than that of England. Even after the excesses and cruelties 
 that had been committed against the Catholics, when they were 
 ■deprived of power, and when they regained it, was there a system of 
 
G54 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 blood and cruelty on their part, although they had the dominion if 
 they used it? Under Mary the Catholics of Ireland were not perse- 
 cutors, and again under James they wielded their power in mercy 
 and toleration. They forgot the persecutions which their body 
 endured under Elizabeth, and they only bore in recollection the 
 character of their religion, which taught them to give charity and 
 good-will for persecution and cruelty. Mr. Dawson had said that 
 King James had taken away their churches from tlae Protestants. 
 This assertion, as well as the other assertion, made by that profound 
 statesman, was false. This statement was derived from the pure 
 pages of Archbishop King's work. The cathedral of Christ's Church 
 in Dublin was the Kang's chapel, and it was in that case alone that 
 James exercised his authority, and in dispossessing the holders of 
 that cathedral he acted under his royal right and was not influenced 
 by his religious feelings. The contrary was the fact with regard to 
 Wexford. In that county the Catholic soldiery had taken possess- 
 ion of a Protestant church, and when James heard the circumstan- 
 ces he ejected the soldiery and restored the church to its owners. 
 Doctor Leslie, a learned divine of the Protestant Church, had chal- 
 lenged the accuracy of Iving's book, and had denounced and refuted 
 it, and now, after such a lapse of years, Mr. Peel sends out his 
 inidei-ling, Mr. Dawson, his clerk, to repeat the calumnies. Who 
 was this King? He was a vile parasite of James. He was the 
 ecclesiastic who prayed from his pulpit, that God might blast him 
 if he ever preached any other doctrine than passive obedience, and 
 at another time, that God might blast and destroy William and his 
 consort, if they had an}' intention of invading this country ! He — 
 he is the vile toad-eater, who has denounced the monarch whose feet 
 he kissed? DojDping, who preached up that there was no faith to be 
 kept with the Catholics of Limerick, was the first to present an 
 address to King James on his landing. What an exquisite pair of de- 
 fendei's of the violation of the treaty of Limerick ! What immaculate 
 authority for Mr. Dawson to quote from ! Is it to be endured that 
 Peel, who knows nothing of the history of these times, or the history 
 of our country, is to send out one of his clerks to blow up, with his 
 pestiferous breath, the embers of those unholy fires of bigotry 
 which had been nearly extinguished by the superincumbent influence 
 of liberality and good fellowship, and to excite, by his evil agency. 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 655 
 
 the inflammable materials of Irish society? Before I conclude, I 
 will read an extract from a work written by Mr. Storey, a chaplain 
 in the army of King William, who is a tolerably good authority 
 on the bravery of the Irish ti'oops, which Mr. Dawson has re- 
 pudiated : 
 
 Wednesday, 24th. — A breach being made near St. Jolm's Gate, over the Black 
 Battery, that was about twelve yards long, and pretty flat, as it appeared to us, the 
 King gave orders that the counterscarp should be attacked that afternoon, to which 
 purpose a great many woolsacks were carried down, and good store of ammunition, 
 with other things suitable for such work. All the grenadiers in the army were 
 ordered to march down into the trenches, which they did. Those, being about five 
 hundred, were commanded, each company, by their respective captains, and were to 
 make the first attack, being supported by one battalion of the Blue Dutch on the 
 right, then Lieutenant Douglass's regiment. Brigadier Stuart's, my Lord Mcath's^ 
 and my Lord Lisljurn's, as also a Brandenburg regiment. These were all posted 
 towards the breach, upon the left of whom were Col. Cutts and the Danes. Lieutenant 
 General Douglass commanded, and their orders were to possess themselves of the 
 counterscarp and maintain it. We had also a body of horse drawn up to succor the 
 foot upon occasion. About half an hour after three, the signal being given by firing 
 three pieces of cannon, the grenadiers, being in the furthest angle of our trenches, 
 leaped over and ran towards the counterscarp, firing their pieces and throwing tlieir 
 grenades. This gave the alarm to the Irish, who had their guns all ready, and dis- 
 charged great and small shot upon us, as fast as 'twas possible. Our men were not 
 behind them in either, so that in less than two minutes, the noise was so terrible 
 that one would liave thought the very S'kies were ready to rend in sunder. This 
 was seconded by dust, smoke and all the terrors that the art of man could iuvent to 
 ruin and undo one another; aud to make it the more uneasy, the day itself w.is 
 excessively hot to the bystanders, and much more sore, in all respects, to those upon 
 action. Captain Carlisle, of my Lord Drogheda's regiment, ran in with his gren.a- 
 diers to the counterscarp, and though he received two wounds between that and the 
 trenches, yet he went forward and commanded his men to throw in the grenades, 
 but in the leaping into the dry ditch below the counterscarp, an Irishman below 
 shot him dead. Lieutenant Buxton, however, encouraged the men, and they got 
 upon the counterscarp, and all the rest of the grenadiers were as ready as they. By 
 this time the Irishmen were throwing down their arms and running as fast as they 
 could into town, which, our men perceiving, entered the breach, pell-mell, with 
 them, and half the Earl of Drogheda's grenadiers aud some others were actually In 
 town. The regiments that were to second the grenadiers went to the counterscarp, 
 and, having no order to proceed, they stopt." [I engage they did, they stopt sure 
 enough.] " The Irishmen were all running from the walls, and quite over the 
 bridge into the English town; but seeing but a few of our men enter, they were 
 with much ado persuaded to rally, and those that were in seeing themselves not 
 followed, and their amunitiou being spent, they designed to retreat, but some were 
 shot, some taken, and the rest came out again, but very few without being wounded. 
 The Irish then ventnred upon the breach again, and from the walls and every place 
 so pestered us upon the counterscarp, that, after nigh three hours resisting bullets, 
 stones, broken bottles, from the very women, who boldly stood in the breach, and 
 were nearer our men than their own " 
 
656 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 And here I will pay a tribute to the heroic virtues of these women, 
 who thus sacrificed themselves for their country's honor. An officer 
 of the Irish army was wounded. The instance is one of singular 
 interest, arising from female courage and presence of mind. He was 
 wounded, and was flying into his own house, and was puTsued by an 
 enemy. He had gained his door, and his wife, from a window in 
 the house, was a witness of his efforts to escape from his relentless 
 pursuer. The window-stone was loose, and it was a ready instru- 
 ment for her purpose. Her husband was nearly a victim to the 
 revenge of his foe, who had just stepped upon the threshold, when 
 the impulse of the mind of the fond and courageous woman gave a 
 strength and energy to her efforts ; she hurled the stone upon the 
 ruffian's head, and he bit the dust. Oh, what splendid devotion to 
 country ! Would there have been an Irish heart among the Irish if 
 they did not beat out their invaders, stimulated, as they were, by 
 such heart-cheering examples. 
 
 Mr. O'Connell resumed the reading. 
 
 ..." whatever ways could be thought on to destroy us, our ammunition being 
 spent, it was judged safest to return to our trenches. When the worii was at the 
 hottest, the Brandenburg regiment, who behaved themselves very well, had got 
 upon the Black Battery, when the enemy's powder happened to take fire, and blew 
 up a great many of them, the men, fagots, and stones, and what not, flying into the 
 air with a most terrible noise. Colonel Cutts was commanded by the Duke of Wur- 
 temburg to march tovvarda the spur at the south gate and beat in the Irish 
 that appeared there, which he did, though he lost several of his men and was him- 
 self wounded; he went within half musket shot of the gate, and all his men were 
 open to the enemy's fire, who lay secure within the walls. The Danes were not idle 
 all the while, but flred upon the enemy with all imaginable fury, and had several 
 killed, but the mischief was, we had but one breach, and all towards the left, it was 
 impossible to get into the town when the gates were shut if there had been no enemy 
 to oppose us, without a great many scaling ladders, which we had not. From half 
 an hour after three till after seven there was one continued flre of grape and small 
 shot without any intermission; insomuch that the smoke that went from the town 
 reached in one continued cloud to the top of a mountain at least six miles off. 
 When our men drew off, some were brought up dead and some without a leg ; others 
 wanted arms, and some were blind with powder; especially a great many of the i)oor 
 Brandenburghers looked like furies, with the misfortune of gunpowder. One Mr. 
 Upton, getting in amongst the Irish in town, and seeing no way to escape, went in 
 the crowd undiscovered till he came at the Goveruor, and then surrendered himself. 
 There was a captain, one Bedloe, who deserted the enemy the day before, and now 
 went upon the breach ami fought bravely on our side, for which his Majesty gave 
 him a company. The Sing stood nigh Cromwell's fort all the time, and the busi- 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 657 
 
 ness being over, lie went to his camp very much concerned, as indeed was the whole 
 army ; for you might have seen a mixture of anger and sorrow in everybody's coun- 
 tenance. The Irish had two small field pieces planted in the King's Island, which 
 flanked their own counterscarp, and in our attack did us no small damage, as did 
 also two guns more that they had planted within the town, opposite the breach, 
 and charged with cartridge shot. We lost at least live hundred upon the spot, and 
 had a thousand more wounded, as I understand by the surgeons of our hospitals, 
 who are the properest judges. The Irish lost a great many by cannou and other 
 ways ; but it cannot be supposed that their loss should be equal to ours, since it is 
 a much easier thing to defend walls than 'tis by main strength to force people from 
 them ; and one man within has the advantage of four without." 
 
 [Here followed a list of oflicers killed and wounded, needless to be recounted.] 
 
 Are we after this to be told by Duwson that our countrymen wore 
 not brave, and would not succeed if they had held out? In a base 
 violation of the treaty, M^hich had been signed before the walls of 
 Limerick, the privileges and immunities promised were denied ; the 
 treaty was broken ; it stands a record of British perGdy ! Our 
 ancestoi-s, sir, for I, too, may say that blood runs even in my veins 
 from those who fought before Limerick, are denied their rights ! 
 Your noble brother, degraded from his natural rank, is unrepre- 
 sented and unrepresenting. He neither has a vote in the election of 
 his own order, nor the voice of a Forty-shilling Freeholder in re- 
 turning a member to the Commons' House of P.nrliament. Where 
 is the liberty the Catholics enjoyed under Charles I., which was 
 secured to them by the treaty of Limerick ? Tell me that, Mr. 
 Dawson. Tell me that, Orange faction. Let Mr. Peel bring his 
 borough members, who come in when the division bell is rung, to 
 assert facts contrary to reason and religion against us ; but let them 
 not insult us by saying that the treaty of Limerick has not been 
 foully violated. 
 
 There is another trait of Mr. Dawson's hypocrisy that is worth 
 mentioning. After my examination before the Parliamentary Com- 
 mittee, Mr. Dawson came up to me and told me, in the weakness of 
 his heart, that my evidence had removed many prejudices from him, 
 and that his opinions on many subjects Avere altered. I rejoiced at 
 the declaration, and I respected him for making it at the time. I 
 mentioned in public the fact, and stated that Mr. Dawson had shaken 
 hands with me in the interview, and this part of the relation it was 
 deemed necessary to contradict in the Dublin Evening Mail. I do 
 
058 TREASUEY OF ELOQUI'^NCE. 
 
 not know whether he shook hands with me or not. I hojie now he 
 did not. I would shrink from any contact with a man who could 
 make such a declaration to me as he did, and since falsify it by his 
 acts. 
 
 I have done. I have shown that the treaty of Limerick was foully 
 violated. I arraign those who perpetuate the violation by their 
 hostility to us and to our cause. I arraign their bigotry in the face 
 of the world ; and I demand, in the name of humanity and justice 
 and faith, that at least the terms of the compact should be fulfilled. 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 659^ 
 
 Speech at the Second Clare Election, 
 
 Mr. O'Coitneli, arose and placed his hand several times upon his breast during 
 the acclamations, evidently under the influence of powerful emotions. 
 
 ^i ACCEPT the trust, not with any presumptuous confidence in 
 P^ my own abilities, but simply with an honesty of intuition and 
 'i^^ purity of motive. We have procured Emnncipation, from the 
 i, moral condition of the people, from that high enlightenment 
 they had acquired from their submission, their obedience to the 
 laws, from their respect to the mauy ordinances of man and laws of 
 God. 
 
 It was impossible that that measure could be any longer withheld 
 — but I complain of the results of that measure; I complain that 
 since it hns passed, four months have now elapsed and there has not 
 been an effort employed on the part of the government, nor any dis- 
 position manifested to do away with the distinctions Avhich then 
 existed and which still continue to exist in the country. No, they 
 are still kept alive as much as ever, and up to the period at wliich I 
 now speak, there does not appear a single Catholic who has derived 
 the least benefit from the meiisure. In speaking of your having 
 elected me now, I shall still point out to you — I feel it my duty to 
 do so — the injustice which has been done to you and me when the 
 last election was made the subject of discussion in the House, and I 
 must say that it had anything but my respect or submission upon 
 that occasion. I heard the insolent opinion of the speaker pro- 
 nounced, and, though I am well aware of the little and contemptible 
 motives by which he was actuated ; although I am well aware that 
 they are of that description which the character of the sex from 
 which they emanated should consign to silence, I shall not say any- 
 thing more about them now, but the time shall come when with your 
 voice I will bring this matter forth. Upon that occasion, too, I 
 
660 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 have to complain of the conduct of a, certain profession, a profession 
 to which I once considered it an honor to belong. I allude to the 
 profession of the bar. 
 
 The bar, in my opinion, have disgraced themselves in the discus- 
 sion of my case before the House of Commons. I put forward, upon 
 that occasion, my opinions as to my right to sit and vote. I proved 
 my right to sit and vote by the existing law. There was not one 
 who came forward either by pamphlet or letter to contradict my 
 statement. If they had done so in print, I would immediately have 
 annihilated them. ]\Ir. Sugden committed one of the most egregious 
 errors that ever a lawyer of any country was guilty of upon that 
 occasion. Mr. Tyndal waited, and in a dry, hum-drum form of a 
 speech in parliament, opposed me. It was a poor, miserable attempt 
 at a speech, and this man has since become the Lord Chief Justice 
 of England. That country is to be pitied that has such a judge. It 
 is melancholy to reflect that elevation can be easily procured by 
 abandonment of princijile. There was another who opposed me — 
 Mr. Sugden — one who has lately made himself very reraarkal)le by 
 some ridiculous oI)servation, but whose name has not been intro- 
 duced to-day. He committed an egregious blunder, and I nailed it 
 to him. The first who opposed me has since become a Chief Jus- 
 tice, whilst another has been appointed his Majesty's Attorney Gen- 
 eral for England. 
 
 I cannot express the sentiments of abhorrence and contempt I 
 entertain for the opinion pronounced by Sir James Scarlett. He 
 was favorable in opinion to me, so much so that Mr. Hutchinson, 
 the member for Mallow, and others, told me they were convinced 
 by the reasonings of Sir James Scarlett ; yet this man afterwards 
 voted against me. Thus I was put down by parliamentary magic 
 and two lawyers, l)oth of whom are promoted, and one of whom 
 advocated my cause at one period. I must, however, do justice to 
 that portion of the profession who acted nobly, consistently, and 
 honorably. I cannot be unmindful of the splendid aid of Henry 
 Brougham, that man of unrivalled talent, who possesses more infor- 
 mation than any other man I ever met. Oh, yes ; it gladdens my 
 heart to reflect that I had such a man at my side, the brightest orna- 
 ment in the British House of Commons, the statesman, the orator, 
 the lawyer, the man of science, and the philosopher. There were 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. (56 X 
 
 others, too, who supported me. I cannot omit the names of Dim- 
 cannon, Ebrington, of Rice, of Lloyd. 
 
 [Yes, and, said some individual, the Knight of Kerry.] 
 
 Oh ; as to the Knight of Kerry, I hardly consider it a debt I owe 
 him, to enumerate his distinguished name, one of the most honest 
 men who ever entered into tiio House of Commons. There were 
 also many who supported me. among the high families of England. 
 The illustrious name of Grey can never be forgotten by me. I had 
 his distinguished support. The decision, notwithstanding all, was 
 against me. It was a decision in the face of the law. I told them 
 so before the bar of the House — that there was an injustice done 
 me, and an injustice in my person done to you. As far as I am con- 
 cerned nothing shall prevent me tearing away the veil and showing 
 the administration in all its naked deformity, for the purpose of 
 saving the coiuitry for the King and the p^eople. I shall next allude 
 to the destruction of the Catholic Association. It certainly reminds 
 me — in truth it does, of the immortal Alexander, who " twice had 
 slew the slain," — it was a most unnecessary measure, for the 
 Association had previously performed a virtual suicide. It was 
 frightful to consider the consequence of that act ; it is a despotic 
 power put into the hands of the Viceroy, and I complain of it 
 because it bears, without distinction, upon all classes. I shall not 
 be one fortnight in the House until I call for its repeal. I shall 
 demand, too, the repeal of that act which deprived the virtuous 
 forty-shilling freeholders of their franchise — an act which robbed 
 two hundred and fifty thousand of the elective franchise in one day. 
 
 The disfranchisement of the forty-shilling freeholders was a breach 
 of the Union. It was the basis of the Union tiiat the country should 
 be represented by the forty-shilling freeholders among the constitu- 
 ency of the countiy, for the purpose of placing the representation of 
 both kingdoms upon an equalization ; that equalization was now 
 destroyed — the basis of the Union was therefore destroyed. ai;d 
 the measure was grossly violated in this instance. Standing hei'e 
 now, as I do, for the first time, the undisputed member of the 
 county of Clare, I pledge myself to have those virtuous men reslored 
 to their rights. As a favorable result of emancipation, and a dispo- 
 sition to dispense justice, the IMinistry point, no doubt, to the late 
 
(362 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 proclamation for the dispersion of Orange assemblies. I will admit 
 this, but I am at liberty to canvass this proclamation ; it came a 
 ■week just too late. I went, about a week before the fatal occur- 
 rence which called it forth, to Lord Levison Gower, and told him 
 my apprehensions ; I told him I feared, if some timely and salutary 
 measures were not taken, that sixty individuals, at least, would foil 
 victims to Orange butchery. In a week afterwards the proclama- 
 tion is issued ; it reminds me of the familiar adage, that "he was a 
 good servant who locked the stable door when the steed was stolen." 
 His master had certainly good reason to congratulate himself on the 
 services of such a servant. There was no proclamation as long as 
 the people lay quiet, as long as they laid themselves down to the 
 fury of the Orange gang, as long as the}' patiently submitted to the 
 sword ; as long as all this continued there was no proclamation ; 
 but when the battle of Mackeon took place, which was gallant and 
 victorious to the Catholics, then the proclamation was issued. 
 
 I shall now address j'ou on a subject more closely allied to your 
 feelings, and I address you with pain, as'I have to allude to myself. 
 What, I ask, can I do for Clare ? I will tell you what I can't do, I 
 -cannot provide anyone among you with place, pension, or office. I 
 •cannot meet the expectation of anyone in this way. I don't care 
 what the administration may be, I shall always be like the shep- 
 herd's dog, watching to mark where the rights and liberties of the 
 people shall be infringed upon, to sound the alarm, to protect them 
 from danger. The first object to w4iich my attention shall bo 
 directed, is to hold out the olive branch of peace to all ; to reconcile 
 the temporary separation between landlord and tenant ; to engender 
 those kindly and affectionate feelings between those respective 
 classes which ought forever to exist, and, if possible, ought never 
 to have suffered estrangement or alienation. Upon the occasion of 
 the last election, there were many and many who opposed me, who 
 are now disposed to give me their support ; and there were many 
 who were actuated in that opposition by the most honorable motives. 
 There is Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald, too, of whom I can scarcely speak 
 in adequate terms of eulogy. I should be base, indeed, if I did not 
 bestow upon him the commendations he deserves. The Catholics 
 turned him out of the county, and the revenge which he practiced, 
 was one of the best speeches I ever heard in their favor. It was one 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 663 
 
 ■of the greatest instances of generosity, which I ever befoi-e Avit- 
 iiessed. I consider Mr. Vesey Fitzgerald one of the ablest men in 
 the cabinet, and if he were not encumbered with a certain peculiarity 
 approaching to diffidence in his own powers, frequently the com- 
 panion of great merit, — he would be the first man in the cabinet. 
 I shall now turn to mj^ public duties, and it may be asked, what are 
 my qualifications ? I say it unafiectedly, I am no orator. I am a 
 "plain, blunt man," who speaks the plain language. My forensic 
 habits have given me a facility in delivering my sentiments as they 
 occur to my mind, without humming, or having to look for a better 
 word. I have no pretensions to poetry. The Muses have never 
 hovered over me with their zephyr-airy wings, or carried me aloft 
 on those wild and ethereal voyages of fancy which arc taken by her 
 favorite votaries. I come, as I have said, to the House of Com- 
 mons, a plain workingman, with honesty of intentions — a man of 
 business. That man must be an early riser who is up before me ; 
 and he must be a sober fellow who goes to bed with a more sober 
 head than 1 do. When I go over to the House of Commons, it is 
 my intention to be there from the moment that prayers begin until 
 the moment that all the business is over. I will be the first in the 
 House, and I shall be last out. I will read every bill, every word of it. 
 I come now to what I consider my duties with regard to religion. If 
 any question should come before tl e House on the subject of the dis- 
 cipline of the Established Church, I shall immediately walk out. I shall 
 leave Protestants to deal with what leads to their own spiritual con- 
 cerns. I should wish the same for myself, and I will do as I would be 
 done bj'. But with respect to the temporalities of the Established 
 Church, that is totally another subject. I should wish to bring about a 
 suitable equalization of church property, not that thousands of curates 
 should hardly have the means of subsistence, while the bishops were 
 rioting in luxury. The former have only £75 a year, while many of 
 the bishops have twenty thousand ! The time is approaching when 
 the system of tithes must be abolished. France is now comfortable 
 in the abolition of its tithes. If no one will introduce the subject, I will 
 introduce it myself. I know that I shall have more Protestants than 
 any other class to join me in this measure. I shall endeavor to put 
 an end to the perpetually returning litigation to which the Catholics 
 and Dissenters are subject, by these primeval transfers of deeds, 
 
(3(34 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 which were a consuming gangrene to both Dissenters and Catholics 
 in their public charities. I shall endeavor to pi'otect them by the 
 law, free from litigation. I go into parliament for freedom for all 
 men — Jew and Gentile, Heathen and Christian. I except, how- 
 ever, the subjects of that abominable monopoly, the East India Com- 
 pany, who still keep the abominations of the idol Juggernaut. I 
 would leave those people to their superstitions, endeavoring to con- 
 vince them by every reasonable argument, but I should neither sup- 
 port' nor encourage them, nor support those who would do so either. 
 I would place no limit to the freedom of the human mind. But I 
 shall pass from these subjects to those of much more interest. 
 
 Let me draw your attention to a system of oaths, a hoi'rible sys- 
 tem of oaths. There are no less a number of oaths required to be 
 taken in various departments than seventeen or eighteen hundred. 
 There are a multitude of oaths in the excise, and I shall make it my 
 business to call for a list of all the public oaths which are now 
 required to be taken in vai'ious departments, for the purpose of hav- 
 ing them abolished. I condemn the taking of oaths altogether. The 
 next subject to which I shall call your attention is that of parliamen- 
 tary reform. I consider that it is calculated to give security to 
 jiroperty and safety to life. I claim, in a word, for the people at 
 large a full and free representation. I profess myself a radical 
 reformer. The voting should be by ballot, and carried on regularly 
 in the parish in which each individual lived. I may be asked what 
 are my sentiments respecting the duration of parliament. I will not 
 quarrel much about that, but I am an advocate for full, free, and fre- 
 quent parliaments. The parliament anterior to the year 1688 was 
 triennial. For my part, in this particular, I must say I am much 
 attached to biennial parliaments. From this subject, I shall now 
 turn to that of the Repeal of the Union. I may be asked, shall I be 
 able to etfect this. Who Avould be believed if, two years ago, he 
 should have been hazardous enough to say, that this day I would 
 stand the unquestioned representative of the County of Clare? I 
 know that in seeking the Repeal of the Union,- 1 shall have the sup- 
 port of the Coi'poratiou of Dublin, however opposed to me upon 
 other subjects. 
 
 I now come to that species of reform which is the object of my 
 darling solicitude — the reform of law. The government should pay 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 665 
 
 all the expenses ; there should be no hireling advocacy. Prosecutors 
 never see one another until they are brought into court, and their 
 case comes on in the shape of a record. In every case of litigation, 
 the contending parties should previously see one another, the judge 
 explain the laws, and I have no doubt that under those circumstances 
 a mutual corapi'omise and arrangement would take place before the 
 parties Avould leave the court. There is one subject more to which 
 I shall advert. I am the respecter of authority. If calumny assail 
 the Throne, then private life cannot be secure. I have read with 
 horror some details of a distinguished individual in the Loudon news- 
 papers. The story of Captain Garth, however, must come to light, 
 and the Duke of Cumberland, I have no doubt, will be freed from 
 the foul calumny with which he has been assailed. No — I shall not 
 see the brother of my King attacked. I am norespecter of persons,, 
 but I will call for and demand investigation into this transaction. 
 There is a moral progress at present in the world. There is no truej 
 basis for liberty but religion. 
 
(366 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Speech 
 
 At Mullaghmast Monster Meeting. 
 
 Septembee, 1843. 
 
 f^yi ACCEPT, with the greatest alacritj^ the high honor you havo 
 g^ done me in calling me to the chair of this majestic meeting. 
 2i^ I feel more honored than I ever did in my life, with one single 
 i exception, and that related to, if possible, an equally majestic 
 meeting at Tara. But I must say that if a comparison were instituted 
 between them, it would take a more discriminating eye than mine to 
 discover any difference between them. There are the same incal- 
 culable numl)ers ; there is the same firmness ; there is the same 
 determination ; there is the same exhibition of love to old Ireland ; 
 there is the same resolution not to violate the peace ; not to be guilty 
 of the slightest outrage ; not to giye the enemy power by commit- 
 ting a crime, but peacefully and manfully to stand together in the 
 open day, to protest before man and in the presence of God against 
 the iniquity of continuing the Union. 
 
 At Tara, I protested against the Union — I repeat the protest at 
 Mullaghmast. I declare solemnly my thorough conviction as a con- 
 stitutional lawyer, that the Union is totally void in point of principle 
 and of constitutional force. I tell you that no portion of the empire 
 had the power to traffic on the rights and liberties of the Irish people. 
 The Irish people nominated them to make laws, and not legislatures. 
 They were appointed to act under the constitution and not annihilate 
 it. Their delegation from the people was confined within the limits of 
 the constitution, and the moment the Irish parliament went beyond 
 those limits and destroyed the constitution, that moment it annihilated 
 its own power, but could not annihilate the immortal spirit of liberty, 
 which belongs, as a rightful inheritance, to the people of Ireland. 
 Take it then from me that the Union is void. I admit there is the 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. (J(37 
 
 force of a law, because it has been supported by the policeman's 
 truncheon, by the soldier's bayonet, and by the hoi-seman's sword ; 
 because it is supported by the courts of law, and those who have 
 power to adjudicate in them ; but I say solemnly, it is not supported 
 by constitutional right. The Union, therefore, in my thorough con- 
 viction, is totally void, and I avail myself of this opportunity to 
 announce to several hundreds of thousands of my fellow-subjects, 
 that the Union is an unconstitutional law, and that it is not fated to 
 last long — its hour is approaching. America offered us her sym- 
 pathy and support. We refused the support but we accepted the 
 sympathy ; and while we accepted the sympathy of the Americans 
 we stood upon the firm ground of the right of every human being 
 to liberty ; and I, in the name of the Irish nation, declare that no 
 support ol^tained from America should be purchased by the price of 
 abandoning principle for one moment, and that principle is, that 
 ever}^ human being is entitled to freedom. 
 
 My friends, I want nothing for the Irish but their country, and I 
 think the Irish are competent to obtain their own country for them- 
 selves. I like to have the sympathy of every good maju everywhere, 
 but I want not armed support or physical strength from any country. 
 The Republican party in France offered me assistance. I thanked 
 them for their sympathy, but I distinctly refused to accept any sup- 
 port from them. I want support from neither France nor America, 
 and if that usurper, Louis Philippe, who trampled on the liberties 
 of his own gallant nation, thought fit to assail me in his newspaper, 
 I returned the taunt with double vigor, and I denounce him to Europe 
 and the woi'ld as a treacherous tyrant, who has violated the compact 
 with his own country, and thei'efore is not fit to assist the liberties 
 of any other country. I want not the support of France ; I want 
 not the support of America ; I have physical support enough about 
 me to achieve any change ; but you know well that it is not my plan 
 — I will not risk the safety of one of you. I could not afford the 
 loss of one of you — I will protect you all, and it is better for you 
 all to be merry and alive, to enjoy the repeal of the Union ; but there 
 is not a man of you there that would not, if we were attacked unjustly 
 and illegally, be ready to stand in the open field by my side. Let 
 every man that concurs in that sentiment lift up his hand. 
 
 Every individual in the imineuse naultitude lifted his hand amidst tremendous 
 cbeering. 
 
(5(38 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 The assertion of tlmt .seiitiiiiciit is our sure protection, for no- 
 person will attack us, and we will attack nobody. Indeed, it would 
 be the height of absurdity for us to think of making any attack ; for 
 there is not one man in his senses in Europe or America, that does 
 not admit that the repeal of the Union is now inevitable. The Eng- 
 lish papers taunted us, and their writers laughed us to scorn ; but 
 now thej' admit that it is impossible to resist the application for 
 repeal. More power to you. But that even shows we have power 
 enough to know how to use it. Why, it is only this week that one of 
 the leading Loudon newspapers, called the "Morning Herald,"' who 
 had a reporter at the Lismore meeting, published an account of that 
 great and mighty meeting, and in that account the writer expressly says 
 that it will be impossible to refuse so peaceable, so determined, so 
 unanimous a people, ^ as the people of Ireland, the restoration of 
 their domestic legislature. For my own part, I would have thought 
 it wholly unnecessary to call together so large a meeting as this, but 
 for the trick played by Wellington, and Peel, and Graham, and 
 Stanley, and the rest of the paltry administration, by whose govern- 
 ment this country is disgraced. I don't suppose so worthless an 
 administration ever before got together. Lord Stanley is a renegade 
 from Whiggism, and Sir James Graham is woi'se. Sir Robei't Peel 
 has five hundred colors on his bad standard, and not one of them is 
 permanent. To-day it is orange, to-morrow it will be green, the 
 day after neither one nor the other, but we shall take care that it 
 shall never be dyed in blood. 
 
 Then there is the poor old Duke of Wellington, and nothing was 
 ever so absurd as their deification of him in England. The English 
 historian — rather the Scotch one — Alison, an arrant Tory, admits 
 that the Duke of Wellington was surpi-ised at Waterloo, and if he 
 got victoriously out of that battle, it was owing to the valor of the 
 British troops, and their unconquerable detci-mination to die, but 
 not to yield. No man was ever a good soldier, but the man who 
 goes into the battle determined to conquer or not come back from 
 the battle-field. No other principle makes a good soldier ; conquer 
 or die is the battle cry for the good soldier ; conquer or die is his 
 only security. The Duke of Wellington had troops at Waterloo 
 that had learned that word, and there were Irish troops amongst 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. 669 
 
 them. You all remember the verses made by the poor Shan Van 
 Vocht : 
 
 " At famed Waterloo, 
 
 Duke Wellington would look blue 
 
 If Paddy was not there too, 
 
 Says the Shan Van Vocht." 
 
 Yes, the glory he got there was bought by the blood of the Eng- 
 lish, Irish, and Scotch soldiers — the glory was yours. He is nom- 
 inally a member of the administration, but yet they would not 
 entrust him with any kind of otSce. He has no duty at all to perform, 
 but a sort of Irish anti-repeal warden. I thought I never would be 
 obliged to the ministry, but I am obliged to them. They put a 
 speech abusing the Irish into the Queen's mouth. They accused us 
 of disaflection, but they lie ; it is their speech ; there is no disaffec- 
 tion in Ireland. "We were loyal to the sovereigns of Great Britain, 
 even when they were our enemies ; we were loj'al to George the 
 Third, even when he betrayed us ; we were loyal to George the 
 Fourth, when he blubbered and cried when we forced him to eman- 
 cipate us. We were loj-al to old Billy, though his minister put into 
 his mouth a base, bloody, and intolerant speech against Ireland ; and 
 we are loyal to the Queen, no matter what our enemies may say to 
 the contrary. It is not the Queen's speech, and I pronounce it to 
 be a lie. There is no dissatisfaction in Ireland, but there is this — a 
 full deternnnation to obtain justice and liberty. I am much obliged 
 to the ministr}' for that speech, for it gives me, amongst other things, 
 an opportunity of addressing such meetings as this. I had held the 
 monster meetings. I had fully demonstrated the opinion of Ireland. 
 I was convinced their unanimous determination to obtain liberty was 
 sufficiently signified by the many meetings already held ; but when 
 the minister's speech came out, it was necessary to do something 
 more. Accordingly, I called a monster meeting in Loughrea. I 
 called another meeting in Cliffden. I had another monster meeting 
 in Lismore, and here now we are assembled on the Rath of Mullagh- 
 mast. 
 
 At MuUaghmast (and I have chosen this for this obvious reason), 
 •we are on the precise spot where English treachery — aye, and false 
 Irish treachery, too — consummated a massacre that has never been 
 imitated, save in the massacre of the Mamelukes by Mahomet Ali. 
 
670 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 It was necessary to have Turks atrocious enough to commit a crime 
 equal to that perpetrated by Englishmen. But do not think that 
 the massacre at Mullaghmast was a question between Protestants and 
 Catholics — it was no such thing. The murdered persons were to 
 be sure Catholics, but a great number of the murderers were also 
 Catholic, and Irishmen, because there were then, as well as now, 
 many Catholics who were traitors to Ireland. But we have now 
 this advantage, that we may have many honest Protestants joining 
 us — joining us heartily in hand and heart, for old Ireland and lib- 
 erty. I thought this a fit and becoming spot to celebrate, in the 
 open day, our unanimity in declaring our determination not to be 
 misled by any treachery. Oh, my friends, I will keep you clear of 
 all treachery — there shall be no bargain, no compromise with Eng- 
 land — we shall take nothing but repeal, and a parliament in College 
 Green. You will never, by my advice, confide in any false hopes 
 they hold out to you ; never confide in anything coming from them, 
 or cease from your struggle, no matter what promise ma}' be held 
 to you, until you hear mc say I am satisfied ; and I will tell you 
 where I will say that^ — near the statue of King "William, in College 
 Green. No, we came here to express our determination to die to a 
 man, if necessary, in the cause of old Ireland. We came to take 
 advice of each other, and above all, I believe you came here to take 
 my advice. I can tell you, I have the game in my hand — I have 
 the triumph secure — I have the repeal certain, if you but obey my 
 advice. [Great cheers, and cries of " We will obey you in any- 
 thing."] 
 
 I will go slow — you must allow me to do so — but you will go sure. 
 No man shall find himself imprisoned or persecuted who follows my 
 advice. I have led you thus far in safety ; I have swelled the multi- 
 tude of repealers until they are identified with the entire population, 
 or nearly the entire population of the laud, for seven-eighths of the 
 Irish people are now enrolling themselves repealers. [Cheers and 
 cries of more power to you.] I don't want more power; I have 
 power enough, and all I ask of j'ou is to allow me to use it. I will 
 go on quietly and slowly, but I will go on firmly, and with a cer- 
 tainty of success. I am now arranging a plan for the formation of 
 the Irish House of Commons. 
 
 It is a theory, but it is a theory that may be realized in three 
 
DANIEL O'CONNELL. (371 
 
 ■weeks. The repeal arbitrators are beginning to act ; the people are 
 submitting their ditTerences to men chosen by themselves. You will 
 see by the newspapers that Dr. Gray and my son, and other gentle- 
 men, have already held a petty session of their own, where justice 
 will be administered free of all expense to the people. The people 
 shall have chosen magistrates of their own in the room of the magis- 
 trates who have been removed. The people shall submit their differ- 
 ences to them, and shall have sti'ict justice administered to them 
 that shall not cost them a single farthing. I shall go on with that 
 l^lan until wo have all disputes settled and decided by justices ap- 
 pointed by the people themselves. [Long may you live.] I wish 
 to live long enough to have perfect justice administered to Ireland, 
 and liberty proclaimed throughout the land. It will take me some 
 time to prepare my plan for the formation of the new Irish House of 
 Commons — that plan which we will yet submit to her Majesty for 
 lier approval, when she gets rid of her present paltry aduiinistration 
 and has one that I can support. But I must finish that job before I 
 go forth, and one of my reasons for calling you together is to state 
 my intentions to you. Before I arrange my plan the Conciliation 
 Hall will be finished, and it will be worth any man's while to go 
 from MuUaghmast to Dublin to see it. 
 
 When we have it arranged I will call together three hundred, as 
 the "Times"' called them, bogtrotters, but better men never stepped on 
 pavement. But I will have the three hundred and no thanks to 
 them. Wales is up at present, almost in a state of insurrection. 
 The people there have found that the landlords' power is too great 
 and has been used tyrannically, and I believe j^ou agree with them 
 tolerably well in that. They insist on the sacredness of the right of 
 the tenants to security of possession, and with the equity of tenure 
 which I would establish we will do the landlords full justice, but we 
 will do the people justice also. We will recollect that the land 
 is the landlord's, and let him have the benefit of it, but we 
 will also recollect that the labor belongs to the tenant and the tenant 
 must have the value of his labor, not transitory and by the day, but 
 permanently and by the year. Yes, my friends, for this purpose I 
 must get some time. I worked the present repeal year tolerably 
 well. I believe no one in January last would believe that we could 
 have such a meeting within the year as the Tara demonstration. 
 
(372 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 You may be sure of this — and I say it iu the presence of Him who 
 will judge me— that I never will willfully deceive you. I have but 
 one wish under heaven, and that is for the liberty and prosperity of 
 Ireland. I am for leaving England to the English, Scotland to the 
 Scotch, but we must have Ireland for the Irish. I will not be con- 
 tent until I see not a single man in any office, from the lowest 
 constable to the Lord Chancellor, but Irishmen. This is our land, 
 and we must have it. We will be obedient to the Queen, joined to 
 England by the golden link of the Crown, but we must have our 
 own parliament, our own bench, our own magistrates, and we will 
 give some of the shoneens who now occupy the bench leave to retire, 
 such as those lately appointed by Sugdcn. He is a pretty boy, sent 
 here from England ; but I ask, did you ever hear such a name as he 
 has got? I remember, in Wexford, a man told me he had a pig at 
 home which he was so fond of that he would call it Sugden. No ; 
 we shall get judicial independence for Ireland. It is for this jiurpose 
 we are assembled here to-day, as every countenance I see around 
 me testifies. If there is any one here who is for the Union, let him 
 say so. Is there anybody here for the repeal? [Cries of ''all, all," 
 and loud cheering.] 
 
 Yes, my friends, the Union was begot in iniquity — it was perpe- 
 trated in fraud and cruelty. It was no compact, no bargain, but it 
 ■was an act of the most decided tyranny and corruption that was ever 
 yet perpetrated. Trial by jury was suspended — the right of personal 
 protection was at an end — courts martial sat throughout the land — 
 and the county of Kildare, among others, flowed with blood. Oh, 
 my friends, listen now to the man of peace, who will never expose 
 you to the power of your enemies. In 1798 there were some brave 
 men, some valiant men, to head the people at large, but there were 
 many traitors, who left the people in the power of their enemies. 
 The Curragh of Kildare afforded an instance of the ftxte which Irish- 
 men were to expect, who confided in their Saxon enemies. Oh, it 
 was an ill-organized, a premature, a foolish, and an absurd insurrec- 
 tion ; but you have a leader now who never will allow you to com- 
 mit any act so foolish or so destructive. How delighted do I feel 
 with the thorough conviction which has come over the minds of the 
 people, that they could not gratify your enemies more than by com- 
 mittinof a crime. No ; our ancestors suffered for confidin<j in the 
 
DANIEL 0' CON NELL. 673 
 
 English, but we never will confide in them. They suifered for being 
 divided amongst themselves. There is no division amongst us. 
 They sufTcred for their own dissensions — for not standing man to 
 man by each other's side. We shall stand peaceably side by side 
 in the face of every enemy. Oh, how delighted was I in the scenes 
 whicli I witnessed as I came along here to-day ! How my heart 
 throljbed, how my spirit was elevated, how my bosom swelled with 
 delight at the multitude which I beheld, and which I shall behold, 
 of the stalwart and strong men of Kildare ! I was delighted at the 
 activity and force that I saw around me, and my old heart grew 
 warm again in admiring the beauty of the dark-eyed maids and ma- 
 trons of Kildare. Oh, there is a starlight sparkling from the eye of 
 a Kildare beauty, that is scarcely equalled, and could not be 
 excelled all over the world. And remember that you are the sons, 
 the fathers, the brothers, and the husbands of such women, and a 
 traitor or a coward could never be connected with any of them. 
 Yes, I am in a county, remarkable in the history of Ireland for its 
 bravery and its misfortune, for its credulity in the faith of others, 
 for its people judged of the Saxon by the honesty and honor of their 
 own natures. I am in a county celebrated for the sacrcdness of its 
 shrines and fanes. I am in a county where the lamp of Kildare's 
 holy shrine burned with its sacred fire, through ages of darkness 
 and storm — that fire which for six centuries burned before the high 
 altar without being extinguished, being fed continuously, without 
 the slightest interruption, and it seemed to me to have been not an 
 inapt representation of the continuous fidelity and religious love of 
 country of the men of Kildare. Yes, you have those high qualities 
 — religious fidelity, continuous love of country. Even your ene- 
 mies admit that the world has never produced any people that 
 exceeded the Irish in activity and strength. The Scottish philoso- 
 pher has declared, and the French philosopher has confirmed it, that 
 number one in the human race is, blessed be Heaven, the Irishman. 
 In moral virtue, in religion, in perseverance, and in glorious tem- 
 perance, you excel. Have I any teetotallers here? Yes, it is tee- 
 totallism that is repealing the Union. I could not afford to bring 
 you together, I would not dare to bring you together, but that I had 
 the teetotallers for my police. 
 
 Yes, among the nations of the earth, Ireland stands number one 
 
(574 TIIEASURY OF ELOQUEXCE. 
 
 ill the ph^'sical strengtli of her «oiis, and in the beaut}' and purity of 
 licr daughters. Ireland, land of my forefathei's, hoAV my mind 
 expands, and my spirit walks abroad in something of majesty, when 
 I contemplate the high qualities, inestimable virtues, and true 
 purity and piety, and religious fidelity of the inhabitants of your 
 green fields and productive mountains. Oh, what a scene sur- 
 rounds us! — It is not only the countless thousands of brave and 
 active and peaceable and religious men that are here assembled, but 
 nature herself has written her character with the finest beauty in the 
 verdant plains that surround us. Let any man run round the hori- 
 zon with his eye, and tell me if created nature ever produced any- 
 thing so green and so lovely, so undulating, so teeming with 
 production. The richest harvests that any land can produce are 
 those reaped in Ireland ; and then here are the sweetest meadows, 
 the greenest fields, the loftiest mountains, the i)m'cst streams, the 
 noblest rivers, the most capacious harbors - — and her water-power is 
 equal to turn the machinery of the whole world. Oh, my friends, 
 it is a country worth fighting fur — it is a country worth dying for; 
 but iibove all, it is a country worth being tranquil, determined, sub- 
 missive and docile ; for disciplined as you are in obedience to those 
 ■who are breaking the way, and trampling down the barriers between 
 you and your constitutional liberty, I will see every man of you 
 having a vote, and every man protected by the Ijallot from the agent 
 or landlord. I will see labor jirotected, and every title to posses- 
 sion recognized, when you arc industrious and honest. I will see 
 prosperity again throughout ^our land — the busy hum of the shut- 
 tle and the tinkling of the smithy shall be heard again. . We shall 
 .see the nailer employed even until the middle of the night, and the 
 carpenter covering himself with his chips. I will see prosperity ia 
 all its gradations spreading through a hapt^y, contented, religious 
 land. I will hear the lij^mn of a happy people go forth at sunrise 
 to God in pi'aise of his mercies — and I will see the evening sun set 
 down amongst the uplifted hands of a religious and free population. 
 Every blessing that man can bestow and religion can confer upon 
 the faithful heart, shall spread throughout the land. Stand by me 
 — join with me — I will say be obedient to me, and Ireland shall be 
 free. 
 
SPEECHES, 
 
 Charles Phillips, Esq, 
 
 [C75] 
 
A Speech 
 
 Delivered at a Public Dinner given to Mr. Finlat bt the 
 Roman Catholics op the Town and Countt of Sligo. 
 
 f"^ THINK, Sir, you will agree with me, that the most experienced 
 gj^ speaker might justly tremble in addressing you, after the 
 f display you have just witnessed. What then, must I feel, 
 ^ who never before addressed a public audience? However, it 
 ■would be but an unworthy affectation in me, were I to conceal from 
 you the emotions with which I am agitated by this kindness. The 
 exaggerated estimate which other countries have made of the few 
 services so young a man could render, has I hope, inspired me with 
 the sentiments it ought; but here, I do confess to you, I feel no 
 ordinary sensation — here, where every object springs some new 
 association, and the loveliest objects, mellowed as they are by time, 
 rise painted on the eye of memory — here, where the light of 
 heaven first blessed my infant view, and nature breathed into my 
 infant heart, that ardor for my country which nothing but death 
 can chill — here, where the scenes of my childhood remind me how 
 innocent I was, and the gi'aves of my fathers admonish me how 
 pure I should continue — here, standing as 1 do amongst ray fairest, 
 fondest, earliest sympathies — such a welcome, operating, not 
 merely as an affectionate tribute, but as a moral testimony, does 
 indeed quite oppress and overwhelm me. 
 
 Oh ! believe me, warm is the heart that feels, and willing is the 
 tongue that speaks ; and still, I cannot, by shaping it to my rudely 
 inexpressive phrase, shock the sensibility of a gratitude too full to 
 be suppressed, and yet (how far !) too eloquent for language. 
 
 If any circumstance could add to the pleasure of this day, it is 
 that which I feel in introducing to the friends of my youth the friend 
 of my adoption ; though perhaps I am committing one of our im- 
 
678 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 puted blunders, when I speak of introducing one whose patriotism 
 has ah-eady rendered him familiar to every heart in Ireland ; a man, 
 ■who, conquering every disadvantage, and spurning every difEculty, 
 has poured around our misfortunes the splendor of an intellect, 
 that at once irradiates and consumes them. For the services he has 
 rendered to his country, from my heart I thank him ; and, for 
 myself, I offer him a personal, it may be selfish tribute, for saving me, 
 by his presence this night, from an impotent attempt at his pane- 
 gyric. Indeed, gentlemen, yon can have little idea of what he has to 
 endure, who in these times, advocates your cause. Every calumny 
 which the venal and the vulgar, and the vile, are lavishing upon 3'ou, 
 is visited with exaggeration upon us. We are called traitors, 
 because we would rally round the crown an unanimous people. Wo 
 are called apostates, because we will not persecute Christianity. 
 We are branded as separatists, because of our endeavors to annihil- 
 ate the fetters that, instead of binding, clog the connection. To 
 these niaj' be added, the frowns of power, the env3'^ of dulncss, the 
 mean malice of exposed self-interest, and, it may be, in despite of 
 all natural affection, even the discountenance of kindred ! — Well, be 
 
 it so, — 
 
 For thee, fair Freedom, welcome all the past. 
 For thee, my couutry, welcome, even the last ! 
 
 I am not ashamed to confess to you, that there was a day when I was 
 bigoted as the blackest ; but I thank the Being who gifted me Avith 
 a mind not quite impervious to conviction, and I thank you, who 
 afforded such convincing testimonies of my error. I saw you 
 enduring with patience the most unmerited assaults, bowing before 
 the insults of revived anniversaries ; in private life, exemplary ; in 
 public, unoffending ; in the hour of peace, asserting your loy- 
 alty ; in the hour of danger, proving it. Even when an invading 
 enemy victoriously penetrated into the very heart of our country, I 
 saw the banner of your allegiance beaming refutation on your slan- 
 derers ; was it a wonder, then that I seized my prejudices, and with 
 a blush burned them on the altar of my country ! 
 
 The great question of Catholic, shall I not rather say, of Irish 
 emancipation, has now assumed that national aspect which imperi- 
 ously challenges the scrutiny of every one. While it was shrouded 
 in the mantle of religious myster3% with the temple for its sanctuary, 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. (J79 
 
 and the pontiff for its sentinel, the vulgar eye might shrink and the 
 vulgar spirit shudder. But now it has come forth, visible and 
 tangible for the inspection of the laity ; and I solemnly protest, 
 di-essed as it has been in the double haberdashery of the English 
 minister and the Italian prelate, I know not whether to laugh at its 
 appearance, or to loathe its pretensions — to shudder at the deform- 
 ity of its original creation, or smile at the grotesqueness of its 
 foreign decorations. Only just admire this far-famed security bill, 
 this motley compound of oaths and penalties, which, under the name 
 of emancipation, would drag your prelates with a halter about their 
 necks to the vulgar scrutiny of every village tyrant, in order to 
 enrich a few political traders and distil through some state alembic 
 the miserable rinsings of an ignorant, a decaying, and degenerate 
 aristocracy ! Only just admire it ! Originally engendered by our 
 friends the opposition, with a cuckoo insidiousness they swindled it 
 into the nest of the treasury ravens, and when it had been fairly 
 hatched with the beak of the one, and the nakedness of the other, 
 they sent it for its feathers to Mouseigneur Quarantotti, who has 
 obligingly transmitted it with the hunger of its parent, the rapacity 
 of its nurse, and the coxcombry of its plumassier, to be baptized by 
 the bishops, and received aequo gratoque aniino hy the jieople of 
 Ireland ! ! Oh, thou sublimely ridiculous Quarantotti ! Oh, thou 
 superlative coxcomb of the conclave ! what an estimate hast thou 
 formed of the mind of Ireland ! Yet why should I blame this 
 wretched scribe of the Propaganda ! He had every right to specu- 
 late as he did ; all the chances of the calculation were in his favor. 
 Uncommon must be the people, over whom centuries of oppression 
 have revolved in vain ! Strange must be the mind, which is not 
 subdued by suffering ! Sublime the spirit which is not debased by 
 servitude! God, I give thee thanks! — he knew not Ireland. 
 Bent — broken — manacled as she had been, she will not boAV to the 
 mandate of an Italian slave, transmitted through an English vicar. 
 For my own part, as an Irish Protestant, I trample to earth this 
 audacious and desperate experiment of authority ; and for you, as 
 Catholics, the time has come to give that calumny the lie, which 
 represents 3^ou as subservient to a foreign influence. That influ- 
 ence, indeed, seems not quite so unbending as it suited the purposes 
 of bigotry to represent it, and appears now not to have conceded 
 
680 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 more, only because more was not demanded. The theolog}' of the- 
 question is not for me to argue, it cannot be in better hands than in 
 those of your bishops ; and I can have no doubt that wlien they 
 bring their rank, their learning, their talents, their piety, and their 
 patriotism to this sublime deliberation, they will consult the dignity 
 of that venerable fabric which has stood for ages, splendid and, 
 immutable ; which time could not crumble, nor pei'secutions shake, 
 nor revolutions change ; which has stood amongst us, like some stu- 
 pendous and majestic Appeninc, the earth rocking at its feet, and the 
 heavens roaring around its head, firmly balanced on the base of its 
 eternity ; the relic of avh-^t was ; the solemn and sublime memento 
 of what must be ! 
 
 Is this my opinion as a professed member of the church of Eng- 
 land? Undoubtedly it is. As an Irishman, I feel my liberties 
 interwoven, and the best affections of my heart as it were enfihrcd 
 with those of my Catholic countrymen ; and as a Protestant, con- 
 vinced of the purity of my own faith, would I not debase it by post- 
 poning the powers of reason to the suspicious instrumentality of 
 this woi'ld's conversion? No; surrendering as I do, uitli a proud 
 contempt, all the degrading advantages with which an ecclesiastical 
 usurpation would invest me ; so I will not interfere with a blas- 
 phemous intrusion between any man and his Maker. I hold it a 
 criminal and accursed sacrilege, to rob even a beggar of a single 
 motive for his devotion : and I hold it an equal insult to my own faith, 
 to offer me any boon for its profession. This pretended emancipa- 
 tion bill passing into a law, would, in my mind, strike not a blow at 
 this sect or that, but at the very vitality of Christianity itself. I am 
 thoroughly convinced that the antichristian connection between 
 church and state, which it was suited to increase, has done more 
 mischief to the Gospel interest, than all the ravings of infidelity since 
 the crucifixion. The sublime Creator of our blessed creed never 
 meant it to be the channel of a courtly influence, or the source of a 
 corrupt ascendancy. He sent it amongst us to heal, not to irritate ; 
 to associate, not to seclude ; to collect together, like the baptismal 
 dove, every creed and clime and color in the universe, beneath the 
 spotless wing of its protection. The union of church and state only 
 converts good Christians into bad statesmen, and political knaves 
 into pretended Christians. It is at best but a foul and adulterous 
 
CHARLES PtllLLIPS. 681 
 
 connection, polluting the purity of heaven -with the abommation of 
 earth, and hanging the tatters of a political piety upou the cross of 
 au insulted Saviour. 
 
 Keligion, holy religion, ought not, in the words of its Founder, 
 to be " led into temptation." The hand that holds her chalice should 
 be pure, and the priests of her temple should be spotless as tlie vest- 
 ments of their ministry. Eank only degrades, wealth only impov- 
 erishes, ornaments but disfigure her. I would have her pure, 
 unpensioned, unstipendiary ; she should rob the earth of nothing but 
 its sorrows : a divine arch of promise, her extremities should rest on 
 the horizon, and her span embrace the universe ; but her only suste- 
 nance should be the tears that were exhaled and embellished by the 
 sunbeam. Such is my idea of what religion ought to be. What 
 would this bill make it? A mendicant of the Castle, a menial at the: 
 levee, its manual the red book, its liturgy the pension list, its gospeli 
 the will of the minister ! Methinks I see the stalled and fatted vic- 
 tim of its creation, cringing with a brute suppliancy through the 
 venal mob of ministerial flatterers, crouching to the ephemeral idol 
 of the day; and, lilie the devoted sacrifice of ancient heathenism, 
 glorying in the garland that only decorates him for death ! I will 
 read to you the opinions of a celebrated Irishman, on the suggestion 
 in his day, of a bill similar to that now proposed for our oppression. 
 He was a man who added to the pride, not merely of his country, 
 but of his species ; a man who robed the very soul of inspiration in 
 the splendors of a pui-e and overpowering eloquence. I allude to 
 Mr. Burke, — an authority at least to which the sticklers for estab- 
 lishments can ofier no objection. "Before I had written thus far," 
 says he, in his letter on the penal laws, " I heard of a scheme for 
 giving the Castle the patronage of the presiding members of the 
 Catholic clergy. At first I could scarcely credit it ; for I believe it 
 is the first time that the presentation to other people's alms has been 
 desired in any country. Never were the members of one religious 
 sect fit to appoint the pastors to another. It is a great deal to sup- 
 pose that the present Castle would nominate bishops for the Romau 
 church in Ireland, with a religious regard for its welfare. Perhaps 
 they cannot, perhaps tliey dare not do it. But suppose them to be as 
 well inclined, as I know that I am, to do the Catholics all lands of 
 justice, I declare I would not, if it were in my power, take that pat- 
 
G82 TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ronnge on myself. I know I ought not to do it. I belong to another 
 coniraunity ; and it would be an intolerable usnrpation in me, where 
 I conferred no benefit, or even if I did confer temporal advantages. 
 How can the Lord Lieutenant form the least judgment on their mer- 
 its, so as to decide which of the Popish priests is fit to be a bishop? 
 It cannot be. The idea is ridiculous. He will hand them over to 
 Lords-Lieutenant of counties, justices of the peace, and others, who, 
 for the purpose of vexing and turning into derision this miserable 
 people, will jjick out the worst and most obnoxious they can find 
 amongst the clergy to govern the rest. Whoever is complained 
 against by his brother, will be considered as persecuted ; whoever 
 is censured by his superior, will be looked upon as oppressed ; who- 
 ever is careless in his opinions, loose in his morals, will be called a 
 liberal man, and will be supposed to have incurred hatred because 
 he was not a bigot. Informers, tale-bearers, perverse and obstinate 
 men, flatterers, who turn their back upon their flock, and court the 
 Protestant gentlemen of their country, will be the objects of prefer- 
 ment; and then I run no risk in foretelling, that whatever order, 
 quiet, and morality you have in the country, will be lost." Now, 
 let me ask you, is it to such characters as those described by Burke, 
 that you would delegate the influence imputed to your priesthood? 
 Believe me, you would see them transferring their devotion from 
 the Cross to the Castle ; wearing their sacred vestments but as a 
 masquerade appendage, and, under the degraded passport of the 
 Almighty's name, sharing the pleasures of the court, and the spoils 
 of the people. When I say this I am bound to add, and I do so 
 from many proud and pleasing recollections, that I think the 
 impression on the Catholic clergy of the present day would be 
 late, and would be delible. But it is human nature. Rare ai'e 
 the instances in which a contact with the court has not been the 
 beginning of corruption. The man of God is peculiarly discon- 
 nected with it. It directly violates his special mandate, who took 
 his birth from the manger, and his disciples from the fishing-boat. 
 Judas was the first who received the money of power, and it ended 
 in the disgrace of his creed and the death of his master. If I was a 
 Catholic, I woul'd peculiarly deprecate any interference with my 
 priesthood. Indeed, I do not think, in any one respect in which we 
 should wish to view the delegates of the Almighty, that, making fair 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 683 
 
 allowances for buiuMn infirmity, they could be amended. The Cath- 
 olic clergy of Ireland are rare examples of the doctrines they incul- 
 cate. Pious in their habits, almost primitive in their manners, they 
 have no care but their flock ; no study but their Gospel. It is not 
 in the gaudy ring of courtly dissipation that you will find the Mur- 
 rays, the Corpingers, and the Moylands of the present day — not at 
 the levee, or at the lounge, or the election riot. No ; you will find 
 them wherever good is to be done, or evil to be connected — rearing 
 their mitres in the van of misery, consoling the captive, reforming 
 the convict, enriching the orphan ; ornaments of this world, and 
 -emblems of a better ; preaching their God through the practice of 
 «very virtue ; monitors at the confessional, apostles in the pulpit, 
 saints at the death bed, holding the sacred water to the lip of sin, 
 or pouring the redeeming unction on the agonies of despair. Oh, I 
 would hold him little better than the Promethean robber, who 
 would turn the fire of their eternal altar into the impure and perish- 
 able mass of this world's preferment. Better by far that the days of 
 ancient barbarism should revive ; belter that your religion should 
 again take refuge among the fastnesses of the mountain, and the sol- 
 itude of the cavern ; better that the rack of a muixlerous bigotry- 
 should again terminate the miseries of your priesthood, and that the 
 gate of freedom should be only open to them through the gate of 
 martyrdom, than they should gild their missals .with the wages of a 
 ■court, and expect their ecclesiastical promotion, not from their 
 superior piety, but their comparative prostitution. But why this 
 interference with your principles of conscience? Why is it that they 
 will not erect your liberties save on the ruin of your temples ? Why 
 is it that in the day of peace they demand secui-ities from a people 
 who in the day of danger constituted their strength ? When were 
 they denied every security that was reasonable? Was it in 1776, 
 when a cloud of enemies, hovering on our coast, saw every heart a 
 shield, and every hill a fortress? Did they want securities in Cath- 
 olic Spain? Were they denied securities in Catholic Portugal? 
 What is their security to-day in Catholic Canada? Return — 
 return to us our own glorious Wellington, and tell incredulous 
 England what was her security amid the lines of Torres Vedras, 
 or on the summit of Barrossa ! Rise, libelled martyrs of the Penin- 
 sula ! rise from your " gory bed," and give security for your child- 
 
(38i TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 less parents ! No, there is not a Catholic familj' in Ireland, tliat for 
 the glorj' of Great Britain is not weeping over a child's, a brother's, 
 or a parent's grave, and yet still she clamors for securities ! Oh, 
 Prejudice ! where is thy reason ! Oh, Bigotrj^ ! where is thy hUish ! 
 If ever there was an opportunity for England to combine gratitude 
 with justice, and dignity with safety, it is the present. Now, when 
 Irish blood has crimsoned the cross upon her naval flag, and an Irish 
 hero strikes the harp to victory upon the summit of the Pyrenees. 
 England — England ! do not hesitate. This hour of triumph may be 
 but the hour of trial ; another season may see the splendid pano- 
 rama of European vassalage, arrayed by your ruthless enemy, and 
 glittering beneath the ruins of another capital — perhaps of London. 
 Who can say it? A few months since, JIoscow stood as splendid, 
 as secure. Fair rose the morn on the patriarchal city — the empress 
 of her nation, the queen of commerce, the sanctuary of strangers; 
 her thousand sj^ires pierced the very heavens, and her domes of gold 
 reflected back the sunbeams. The spoiler came ; he marked her for 
 his victim; and, as if his very glance was destiny, even before the 
 night-i^ill, with all her pomp and wealth, and happiness, she \vithercd 
 from the world ! A heap of ashes told where once stood IMoscow I 
 Merciful God ! if this lord of desolation, heading his locust legions, 
 were to invade our country ; though I do not ask what would be 
 your determination ; though, in the language of our young enthusi- 
 ast, I am sure you would oppose him with " a sword in one hand, 
 and a torch in the other ; " still I do ask with fearlessness, upon 
 what single principle of policy or of justice, could the advocates for 
 your exclusion solicit your assistance ; could they expect you to 
 support a constitution from whose benefits you were debarred? 
 With what front could they ask you to recover an ascendancy, 
 which, in point of fact, was but re-establishing your bondage? 
 
 It has been said that there is a faction in Ireland ready to join 
 this despot — "a French party," as Mr. Grattan thought it decent, 
 even in the very senate house, to promulgate. Sir, I sj^eak the uni- 
 versal voice of Ireland, when I say, she spurns the imputation. 
 There is no " Fi'ench party " here, but there is, — and it would be 
 strange if there was not, — there is an Irish party — men who can- 
 not bear to see their country taunted with the mockery of a consti- 
 tution ; men who will be content with no connection that refuses 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 685 
 
 them a community of benefits while it imposes a community of pri- 
 vations ; men who, sooner than see this land polluted by the foot- 
 steps of a slave, would wish the ocean-wave became its sepulchre, 
 and that tbc orb of heaven forgot where it existed. It has been said 
 too (and when we were to be calumniated, what has not been said?) 
 that Irishmen are neither fit for freedom or grateful for favors. In 
 the first place, I deny that to be a fiivor which is a right; and in the 
 next place, I utterly deny that a system of conciliation has ever been 
 adopted with respect to Ireland. Try them, and, my life on it, they 
 will be found grateful. I think I know my countrymen ; they can- 
 not help being grateful for a benefit ; and there is no country on the 
 earth where one would l)e conferred with more characteristic benev- 
 olence. They are, emphatically, the scbool-ljoys of the heart, a peo- 
 ple of sympathy ; their acts spring instinctively from their passions ; 
 by nature ardent, by instinct bravo, by inheritance generous. The 
 children of impulse, they cannot avoid their virtues ; and to be other 
 than noble, they must not only be unnatural l)ut unnational. Put 
 my panegyric to the test. Enter the hovel of the Irish peasant. I 
 do not say you will find the frugality of the Scotch, the comfort of 
 the English, or the fantastic decorations of the French cottager ; but 
 I do say, within those wretched bazaars of mud and misery you will 
 find sensibility the most atfecting, politeness the most natural, hos- 
 pitality the most grateful, merit the most unconscious ; their look is 
 eloquence, their smile is love, their retort is wit, their remark is wis- 
 dom ; not a wisdom borrowed from the dead, but that with which 
 nature herself has inspired them; an acute observance of the pass- 
 ing scene, and a deep insight into the motives of its agent. Tiy to 
 deceive them, and see with M'hat shrewdness they will detect; try 
 to outwit them, and see with what humor they will elude ; attack 
 them with argument, and you will stand amazed at the strength of 
 their expression, the rapidity of their ideas, and the energy of their 
 gesture. In short, God seems to have formed our country like our 
 people ; he has thrown round the one its wild, magnificent, deco- 
 rated rudeness ; he has infused into the other the simplicity of genius 
 and the seeds of virtue ; he says audibly to us, " Give them cultiva- 
 tion." 
 
 This is the way. Gentlemen, in which I have always looked upon 
 your question — not as a party, or a sectarian, or a Catholic, but as 
 
(386 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 an Irish question. Is it possible that any man can seriously believe 
 the paralyzing five millions of such a people as I have been describ- 
 ing, can be a benefit to the empire ! Is there any man who deserves 
 the name not of a statesman, but of a rational being, who can think 
 it politic to rob such a multitude of all the energies of an honorable 
 ambition ! Look to Protestant Ireland, shooting over the empire 
 those rays of genius, and those thunderbolts of war, that have at 
 once embellished and preserved it. I speak not of a former era. I 
 refer not for my example to the day just passed, when our Burkes, 
 our Barrys, and our Goldsmiths, exiled l)y this system from their 
 native shoi-e, wreathed the "immortal shamrock" round the brow of 
 painting, poetry, and eloquence ! But now, even while I speak, who 
 leads the British senate ? A Protestant Irishman ! Who guides the 
 British arms? A Protestant Irishman ! And why, why is Catholic 
 Ireland, with her quintuple population, stationary and silent? Have 
 physical causes neutralized its energies? Has the religion of Christ 
 stupefied its intellect? Has the God of mankind become the partisan 
 of a monopoly, and put an interdict on its advancement? Stranger, 
 do not ask the bigoted and jDampered renegade who has an interest 
 in deceiving 30U ; but open the penal statutes, and weep tears of 
 blood over the reason. Come — come yourself, and see this un- 
 happy people ; see the Irishman, the only alien in Ireland, in rags 
 and wretchedness, staining the sweetest scenery ever eye reposed 
 on, persecuted by the extorting middleman of some absentee land- 
 lord, plundered by the Iny-proctor of some rapacious and uusym- 
 pathizing incumbent, bearing through life but insults and injustice, 
 and bereaved even of any hope in death liy the heart-rending reflec- 
 tion that he leaves his children to bear, like their father, an abom- 
 inable bondage? Is it the fact? Let any who doubts it walk out 
 into your streets, and see the consequences of such a system ; see it 
 rearing up crowds in a kind of apprenticeship to the prison, abso- 
 lutely permitted by their parents, from utter despair, to lisp the 
 alphabet and learn the rudiments of profligacy? For my part, 
 never did I meet one of these 3'outhful assemblages without feeling 
 within me a melancholy emotion. How often have I thought, within 
 that little circle of neglected triflers who seem to have been born in 
 caprice and bred in orphanage, there may exist some mind formed 
 of the finest mould, and wrought for immortality; a soul swelling: 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. G87 
 
 ■with the energies and stamped with the patent of the Deity, which, 
 under proper culture might perhaps bless, adorn, immortalize, or 
 ennoble empires; some Cincinnatus, in whose breast the destinies 
 of a nation may lie dormant; some Milton, "pregnant with celes- 
 tial fire;" some Curran, who, when thrones were crumbled and 
 d^'nasties forgotten, might stand the landmark of his country's 
 genius, rearing himself amid regal ruins and national dissolution, 
 a, mental pyramid in the solitude of time, beneath whose shade 
 things might moulder, and round whose summit eternity must 
 play. Even in such a circle the young Demosthenes might have 
 once been found, and Homer, the disgrace and glory of his age, 
 have sung neglected ! Have not other nations witnessed those 
 things, and who shall say that nature has peculiarly degraded the 
 intellect of Ireland? Oh, my countrymen, let us hope that under 
 better auspices and a sounder policy, the ignorance that thinks so 
 may meet its refutation. Let us turn from the blight and ruin of 
 this wintry day to the fond anticipatiou of a happier period, when 
 our prostrate land shall stand erect among the nations, fearless and 
 unfettered ; her brow blooming with the wreath of science, and her 
 path strewed with the offerings of art ; the breath of heaven bless- 
 ing her flag, the extremities of earth acknowledging her name, her 
 fields waving with the fruits of agriculture, her ports alive with the 
 contributions of commerce, and her temples vocal with unrestricted 
 piety. Such is the ambition of the true patriot ; such are the views 
 for which we are calumniated ! Oh, divine ambition ! Oh, delight- 
 ful calumny ! Happy he who shall see thee accomplished ! Happy 
 he who through every peril toils for thy attainment ! Proceed, friend 
 of Ireland and partaker of her wrongs, pi'oceed undaunted to this 
 glorious consummation. Fortune will not gild, power will not en- 
 noble thee : but thou shalt be rich in the love and titled by the bless- 
 ings of thy country ; thy path shall be illumined by the public eye, 
 thy labors enlightened by the public gratitude ; and oh, i-emcmber — 
 amid the impediments with which corruption will oppose, and the 
 dejection with which disappointments may depress you — rememlier 
 you are acquiring a name to be cherished by the future generations 
 of earth, long after it has been enrolled amongst the inheritors of 
 heaven. 
 
g38 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 A Speech 
 
 Delivered at an Aggregate Meeting of the Eoman Catholics 
 OF Cork. 
 
 ^^T is with no small degree of self-congratiilatiou that I at length 
 P^ find myself in a province Avhich every glance of the eye, and 
 pf every throb of the heart, tells me is truly Irish ; and that 
 I, congratulation is not a little enhanced by finding that you re- 
 ceive me not quite as a stranger. Indeed, if to respect the Christiau 
 without regard to his creed, if to love the country but the more for 
 its calamities, if to hate oppression though it be robed in i^ower, if 
 to venerate integrity though it pine under persecution, gives a man 
 any claim to your recognition, then, indeed, I am not a stranger 
 amongst you. There is a bond of union between brethren, however 
 distant ; there is a sympathy between the virtuous, however sep- 
 parated ; there is a heaven-born instinct by which the associates of 
 the heart become at once acquainted, and kindred natures, as it 
 .were by magic, see in the fice of a stranger, the features of a friend. 
 Thus it is, that, though we never met, you hail in me the sweet as- 
 sociation, and I feel myself amongst you even as if I were in the 
 home of my nativity. But this my knowledge of you was not left 
 to chance ; nor was it left to the records of your charity, the memo- 
 rials of your patriotism, your municipal magnificence, or your com- 
 mercial splendor ; it came to me hallowed by the accents of that 
 tongue on which Ireland has so often hung Avith ecstacy, heightened 
 by the eloquence and endeared liy the sincerity of, I hope, our mu- 
 tual friend. .Let me congratulate him on having become in some 
 degree, naturalized iu a province, where the spirit of the elder day 
 seems to have lingered ; and let me congratulate you ou the acquis- 
 ition of a man who is at once the zealous advocate of your cause, 
 and a practical instance of the injustice of your oppressions. Surely, 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 689 
 
 surely if merit had fair play, if splendid talents, if indefatigable in- 
 dustry, if great research, if unsullied principle, if a heart full of the 
 finest afi'ections, if a mind matured in every manly accomplishment, 
 in short, if every noble, public quality, mellowed and reflected in 
 the pure mirror of domestic virtue, could entitle a subject to dis- 
 tinction in a state, Mr. O'Connell shouldbe distinguished ; but, it is 
 his crime to be a Catholic, and his curse to be an Irishman. Simple- 
 ton ! he i^refers his conscience to a place, and the love of his country 
 to a participation in her plunder ! Indeed he Avill never rise. If he 
 joined the bigots of my sect, he might be a sergeant ; if he joined 
 the infidels of your sect, he might enjoy a pension, and there is no 
 knowing whether some Orange-corporator, at an Orange-anniver- 
 sary, might not modestly yield him the precedence of giving " the 
 glorious and immortal memory." Oh, j^es; he might be privileged 
 to get drunk in gratitude to the man who colonized ignorance in his 
 native land, and left to his creed the legacy of legalized persecution. 
 Nor would he stand alone, no matter what might be the measure of 
 his disgrace, or the degree of his dereliction. You will know there 
 are many of your own community who would leave him at the dis- 
 tance-post, lu contemplating their recreancy, I should be almost 
 temjited to smile at the exhiljition of their pretensions, if there was 
 not a kind of moral melancholy intermingled, that changed satire 
 into pity, and ridicule into contempt. For my part, I behold them 
 in the apathy of their servitude, as I would some miserable maniac 
 in the contentment of his captivity. Poor creature ! when all that 
 raised him from the brute is levelled, and his glorious intellect is 
 mouldering in ruins, you may see him with his song of triumph, 
 and his crown of straw, a fancied freeman amid the clanking of his 
 chains, and an imnginaiy monarch beneath the inflictions of his 
 keeper ! Merciful God ! is it not almost an argument for the sceptic 
 and disbeliever, when we see the human shape almost without an 
 aspiration of the human soul, separated by no boundary fi'om the 
 beasts that perish — beholding with indiflerence the captivity of their 
 country, the persecution of their creed, and the helpless, hopeless 
 destiny of their children? But they have nor creed nor consciences, 
 nor country ; their god is gold, their gospel is a contract, their church 
 a counting-house, their characters a commodity ; they never pray but 
 for the opportunities of corruption, and hold their consciences, as 
 
690 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 they do their government-debentures, at a pi'ice proportioned to th© 
 misfortunes of tlicir country. 
 
 But let us turn from these mendicants of disgrace : though Ireland 
 is doomed to the stain of their birth, her mind need not be sullied 
 by their contemplation. I turn from them Avith pleasure to the con- 
 templation of your cause, which, as far as argument can affect it, 
 stands on a sublime and splendid elevation. Every obstacle has 
 vanished into air ; every favorable circumstance has hardened into 
 adamant. The Pope, whom childhood was taught to lisp as the 
 enemy of religion, and age shuddered at as a prescriptive calamity, 
 has by his example put the princes of Christendom to shame. This 
 day of miracles, in which the human heart has been strung to its 
 extremest point of enei'gy ; this day,, to which posterity will look 
 for in>tanccs of every crime and every virtue, holds not in its page 
 of wonders a more sublime phenonemon, than that calumniated 
 pontiff. Placed at the very pinnacle of human elevation, surrounded 
 by the pomp of the Vatican and the splendors of the court, pouring 
 the mandates of Christ from the throne of the Ctesars, nations were 
 his subjects, kings were his companions, religion was his handmaid; 
 he went forth gorgeous with the accumulated dignity of ages, every 
 knee bending, and every eye blessing the prince of one world and 
 the prophet of another. Have we not seen him in one moment, his 
 crown crumbled, his sceptre a reed, his throne a shadow, his home 
 a dungeon ! But if we have, Catholics, it was only to show how 
 inestimable is human virtue compared with human grandeur ; it was 
 only to show those whose faith was failing, and whose fears were 
 strengthening, that the simplicity of the patriarchs, the piety of the 
 saints, and the patience of the martyrs, had nst wholly vanished. 
 Perhaps it was also ordained to show the bigot at home, as well as 
 the tyrant abroad, that though the person might be chained, and the 
 motive calumniated, religion was still strong enough to support her 
 sons, and to confound, if she could not reclaim, her enemies. No 
 threats could awe, no promises could tempt, no suffci'ings could 
 appal him ; mid the damps of his dungeon he dashed away the cup 
 in which the pearl of his liberty was to be dissolved. Only reflect 
 on the state of the world at that moment ! All around him was 
 convulsed, the very foundations of the earth seemed giving away, 
 the comet was let loose that, " from its fiery hair shook pestilence 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 691 
 
 and death," the twilight was gathering, the tempest was roaring, the 
 darlcness was at hand ; but he towered sublime, like the last moun- 
 tain in the deluge — majestic, not less in his elevation than in his 
 solitude, immutable amid change, magnificent amid ruin, the last 
 remnant of earth's beauty, the last resting-plac(5 of heaven's light ! 
 Thus have the terrors of the Vatican retreated ; thus has that cloud 
 which hovered o'er your cause brightened at once into a sign of your 
 faith and an assurance of your victory. 
 
 Another obstacle, the omnipotence of France ; I know it was a 
 pretence, but it Avas made an obstacle. What has become of it? 
 The spell of her invincibilit}' destroyed, the spirit of her armies 
 broken, her immense boundary dismembered, and the lord of her 
 empire become the exile of a rock. She allows fancy no fear, and 
 bigotry no speciousness ; and, as if in the very operation of the 
 change to point the purpose of your redemption, the hand that 
 replanted the rejected lily was that of an Irish Catltolic. Perhaps it 
 is not also unworthy of remark, that the last day of her triumph, 
 and the first of her decline, was that on which her insatiable chief- 
 tain smote the holy head of your religion. You will hardly suspect 
 I am imbued with the follies of superstition ; but when the man now 
 unborn shall trace the story of that eventful day, he will see the 
 adopted child of fortune, borne on the wings of victory from clime 
 to clime, marking every movement with a triumph, and every pause 
 with a crown, till time, space, and seasons, nay, even nature herself, 
 seeming to vanish from before him — in the blasphemy of his am- 
 bition he smote the apostle of his God, and dared to raise the ever- 
 lasting Cross amid his perishable trophies ! I am no fanatic : but is 
 it not remarkable ? May it not be one of those signs which the 
 Deity has sometimes given, in compassion to our infirmity? — signs 
 which, in the punishment of one nation, not unfrequently denote the 
 warning to another : — 
 
 " SigDS sent, by God to mark the will of Heaven : 
 Signs wliicli bid nations weep and be forgiven." 
 
 The argument, however, is taken from the bigot ; and those whose 
 consciousness taught them to expect what your loyalty should have 
 taught them to repel, can no longer oppose you from the terrors of 
 invasion. Thus, then, the papal phantom and the French threat 
 have vanished into nothing. 
 
692 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Another obstacle, the tenets of your creed. Has England still to 
 learn them? I will tell her where. Let her ask Canada, the last 
 plank of her American shipwreck. Let her ask Portugal, the first 
 omen of her European splendor. Let her ask Spain, the most Cath- 
 olic country in the universe, her Catholic friends, her Catholic allies, 
 her rivals in the triumph, her reliance in the retreat, her last stay 
 when the world had deserted her. They must have told her on the 
 field of blood whether it was true that they " kept no faith with 
 heretics." Alas, alas ! how miserable a thing is bigotry, when every 
 friend puts it to the blush, and every triumph but rebukes its weak- 
 ness. If England continued still to accredit this calumny, I would 
 direct her for conviction to the hero, for whose gift alone she owes 
 us an eternity of gratitude ; whom we have seen leading the van of 
 universal emancipation, decking his wreath with the flowers of every 
 soil, and filling liis army with the soldiers of every sect; befors 
 whose splendid dawn, every tear exhaling, and every vapor vanish- 
 ing, the colors of the European world have revived, and the spirit of 
 European liberty (may no crime avert the omen!) seems to have 
 arisen ! Suppose he was a Catholic, could this have been? Suppose 
 Catholics did not follow him, could this have been ? Did the Cath- 
 olic Cortes inquire his faith when they gave him the supreme com- 
 mand? Did the Ecgent of Portugal withhold from his creed the 
 reward of his valor? Did the Catholic soldier pause at Salamanca 
 to dispute upon polemics ? Did the Catholic chieftain prove upon 
 Barossa that he kept no faith with heretics ? or did the creed of 
 Spain, the same with that of France, the opposite of that of England, 
 prevent their association in the field of liberty? Oh, no, no, no! 
 the citizen of every clime, the friend of every color, and the child of 
 every creed, lil)erty walks abroad in the ubiquity of her benevolence : 
 alike to her the varieties of faith and the vicissitudes of country ; 
 she has no object but the happiness of man, no bounds but the 
 extremities of creation. Yes, yes, it was reserved for Wellington 
 to redeem his own country when ho was regenerating every other. 
 It was reserved for him to show how vile were the aspersions ou 
 your creed, how generous were the glowings of your gratitude. He 
 was a Protestant, yet Catholics trusted him : he was a Protestant, 
 yet Catholics advanced him ! He is a Protestant Knight in Catholic 
 Portugal ; ho is a Protestant Duke in Catholic Spain ; he is a Prot- 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 693 
 
 estant commander of Catholic armies. He is more : he is the living 
 proof of the Catholic's liberality, and the undeniable refutation of 
 the Protestant's injustice. Gentlemen, as a Protestant, though I 
 may blush for the bigotry of many of my creed who continue obsti- 
 nate, in the teeth of this conviction, still, were I a Catholic, I should 
 feel little triumph in the victory. I should only hang my head at 
 the distresses which this warfare occasioned to my country. I should 
 only think how long she had withered in the agony of her disunion ; 
 how long she had bent, fettered by slaves,. cajoled by blockheads, 
 and plundered by adventurers ; the proverb of the fool, the prey of 
 the politician, the dupe of the designing, the experiment of the des- 
 perate ; struggling as it were between her own fanatical and infatu- 
 ated parties, those hell-engendered serpents which enfold her, like 
 the Trojan seer, even at the worship of her altars, and crush her to 
 death in the very embraces of her children ! It is time (is it not?) 
 that she should be extricated. The act would be proud, the means 
 would be Christian ; mutual forbearance, mutual indulgence, mutual 
 concession. I would say to the Protestant, " Concede : " I would 
 say to the Catholic, "Forgive ; " I would say to both, "Though you 
 bend not at the same shrine, you have a common God and a common 
 country ; the one has commanded love, the other kneels to j'ou for 
 peace." This hostility of her sects has been the disgrace, the pecu- 
 liar disgrace of Christianity. The Gentoo loves his cast ; so does 
 the Mahometan ; so does the Hindoo, whom England, out of the 
 abundance of her charity, is about to teach her creed ; — I hope she 
 may not teach her practice. But Christianity, Christianity alone, 
 exhibits her thousand sects, each denouncing his neighbor here, in 
 the name of God, and damning hereafter, out of pure devotion I 
 "You're a heretic," says the Catholic : "You're a Papist," says the 
 Protestant. " T appeal to Saint Peter," exclaims the Catholic : " I 
 appeal to Saint Athanasius," cries the Protestant; "and if it goes to 
 damning, he's as good at it as any saint in the calendar." "You'll 
 all be damned eternally," moans out the Methodist ; "I'm the elect ! " 
 Thus it is, you see, each has his anathema, his accusation, and his 
 retort ; and in the end. Religion is the victim ! The victory of each 
 is the overthrow of all ; and Infidelity, laughing at the contest, 
 writes the refutation of their creed in the blood of the combatants I 
 I wonder if this reflection has ever struck any of those reverend dig- 
 
694 TREASUEY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 nitaries who rear their mitres against Catholic emancipation. Has 
 it ever glanced across thoir Christian zeal, if the story of our country 
 should have casually reached the valleys of Hindostan, with what an 
 argument they arc furnishing the heathen world against their sacred 
 missionary? In what terms could the Christian ecclesiastic answer 
 the Eastern Brahmin, when he replied to his exhortation sin language 
 such as this : " Father, we have heard your doctrine ; it is splendid 
 in theory, specious in promise, sublime in prospect ; like the world 
 to which it leads, it is rich in the miracles of light. But, Father, 
 we have heard that there are times when its rays vanish and leave 
 your sphere in darkness, or when your only lustre arises from mete- 
 ors of fire, and moons of blood ; we have heard of the verdant island 
 which the Great Spirit has raised in the bosom of the waters with 
 such a bloom of beauty, that the very wave she has usurped worships 
 the loveliness of her intrusion. The sovereign of our forests is not 
 more generous in his anger than her sous ; the snow-flake, ei"e it 
 falls on the mountain, is not purer than her daughters ; little inland 
 seas reflect the splendors of her landscape, and her valleys smile at 
 the story of the serpent ! Father, is it true that ihis isle of the sun, 
 this people of the morning, find the fury of the ocean in your creed, 
 and more than the venom of the viper in your policy ? Is it true, 
 that for six hundred j'^ears her peasant has not tasted peace, nor her 
 piety rested from prosecution? Oh, Brahma ! defend us from the 
 God of the Christian ! Father, Father, return to your brethren ; 
 retrace the waters ; we may live in ignorance, but we live in love, 
 and we will not taste the tree that gives us evil when it gives us 
 wisdom. The heart is our guide, nature is our gospel; in the imi- 
 tation of our fathers we found our hope ; and, if we err, on the 
 virtue of our motives we rely for our redemption." How would the 
 missionaries of the mitre answer him? How will they answer that 
 insulted Being of whose creed their conduct carries the refutation? 
 But to what end do I argue with the Bigot ? — a wretch whom no 
 philosophy can humanize, no charity soften, no religion reclaim, no 
 miracle convert ; a monster who, red with the fires of hell and bend- 
 ing under the crimes of earth, erects his murderous divinity upon 
 a throne of skulls, and would gladly feed, even M'ith a brothers 
 blood, the cannibal appetite of his rejected altar ! His very interest 
 cannot soften him into humanity. Surely if it could, no man would 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 695 
 
 be found mad enough to advocate a system which cankers the very 
 heart of society and undermines the natural resources of government ; 
 which takes away the strongest excitement to industry by closing up 
 every avenue to laudable ambition ; which administers to the vanity 
 or the vice of a party when it should only study the advantage of a 
 people ; and holds out the perquisites of state as an impious bounty 
 on the persecution of religion. I have already shown that the power 
 of the Pope, that the power of France, and that the tenets of your 
 creed, were but imaginary auxiliaries to this system. Another pre- 
 tended obstacle has, however, been opposed to your emancipation. 
 I .allude to the danger arising from a i'orcign influence, "\^'hat a 
 triumphant answer can you give to that ! Methinks, as lately, I see 
 the assemblage of your hallowed hierarchy, snnoundedby the priest- 
 hood and followed by the people, waving aloft the crueitix of ( lirist 
 alike against the seductions of the court and the commands of the 
 conclave ! Was it not a delightful, a heart-cheering spectacle, to sec 
 that holy band of brothers preferring the chance of martyrdom to 
 the certainty of promotion, and postponing ail the gratihcations of 
 worldly pride to the severe but heaven-gaining glories of their pov- 
 erty? They acted honestly, and they acted wisely also; for I say 
 here, before the largest assembly I ever saw in any country — and I 
 believe you are almost all Catholics — I say here, that if the see of 
 Home presumed to impose any temporal mandate directly or in- 
 directly on the Irish people, the Irish bishops should at once aban- 
 don it, or the flocks, one and all, would abjure and banish them l)oth 
 together. History atfords us too fatal an example of the perfidious, 
 arrogant, and venal interference of a papal usurper of former days 
 in the temporal jurisdiction of this country; an intirfercnce assumed 
 without right, exercised without principle, and fullowcd by calam- 
 ities apparently witliout end. Thus, then, has every ol)stacle van- 
 ished ; but it has done more ; every obstacle has, as it were, by 
 miracle, produced a powerful argument in your favor. How do I 
 prove it? Follow me in my proofs, and you will see by what linivs 
 the chain is united. The power of Napoleon was the grand and 
 leading obstacle to your emancipation. That power led him to iiic 
 menace of an Irish invasion. What did that prove? Only the siii- 
 fserity of Irish allegiance. On the very threat we poured foith o;ir 
 volunteers, our yeomen, and our militia ; and the country became 
 
696 TEEASDKT OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 encircled with an armed and a loyal population. Thus, then, the 
 calumny of your disaffection vanished. That power next led him to 
 the invasion of Portugal. What did it prove ? Only the good faith of 
 Catholic allegiance. Every field in the Peninsula saw the Catholic 
 Portuguese hail the English Protestant as a brother and a friend, 
 joined in the same pride and the same peril. Tlius, then, vanished 
 the slander that you could not keep faith with heretics. Tiiat power 
 next led him to the imprisonment of the Pontiff, so long suspected 
 of being quite ready to sacrifice everj'thing to his interest and his do- 
 minion. What did that prove? The strength of his principles, the 
 puritj' of his faith, the disinterestedness of his practice. It proved 
 a life spent in the study of the saints, and ready to be closed by an 
 imitation of the martyrs. Thus, also, was the head of your religion 
 vindicated to Europe. There remained behind but one impediment 
 — your liability to a foreign influence. Now mark! The Pontiff's 
 captivity led to the transmission of Quarantotti's rescript ; and on its 
 arrival, from the priest to the peasant there was not a Catholic in the 
 land who did not spurn the document of Italian audacity ! Thus, 
 then, vanished also the phantom of a foreign influence ! Is this con- 
 viction ? Is not the hand of God in it ? Oh yes ! for observe what 
 followed. The very moment that power, which was the first and 
 last leading argument against you, had, by its special operation, ban- 
 ished every obstacle ; that power itself, as it were by enchantment, 
 evaporated at once ; and jieace with Europe took away the last pre- 
 tence for your exclusion. Peace with Europe ! alas, alas, there is 
 no peace for Ireland ; the universal pacification was but the signal for 
 renewed hostility to us ; and the mockery of its preliminaries were 
 tolled through our provinces by the knell of the curfew. I ask, is 
 it not time that this hostility should cease ? If ever there was a day 
 when it was necessary, that day undoubtedly exists no longer. 
 
 The continent is triumphant, the Peninsula is free, France is our 
 all}'. The hapless house which gave birth to Jacobinism is extinct 
 forever. The Pope has been found not only not hostile, but com- 
 plying. Indeed, if England would recollect the share you had in 
 these sublime events, the very recollection should subsidize her into 
 gratitude. But should she not — should she, with a baseness mon- 
 strous and unparalleled, forget our services, she has still to study a 
 tremendous lesson. The ancient order of Europe, it is true, is 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 697 
 
 restored, but -what restored it ? Coalition after coalition had crumbled 
 away before the might of the conqueror ; crowns were but ephemeral ; 
 monarchs only the tenants of an hour ; the descendants of Frederick 
 dwindled into a vassal ; the heir of Peter shrunk into the recesses of 
 his frozen desert ; the successor of Charles roamed a vagabond, not 
 only throneless but houseless ; every evening sun set upon a change ; 
 every morning dawned upon some new convulsion ; in short, the 
 whole political globe quivered as with an earthquake, and who 
 could tell what venerable monument was not to shiver beneath the 
 splendid, frightful, and reposeless heavings of the French volcano? 
 What gave Europe peace, and England safety, amid this palsy of her 
 Princes ? Was it not the Landwehr and the Landstnun and the Levy 
 en Masse ? Was it not the people ? — that first and last, and best, 
 and noblest, as well as safest security of a virtuous government. It 
 is a glorious lesson ; she onght to study it in this hour of safety ; 
 but should she not — 
 
 " Oh, woe be to the Prince who rules by fear, 
 When clanger comes upon him ! " 
 
 She will adopt it. I hope it from her wisdom ; I expect it from her 
 policy ; I claim it from her justice ; I demand it from her gratitude. 
 She must at length see that there is a gross mistake in the manage- 
 ment of Ireland. No wise man ever yet imagined injustice to be his 
 interest ; and the minister who thinks he serves a state by upholding 
 the most irritating and the most impious of all monopolies will one 
 day or other find himself miserably mistaken. This system of per- 
 secution is not the way to govern this country ; at least, to govern 
 it with any happiness to itself, or advantage to its rulers. Centuries 
 have proved its total inefiiciency ; and if it be continued for centuries, 
 the proofs will be but multiplied. Why, however, should I blame 
 the English people, when I see our own representatives so shamefully 
 negligent of our interest? The other day, for instance, when Mr. 
 Peel introduced, aye, and passed too, his three newly invented 
 penal bills, to the necessity of which, every assizes in Ireland, and 
 as honest a judge as ever dignified or redeemed the ermine, has given 
 the refutation ; why was it that no Irish member rose in his place to 
 vindicate his country ? Where were the nominal representatives of 
 Ireland? Where were the renegade revilers of the demagogue? 
 Where were the noisy proclaimers of the board ? What, was there 
 
69S TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 not one voice to own the country? Was the patriot of 1782 an 
 assenting auditor? Were our hundred zVnzej'an^s mute and motion- 
 less — "quite cbopfallen? " or is it only when Ireland is slandered, 
 and her motives misrepresented, and her oppressions are basely and 
 falsely denied, that their venal throats are ready to echo the chorus 
 of ministerial calumny? Oh, I should not have to ask those ques- 
 tions, if in the lute contest for this city, you had prevailed, and sent 
 Hutchinson into Parliament ; he would have risen, though alone, as 
 I have often seen him — riciier not less in hereditary fame, than in 
 personal accomplishments ; the ornament of Ireland as she is, the 
 solitary remnant of what she was. If slander dare asperse her, 
 it would not have done so with impunity. He would have encour- 
 aged the timid ; he Avould have shamed the recreant ; and thongh he 
 could not save us from chains, he would at least have shielded us from 
 calumny. Let me hope that his absence shall be but of short dura- 
 tion, and that this city will earn an additional claim to the gratitude 
 of the country, by electing him her representative. I scarcely know 
 bim but as a public man ; and considering the state to which w^c are 
 reduced by the apostacy of some, and the ingratitude of others, and 
 venality of more, — I say you should inscribe the conduct of such a 
 man in ihc manuals of your devotion, and in the primers of your 
 children ; but above all, you should act on it yourselves. Let me 
 entreat of you, above all things to sacrifice any personal differences 
 among yourselves, for the great cause in which 30U are embarked. 
 Iveniember the contest is for your children, your country, and your 
 God ; and remember also, that the day of Irish union will be the 
 nalal day of Irish liberty. When your own Parliament (which I 
 trust in heaven we may yet see again) voted you the right of fran- 
 chise, and the right of purchase, it gave you, if you are not false to 
 yourselves, a certainty of your emancipation. My friends, farewell ! 
 This has been a most unexpected meeting to me ; it has been our 
 first — it may be our last. I can never forget the enthusiasm of this 
 reception. I am too much affected by it to make professions; but, 
 believe me, no matter where I may be driven by the whim of my 
 destiny, you shall find me one, in whom change of place shall create 
 no change of principle; one whose memory must perish ere he. 
 forgets his country ; whose heart must be cold when it beats not for 
 her happiness. 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 699 
 
 A Speech 
 
 Delivered at a Dinner given on Dinas Island, est the Lake 
 
 OF KiLLARNET, ON Mr. PhILLIPS' HeALTH BEING GIVEN, TO- 
 GETHER WITH THAT OP Mr. Payne, a young American. 
 
 ^^T is not with the vain hope of returning by woi-ds the kindnesses 
 §^ which have been literally showered on me during the short 
 p< period of our acquaintance, that I now interrupt, for a moment, 
 •L the tlow of your festivity. Indeed, it is not necessary ; an 
 Irishman needs no requital for his hospitality ; its generous impulse 
 is the instinct of his nature, and the very consciousness of the act 
 carries its recompense along with it. But, sir, there are sensations 
 excited by an allusion in your toast, under the influence of which 
 silence would be impossible. To be associated with Mr. Payne 
 must be, to any one who regards private virtues and personal ac- 
 complishments, a source of peculiar pride ; and that feeling is not a 
 little enlianced in me by a recollection of the country to which we 
 are indeljted for his qualifications. Indeed, the mention of America 
 has never failed to fill me with the most lively emotious. In my 
 earliest infancy, that tender season when impressions, at once the 
 most permanent and the most powerful, are likely to be excited, the 
 story of her then recent struggle raised a throb in every heart tliat 
 loved liberty, and wrung a reluctant tribute even from discomfited 
 oppression. I saw her spurning alike the luxuries that would ener- 
 vate, and the legions that would intimidate ; dashing from her lips 
 the poisoned cup of European servitude, and, through all the vicissi- 
 tudes of her protracted conflict, displaying a magnanimity that defied 
 misfortune, and a moderation that gave new grace to victory. It 
 was the first vision of my childhood ; it will descend with me to the 
 grave. But if as a man, I venerate the mention of America, what 
 
700 TKEASTIRY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 must be my feelings towards her as an Irishman. Never, oh never, 
 ■while memory remains, can Ireland forget the home of her emigrant 
 and the asylum of her exile. No matter whether their sorrows 
 sprung from the errors of enthusiasm, or the realities of suffei-ing — 
 from fancy or infliction ; that must be reserved for the scrutiny of 
 those whom the lapse of time shall acquit of partiality. It is for the 
 men of other ages to investigate and recoi'd it ; but surely it is for 
 the men of every age to hail the hospitality that received the shel- 
 terless, and love the feeling that befriended the unfortunate. Search 
 creation round, where can you find a country that presents so sub- 
 lime a view, so interesting an anticijoation ? What noble institutions ! 
 What a comprehensive policy ! What a wise equalization of every 
 political advantage ! The oppressed of all countries, the martyrs of 
 every creed, the innocent victim of despotic arrogance or supersti- 
 tious phrenzy, may there find refuge ; his industiy encouraged, his 
 piety respected, his ambition animated ; with no restraint but those 
 laws which are the same to all, and no distinction but that whicli his 
 merit may originate. Who can deny that the existence of such a 
 country presents a subject for human congratulation ! Who can 
 deny that its gigantic advancement offers a field for the most rational 
 conjecture ! At the end of the very next century, if she proceeds 
 as she seems to promise, what a wondrous spectacle may she not 
 exhibit ! Who shall say for what purpose a mysterious Providence 
 may not have designed her ! Who shall say that when in its follies 
 or its crimes, the old world may have interred all the pride of its 
 power, and all the pomp of its civilization, human nature may not 
 find its destined renovation in the new ! For myself, I have no 
 doubt of it. I have not the least doubt that when our temples and 
 our trophies shall have mouldered into dust ; when the glories of 
 our name shall be but the legend of tradition, and the light of our 
 achievements only live in song ; philosophy will rise again in the 
 sky of her Fi-anklin, and glory rekindle at the urn of her Washing- 
 ton. Is this the vision of romantic fancy? Is it even improbable? 
 Is it half so improbable as the events, which, for the last twenty 
 years have rolled like successive tides over the sui'face of the Euro- 
 pean woi'ld, each erasing the impressions that preceded it? Thou- 
 sands upon thousands, sir, I know there are, who will consider this 
 supposition as wild and whimsical ; but they have dwelt with little 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 701 
 
 reflection upon the records of the past. They have but ill observed 
 the never-ceasing progress of national rise and national ruin. They 
 form their judgment on the deceitful stability of the pi'esent hour, 
 never considering the innumerable monarchies and republics, in 
 former days, apparently as permanent, their very existence become 
 now the subjects of speculation — I had almost said of scepticism. I 
 appeal to history ! Tell me, thou reverend chronicler of the grave, 
 can all the illusions of ambition realized, can all the wealth of an 
 universal commerce, can all the achievements of successful heroism, 
 or all the establishments of this world's wisdom, secure to empire 
 the permanency of its possessions? Alas, Troy thought sconce; 
 yet the land of Priam lives only in song ! Thebes thought so once, 
 yet her hundred gates have crumbled, and her very tombs are but 
 as the dust they were vainly intended to commemorate ! So thought 
 Palmjrra — where is she? So thought Persepolis, and now — 
 
 "Yon waste, where roaming lions howl, 
 Yon aisle, where moaus the grey-eyed owl 
 Shows the proud Persian's great abode. 
 Where sceptered once, an earthly god, 
 His power-clad arm controlled each happier clime, 
 Where sports the warbling muse, and fancy soars sublime." 
 
 So thought the countries of Demosthenes and the Spartan, yet Le- 
 onidas's is trampled by the timid slave, and Athens insulted by 
 the servile, mindless, and enervate Ottoman ! In his hurried march, 
 Time has but looked at their imagined immortality, and all its vani- 
 ties, from the palace to the tomb, have, with their ruins, erased the 
 very impression of his footsteps ! The days of their glory are as if 
 they had never been ; and the island that was then a speck, rude 
 and neglected in the barren ocean, now rivals the ubiquity of their 
 commerce, the glory of their arms, the fame of their philosophy, the 
 eloquence of their senate, and the inspiration of their bards ! Who 
 shall say, then, contemplathig the past, that England, proud and 
 potent as she appears, may not one day be what Athens is, and the 
 young America yet soar to be what Athens was ! Who shall say, 
 when the European columns shall have mouldered, and the night of 
 barbarism obscured its very ruins, that that mighty continent may 
 not emerge from the horizon, to rule, for its time, sovereign of the 
 ascendant ! 
 
702 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Such, sir, is the natural progress of human operations, and such 
 the unsubstantial mockery of human pride. But I should, perhaps, 
 apologize for this digression. The tombs are, at best, a sad although 
 an instructive subject. At all events, they are ill suited to such an 
 hour as this. I shall endeavour to atone for it, by turning to a 
 theme which tombs cannot inurn, or revolution alter. It is the cus- 
 tom of your board, and a noble one it is, to deck the cup of the gay 
 with the garland of the great ; and surely, even in the eyes of its 
 deity, his grape is not the less lovely when glowing beneath the foli- 
 age of the palm-tree and the myrtle. Allow me to add one flower 
 to. the chaplet, which, though it sprang in America, is no exotic. 
 Virtue planted it, and it is naturalized everywhere. I see you an- 
 ticipate me ; I see you concur with me, that it matters very little 
 what immediate spot may be the birth-place of such a man as Wash- 
 ington. No people can claim, no country can appropriate him ; the 
 boon of Providence to the human race, his fame is eternity, and his 
 residence creation. Tiiough it was the defeat of our arms, and the 
 disgrace of our policy, I almost bless the convulsion in which he had 
 his origin. If the heavens thundered and the earth rocked, yet, 
 when the storm passed, how pure was the climate that it cleared ; 
 bow bright in the brow of the firmament was the planet which it re- 
 vealed to us ! In the production of Washington, it does really ap- 
 pear as if nature was endeavoring to improve upon herself, and that 
 all the virtues of the ancient world were but so many studies prepar- 
 atory to the patriot of the new. Individual instances no doubt there 
 were ; splendid exemplifications of some single qualifications. Csesai 
 was merciful, Scipio was continent, Hannibal was patient; but it 
 was reserved for Washington to blend them all in one, and like the 
 lovely clief d'cEitvi-e of the Grecian artist, to exhibit in one glow of 
 associated beauty, the pride of every model, and the perfection of 
 every master. As a General, he marshalled the peasant into a vet- 
 eran, and supplied by discipline the absence of experience ; as a 
 statesman, he enlarged the policy of the cabinet into the most com- 
 prehensive system of general advantage ; and such was the wisdom 
 of his views, and the philosophy of his counsels, that to the soldier 
 and the statesman he almost added the character of the sage ! a con- 
 queror, he was untainted with the crime of blood ; a revolutionist. 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 703 
 
 the contest, and his country called him to the command. Liberty 
 unsheathed his sword, necessity stained, victory returned it. If he 
 had paused here, history might have doubted what station to assign 
 him, whether at the head of her citizens or her soldiers, her heroes, 
 or her patriots. But the last glorious act crowns his career, and ban- 
 ishes all hesitation. Who, like Washington, after having emanci- 
 pated a hemisphere, resigned its crown, and preferred the retirement 
 of domestic life to the adoration of a land he might be almost said 
 to have created? 
 
 " How shall we rank thee upon glory's page, 
 Thou more than soldier, and just less than sage; 
 All thou hast been reflects less fame on thee, 
 Far less than all thou hast forborne to be ! " 
 
 Such, Sir, is the testimony of one not to be accused of partiality 
 in his estimate of America. Happy, proud America ! the lightnings 
 of heaven yielded to your philosophy ! The temptations of earth 
 could not seduce your patriotism ! 
 
 I have the honor. Sir, of proposing to you as a toast, The immortal 
 KEMOKr OF George Washington. 
 
704- TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 A Speech 
 
 Deliveeed at an Aggregate Meeting of the Eoman Catholics 
 OF the County and City of Dublin. 
 
 1^«AVING taken, in the discussions on your question, such humble 
 ^M§ share as was allotted to my station and capacity, I may be 
 ujjkt) permitted to ofier my ardent congratulations at the proud 
 ;^^« pinnacle on which it this day reposes. After having com- 
 •^ bated calumnies the most atrocious, sophistries the most 
 plausible, and perils the most appalling that slander could invent or 
 ingenuity could devise or power array against you, I at length behold 
 the assembled rank and wealth and talent of the Catholic body oifer- 
 ing to the legislature that appeal which cannot be rejected, if there 
 be a Power in heaven to redress injury, or a spirit on earth to ad- 
 minister justice. No matter what may be the depreciations of faction 
 or of bigotry ; this earth never presented a more ennobling spectacle 
 than that of a Christian country suffering for her religion with the 
 patience of a martyr, and suing for her liberties with the expostula- 
 tions of a philosopher ; reclaiming the bad by her piety ; refuting 
 the bigoted by her practice ; wielding the Ajiostle's weapons in the 
 patriot's cause, and at length, laden with chains and with laurels, 
 seeking from the country she had saved, the constitution she had 
 shielded ! Little did I imagine, that in such a state of j'our cause, we 
 should be called together to counteract the impediments to its success, 
 created not by its enemies, but by those supposed to be its friends. 
 It is a melancholy occasion ; but melancholy as it is, it must be met, 
 and met with the fortitude of men struggling in the sacred cause of 
 liberty. I do not allude to the proclamation of your Board ; of that 
 Board I never was a member, so I can speak impartially. It con- 
 tained much talent, some learning, many virtues. It was valuable 
 on that account ; but it was doubly valuable as being a vehicle for 
 
CIIAKLES PHILLIPS. 705 
 
 the individual sentiments of any Catholic, and for the aggregate 
 sentiments of every Catholic. Those who seceded from it do not 
 rememher that, individually, they are nothing ; that as a body they 
 are everything. It is not this wealthy slave, or that titled sycophant, 
 whom the bigots dread, or the parliament respects ! No, it is the 
 body, the numbers, the rank, the property, the genius, the perse- 
 verance, the education, but, above all, the Union of the Catholics. 
 I am far from defending every measure of the Buard — perhaps I 
 condemn some of its measures even more than those who have seceded 
 from it; but is it a reason, if a general makes one mistake, that his 
 followers are to desert him, especially when the contest is for all that 
 is dear or valuable? No doubt the Board had its errors. Show me 
 the human institution which has not. Let the man, then, who de- 
 nounces it, prove himself superior to humanity, before he triumphs 
 in his accusation. I am surry for its suppression. When I consider 
 the animals who are in office around us, the act does not surprise me ; 
 but I confess, even from them, the manner did, and the time chosen 
 did, most sensibly. 1 did not expect it on the very hour when the 
 news of universal peace was first promulgated, and on the anniver- 
 sary of the only British monarch's birth, who ever gave a boon to 
 this distracted country. 
 
 You will excuse this digression, rendered in some degree necessary. 
 I shall now confine myself exclusively to your resolution, which de- 
 termines on the immediate presentation of your petition, and censures 
 the neglect of any discussion on it by your advocates during the last 
 session of Parliament. You have a right to demand most fully 
 the reasons of any man who dissents from Mr. Grattan. I will give 
 you mine explicitly. But I shall first state the reasons which he has 
 given for the postponement of your question. I shall do so out of 
 respect to him, if indeed it can be called respect to quote those sen- 
 timents, which on their very mention must excite your ridicule. 
 Mr. Grattan presented your petition, and, on moving that it should 
 lie where so many preceding ones have lain, namely, on tlie table, he 
 declared it to be his intention to move for no discussion. Here in 
 the first place, I think Mr. Grattan wrong ; he got that .petition, 
 if not on the express, at least on the implied condition of having it 
 immediately discussed. There was not a man at the aggregate 
 meetinii at which it was adopted, who did not expect a discussion on 
 
706 TREASURE OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the very first opportunity. Mr. Grattan, however, was angry at 
 "suggestions." I do not think Mr. Grattan, of all men, had any 
 right to be so angry at receiving that which every English member 
 was willing to receive, and was actually receiving from any English 
 corn-factor. Mr. Grattan was also angry at our " violence." 
 Neither do I think he had any occasion to be so squeamish at what 
 he calls our violence. There was a day, when Mr. Grattan would not 
 have spurned our suggestions, and there was also a day when he was 
 fifty-fold more intemperate than any of his oppressed countrymen, 
 whom he now holds up to the English people as so unconstitu- 
 tionally violent. A pretty way, forsooth, for your advocate to 
 commence conciliating a foreign auditory in favor of your petition. 
 Mr. Grattan, however, has fulfilled his own prophecy, that "an oak 
 of the forest is too old to be transplanted at fifty," and our fears 
 that an Irish native would soon lose its raciness in an English 
 atmosphere. "It is not my intention," says he, "to move for a dis- 
 cussion at present." Why? " Great obstacles have been removed." 
 That 's his first reason. "I am, however," says he, "still ardent." 
 Ardent ! Why it strikes me to be a very novel kind of ardor, which 
 toils till it has removed every impediment, and then pauses at tho 
 prospect of its victory. "And I am of opinion," he continues, 
 "that any immediate discussion would be the height of precipitation" ; 
 that is, after having removed the impediments, he pauses in his path, 
 declaring he is "ardent": and after centuries of suffering, when you 
 press for a discussion, he protests that he considers you monstrously 
 precipitate ! Now is not that a fair translation? Why really if we 
 did not know Mr. Grattan, we should be almost tempted to think 
 that he was quoting from the ministry. With the exception of one 
 or two plain, downwright, sturdy, unblushing bigots, who opposed 
 you because you were Christians, and declared they did so, this was 
 the cant of every man who afi"ected liberality. "Oh, I declare," 
 they say, "they may not be cannibals, though they are Catholics ; ;ind 
 I would be very glad to vote for them, but this is no (hue." "Oh 
 no," says Bragge Bathurst, "it's no time. What! in time of war! 
 Why it looks like bullying us ! " Very well : next comes the peace, 
 and what say onv friends the opposition ? " Oh I I declare peace ia 
 no time, it looks so like persuading us." For mj part, serious as 
 the subject is, it afiects me with the very same ridicule with which I 
 
CHAKLES PHILLIPS. 707 
 
 see I have so unconsciously affected you. I will tell you a story of 
 "which it reminds me. It is told of the celebrated Charles Fox. Far 
 be it from me, however, to mention that name with levity. As he 
 was a great man, I revere him ; as he was a good man, I love him. 
 He had as Avise a head as ever paused to deliberate ; he had as sweet 
 a tongue as ever gave the words of wisdom utterance ; and he had a 
 heart so stamped with the immediate impress of the Divinity, that its 
 very errors might _be traced to the excess of its benevolence. I had 
 almost forgot the story. Fox was a man of genius — of course, he 
 was poor. Poverty is a reproach to no man ; to such a man as Fox, 
 I think it was a pride : for if he chose to trafEc with his principles ; 
 if lie chose to gamble with his conscience, how easily might he have 
 been rich? I guessed j'our answer. It would be hard, indeed, if 
 you did not believe that in England talents might find a purchaser, 
 who have seen in Ireland how easily a blockhead may swindle himself 
 into preferment. Juvenal says that the greatest misfortune attend- 
 ant on poverty is ridicule. Fox found out a greater — debt. The 
 Jews called on him for payment. " Ah, my dear friends," says Fox, 
 " I admit the principle ; I owe you money, but what time is this, 
 when I am going upon business?" Just so our friends admit the 
 l^rinciple ; they owe you emancipation, but war's no time. Well, 
 the Jews departed just as you did. They returned to the charge : 
 "What ! " cries Fox, " is this a time, when I am engaged on an ap- 
 pointment?" What! say our friends, is this a time v,hcn all the 
 world's at peace? The Jews departed; but the end of it was, Fox, 
 with his secretary, Mr. Hare, who was as much in debt as he was, 
 shut themselves up in garrison. The Jews used to surround his 
 habitation at da^'light, and poor Fox regularly put his head out of 
 the window, with tliis question; "Gentlemen, are you /W-Iiunting 
 or //aj'e-hunting, this morning?" His pleasantry mitigated the very 
 Jews. "Well, well. Fox, now you have always admitted the prin- 
 ciple, but protested against the iiine; we will give you your own 
 time, only just fix some final day for our repayment." "Ah, 
 my dear Moses," replies Fox, "now this is friendly. I will take you 
 at your word ; I will fix a day, and as it's to be a final day, what 
 would you thiuk of the day of judgment?" " That will be too busy 
 a day with us." " Well, well, in order to accommodate all parties, 
 let us settle the day after." 
 
708 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Thus it is, between tlie war inexpediency of Bragge Batliurst and 
 the peace inexpediency of Mr. Grattan, you may expect your eman- 
 cipation-bill pretty much about the time that Fox settled for the 
 payment of his creditors. Mr. Grattan, however, though he scorn- 
 ed to take your suggestions, took the suggestions of your friends. 
 " I have consulted," says he, " my right honorable friends ! " Oh, 
 all friends, all right honorable! Now this it is to trust the interest 
 of a people into the hands of a party. You must know, in parlia- 
 mentary pai'lauce, these right honorable friends mean a party. 
 There are few men so contemptible, as not to have a party. The 
 minister has his party. The opposition have their party. The 
 saints, for there are saints in the House of Commons, lucusanon 
 hicendo, the saints have their party. Every one has his party. I 
 had forgotten — Ireland has no 2Mrty. Such are the reasons, if 
 reasons they can be called, which Mr. Grattan has given for the 
 postjDonement of your question ; and I sincerely say, if they had 
 come from any other man, I would not have condescended to have 
 given them an answer. He is indeed I'eported to have said that he 
 has others in reserve, which he did not think it necessary to detail. 
 If those which he reserved were like those he delivered, I do not 
 dispute the prudence of keeping them to himself; but as we have 
 not the gift of prophecy, it is not easy for us to answer them, until 
 he shall deign to give them to his constituents. 
 
 Having dealt thus freely with the alleged I'easons for the post- 
 ponement, it is quite natural that you should require what my 
 reasons are for urging the discussion. I shall give them candidly. 
 They are at once so simple and explicit, it is quite impossible that 
 the meanest capacity amongst you should not comprehend them. I 
 would urge the instant discussion, because discussion has always 
 been of use to you ; because, upon every discussion you have gained 
 converts out of doors ; and because, upon every discussion within 
 the doors of pai'liament, your enemies have diminished and 3'our 
 friends have increased. Now, is not that a strong reason for con- 
 tinuing your discussions? This may be assertion. Aye, but I will 
 prove it. In order to convince you of the argument as referring to 
 the country, I need but point to the state of the public mind now 
 upon the subject, and that which existed in the memory of the 
 youngest. I myself remember the blackest and the basest universal 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 709 
 
 denunciations against your ci'eed, and the vilest anatliemas against 
 any man who would grant you an iota. Now, every man affects to 
 be liberal, and the only question with some is the time of the con- 
 cession ; with others, the extent of the concessions ; with many, the 
 nature of the securities you should afford; whilst a great multitude, 
 in which I am proud to class myself, think that your emancipation 
 should be immediate, universal, and unrestricted. Such has been 
 the progress of the human mind out of doors, in consequence of the 
 powerful eloquence, argument, and policy elicited by those discus- 
 sions which your friends now have, for the first time, found out to 
 be precipitate. Now let us see what has been the effect produced 
 ivUkin the doors of Parliament. For twenty years you were silent, 
 and of course you were neglected. The consequence was most 
 natural. Why should Parliament grant jirivileges to men who did 
 not think those privileges worth the solicitation? Then rose your 
 agitators, as they are called by those bigots who are trembling at 
 the effect of their arguments on the community, and who, as a mat- 
 ter of course, take every opportunity of calumniating them. Ever 
 since that period your cause has been advancing. Take the numer- 
 ical proportions in the House of Commons on each subsequent dis- 
 cussion. In 1805, the iirst time it was brought forward in the 
 Imperial legislature, and it was then aided by the powerful eloquence 
 of Fox, there was a majority against even taking your claims into 
 consideration, of no less a number than 212. It Avas an appalling 
 omen. In 1808, however, on the next discussion, that majority 
 Avns diminished to 163. In 1810 it decreased to 104. In 1811 it 
 dwindled to 64, and at length in 1812, on the motion of Mr. Can- 
 ning, and it is not a little remarkable that the first successful exer- 
 tion in your favor was made by an English member, your enemies 
 fled the field, and you had the triumphant majoi-ity to support you 
 of 129 ! Now, is this not demonstration? What becomes now of 
 those who say discussion has not been of use to you : but I need 
 not have resorted to ai-ithmetical calculation. Men become ashamed 
 of combating with axioms. Truth is omnipotent, and must prevail ; 
 it forces its way with the fire and the precision of the morning sim- 
 b.am. Vapors may impede the infimcy of its progress ; but the 
 very resistance that would check only condenses and concentrates 
 it, until at length it goes forth in the fullness of its meridian, all life 
 
710 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 and sight and lustre, the minutest objects visible in its refulgence. 
 You lived for centuries on the vegetable diet and eloquent silence 
 of this Pythagorean policy ; and the consequence was, when you 
 thought yourselves mightily dignified and mightily interesting, the 
 whole world was laughing at your philosophy, and sending its aliens 
 to take possession of your birthright. I have given you a good 
 reason for urging your discussion, by having shown you that dis- 
 cussion has always gained you proselytes. But is it the time? says 
 Mr. Grattan. Yes, sir, it is tlie lime, peculiarly the time, unless 
 indeed the great question of Irish liberty is to be reserved as a 
 weapon in the hands of a party to wield against the weakness of the 
 British minister. But why should I delude j'ou by talking about 
 time! Oh! there will never be a time with Bigotry ! She has uo 
 head, and cannot think ; she has no heart, and cannot feel; when 
 she moves, it is in wrath ; when she pauses, it is amid ruin ; her 
 prayers are curses, her communion is death, her vengeance is eter- 
 nity, her decalogue is written in the blood of her victims ;' and if 
 she stoops for a moment from her infernal flight, it is upon some 
 kindred rock to whet her vulture fang for keener rapine, and 
 replume her wing for a more sanguinary desolation ! I appeal from 
 this infernal, grave-stalled fury, I appeal to the good sense, to the 
 policy, to the gratitude of England; and I make my appeal pecu- 
 liarly at this moment, when all the illustrious potentates of Europe 
 are assembled together in the British capital, to hold the great festi- 
 val of universal peace and universal emancipation. Perhaps when 
 France, flushed with success, fired by ambition, and infuriated by 
 enmity ; her avowed aim an universal conquest, her means the 
 confederated resources of the continent, her guide the greatest mili- 
 tary genius a nation fertile in prodigies has produced — a man who 
 seemed born to invert what had been regular, to defile what had 
 been venerable, to crush what had been established, and to create, 
 as if by a magic impulse, a fairy world, peopled by the paupers he 
 Lad commanded into kings, and based by the thrones he had 
 crumbled in his caprices — perhaps when such a power, so led, so 
 organized, and so incited, was in its noon of triumi^h, the timid 
 might tremble even at the charge that would save, or the concession 
 that would strengthen. But now,— her allies faithless, her con- 
 quests despoiled, her territory dismembered, her legions defeated, 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 71 X 
 
 her leader dethroned, and her reigning prince our ally by treat}', 
 our debtor by gratitude, and our inalienable friend by every solemn 
 obligation of civilized society, — the objection is our strength, and 
 the obstacle our battlement. Perhaps when the Pope was in the 
 power of our enemy, however slender the pretext, bigotry might 
 have rested on it. The inference was false as to Ireland, and it was 
 ungenerous as to Rome. The Irish Catholic, firm in his faith, bows 
 to the Pontiff's spiritual supremacy, but he would spurn the Pontiff's 
 temporal interference. If, with the spirit of an earthly domination, 
 he were to issue to-morrow his despotic mandate. Catholic Ireland 
 Avith one voice would answer him : " Sire, we bow with reverence 
 to 3'our spiritual mission : the descendant of Saint Peter, we freely 
 acknowledge you the head of our church, and the organ of our creed : 
 but, Sire, if we have a church, we cannot forget that we also have a 
 country ; and when you attempt to convert j^our mitre into a crown, 
 and 3^our crozier into a sceptre, you degrade the majesty of your 
 high delegation, and grossly miscalculate upon our acquiescence. 
 No foreign power shall regulate the allegiance which we owe to our 
 sovereign ; it was the fault of our fathers that one Pope forged our 
 fetters ; it will be our own, if we allow them to be riveted by 
 another." Such would be the answer of universal Ireland ; such 
 was her answer to the audacious menial, who dared to dictate her 
 unconditional submission to an act of Parliament which emancipated 
 by penalties, and redressed by insult. But, sir, it never would 
 have entered into the contemplation of the Pope to have assumed 
 such an authority. His character was a sufficient shield against the 
 imputation, and his policy must have taught him that, in grasping at 
 the shadow of a temporal power, he should but risk the reality of 
 his ecclesiastical supremacy. 
 
 Thus was Parliament doubly guarded against a foreign usurpa- 
 tion. The people upon whom it was to act deprecate its authority, 
 and the power to which it was imputed a)>hors its ambition ; the Pope 
 Avould not exert it if he could, and the people would not obey it if 
 he did. Just [)recisely upon the same foundation rested the asper- 
 sions which were cast upon your creed. How did experience justify 
 them? Did Lord Wellington find that religious faith made any 
 difference amid the thunder of the battle? Did the Spanish soldier 
 desert his colors because his General believed not in the real 
 
712 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 presence ? Did the brave Portuguese neglect his orders to negotiate 
 about mysteries ? Or what comparison did the hero draw between 
 the policy of England and the piety of Spain, when at one 
 moment he led the heterodox legions to victory, and the very next 
 was obliged to fly from his own native flag, waving defiance on the 
 walls of Burgos, where the Irish exile planted and sustained it? 
 What must he have felt when in a foreign land he was obliged to 
 connnand brother against brother, to raise the sword of blood, and 
 drown the cries of nature with the artillery of death? What were 
 the sensations of our hapless exiles Mhen they recognized the fea- 
 tures of their long-lost country ? when they heard the accents of the 
 tongue they loved, or caught the cadence of the simple melody 
 which once lulled them to sleep within a mother's arms, and cheered 
 the darling circle they must behold no more? Alas, how the poor 
 banished heart delights in the memoiy that song associates ! He 
 heard it in happier days, when the parents he adored, the maid he 
 loved, the friends of his soul, and the green fields of his infancy were 
 round him ; when his labors were illumined with the sunshine of the 
 heart, and his humble hut was a palace — for it was home. His soul 
 is full, his eye suffused, he bends from the battlements to catch the 
 cadence, when his death-shot, sped by a brother's hand, lays him in 
 his grave— the victim of a code calling itself Christian ! Who shall 
 say, heart-rending as it is, this picture is from fancy? Has it not 
 occurred in Spain ? May it not at this instant be acting in America ? 
 Is there any country in the universe in which these brave exiles of a 
 barI)arous bigotry are not to be found refuting the calumnies that 
 banished and rewarding the hospitality that received them? Yet 
 England, enlightened England, who sees them in every field of the 
 old world and the new, defending the various flags of every faith, 
 supports the injustice of her exclusive constitution by branding upon 
 them the ungenerous accusation of an exclusive creed ! England, the 
 ally of Catholic Portugal, the ally of Catholic Spain, the all}' of 
 Catholic France, the friend of the Pope ! England, wlio seated a 
 Catholic bigot in INIadrid ! who convoyed a Catholic Braganza to the 
 Brazils ! wiio enthroned a Catholic Bourbon in Paris ! who guaran- 
 teed a Catholic establishment in Canada ! who gave a constitution to 
 Catholic Hanover ! England, who searches the globe for Catholic 
 grievances to redress and Catholic princes to restore, will not trust 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 7I3, 
 
 the Catholic at home, who speuds his blood and treasure in her ser- 
 vice ! Is this generous ? Is this consistent? Is it just? Is it even 
 politic ? Is it the act of a wise country to fetter the energies of an 
 entire population? Is it the act of a Christian country to do it in 
 the name of God? Is it politic in a government to degrade part of 
 the body by which it is supported, or pious to make Providence a 
 party to their degradation ? There are societies in England for dis- 
 countenancing vice; there are Christian associations for distributing 
 the Bible ; there are voluntary missions for converting the heathen ; 
 but Ireland, the seat of their government, the stay of their empire, 
 their associate by all the ties of nature and of interest, how has she 
 benefited by the gospel of which they boast ? Has the sweet spirit 
 of Christianity appeared on our plains in the character of her pre- 
 cepts, breathing the air and robed in the beauties of the world to 
 which she would lead us ; with no argument but love, no look but 
 peace, no wealth but piety ; her creed comprehensive as the arch of 
 heaven, and her charities bounded but by the cii'cle of creation ? Or 
 has she been let loose amongst us in form of fury and in act of 
 demon, her heart festered with the fires of hell, her hands clotted 
 with the gore of earth, withering alike in her repose and in her 
 progress, her path apparent by the print of blood and her pause de- 
 noted by the expanse of desolation ? Gospel of Heaven ! is this thy 
 herald? God of the imiverse ! is this thy hand-maid? Christian of 
 the ascendancy ! how would you answer the disbelieving infidel, if 
 he asked you, should he estimate the Christian doctrine by the 
 Christian practice ; if he dwelt upon those periods when the human 
 victim writhed upon the altar of the peaceful Jesus, and the cross, 
 crimsoned with his blood, became little better than a stake to the 
 sacrifice of his votaries ; if he pointed to Ireland, where the word of 
 peace was the war-whoop of destruction ; where the son was bribed 
 against the father and the plunder of the parent's property was made 
 a bounty on the recantation of the parent's creed ; where the mai'ch 
 of the human mind was stayed in His name who had inspired it witli 
 reason, and any effort to liberate a fellow-creature from his intellec- 
 tual bondage was sure to be recompensed by the dungeon or the 
 scaffold ; where ignorance was so long a legislative command, and 
 piety legislative crime ; where religion was placed as a barrier be- 
 tween the sexes, and the intercourse of nature was pronounced felony 
 
714 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 by law ; where Gcxl's worship was an act of stealth, and His minis- 
 ters sought amongst the savages of the woods that sanctuary which a 
 nominal civilization had denied them ; where at this instant conscience 
 is made to blast every hope of genius and every energy of ambition ; 
 and the Catholic who would rise to any station of trust must, in the 
 face of his country, deny the faith of his fathers ; where the prefei"- 
 ments of earth are only to be obtained by the forfeiture of Heaven? 
 
 " Unprized are her sons till tliey learn to betray, 
 
 Undistinguished they live if they shame not their sires; 
 And the torch that would light them to dignity's way 
 
 Must be caught from the pile where their country expires?" 
 
 How, let me ask, how would the Christian zealot droop beneath this 
 catalogue of Christian qualifications? But, thus it is, when secta- 
 rians diifer on account of mysteries ; in the heat and acrimony of 
 the causeless contest, religion, the glory of one world, and the guide 
 of another, drifts from the splendid circle in which she shone, in the 
 comet-maze of uncertainty and error. The code, against which you 
 petition, is a vile compound of impiety and impolicy : impiety, be- 
 cause it debases in the name of God ; impolicy, because it disquali- 
 fies under pretence of government. If we are to argue fi'om the 
 services of Protestant Ireland, to the losses sustained by the bond- 
 age of Catholic Ireland, and I do not see wb}^ we should not, the 
 state which continues such a system is guihy of little less than a 
 political suicide. It matters little where the Protestant Irishman 
 has been employed ; whether with Burke, wielding the senate with 
 his eloquence \ with Castlereagh, guiding the cabinet with his coun- 
 sels ; with Barry, enriching the arts by his pencil ; with Swift, adorn- 
 ing literature by his genius ; with Goldsmith or with Moore, softening 
 the heart by their melody ; or with Wellington, chaining victory at 
 his car, he may boldly challenge the competition of the world. Op- 
 pressed and impoverished as our country is, every muse has cheered, 
 every art adorned, and every conquest crowned her. Plundered, 
 she was not poor, for her character enriched ; attainted, she was not 
 titleless, for her services ennobled ; literally outlawed into eminence, 
 and fettered into fame, the fields of her exile were immortalized by 
 her deeds, and the links of her chain became decorated by her lau- 
 rels. Is this fancy, or is it fact? Is there a department in the state 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 715 
 
 in which Irish genius does not possess a predominance ? Is there a 
 conquest which it does not achieve, or a dignity which it does not 
 adorn? At this instant, is there a country in the world to which 
 England has not deputed an Irishman as her repi'esentative? She 
 has sent Lord Moira to India, Sir Gore Ousely to Isjiahan, Lord 
 Stuart to Vienna, Lord Castlereagh to Congress, Sir Henry Wel- 
 lesly to Madrid, Mr. Canning to Lisbon, Lord Strangford to the 
 Brazils, Lord Clancarty to Holland, Lord Wellington to Paris — all 
 Irishmen ! Whether it results from accident or from merit, can there 
 be a more cutting sarcasm on the policy of England ! Is it not di- 
 rectly saying to her, "here is a country from one-fifth of whose 
 people you depute the agents of your most august delegation, the 
 remaining four-fifths of which by your odious bigotry, you incapaci- 
 tate from an}' station of oflice or of trust ! " It is adding all that is 
 weak in impolicy to all that is wicked in ingratitude. What is her 
 apology? Will she pretend that the Deity imitates her injustice, and 
 incapacitates the intellect as she has done the creed ? After making 
 Providence a pretence for her code, will she also make it a party to 
 her crime, and arraign the universal spirit of partiality in his dis- 
 pensations? Is she not content with him as a Protestant God, un- 
 less he also consents to become a Catholic demon ? But, if the 
 charge were true ; if the Irish Catholic were imbruted and debased, 
 Ireland's conviction would be England's crime, and your answer to 
 the bigot's charge should be the bigot's conduct. What, then ! is 
 this the result of six centuries of your government? Is this the 
 connection which j'ou called a benefit to Ireland ? Have your pro- 
 tecting laws so debased them, that the very privilege of reason is 
 worthless in their possession? Shame! oh, shame! to the govern- 
 ment where the people are barbarous ? The day is not distant when 
 they made the education of a Catholic a crime ; and yet they arraign 
 the Catholic for ignorance ! The day is not distant when they pro- 
 claimed the celebration of the Catholic worship a felony, and yet 
 they complain that the Catholic is not moral ! What folly ! Is it 
 to be expected that the people are to emerge in a moment from the 
 stupor of a protracted degradation? There is not perhaps to be 
 traced upon the map of national misfortune, a spot so truly and so 
 tediously deplorable as Ireland. Other lands, no doubt, have had 
 their calamities. To the horrors of revolution, the miseries of des- 
 
716 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 potisni, the scourges of anarchy, they have in their turus been sub- 
 ject. But it has been only in their turns ; the visitations of woe, 
 though severe, have not been eternal ; the hour of probation, or of 
 punishment, has passed away ; and the tempest, after having emptied 
 the vial of its wrath, has given place to the serenity of the calm and 
 of the sunshine. Has this been the case with respect to our mis- 
 erable country ? Is there, save in the visionary world of tradition — 
 is there in the progress, either of record or recollection, one verdant 
 spot in the desert of our annals, where patriotism can find repose, 
 or philanthi'opy refreshment? Oh, indeed, posterit}" will pause 
 with wonder on the melancholy page which shall portray the story 
 of a people amongst whom the policy of man, has waged an eternal 
 warfare with the providence of God, blighting into deformity all 
 that was beauteous, and into famine all that was abundant. I re- 
 peat, however, the charge to be false.. The Catholic mind in Ireland 
 has made advances scared}' to be hoped in the short interval of its 
 partial emancipation. But what encouragement has the Catholic 
 parent to educate his offspring? Suppose he sends his son, the hope 
 of his pride, and the wealth of his heart, into the army ; the child 
 justifies his parental anticipation ; he is moral in his habits, he is 
 strict in his discipline, he is daring in the field, and temperate at the 
 board, and patient in the camp; the first in the charge, and the last 
 in the retreat ; with a hand to achieve, and a head to guide, and 
 temper to conciliate ; he combines the skill of Wellington with the 
 clemency of Cajsar and the courage of Turenne — yet he can never 
 rise — he is a Catholic! Take another instance. Suppose him at 
 the bar. He has spent his nights at the lamp, and his days in the 
 forum ; the rose has withered from his cheek mid the drudgery of 
 form; the spirit has fainted in his heart mid the anal3sis of crime; 
 he has foregone the pleasures of his j'outh and the associates of his 
 heart, and all the fairy enchantments in which fancy may have wrap- 
 ped him. Alas! for what? Though genius flashed from his eye, 
 and eloquence rolled from his lips ; though he spoke with the tongue 
 of Tully, and argued with the learning of Coke, and thought with 
 the purity of Fletcher, he can never rise — he is a Catholic! Jlerci- 
 ful God ! what a state of society is this, in which thy worship is 
 interposed as a disqualification upon thy Providence ! Behold, in a 
 word, the effects of the code against which you petition ; it dis- 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 717 
 
 heartens exertion, it disqualifies merit, it debilitates the state, it 
 degrades the God-head, it disobeys Christianity, it makes religion 
 an article of traffic, and its founder a monopoly ; and for ages it has 
 reduced a country, blessed with every beauty of nature, and every 
 bounty of Providence, to a state unparalleled under any constitution 
 professing to be free, or any government pretending to be civilized. 
 To justify this enormity there is now no argument. Now is the time 
 to concede with dignity that which was never denied without injustice. 
 Who can tell how soon we may require all the zeal of our united 
 population to secure our very existence ? Who can argue upon the 
 continuance of this calm ? Have we not seen the labor of ages over- 
 thrown, and the whim of a day erected on its ruins ; establishments 
 the most solid, withering at a word, and visions the most whimsical 
 realized at a wish ? crowns crumbled, discords confederated, .kings 
 become vagabonds, and vagabonds made kings at the capricious 
 frenzy of a village adventurer ? Have Ave not seen the whole politi- 
 cal and moral world shaking as with an earthquake, and shapes the 
 most fantastic and formidable and frightful, heaved into life by the 
 quiverings of the convulsion ? The storm has passed over us ; Eng- 
 land has survived it; if she is wise, her present prosperity will be 
 but the handmaid to her justice; if she is pious, the peril she has 
 escaped will be but the herald of her expiation. Thus much have I 
 said in the way of ai-gument to the enemies of your question. Let 
 me offer an humble opinion to its friends. The first and almost the 
 solo request which an advocate would make to you is, to remain 
 united ; rely on it, a divided assault can never overcome a consol- 
 idated resistance. I allow that an educated aristocracy, are as a 
 head to the people, without which they cannot tliink : but then the 
 people are as hands to the aristocracy, without which it cannot act. 
 Concede, then, a little to even each other's prejudices ; recollect that 
 individual sacrifice is universal strength; and can there be a nobler 
 altar than the altar of your country ? This same spirit of concilia- 
 tion should be extended even to your enemies. If England will not 
 consider that a brow of suspicion is but a bad accompaniment to an 
 act of grace ; if she will not allow that kindness may make those 
 friends whom even oppression could not make foes ; if she will not 
 confess that the best security she can have from Ireland is by giving 
 Ireland an interest in her constitution ; still, since her power is the 
 
718 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 shield of hev prejudices, you should concede where you cannot con- 
 quer ; it is wisdom to yield, when it has become hopeless to combat. 
 There is but one concession which I would never advise, and 
 which, were I a Catholic, I would never make. You will perceive 
 that I allude to any interference with your clergy. That was the 
 crime of Mr. Grattau's security bill. It made the patronage of your 
 religion the ransom for your liberties, and bought the favor of the 
 crown by the surrender of the church. It is a vicious pi'inciple ; it 
 is the cause of all your sorrows. If there had not been a state- 
 establishment, there would not have been a Catholic bondage. By 
 that incestuous conspiracy between the altar and the throne, infidel- 
 ity has achieved a more extended dominion than by all the sophisms 
 of her philosophy, or all the teiTors of her persecution. It makes 
 God's apostle a court appendage, and God himself a court-purveyor ; 
 it carves the cross into a cbair of state, where with grace on his 
 brow, and gold in his hand, the little perishable puppet of this 
 world's vanity makes Omnipotence a menial to its power, and 
 Eternity a pander to its profits. Be not a party to it. As you have 
 spurned the temporal interference of the Pope, resist the si)iritual 
 jurisdiction of the crown. As I do not think that J'ou, on the one 
 hand, could surrender the patronage of your religion to the King 
 without the most unconscientious compromise, so, on the other hand, 
 I do not think the King could ever conscientiously receive it. 
 Suppose he receives it ; if he exercises it for the advantage of your 
 church, he directly violates the coronation oath, which binds him to 
 the exclusive interest of the Church of England ; and if he does not 
 intend to exercise it for your advantage, to what purpose does he re- 
 quire from you its surrender? But what pretence has England for 
 this intei'ferenco with your religion ? It was the religion of her most 
 glorious era ; it was the religion of her most ennobled patriots ; it 
 was the religion of the wisdom that fi'amed her constitution ; it was 
 the religion of the valor that achieved it ; it would have been to this 
 day the religion of her empire, had it not been for the lawless lust 
 of a murderous adulterer. What right has she to suspect 3'our 
 church ? When her thousand sects were brandishing the fragments 
 of their faith against each other, and Christ saw his garment without 
 a seam, a piece of patch-work for every mountebank who figured in 
 the pantomime ; when her Babel temple rocked at every breath of 
 
CHARLES PHILLIPS. 719 
 
 her Priestleys aud her Paines, Ireland, proof against the menace of 
 her power, was proof also against the perilous impiety of her ex- 
 ample. But if as Catholics you should guard it, the palladium of 
 your creed, not less as Irishmen should you jDrizc it, the relic of your 
 country. Deluge after deluge has desolated her provinces. The 
 monuments of art which escaped the barbarism of one invader, fell 
 beneath the still more savage civilization of another. Alone, amid 
 the solitude, your temple stood like some majestic monument amid 
 the desert of antiquity, just in its proportions, sublime in its associa- 
 tions, rich in the virtue of its saints, cemented by the blood of its 
 martyrs, pouring forth for ages the unbroken series of its venerable 
 hierarchy, and only the more magnificent from the ruins by which it 
 was surrounded. Oh ! do not for any temporal boon betray the 
 great principles Avhich are to purchase you an eternity ! Here, from 
 your very sanctuary, — here, with my hand on the endangered altars 
 of your faith, in the name of that God, for the freedom of whose 
 worship we are so nobJy struggling — I conjure }'ou, let no unholy 
 hand firofane the sacred ark of your religion ; presei"ve it inviolate ; 
 its light is " light from heaven ; " follow it through all the perils of 
 your journey ; and, like the fiery pillar of the captive Israel, it will 
 cheer the desert of your bondage, and guide to the land of your 
 liberation I 
 
SPEECHES, 
 
 / 
 
 Right Hon. Edmund Burke. 
 
 [721] 
 
... >>e - 
 
 HON. EDMUND BURKE. 
 
Speech on American Taxation. 
 
 On the 19th April, 1774, Mr. Rose Fuller, member for Eye, proposed in the House- 
 of Commons that the House should proceed to take into consideration the duty of 
 3d. per lb., imposed under the Act of 17U7, on tea imported into America. It ^vas 
 on this occasion that Burke, then member for the borough of Wendover, dolivered 
 the following spcocli — an oration wliicli contains some of the most splendid pas- 
 sages in the English language. It was marked witli such enci'gy, tliat it roused the 
 attention of the House, thougli spoken at a very late period in the debate. It is 
 said tliat Lord John Towusheud, struck by tlie remarkable beauty of one passage, 
 cried aloud, "What a man is this ! how couldhe acquire sucli transcendent powers .'" 
 The speech was published under the orator's supervision, in compliance witli the 
 public wish. Few literary efforts have given evidence of the possession of so much 
 power of sarcasm, as the description of the coalition ministry of Lord Grafton. 
 The character of Lord Chatham is most exquisitely portrayed. For elegance of 
 diction, and beauty of illustration, it has, perhaps, never been surpassed. 
 
 ^P?IR, — I agree with the honorable gentleman who spoke last, that 
 ^^ this subject is not new in this house. Very disagreeably to 
 
 fthis house, very unfortunately to this nation, and to the peace 
 and prosperity of this whole empire, no topic has been more 
 familiar to us. For nine long years, session after session, we have 
 been lashed round and round this miserable circle of occasional 
 arguments and temporary expedients. I am sure our heads must 
 turn, and our stomachs nauseate with them. Wc have had them in 
 every shape ; we have looked at them in every point of view. In- 
 vention is exhausted ; reason is fiitigued ; experience has given 
 judgment ; but obstinacy is not yet conquered. 
 
 The honorable gentleman has made one endeavor more to diver- 
 sify the form of this disgusting argument. He has thrown out a 
 speech composed almost entirely of challenges. Challenges are 
 serious things ; and as he is a man of prudence as well as resolution, 
 I dare say he has very well weighed those challenges befm'e he de- 
 livered them. I had long the happiness to sit at the same side of 
 
 (723) 
 
721 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the house, and to agree with the honorable gentleman on all the 
 American questions. My sentiments, I am sure, ai"e well known to 
 him ; and I thought I had been perfectly acquainted with his. Though 
 I find myself mistaken, he will still permit me to use the privilege of 
 an old friendship, he will permit me to apply myself to the house 
 under the sanction of his authority; and, on the various grounds he 
 has measured out, to submit to you the poor opinions which I have 
 formed, upon a matter of importance enough to demand the fullest 
 consideration I could bestow upon it. 
 
 He has stated to the house two grounds of deliberation ; one nar- 
 row and simple, and merely confined to the question on your paper : 
 the other more large and more complicated ; comprehending the whole 
 series of the parliamentar}'^ proceedings with regard to America, their 
 causes, and their consequences. With regard to the latter ground, 
 he states it as useless, and thinks it maybe even dangerous, to enter 
 into so extensive a field of inquiry. Yet, to m}' surprise, he had 
 hardly laid down this restrictive proposition, to which his authority 
 would have given so much weight, when directly, and with the same 
 authorit}', ho condemns it, and declares it absolutely necessary to 
 enter into the most ample historical detail. His zeal has thrown him 
 a little out of his usual accuracy. In this perplexity what shall we 
 do. Sir, who are willing to submit to the law he gives us? He has 
 reproljated in one part of his speech the rule he had laid down for 
 debate in the other ; and, after narrowing the ground for all those 
 who are to speak after him, he takes an excursion himself, as un- 
 bounded as the subject and the extent of his great abilities. 
 
 Sir, when I cannot obey all his laws, I will do the best I can. I 
 will endeavor to obey such of them as have the sanction of his ex- 
 ample, and to stick to that rule, which, though not inconsistent with 
 the other, is tlie most rational. He was certainly in the right when he 
 took the matter largely. I cannot prevail on myself to agree with 
 him in his censure of his own conduct. It is not, he will give me leave 
 to say, either useless or dangerous. He asserts, that retrospect is 
 not wise ; and tlie proper, tlie only proper, subject of inquiry is, " not 
 how we got into this difBculty, but how we are to get out of it." In 
 other words, we are, according to him, to consult our invention, and 
 to reject our experience. The mode of delil)eration he recommends 
 is diametrically opposite to every rule of reason, and every principle of 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 725- 
 
 good sense established amongst mankind. For that sense, and that 
 reason, I have always understood, absolutely to prescribe, whenever 
 we are involved in difficulties from the measures we have pursued, 
 that we should take a strict review of those measures, in order to cor- 
 rect our errors if they should be corrigible ; or at least to avoid a 
 dull uniformity in mischief, and the unpitied calamity of being re- 
 peatedly caught in the same snare. 
 
 Sir, I will freely follow the honorable gentleman in his historical 
 discussion, without the least management for men or measures, further 
 than as they shall seem to me to deserve it. But before I go into that 
 large consideration, because I would omit nothing that can give the 
 house satisfaction, I wish to tread the narrow ground to which alone 
 the honorable gentleman, in one part of his speech, has so strictly 
 confined us. 
 
 He desires to know whether, if we were to repeal this tax agree- 
 ably to the proposition of the honorable gentleman who made the 
 motion, the Americans would not take post on this concession, in 
 order to make a new attack on the next body of taxes ; and whether 
 they would not call for a repeal of the duty on wine as loudly as 
 they do now for the repeal of the duty on tea ? Sir, I can give no 
 security on this subject. But I will do all that I can, and all that can 
 be fairly demanded. To the experience which the honorable gentle- 
 man reprobates in one instant, and reverts to in the next ; to that ex- 
 perience, without the least wavering or hesitation on my part, I 
 steadily appeal ; and would to God there was no other arbiter to de- 
 cide ou the vote with which the house is to conclude this day ! 
 
 When parliament repealed the stamp act in the year 1766, 1 affirm 
 first, that the Americans did not in consequence of this measure call 
 upon you to give up the former parliamentary revenue which subsisted 
 in that country ; or even any one of the articles which compose it. 
 I affirm also, that when, departing from the maxims of that repeal, 
 you revived the scheme of taxation, and thereby filled the minds of 
 the colonists with new jealousy, and all sorts of apprehensions, then 
 it was that they quarrelled with the old taxes, as well as the new : 
 then it was, and not till then, that they questioned all the parts of 
 your legislative power ; and by the battery of such questions have 
 shaken the solid structure of this empire to its deepest foundations. 
 
 Of those two propositions I shall, before I have done, give such 
 
726 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 convincing, such damning proof, tliat however the contrary may be 
 whispered in circles, or bawled in newspapers, they never more will 
 dare to raise their voices in this house. I speak with great confidence. 
 I have reason for it. The ministers arc with me. They at least are 
 convinced that the repeal of the stamp act had not, and that no repeal 
 can have, Ihu conscqucn;es which the honorable gentleman who de- 
 fends their measures is so much alarmed at. To their conduct I refer 
 him for a conclusive answer to this objection. I carry my proof irre- 
 sistibly into the very body of both ministry and parliament ; not on 
 any general reasoning growing out of collateral matter, but on the 
 conduct of the honorable gentleman's ministerial friends on the new 
 revenue itself. 
 
 The act of 17G7, which grants this tea duty, sets forth in its pre- 
 amble, that it was expedient to raise a revenue in America, for the 
 supf)ort of the civil government there, as well as for purposes still 
 more extensive. To this support the act assigns six branches of 
 duties. About two years after this act passed, the ministry, I mean 
 the present ministry, thought it expedient to repeal five of the duties, 
 and to leave (for reasons best know to themselves) only the sixth 
 standing. Suppose any person, at the time of that i-epeal, had thus 
 addressed the minister, " Condemning, as j'ou do, the repeal of the 
 stamp act, why do you venture to repeal the duties upon glass, paper, 
 and painters' colors? Let your pretence for the repeal bo what it 
 will, are you not thoroughly convinced, that j^our concessions will 
 produce, not satisfaction, but insolence in the Americans; and that 
 the giving up these taxes will necessitate the giving up of all the rest?" 
 This objection was as palpable then as it is now ; and it was as good 
 for preserving the five duties as for retaining the sixth. Besides, the 
 minister will recollect, that the rcjieal of the stamp act had but just 
 preceded his repeal ; and the ill policy of that measure (had it been 
 so impolitic as it has been represented) , and the mischiefs it produced, 
 were quite recent. Upon tlic principles, theieforc, of the honorable 
 gentleman, upon the principles of the minister himself, the minister 
 has nothing at all to answer. He stands condemned by himself, and 
 by all his associates, old and new, as a destro3'er, in the first trust 
 of finance, of the revenues ; and, in the first rank of honor, as a be- 
 trayer of the dignity of his country. 
 
 Most men, especially great men, do not always know their well- 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 727 
 
 ■wishers. I come to rescue that noble lord out of the hands of those 
 he calls his friends, and even out of his own. I will do him the jus- 
 tice he is denied at home. He has not been this wicked or impru- 
 dent man. He knew that a repeal had no tendency to produce the 
 mischiefs which gave so much alarm to his honorable friend. His 
 work was not bad in its principle, but imperfect in its execution ; 
 and the motion on your paper presses him only to complete a proper 
 plan, which, by some unfortunate and unaccountable error, he had 
 left unfinished. 
 
 I hope, Sir, the honorable gentleman who spoke last, is thoroughly 
 satisfied, and satisfied out of the proceedings of ministry on their 
 own favorite act, that his fears from a repeal are groundless. If he 
 is not, I leave him, and the noble lord who sits by him, to settle the 
 matter as Avell as they can together ; for, if the repeal of American 
 taxes destroys all our government in America, he is the man ! and 
 he is the worst of all the repealers, because he is the last. 
 
 But I hear it rung coutiuually in ray ears, now and formerly, "the 
 preamble ! what will become of the preamble, if you repeal this tax?" 
 I am sorry to be compelled so often to expose the calamities and dis- 
 graces of parliament. The preamble of this law, standing as it now 
 Stands, has the lie direct given to it by the provisionary part of the 
 act ; if that can be called provisionary which makes no provision. I 
 should be afraid to express myself in this manner, especially in the 
 face of such a formidable array of ability as is now drawn up before 
 me, composed of the ancient household troops of that side of the 
 house, and the new recruits from this, if the matter were not clear 
 and indisputable. Nothing but truth could give me this firmness ; 
 but plain truth and clear evidence can be beat down by no ability. 
 The clerk will be so good as to turn to the act, and read this favor- 
 ite preamble : — 
 
 " Whereas it is expedient that a revenue should be raised in your Majesty'8 
 dominions in America, for making a more certain and adequate provision for defray- 
 ing the charge of administration of justice, and support of civil government, in such 
 provinces where it shall be found necessary, and towards further defraying the 
 expenses of defending, protecting, and securing the said dominions." 
 
 You have heard this pompous performance. Now where is the 
 revenue which is to do all these mighty things? Five-sixths 
 repealed, abandoned, sunk, gone, lost forever. Does the poor, 
 
728 TREASUKT OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 solitary tea duty support the purposes of this preamble? Is not 
 the supply there stated as effectually abandoned as if the tea duty 
 had perished in the general wreck? Here, Mr. SjDeaker, is a pre- 
 cious mockery ; a preamble without an act ; taxes granted in order 
 to be repealed, and the reasons of the grant still carefully kept up ! 
 This is raising a revenue in America ! this is jireserving dignity in 
 England ! If you repeal this tax in compliance with the motion, I 
 readily admit that you lose this fair preamble. Estimate your loss 
 in it. The object of the act is gone already ; and all you suffer is 
 the purging the statute-book of the opprobrium of an empty, absurd, 
 and false recital. 
 
 It has been said, again and again, that the five taxes were repealed 
 on commercial principles. It is so said in the paper in my hand ; a 
 paper which I constantly carry about ; which I have often used, and 
 shall often use again. What is got by this paltry pretence of com- 
 mercial principles I know not ; for, if your government in America 
 is destroyed by the repeal of taxes, it is of no consequence upon 
 what ideas the repeal is grounded. Repeal this tax too upon com- 
 mercial principles if you please. These principles will serve as well 
 now as they did formerly. But you know that, either your objec- 
 tion to a repeal from these supposed consequences has no validity, 
 or that this pretence never could remove it. This commercial motive 
 never was believed by any man, either in America, which tliis letter 
 is meant to soothe, or in England, which it is meant to deceive. It 
 was impossible it should. Because every man, in the least acquainted 
 with the detail of commei-ce, must know, that several of the articles 
 on w^iich the tax was repealed were fitter objects of duties than 
 almost any other articles that could possibly be chosen; without 
 comparison more so, than the tea that was left taxed : as infinitely 
 loss liable to be eluded by contraband. The tax upon red and white 
 lead was of this nature. You have, in this kingdom, an advantage 
 in lead, that amounts to a monopoly. When you find yourself in 
 this situation of advantage, you sometimes venture to tax even 3^our 
 own export. You did so, soon after the last war; when, upon this 
 principle, you ventured to impose a duty on coals. In all the articles 
 of American contraband trade, whoever heard of the smuggling of 
 red lead and white lead ? You might, therefore well enough, without 
 danger of contraband, and without injury to commerce (if this were 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 729 
 
 the whole consideration) have taxed these commodities. The same 
 may be said of glass. Besides, some of the things taxed were so 
 trivial, that the loss of the objects themselves, and their utter anni- 
 hilation out of American commerce, would have been comparatively 
 as nothing. But is the article of tea such an object in the trade of 
 England, as not to be felt, or felt but slightly, like white lead, and 
 red lead, and painters' colors? Tea is an object of far other im- 
 portance. Tea is perhaps the most important object, taking it with 
 its necessary connections, of any in the mighty circle of our com- 
 merce. If commercial principles had been the true motives to the 
 repeal, or had they been at all attended to, tea would have been the 
 last article we should have left taxed for a subject of controversy. 
 
 Sir, it is not a pleasant consider.'ition ; but nothing in the world 
 can read so awful and so instructive a lesson, as the conduct of min- 
 istry in this business, upon the mischief of not having large and lib- 
 eral ideas in the management of great affairs. Never have the 
 servants of the state looked at the whole of your complicated inter- 
 ests in one connected view. Thoy have taken things, by bits and 
 scraps, some at one time and one pretence, and some at another, just 
 as they pressed, without any sort of regard to their i-elations or 
 dependencies. They never had anj^ kind of system, right or wrong, 
 but only invented occasionally some miserable tale for the day, in 
 order meanly to sneak out of difSculties, into which they had proudly 
 strutted. And they were put to all these shifts and devices, full of 
 meanness and full of mischief, in order to pilfer piecemeal a repeal 
 of an act, which they had not the generous courage, when they found 
 and felt their error, honorably and fairly to disclaim. By such man- 
 agement, by the irresistible operation of feeble councils, so paltry a 
 sum as threepence in the eyes of a financier, or so insignificant an 
 article as tea in the eyes of a philosopher, have shaken the pillars of 
 a commercial empire that circled the whole globe. 
 
 Do you forget that in the very last year, you stood on the pi'cci- 
 pice of general bankrupt cj-? Your danger was indeed great. Yoii 
 were distressed in the affairs of the East India Compan}^ ; and you 
 well know what sort of things are involved in the comijrehensive 
 energy of that significant appellation. I am not called upon to 
 enlarge to you on that danger, which you thought proper yourselves 
 to aggravate, and to display to the world with all the parade of 
 
730 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 incliscvect declamation. The monopoly of the most lucrative trades, 
 and the possession of imperial revenues, had brought you to the verge 
 of beggary and ruin. Such was your rei)resentation — such, in some 
 measure, was your case. The vent often millions of pounds of this 
 commodity, now locked up by the operation of an injudicious tax, 
 and rotting in the warehouses of the company, would have prevented 
 all this distress, and all that series of desperate measures which you 
 thought yourselves obliged to take in consequence of it. America 
 would have furnished that vent, which no other part of the world can 
 furnish but America ; where tea is next to a necessary of life ; and 
 ■where the demand grows upon the supply. I hope our dear-bought 
 East India committees have done us at least so much good, as to let 
 us know, that without a more extensive sale of that article our East 
 India revenues and acquisitions can have no certain connection with 
 this country. It is through the American trade of tea that j-our 
 East India conquests are to be prevented from crushing you with 
 their burthen. They are ponderous indeed, and they must have that 
 great country to lean upon, or they tumble upon your head. It is 
 the same folly that has lost you at once the benefit of the west and of 
 the east. This folly has thrown open folding-doors to contraband, 
 and will be the means of giving the profits of the trade of your colo- 
 nies to every nation but yourselves. Never did a people suffer so 
 much for the empty words of a preamble. It must be given up. 
 For on what principle does it stand ? This famous revenue stands at 
 this hour, on all the debate, as a description of revenue not as yet 
 known in all the comprehensive (but too comprehensive !) vocabulary 
 of finance — a preambulary tax. It is indeed a tax of sophistry, a 
 tax of pedantry, a tax of disputation, a tax of war and rebellion, a 
 tax for anything but benefit to the imposers, or satisfaction to the 
 subject. 
 
 Well ! but whatever it is, gentlemen will force the colonists to 
 take the teas. You will force them? Has seven years' struggle been 
 yet able to force them? O, but it seems " we are in the right; the 
 tax is trifling — in eflect it is rather an exoneration than an imposi- 
 tion ; three-fourths of the duty formerly payable on teas exported to 
 America is taken off; the place of collection is only siiifted ; instead 
 of the retention of a shilling from the drawback here, it is threepence 
 custom in America." All this, sir, is very true. But this is the 
 
EDMUND BUEKB. 7;>1 
 
 very folly aud mischief of the act. Incredible as it may seem, you 
 know that you have deliberately thrown away a large duty which 
 you held secure and quiet in your hands, for the vain hope of getting 
 one three-fourths less, through every hazard, through certain litiga- 
 tion, and possibly through war. 
 
 The manner of proceeding in the duties on paper and glass im- 
 posed by the same act, was exactly in the same spirit. There are 
 heavy excises on those articles when used in England. On export 
 these excises are drawn back. But instead of withholding the draw- 
 back, which might have been done with ease, without charge, with- 
 out possibility of smuggling ; and instead of applying the money 
 (money already in j'our hands) according to your pleasure, you 
 began your operations in finance by flinging away your revenue ; 
 you allowed the whole drawback on export, and then you charged 
 the duty (which j'ou had before discharged), payable in the colonics ; 
 where it was certain the collection would devour it to the bone ; if 
 any revenue were ever sufiered to be collected at all. One spirit 
 pervades and animates the whole mass. 
 
 Could anything be a subject of more just alarm to America, than 
 to see you go out of the plain high road of finance, and give up your 
 most certain revenues and your clearest interest, merely for the sake 
 of insulting your colonies? No man ever doubted that the commod- 
 ity of tea could bear an imposition of threepence. But no commodity 
 will bear threejoence, or will bear a penny, when the general feelings 
 of men are irritated, and two millions of people are resolved not to 
 pay. The feelings of the colonies were formerly the feelings of 
 Great Britain. Theirs were formerly the feelings of Mr. Hampden 
 when called upon for the payment of twenty shillings. Would 
 twenty shillings have ruined Mr. Hampden's fortune? No ! but the 
 payment of half twenty shillings, on the principle on which it was 
 demanded, would have made him a slave. It is the weight of that 
 preamble, of which you are so fond, and not the M'eight of the duty, 
 that the Americans arc unable and unwilling to bear. 
 
 It is then, sir, upon the principle of this measure, and nothing 
 else, that we are at issue. It is a principle of political expediency. 
 Your act of 1767 assei'ts, that it is expedient to raise a revenue in 
 America ; your act of 1769, which takes away that revenue, contra- 
 dicts the act of 1767 ; and, by something much stronger than words, 
 
732 TREASURiT OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 asserts that it is not expedient. It is a reflection upon your wisdom 
 to pei'sist in a solemn parliamentary declaration of the expediency 
 of any object, for which, at the same time, you make no sort of pro- 
 vision. And pi'ay, sir, let not this circumstance escape you ; it is 
 very material ; that the preamble of this act, which we wish to 
 repeal, is not declaratory of a right, as some gentlemen seem to 
 argue it ; it is only a recital of the expediency of a certain exercise 
 of a right supposed already to have been asserted ; an exercise you are 
 now.contending for by ways and means which you confess, though they 
 were obeyed, to be utterly insufficient for their purpose. You are 
 therefore at this moment in the awkward situation of fighting for a 
 phantom ; a quiddity ; a thing that wants, not only a substance, but 
 even a name ; for a thing, which is neither abstract right nor i)rolit- 
 able enjoyment. 
 
 They tell you, sir, that your dignity is tied to it. I know not 
 how it happens-, but this dignity of yours is a terrible incumbrance 
 to you ; for it has of late been ever at war with your interest, your 
 equity, and every idea of your policy. Show the thing you contend 
 for to be reason ; show it to be common sense ; show it to be the 
 means of attaining some useful end, and then I am content to allow 
 it what dignity you please. But what dignity is derived from the 
 perseverance in absurdity is more than ever I could discern. The 
 honorable gentleman has said well — indeed, in most of his general 
 observations I agree with him — he says, that this subject does not 
 stand as it did formerly. Oh, certainly not ! every hour you con- 
 tinue on this ill-chosen ground, your difficulties thicken on .you, and 
 therefore my conclusion is, remove from a bad position as quickly as 
 you can. The disgrace, and the necessity of yielding, both of them 
 grow upon you every hour of your delay. 
 
 But will you repeal the Act, says the honorable gentleman, at this 
 instant when America is in open resistance to your authority, and 
 that you have just revived your system of taxation? He thinks he 
 has driven us into a corner. But thus pent up, I am content to 
 meet him ; because I enter the lists supported by my old authority, 
 his new friends, the ministers themselves. The honorable gentle- 
 man remembers, that about five j'ears ago as great disturbances as 
 the present pi-evailed in America on account of the new taxes. The 
 ministers represented these disturbances as treasonable ; and this 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 733 
 
 house thought proper, ou that representation, to make a fomous 
 address for a revival, and for a new application of a statute of Henry 
 VIII. We besought the king, in that well-considered address, to 
 inquire into treasons, and to bring the supposed traitors from Amer- 
 ica to Great Britain for trial. His majesty was pleased graciously 
 to promise a compliance with our request. All the attempts from 
 this side of the house to resist these violences, and to bring about 
 a repeal, were treated with the utmost scorn. An appi-ehension of 
 the very consequences now stated by the honorable gentleman was 
 then given as a reason for shutting the door against all hoi)e of such 
 an alteration. And so strong was the spirit for supporting the new 
 taxes, that the session concluded with the following remarkable 
 •declaration. After stating the vigorous measures which had Iieen 
 pursued, the speech from the throne proceeds : — 
 
 " You have assured me of your firm support in the prosecution of 
 them. Nothing, in my opinion, could be more likely to enable the 
 ■well disposed among my subjects in that part of the world, effectu- 
 ally to discourage and defeat the designs of the factious and seditious, 
 than the hearty concurrence of every branch of the legislature, in 
 maintaining the execution of the laws in every part of my domin- 
 ions." 
 
 After this no man dreamed that a repeal under this ministiy could 
 possiblj' take place. The honorable gentleman knows as well as I, 
 that the idea was utterly exploded by those who sway the house. 
 This sijeech was made on the ninth day of May, 1769. Five days 
 after this speech, that is, on the 13th of the same month, the public 
 circular letter, a part of which I am going to read to you, was writ- 
 ten by Lord Hillsborough, secretary of state for the colonies. After 
 reciting the substance of the king's speech, he goes on thus : — 
 
 "I can take upon me to assure you, notwithstanding insinuations 
 to the contrary, from men with factious and seditious views, that hia 
 majesty's present administration have at no time entertained a design 
 to propose to parliament to lay any further taxes upon America, for 
 the purpose of raising a revenue ; and that it is at present their in- 
 tention to propose, the next session of parliament, to take olf the 
 •duties upon glass, paper, and colors, upon consideration of such 
 duties having been laid on contrary to the true principles of com- 
 merce. 
 
734 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 " These have always been, and still are, the sentiments of his 
 majesty's present servants ; and by which their conduct in respect 
 to America has been governed. And his majesty relies upon your 
 prudence and fidelity for such an explanation of his meiisures as may 
 tend to remove the prejudices which have been excited by the mis- 
 representations of those who are enemies to the peace and prosperity 
 of Great Britain and her colonies, and to re-establish that mutual 
 confidence and affection upon which the glory and safety of the Brit- 
 ish empire depend." 
 
 Here, sir, is a canonical book of ministerial scripture, the general 
 epistle to the Americans. AVhat does the gentleman say to it? 
 Here a repeal is promised, promised without condition, and while 
 your authority was actually resisted. I pass by the public promise 
 of a peer relative to the repeal of taxes by this house. I pass by 
 the use of tlie king's name in a matter of supply, that sacred and 
 reserved right of the Commons. I conceal the ridiculous figure of 
 parliament hurling its thunders at the gigantic rebellion of America, 
 and tlien five days after, prostrate at the feet of those assemblies we 
 afi"ected to despise, begging them, by the intervention of our minis- 
 terial sui-etics, to receive our submission, and heartily promising 
 amendment. These might have been serious matters formerly, but 
 wo are grown wiser than our fathers. Passing, therefore, from the 
 constitutional consideration to the mere policy, does not this letter 
 imply, that the idea of taxing America for the purpose of revenue is- 
 an abominable project ; M'hen the ministry suppose none but factious 
 men, and with seditious views, could charge them witli it? does not 
 this letter adopt and sanctify the American distinction of taxing for 
 a revenue? does it not formally reject all future taxation on that 
 principle? does it not state the ministerial rejection of such principle 
 of taxation, not as the occasional, but the constant opinion of the 
 kinfr's servants? does it not say (I care not how consistently), but 
 does it not say, that their conduct with regard to America las been 
 always governed by this policy? It goes a great deal further. 
 These excellent and trusty servants of the king, justly fearful lest 
 they themselves should have lost all credit with the world, bring out 
 the image of their gracious sovereign from the inmost and most 
 sacred shrine, and they pawn him as a security for their promises. 
 " His majesty relies on your prudence and fidelity for such an expla.- 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 735 
 
 nation of his measures." These sentiments of the minister, and 
 these measures of his majesty, can only relate to the principle and 
 pi'actice of taxing for a revenue ; and accordingly Lord Botecourt, 
 stating it as such, did, with great propriety, and in the exact spirit 
 of his instructions, endeavor to remove the fears of the Virginian 
 assembly, lest the sentiments which it seems (unknown to the world) 
 had always been those of the ministers, and by which their conduct 
 in respect to America had been governed, should by some possible 
 revolution, favorable to wicked American taxers, be hereafter coun- 
 teracted. He addresses them in this manner : — 
 
 " Jt may possiblj' be objected, that, as his majesty's present admin- 
 istration are not immortal, their successors may be inclined to attempt 
 to undo what the present ministers shall have attempted to perform ; 
 and to that objection I can give but this answer : that it is my firm 
 opinion that the plan I have stated to you will certainly take place, 
 and that it will never be departed from ; and so determined am I for- 
 ever to abide by it, that I ■will be content to be declai'ed infamous, 
 if I do not, to the last hour of my life, at all times, in all places, and 
 upon all occasions, exert every power with which I either am, or 
 ever shall be legally invested, in order to obtain and maintain for the 
 continent of America that satisfaction which I have been authorized 
 to promise this day by the confidential servants of our gracious sov- 
 ereign, who to my certain knowledge rates his honor so high, that 
 he would rather part with his crown than preserve it by deceit." 
 
 A glurious and true character! which (since we suffer his minis- 
 ters with impunity to answer for his ideas of taxation) we ought to 
 make it our business to enable his majesty to preserve in all its 
 lustre. Let him have character, since ours is no more I Let some 
 l^art of government be kept in respect ! 
 
 This e}Mstle was not the letter of Lord Hillsborough solely, though 
 he held the ofiicial pen. It was the letter of the noble lord upon the 
 floor, and of all the king's (hcu ministers, who (with I think the ex- 
 ception of two only) are his ministers at this hour. The very first 
 news that a British parliament heard of what it was to do with the 
 duties which it had given and granted to the king, was by the pub- 
 lication of the votes of American assemblies. It was in America 
 that your resolutions were pre-declared. It was from thence that 
 we knew to a certainty how much exactly, and not a scruple more 
 
736 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 nor less, we wei-e to repeal. We were unworthy to be let into the 
 secret of our own conduct. The assemblies had confidential commu- 
 nications from his majest^'^'s confidential servants. We were nothing 
 but instruments. Do you, after this, wonder that you have no weight 
 and no respect in the colonies? After this, are you surprised that 
 parliament is every day and everywhere losing (I feel it with sorrow, 
 I utter it with reluctance) that reverential affection which so endear- 
 ing a name of authority ought ever to carry with it ; that you are 
 obeyed solely from respect to the bayonet ; and that this house, the 
 ground and pillar of freedom, is itself held up only by the treacher- 
 ous underpinning and clumsy buttresses of arbitrary power ? 
 
 If this dignity, which is to stand in the place of just policy and 
 common sense, had been consulted, there was a time for preserving 
 it, and for reconciling it with any concession. If in the session of 
 1768, that session of idle terror and empty menaces, you had, as 
 j^ou were often pressed to do, repealed these taxes, then your strong 
 operations would have come justified and enforced, in case 3'our con- 
 cessions had been returned by outrages. But, preposterously, you 
 began with violence ; and before terrors could have any effect, either 
 good or bad, your ministers immediutel_y begged pardon, and pro- 
 mised that repeal to the obstinate Americans which they had refused 
 in an easy, good-natured, complying British parliament. The as- 
 semblies which had been publiclj^ and avowedly dissolved for their 
 contumacy, are called together to receive j'our submission. Your 
 ministerial directors blustered like tragic tyrants here, and then 
 went mumping with a sore leg in America, canting, and whining, and 
 complaining of faction, which represented them as friends to a rev- 
 enue from the colonies. I hope nobody in this house will hereafter 
 have the impudence to defend American taxes in the name of minis- 
 try. The moment they do, with this letter of attorney in my hand, 
 I will tell them in the authorized terms, they are wretches, with 
 factious and seditious views ; enemies to the peace and prosperity 
 of the mother country and the colonies, and subverters of the nuitual 
 affection and confidence on which the glory and safety of the British 
 empire depend. 
 
 After this letter, the question is no more on propriety or dignity. 
 They are gone already, the faith of 3-our sovereign is pledged for 
 the political principle ; the general dec^laration in the letter goes to 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 737 
 
 the whole of it. You must tlierefore either abandon the scheme of 
 taxing, or you must send the ministers tarred and feathered to 
 America, who dared to hold out the royal faith for a renunciation 
 of all taxes for revenue. Them you must punish, or this faith you 
 must preserve ; the preservation of this faith is of more consequence 
 than the duties on red lead or white lead, or on broken glass, or atlas- 
 ordinary, or demy-fine, or blue-royal, or bastard, or fool's-cap, which 
 you have given up ; or the threepence on tea which you retained. 
 The letter went stamped with the public authority of this kingdom. 
 The instructions for the colony government go under no other sanc- 
 tion, and America cannot believe, and will not obey you, if 3'ou do 
 not preserve this channel of communication sacred. You are now 
 punishing the colonies for acting on distinctions, held out by that 
 ver}^ ministry which is here shining in riches, in favor, and in power ; 
 and urging the punishment of the very offence to which they had 
 themselves been the tempters. 
 
 Sir, if reasons respecting simpl}^ your commerce, which is your 
 own convenience, were the sole grounds of the repeal of the live 
 duties, why does Lord Hillsborough, in disclaiming in the name of 
 the king and ministry their ever having had an intent to tax for rev- 
 enue, mention it as the means of re-establishing the confidence and 
 affection of the colonies? Is it a way of sootiiing others, to assiu'e 
 them that j'ou will take good care of yourself? The medium, the 
 only medium for regaining their affection and confidence is, that you 
 will take off something oppressive to their minds ; sir, the letter 
 strongly enforces that idea, for though the repeal of the taxes is 
 promised on commercial principles, yet the means of counteracting 
 the insinuations of men with factious and seditious views, is by a 
 disclaimer of the intention of taxing for revenue, as a constant inva- 
 riable sentiment and rule of conduct in the government of America. 
 
 I remember that the noble lord on the floor, not in a former del)ate 
 to be sure (it would be disorderly to refer to it, I suppose I read it 
 somewhere), but the noble lord was pleased to s;iy, that he did not 
 conceive how it could enter into the head of man to impose such 
 taxes as those of 17G7 ; I mean those taxes which he voted for im- 
 posing and voted for repealing ; as being taxes contrary to all the 
 principles of commerce laid on British manufactures. 
 
 I dare say the noble lord is perfectly well read, because the duty 
 
738 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of his particular office requires he should be so, in all our revenue 
 laws ; and in the policy which is to be collected out of them. Now, 
 sir, %\hen ho had read this act of American revenue, and a little re- 
 covered from his astonishment, I suppose he made one step retro- 
 grade (it is but one), and looked at the act which stands just before 
 in the statute book. The American revenue act is the forty-fifth 
 chapter, the other to which I refer is the forty-fourth of the same 
 session. These two acts are Ijoth to the same purpose, both revenue 
 acts, both taxing out of tlic kingdom, and both taxing British manu- 
 factures exported. As the forty-fifth is an act for raising a revenue 
 in America, the forty-fourth is an act for raising a revenue in the 
 Isle of Man ; the two acts perfectly agree in all respects except one. 
 In the act for taxing tiie Isle of Man, the nolile lord will find, not, 
 as in the American act, four or five articles, but almost the wliole 
 body of British manufactures taxed from two and a half to fifteen 
 per cent., and some articles, such as that of spirits, a great deal 
 higher. You did not think it uncommercial to tax the whole mass* 
 of 3'uur manufactures, and let me add, your agriculture too; for I 
 now recollect, British corn is there also taxed up to ten per cent , 
 and this too in the very headquarters, the very citadel of smuggling, 
 the Isle of Man. Now, will the noble lord condescend to tell nie 
 why he repealed the taxes on your manufactures sent out to America, 
 and not the taxes on the manuflictures exported to the Isle of INIan? 
 The principle was exactly the same, the objects charged infinitely 
 more extensive, the duties without comparistm higher. Why? why 
 notwithstanding all his childish pretexts, because the taxes were 
 quietly submitted to in the Isle of Man, and because they raised a 
 flame in America. Your reasons were political, not commercial. 
 The repeal was made, as Lord Hillsborough's letter well expresses 
 it, to regain the confidence and afl'ection of the colonies, on which 
 the glory and safety of the British empire depend. A wise and just 
 motive surely, if ever there was such. But the mischief and dishonor 
 is, that you have not done what you have given the colonies just 
 cause to expect, when your ministers disclaimed the idea of taxes 
 for a revenue. There is nothing simple, nothing manly, nothing in- 
 genuous, open, decisive, or steady, in the proceeding, with regard 
 either to the continuance or the repeal of the taxes. The whole has 
 an air of littleness and fraud. The article of tea is slurred over in 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 739 
 
 the circular letter, as it were by accident — nothing is said of a res- 
 olution either to keep that tax, or to give it up. There is no fair 
 dealing in any part of the transaction. 
 
 If you mean to follow your true motive and your public faith, give 
 up your tax on tea for raising a revenue, the principle of which has 
 in effect, been disclaimed in 3'our name ; and which produces you no 
 advantage, no, not a penny. Or, if you choose to go on with a poor 
 pretence instead of a solid reason, and will still adhere to your cant 
 of commerce, j'ou have ten thousand times more strong commercial 
 reasons for giving up this duty on tea, than for abandoning the five 
 others that you have already renounced. 
 
 Iho American consumption of tea is annually, I believe, worth 
 £300,000, at the least farthing. If you urge the American violence 
 as a justification of your perseverance in enforcing this tax, you know 
 th;it j'ou can never answer this plain question — why did you repeal 
 the others given in the same act, whilst the very same violence sub- 
 sisted ? — but you did not find the violence cease upon that conces- 
 sion. No ! because the concession was far short of satisfying the 
 principle v.'hich Lord Hillsborough had abjured ; or even the pretence 
 on which tlie repeal of the other taxes was announced, and because, 
 bj^ enabling the East India Company to open a shop for defeating 
 the American resolution not to pay that specific tax, you manifestly 
 shewed a hankering after the principle of the act whicli you formerly 
 had renounced. Whatever road you take leads to a compliance with 
 this motion. It opens to 3^ou at the end of every vista. Your com- 
 merce, your policy, your promises, your reasons, your pretences, 
 your consistency, your inconsistency — all jointly oblige you to this 
 repeal. 
 
 But still it sticks in our throats, if we go so far, the Americans 
 will go farther. We do not know that. We ought from experience 
 rather to presume the contr.ary. Do we not know for certain, that 
 the Americans are going on as fast as possible, whilst we refuse to 
 gratify them? can they do more, or can they do worse, if we 3'ield 
 this point? I think this concession will rather fix a turnpike to pre- 
 vent tlieir further progress. It is impossible to answer for bodies of 
 men. But I am sure the natural effect of fidelity, clemency, kind- 
 ness in governors, is peace, good will, order, and esteem, on the 
 part of the governed. I would, certainly, at least, give these fair 
 
740 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 pi'inciples a fair trial ; which, since the making of this act to this 
 hour, they never have had. 
 
 Sir, the honorable gentleman having spoken what he thought nec- 
 essary upon the narrow part of the subject, I have given him, I hope, 
 a satisfactory answer. He next presses me by a variety of direct 
 challenges and oblique reflections to say something on the historical 
 part. I shall therefore, sir, open myself fully on that important and 
 delicate subject; not for the sake of telling yon a long story (which 
 I know, Mr. Speaker, you are not particularly fond of), but for the 
 sake of the weighty instruction that, I flatter myself, will necessarily 
 result from it. It shall not bo longer, if I can help it, than so seri- 
 ous a matter requires. 
 
 Permit mo then, sir, to lead your attention very f;ir back ; back 
 to the act of navigation ; the corner-stone of the policy of this conn- 
 try with regard to its colonies. Sir, that policy was from the begin- 
 ning purely commercial, and the commercial system was wholly 
 restrictive. It was the system of a monopoly. No trade was let 
 loose from that constraint, but merely to enable the colonists to dis- 
 pose of what, in the course of your trade, you could not take ; or to 
 enable them to dispose of such articles as we forced upon tiiem, and 
 for which, without some degree of liberty, they could not pay. 
 Hence all your specific and detailed eniunerations : hence the innu- 
 merable checks and counterchecks : hence that infinite variety of 
 paper chains by which you bind together this complicated system of 
 the colonies. This principle of commercial monopoly runs through 
 no less than twenty-nine acts of parliament, from the year 1660 to 
 the unfortimate period of 1764. 
 
 In all those acts the system of commerce is established, as that 
 from whence alone you proposed to make the colonies contribute (I 
 mean directly, and by the operation of your superintending legisla- 
 tive power) to the strength of the empire. I venture to say, that 
 during that whole period, a parliamentary revenue from thence was 
 never once in contemplation. Accordingly, in all the number of 
 laws passed with regard to the plantations, the words which distin- 
 guish revenue laws, specifically as such, were, I think, premcditittcly 
 avoided. I do not say, sir, that a form of words alters the nature 
 of the law, or abridges the power of the lawgiver. It certainly 
 docs not. However, titles and formal preaml)les are not always idle 
 
EDMUND BUEItE. 742 
 
 words ; and the lawyers frequently argue from them. I state these 
 facts to shew, not what was yoiu- right, but what has been your set- 
 tled policy. Our revenue laws have usually a tille, purporting their 
 being grants ; and the words " give and grant " usually precede the 
 enacting parts. Although duties were imposed on America in acts 
 of King Charles the Second, and in acts of King William, no one 
 title of giving " an aid to his majesty," or any other of the usual 
 titles to revenue acts, was to be found in any of them till 17G4 ; nor 
 were the Avords "give and grant" in any preamble until the 6th of 
 George the Second. However, the title of this act of George the 
 Second, notw-ithslanding the words of donation, considers it merely 
 as a regulation of trade, "an act for the better securing of the trade 
 of his majesty's sugar colonies in America." This act was made on 
 a compromise of all, and at the express desire of a part, of the colo- 
 nies themselves. It was thei'efore in some measure with their con- 
 sent ; and having a title directly purporting only a commercial 
 regulation, and being in truth nothing more, the words were passed 
 by, at a time when no jealousy was entertained, and things were little 
 scrutinized. Even Governor Bernard, in his second printed letter, 
 dated in 1763, gives it as his opinion, that " it was an act of prohi- 
 bition, not of revenue." This is certainly true, that no act avowedly 
 for the purpose of revenue, and with the ordinary title and recital 
 taken together, is found in the statute book until the year I have 
 mentioned ; that is, the year 1764. All before this period stood on 
 commercial regulation and restraint. The scheme of a colony reve- 
 nue by British authority appeared thercfoi-e to the Americans in the 
 light of a great innovation ; the words of Governor Bernard's ninth 
 letter, written in Nov. 1765, state this idea very strongly; "it 
 must," saj-s he, "have been supposed, such an innovation as a parlia- 
 mentary taxation, would cause a great alarm, and meet with much 
 opposition in most parts of America ; it was quite new to the people, 
 and had no visible bounds set to it." After stating the weakness of 
 government there, he says, "was this a time to introduce so great a 
 novelty as a parliamentary inland taxation in America ? " Whatever 
 the right might have been, this mode of using it was absolutely new 
 in policy and practice. 
 
 Sir, they who are friends to the schemes of American revenue say, 
 that the commercial restraint is full as hard a law for America to 
 
742 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 live under. I think so too. I think it, if uncompensated, to be a 
 condition of as rigorous servitude as men can be subject to. But 
 America boro it from the fundamental act of navigation until 17G4. 
 Why? Because men do bear the inevitable constitution of their 
 original nature with all its infirmities. The act of navigation at- 
 tended the colonies from their infoncj>grew with their growth, and 
 strengthened with their strength. They Avcro confirmed in obedi- 
 ence to it, even more by usage than by law. They scarcely had 
 remembered a time when they were not subject to such restraint. 
 Besides, they were indemnified for it by a pecuniary compensation. 
 Their monopolist happened to be one of the richest men in tlie world. 
 By his immense capital (primarily employed, not for their benefit, 
 but his own) they were enabled to proceed with their fisheries, their 
 agriculture, their ship-building (and their trade too within the 
 limits), in such a manner as got far the start of the slow, languid 
 operations of unassisted nature. This capital was a hot-bed to them. 
 Nothing in the history of mankind is like their progress. For my 
 part, I never cast an eye on their flourishing commerce, and their 
 cultivated and commodious life, but they seem to me rather ancient 
 nations grown to perfection through a long scries of fortunate 
 events, and a train of successful industry, accumulating wealth in 
 many centuries, than the colonies of yesterday ; than a set of mis- 
 erable outcasts, a few years ago, not so much sent as thrown out, on 
 the bleak and barren shore of a desolate wilderness three thousand 
 miles from all civilized intercourse. 
 
 All this was done by England, whilst England pursued trade, and 
 forgot revenue. You not only acquired commerce, but you actually 
 created the very objects of trade in America ; and by that creation 
 you raised the trade of this kingdom at least four-fold. America 
 had the compensation of your capital, which made her bear her ser- 
 vitude. She had another compensation, which you are now going to 
 take away from her. She had, except the commercial restraint, 
 every characteristic mark of a free people in all her internal concerns. 
 She had the image of the British constitution. She had the sub- 
 stance. She was taxed by her own representatives. She chose 
 most of her own magistrates. She paid them all. She had in effect 
 the sole disposal of her own internal government. This whole state 
 of commercial servitude and civil liberty, taken together, is cer- 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 743 
 
 tainly not perfect freedom ; but comparing it with the ordinaiy cir- 
 cumstances of human nature, it was an happy and a liberal condition. 
 
 I know, sir, that great and not unsuccessful pains have been taken 
 to inflame our minds by an outcry, in this house and out of it, that 
 in America the act of navigation neither is, or ever was, obeyed. 
 But if you take the colonies through, I afBrm, that its authority never 
 was disputed ; that it was nowhere disputed for any length of time ; 
 and on the whole, that it was well observed. Wherever the act 
 pressed hard, many individuals indeed evaded it. This is nothing. 
 These scattei'ed individuals never denied the law, and never ol)C3'ed 
 it. Just as it happens whenever the laws of trade, whenever the 
 laws of revenue, press hard upon the people in England ; in that 
 case all 3- our shores arc full of contraband. Your right to give a 
 monopoly to the East India Company, your right to lay immense 
 duties on French brandy, are not disputed in England. You do 
 not make this charge on any man. But you know there is not a 
 creek from Pcntland Frith to the Isle of Wight, in which they do 
 not smuggle immense quantities of teas. East India goods, and 
 brandies. I take it for granted, that the authority of Governor 
 Bernard in this point is indisputal)le. Speaking of these laws, as 
 they regarded that part of America now in so unhappy a condition, 
 he says, "I believe they are nowhere better supported than in this 
 province ; I do not pretend that it is entirely free from a breach of 
 these laws; but that such a breach, if discovered, is justly pun- 
 ished." What more can you say of the obedience to any laws in any 
 country? An obedience to these laws formed the acknowledgment, 
 instituted by yourselves, for your superiority ; and was the payment 
 you originally imposed for your protection. 
 
 Whether you were right or wrong in establishing the colonics on 
 the principles of commercial monopoly, rather than on that of reve- 
 nue, is at this day a problem of mere speculation. You cannot have 
 both by tlie same authority. To join together the restraints of an 
 universal internal and external monopoly, with an universal internal 
 and external taxation, is an unnatural union ; perfect uncompensated 
 slavery. You have long since decided for yourself and them ; and 
 you and they have prospered exceedingly under that decision. 
 
 This nation, sir, never thought of departing from that choice until 
 the period immediately on the close of the last war. Then a scheme 
 
744 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of government new in many things seemed to have been adopted. I 
 saw, or thought I saw, several symptoms of a great change, whilst I 
 sat in your gallery, a good while before I had the honor of a seat iti' 
 this house. At that period the necessity was established of keeping 
 up no less than twenty new regiments, with twenty colonels capable 
 of scats in this house. This scheme was adopted Avith very general 
 applause from all sides, at the very time that, by your conquests iu 
 America, your danger from foreign attempts in that part of the world 
 ■was much lessened, or indeed rather quite over. When this huge 
 increase of military establishment was resolved on, a revenue was to 
 be found to support so great a burthen. Country gentlemen, the 
 great patrons of economy, and the great resisters of a standing 
 armed force, would not have entered with much alacrity into the vote 
 for so large and so expensive an army, if tljey had been very sure 
 that they were to continue to pay for it. But hopes of another kind 
 were held out to them ; and iu particular, I well remember that Mr. 
 Townshcnd, in a brilliant harangue on this subject, did dazzle them, 
 by playing before their eyes the in:age of a revenue to be raised in 
 America. 
 
 Here began to dawn the first glinnnerings of this new colony 
 system. It appeared more distinctly afterwards, when it was de- 
 volved upon a person to whom, on other accounts, this country owes 
 very great obligations. I do believe, that he had a very serious- 
 desire to benefit the public. But with no small study of the detail, 
 he did not seem to have his view, at least equally, carried to th& 
 total circuit of our affairs. He generally considered his objects in 
 lights that were ralher too detached. Whether the business of an 
 American revenue was imposed upon him altogether ; whether it 
 was entirely the result of his own speculation ; or, what is more 
 probable, that his own ideas rather coincided with the instructions he 
 had received ; certain it is, that, with the best intentions in the 
 world, he first brought this fatal scheme into form, and established it 
 by act of parliament. 
 
 No man can believe that at this time of day I mean to lean on the 
 venerable memory of a great man, whose loss we deplore in com- 
 mon. Our little party difi'erences have been long ago composed ; 
 and I have acted more with him, and certainly with more pleasure 
 with him, than ever I acted against him. Undoubtedly Mr. Gren- 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 745 
 
 villc was a first-rate figure in this country. With a masculine un- 
 derstanding and a stout and resolute heart, ho had an application 
 iindissipated and unwearied. He took public business not as a duty 
 which he was to fulfil, but as a pleasure he was to enjoy ; and he 
 seemed to have no delight out of this house, except in such things as 
 some way related to the business that was to be done within it. If 
 he was ambitious, I will say this for him, his ambition was of a noble 
 and generous strain. It was to raise himself, not by the low pimp- 
 ing politics of a court, but to win his way to power through the 
 laborious gradations of public service, and to secure himself a well- 
 earned rank in parliament by a thorough knowledge of its constitu- 
 tion and a perfect practice in all its business. 
 
 Sir, if such a man fell into errors it must be from defects not in- 
 trinsical ; they must be rather sought in the particular habits of his 
 life ; which, though they do not alter the ground-work of character, 
 yet tinge it with their own hue. He was bred in a profession. He 
 was bred to the law, which is, in my opinion, one of the first and no- 
 blest of human sciences ; a science which does more to quicken and 
 invigorate the understanding than all the other kinds of learning put 
 together; but it is not apt, except in persons very happily born, to 
 open and to liberalize the mind exactly in the same proportion. 
 Passing from that study he did not go very largclj^ into the world, 
 but plunged into l)usiiicss ; I mean into the business of office ; and the 
 limited and fixed methods and forms established there. Much knowl- 
 edge is to be had undoubtedly in that line ; and there is no knowl- 
 edge which is not valuable. But it may be truly said that men too 
 much conversant in office are rarely minds of remarkable enlarge- 
 ment. Their habits of office are apt to give them a turn to think the 
 substance of business not to be much moi'e important than the forms 
 in which it is conducted. These forms are adapted to ordinary oc- 
 casions ; and therefore persons who are nurtured in office do admir- 
 ably well as long as things go on in their common order; but when 
 the high roads are broken up and the waters out, when a new and 
 troulilcd scene is opened and the file affords no precedent, then it is 
 that a greater knowledge of mankind and a far more extensive com- 
 prehension of things is requisite tiiaii ever office gave or than office can 
 ever give. Mr. Grcnvillo thougiit better of the wisdom and power 
 of human legislation than in truth it deserves. He conceived, and 
 
746 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 many conceived along with him, that the flourishing trade of this 
 country was greatly owing to hiw and institution, and not quite so 
 mucli to liberty ; for but too many are apt to believe regulation to be 
 commerce, and taxes to be revenue. Among regulations, that which 
 stood first in reputation was his idol. I mean the act of navigation. 
 He has often professed it to be so. The policy of that act is, I 
 readily admit, in many respects well understood. But I do say that 
 if the act be sufiered to run the full length of its principle, and is not 
 changed and modified according to the ciiange of times and the fluc- 
 tuation of circumstances, it must do great mischief and frequently 
 even defeat its own purpose. 
 
 After the war, and in the last year of it, the trade of America had 
 increased far beyond the speculations of the most sanguine imagina- 
 tions. It swelled out on every side. It filled all ils proper 
 channels to the brim. It overflowed with a rich redundance, and 
 breaking its banks on the right and on the left, it spread out upon 
 some places where it M'as indeed improper, upon others where it was 
 only irregular. It is the nature of all greatness not to be exact ; and 
 great trade will always be attended with considerable abuses. The 
 contraband will always keep pace in some measure with the fair 
 trade. It should stand as a fundamental maxim that no vulgar pre- 
 caution ought to be employed in the cure of evils which are closely 
 connected with the cause of our prosperity. Perhaps this great 
 person turned his eye somewhat less than was just towards the in- 
 credible increase of the fair trade, and looked with something of too 
 exquisite a jealousy towards the contraband. He certainly felt a 
 singular degree of anxiety on the subject, and even began to act 
 from that passion earlier than is commonl}' imagined. For whilst 
 he was first lord of the admiralty, though not strictly called upon in 
 his oflicial line, he presented a very strong memorial to the lords of 
 the treasury (my lord Bute was then at the head of the ])oard), 
 heavily complaining of the growth of the illicit commerce in Amevici. 
 Some mischief happened even at that time from this over-earnest 
 zeal. Much greater happened afterwards when it operated with 
 greater power in the highest department of the finances. The bonds 
 of the act of navigation were straitened so much that America was 
 on the point of having no trade, either contraband or legitimate. 
 They found, under the construction and execution then used, the act 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 747 
 
 no longer tying, but actually strangling them. All this coming with 
 new enumerations of commodities ; with regulations which in a 
 manner put a stop to the mutual coasting intercourse of the colonies ; 
 ■with the appointment of courts of admiralty under various improper 
 circumstances ; with a sudden extinction of the paper currencies ; 
 with a compulsory provision for the quartering of soldiers, the 
 people of America thought themselves proceeded against as delin- 
 quents, or at best as people under suspicion of delinquency ; and iu 
 such a manner as, they imagined, their recent services in the war did 
 not at all merit. Any of these innumerable regulations, perhaps, 
 would not have alarmed alone ; some might be thought reasonable, 
 the multitude struck them with terror. 
 
 But the grand raancEuvro in that business of new regulating the 
 colonies was i he 15th act of the fourth of George III., which, be- 
 sides containing several of the matters to which I have just alluded, 
 opened a new principle ; and here properly began the second period 
 of the policy of this country with regard to the colonies ; by which 
 the scheme of a regular plantation parliamentary revenue was adopted 
 iu theory and settled in practice. A revenue not substituted in the 
 place of, but superadded to, a monopoly ; which monopoly was en- 
 forced at the same time with additional sti'ictness, and the execution 
 put into military hands. 
 
 This act, sir, had for the first time the title of granting duties in 
 the colonies and plantations of America, and for the first time it was 
 asserted in the preamble that it was just and necessary that a revenue 
 should be raised. Then came the technical words of giving and 
 granting, and thus a complete American revenue act was made in 
 all the forms, and with a full avowal of tlie right equity policy, and 
 even necessity of taxing the colonies without any formal consent of 
 theirs. There are contained also in the preamble to that act these 
 very remai'kable woi'ds — the commons, &c., "being desirous to make 
 some provision in the present session of parliament towards raising 
 the said revenue." By these words it appeared to the colonies that 
 this act was but a beginning of sorrows ; that every session was to 
 produce something of the same kind ; that we were to go on from 
 day to day in charging them with such taxes as we pleased, for such 
 a military force as we should tliink proper. Had this plan been pur- 
 sued, it was evident that the provincial assemblies in which the 
 
748 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Americans felt all their poi-tion of importance, and beheld their sole 
 image of freedom, were Ipso facto annihilated. This ill prospect 
 before them seemed to be boundless in extent and endless in dura- 
 tion. Sir, they Avere not mistaken. The ministry valned them- 
 selves \vhcn this act passed, and when they gave notice of the 
 stamp act, that both of the duties came very short of their ideas of 
 American taxation. Great was the a[)planse of this measure here. 
 In England we cried out for new taxes on Amei'ica, whilst they cried 
 out that they were nearly crushed with those which the war and their 
 own grants had brongiit upon them. 
 
 Sir, it has been said in the debate that when tlie first American 
 revenue act (the act of 17G4 imposing the port duties) passed, the 
 Americans did not object to the principle. It is true they touched 
 it but very tendei-ly. It was not n direct attack. They were, it is 
 true, as yet novices ; as yet unaccustomed to direct attacks upon any 
 of the rights of parliament. The duties were port duties, like those 
 they had been accustomed to bear, with this difference, that the title 
 was not the same, the preamble not the same, and the spirit alto- 
 gether unlike. But of what service is this observation to the cause 
 of those that make it? It is a full refutation of the pretence for their 
 jircsent cruelty to America; for it shows, out of their own mouths, 
 that our colonies were backward to enter into the present vexatious 
 and ruinous controversy. 
 
 There is also another circulation abroad (spread with a malignant 
 intention, which I cannot attribute to those who say the same thing 
 in this house), that Mr. Grenvillo gave the colony agents an option 
 for their assemblies to tax themselves, which they had refused. I 
 find that much stress is laid on this, as a fiict. However, it happens 
 neither to be true nor possible. I will observe first, that Mr. Gren- 
 ville never thought fit to make this apology for himself in the innu- 
 merable debates that were had upon the subject. He might have 
 proposed to the colony agents that they should agree in some mode 
 of taxation as the ground of an act of parliament. But he never 
 could have proposed that they should tax themselves on requisition, 
 which is the assertion of the day. Indeed, Mr. Grenville well knew 
 that the colony agents could have no general powers to consent to 
 it; and they had no time to consult their assemblies for particular 
 powers before ho passed his first revenue act. If you compare dates 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 749 
 
 you will find it impossible. Burthened as tbe agents knew the col- 
 onies were at that time, they could not give the least hope of such, 
 grants. His own favorite governor was of opinion that the Ameri- 
 cans were not then ta.xable objects : 
 
 " Nor was the time less favorable to the equity of such a taxation. 
 T don't mean to dispute the reasonableness of America contributing 
 to the charges of Great Bi'itain when she is able ; nor, I believe, 
 would the Americans themselves have disputed it, at a proper time 
 and season. But it siiould be considered, that the American gov- 
 ernments themselves have, in the prosecution of the late war, con- 
 tracted very large debts, which it will take some years to pa}' off, 
 and in the meantime occasions very burdensome taxes for that pur- 
 pose only. For instance, this government, which is as much before- 
 hand as any, raises every year £37,500 sterling, for sinking tlicir 
 debt, and must continue it for four years longer at least before it 
 will be clear." 
 
 These are the words of Governor Bernard's letter to a member of 
 the old ministry, and which he has since printed. Mr. Grcnville 
 could not have made this projiosition to the agents, fen- anotlicr rea- 
 son. He was of opinion, which he has declared in this house an 
 hundred times, that the colonies could not legally grant any revenue 
 to the crown ; and that infinite mischiefs would be the consequence 
 of snch a power. When Mr. Grenville had passed the first revenue 
 act, and in the same session had made this house come to a resolu- 
 tion for laying a stamp duty on America, lietween that time and the 
 passing the stamp act into a law, he told a considerable and most 
 respectal)le merchant, a member of this house, whom I am truly 
 sorry I do not now see in his place, when he represented against this 
 proceeding, that if the stamp duty was disliked, he was willing to 
 exchange it for any other equally productive ; l)ut that if he ol>jected 
 to the Americans being taxed by parliament, he might save liimself 
 the trouble of the discussion, aa he was determined on the measure. 
 This is the fact, and if you please, I will mention a very unquestion- 
 able authority for it. 
 
 Thus, sir, I have disposed of this falsehood. But falsehood has a 
 perennial spring. It is said, that no conjecture could be made of the 
 dislike of the colonies to the principle. This is as untrue as the 
 other. After the resolution of the house, and before the passing of 
 
750 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the stamp act, the colonies of Massachusetts Bay and New York did 
 send remonstrances, objecting to this mode of parliamentary taxation. 
 What was the consequence ? They were suppressed ; they were put 
 under the table ; notwithstanding an order of council to the contrary, 
 by the ministry which composed the very council that had made the 
 order ; and thus the house proceeded to its business of taxing with- 
 out the least regular knowlege of the objections which were made to 
 it. But to give that house its due, it was not over desirous to 
 receive information, or to hear remonstrance. On the 15th of Feb- 
 ruary, 1765, whilst the stamp act was under deliberation, they 
 refused with scorn even so much as to receive four petitions pre- 
 sented from so respectable colonies as Connecticut, Rhode Island, 
 Virginia and Carolina; besides one from the traders of Jamaica. As 
 to the colonies, they had no alternative left them but to disobey, or 
 to pay the taxes imposed by that parliament which was not suffered, 
 or did not suffer itself, even to hear them remonstrate upon the sub- 
 ject. 
 
 This was the state of the colonies before his majesty thought fit 
 to change his ministers. It stands upon no authority of mine. It is 
 proved by uncontrovertible records. The honorable gentlemen has 
 desired some of us to lay our hands upon our hearts, and answer to 
 his queries upon the historical part of this consideration ; and by his 
 manner (as well as my eyes could discern it) he seemed to address 
 himself to me. 
 
 Sir, I will answer him as clearly as I am able, and with great 
 openness; I have nothing to conceal. In the year sixty-five, being 
 in a very private station, far enough from any line of l)usiness, and 
 not having the honor of a seat in this house, it was my fortune, un- 
 knowing and unknown to the then ministry, by the intervention of a 
 common friend, to become connected with a very noble pei'son, and 
 at the head of the treasury department. It was indeed a situation 
 of little rank and no consequence, suitable to the mediocrity of my 
 talents and pretensions. But a situation near enough to enable me 
 to see, as well as others, what was going on ; and I did see in that 
 noble person such sound principles, such an enlargement of mind, 
 such clear and sagacious sense, and such unshaken fortitude, as have 
 bound me, as well as others much better than I, by an inviolable 
 attachment to him from that time forward. Sir, Lord Kockingham, 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 751 
 
 very early in that summer, received a strong representation from 
 many weighty English merchants, and manufacturers, from gover- 
 nors of provinces and commanders of men-of-war, against almost tho 
 whole of tho American commercial regulations, and particularly with 
 regard to the total ruin which was threatened to tiic Spanish trade. 
 I believe, sir, the nohle lord soon saw his way in this business. 
 But ho did not rashly determine against acts which, it might be sup- 
 posed, were the result of much deliberation. However, sir, ho 
 scarcely began to open the ground, when the whole veteran body of 
 ofEce took the alarm. A violent outcry of all (except those who 
 knew and felt tlie mischief) was raised against any aUerati(;u. On 
 one hand, his attempt was a direct violation of treaties and public 
 law. On the other, the act of navigation and all the corps of trade 
 laws were drawn up in array against it. 
 
 The first step the noble lord took, was to have the opinion of his 
 excellent, learned, and ever-lamented friend, the late Mr. Yorke, 
 then attorney-general, on the point of law. When he knew that 
 formally and oliicially, which in substance he had known before, he 
 immediately dispatched orders to redress the grievance. But I will 
 say it for the then minister, he is of that constitution of mind, that 
 I know he would have issued, on the same critical occasion, tiie very 
 same orders, if the acts of trade had been, as they were not, di- 
 rectly against him ; and would have cheerfully submitted to the 
 equity of parliament for his indenmity. 
 
 On the conclusion of this business of the Spanish trade, the news 
 of the troubles, on account of the stamp-act, arrived in England. 
 It was not until the end of October that these accounts were re- 
 ceived. No sooner had the sound of that mighty tempest reached 
 us in England, than the whole of tho then opposition, instead of 
 feeling humbled by the unhappy issue of their measures, seemed to 
 be infinitely elated, and cried out that the ministry, from envy to 
 the glory of their predecessors, were prepared to repeal the stamp- 
 act. Near nine years after, the honorable gentleman takes quite 
 opposite ground, and now challenges me to put my hand to my 
 heart, and say, Avhether the ministry had resolved on the appeal till 
 a considerable time after the meeting of parliament. Though I do 
 uot very well know what the honorable gentleman wishes to infer 
 from the admission, or from the denial of this fact, on which he so 
 
752 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 earnestly adjures me ; I do put my hand on my heart and assure 
 liim, that they did not come to a resohitiou directly to repeal. They 
 weighed this matter as its difEculty and importance required, they 
 considered maturely among themselves, they consulted with all who 
 CDuld give advice or information. It was not determined until a, 
 little before the meeting of parliament, but it was determined ; and 
 the main lines of their own plan marked out before that mecling. 
 Two questions arose (I hope I am not going into a narrative trouble- 
 some to the house) — 
 
 A cry of, " Go on, go on." 
 
 — The first of the two considerations was, whether the repeal should 
 be total, or whether only partial ; taking out everything burthen- 
 some and productive, and reserving only an empty acknowledgment, 
 such as a stamp on cards or dice. The other question was, on what 
 principle should the act be repealed? On this head also two princi- 
 ples were started : One, that the legislative rights of this country, 
 ■svith regard, to America, were not entire, but had certain restrictions 
 and limitations. The other principal was, that taxes of this kind 
 were contrary to the fundamental principles of commerce on which 
 the colonies Avere founded ; and contrary to every idea of political 
 equity, l)y which equity we arc bound, as much as possible, to ex- 
 tend the spirit and ))enelit of the British constitution to every part 
 of the British dominions. The option both of the measure, and of 
 the principle of repeal, was made before the session ; and I wonder 
 how any one can rend the king's speech at the opening of that ses- 
 sion, without seeing in that speech both the repeal and the declara- 
 tory act very sufiiciently crayoned out. Those who cannot see this 
 can see nothing. 
 
 Surely the honorable gentleman will not think that a great deal 
 less time than was then employed, ought to have been spent in de- 
 liberation ; when he considers that the news of the troui)les did not 
 iirrivc till towards the end of October. The parliament sat to fill 
 the vacancies on the 14th day of December, and on business the 
 14th of the following January. 
 
 Sir, a partial repeal, or, as the bon ion of the court then was, a 
 moditication, would have satisfied a timid, uns3stematic, procrasti- 
 nating ministry, as such a measure has since done such a ministiy. 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 753 
 
 A modification is the constant resource of weak undeciding minds. 
 To repeal by a denial of our riglit to tax in the preamble (and this 
 too did not want advisers), would have cut, in the heroic stylo, the 
 Gordian knot witii a sword. Either measure would have cost no 
 more than a day's del)ate. But when the total repeal was adoijtcd, 
 and adopted on principles of policy, of equity, and of connnerce ; 
 this plan made it necessary to enter into many and difficult meas- 
 ures. It became necessary to open a very large field of evidence 
 commensurate to these extensive views. But then this labor did 
 knight's service. It opened the eyes of several to the true state of 
 the American affairs, it enlarged their ideas, it removed prejudices, 
 and it conciliated the opinions and afiections of men. The noble 
 lord who tiien took the lead in administration, my honorable friend 
 .under me, and a right honorable gentleman (if lie will not reject 
 Lis share, and it was a large one, of this business), exerted the most 
 laudable industry in bringing before j'ou the fullest, most impartial, 
 and least-garbled body of evidence that ever was produced to this 
 house. 1 think the inquiry lasted in the committee for six weeks ; 
 and at its conclusion this house, by an independent, noble, spirited, 
 and unexpected majority; by a majority that will redeem ad the 
 acts ever done by majorities in parliament; in the teeth of all the 
 ■old mercenary Swiss of state, in despite of ail the speculators niid 
 augurs of political events, in defiance of the a\ hole embattled legion 
 of veteran pensioners and practised instruments of a court, gave a 
 total repeal to the stamp-act, and (if it had been so permitted) a 
 lasting peace to this whole empire. 
 
 I state, sir, these p.irticiilars, because this act of spirit and forti- 
 tude has lately been in the circulation of the season, and in sonic 
 hazardous declamations in this house, attributed to timidity. If, 
 sir, the conduct of the ministry in proposing the repeal, had arisen 
 from timidity with regard to themselves, it would have been greatly 
 to be condemned. Interested timidity disgraces as much in the 
 <?abiiiet, as pei'sonal timidity does in the field. But timidity with 
 regard to the well-being of our country is heroic virtue. The noble 
 lord who then conducted affairs, and his woitliy colleagues, whilst 
 they trembled at the prospect of such distresses as you have since 
 brought upon yourscdves, were not afraid steadily to look in the face 
 that glaring and dazzling influence at which the eyes of eagles have 
 
754 TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 blenched. He looked in the face of one of the ablest, and, let me 
 say, not the most scrupulous oppositions, that perhaps ever was in 
 this house, and withstood it, unaided by even one of the usual 
 supports of administration. He did this when he repealed the 
 stamp-act. He looked in the face a person he had long respected 
 and regarded, and whose aid was then particularly wanting, I mean 
 Lord Chatham. He did this when he passed the declaratory act. 
 
 It is now given out for the usual purposes, by the usual emissa- 
 ries, that Lord Rockingham did not consent to the repeal of this act 
 until he was bullied into it by Lord Chatham ; and the reporters 
 have gone so far as publicly to assert in a hundred companies, that 
 the honorable gentleman under the gallery, who proposed the repeal 
 in the American committee, had another set of resolutions in his 
 pocket directly the reverse of those he moved. These ai'titices of a 
 desperate cause are at this time spread abroad, with incredible care, 
 in every part of the town, from the highest to the lowest companies ; 
 as if the industry of the circulation were to make amends for the 
 absurdity of the report. 
 
 Sir, whether the noble lord is of a complexion to be bullied by 
 Lord Chatham, or by any man, I must submit to those who know 
 him. I confess, when I look back to that time, I consider him ;is 
 placed in one of the most trying situations in which, perhaps, any 
 man ever stood. In the house of peers there were very few of the 
 ministry, out of the noble lord's own particular connection (except 
 Lord Egmont, who acted, as far as I could discern, an honorable 
 and manly jiart) , that did not look to some other future arrangement 
 which warped his politics. There were in both houses new and 
 menacing appearances, that might very naturally drive any other 
 than a most resolute minister, from his measure or from his station. 
 The household troops openly revolted. The allies of ministry 
 (those I mean, who supported some of their measures, but refused 
 responsibility for any) endeavored to undermine their credit, and to 
 take ground that must be fiital to the success of the very cause which 
 they would be thought to countenance. The question of repeal was 
 brought on by ministry iu the committee of this house, in the very 
 instant when it was known that more than one court negociation was 
 carrying on with the heads of the opposition. Everything, upon 
 every side, was full of traps and mines. Earth below shook, heaven 
 
EDMUND BUKKE. 755 
 
 above menaced, all the elements of ministerial safety were dis- 
 solved. It was in the midst of this chaos of plots and counterplots, 
 it was in the midst of this complicated warfai'e against public oppo- 
 sition and private treachery, that the firmness of that noble person 
 was put to the proof. He never stirred from his ground, no, not an 
 inch. He remained fixed and determined, in principle, in measure, 
 and in conduct. He practised no managements. He secured no 
 retreat. He sought no apology. 
 
 I will likewise do justice, I ought to do it, to the honorable gen- 
 tleman who led us in this house. Far from the duplicity wickedly 
 charged on him, he acted his part with alacrity and resolution. We 
 all felt inspired by the example he gave us, down even to myself, 
 the Aveakest in that phalanx. I declare for one, I knew well 
 enough (it could not be concealed from any body) the true state of 
 things ; but, in my life, 1 never came with so much spirits into this 
 house. It was a time for a man to act in. We had powerful ene- 
 mies, but we had faithful and determined friends, and a glorious 
 cause. We had a gi'eat battle to fight, but we had the means of 
 fighting ; not as now, when our arms are tied behind us. Wc did 
 fight that day, and conquer. 
 
 I remember, sir, with a melan«holj' pleasure, the situation of the 
 honorable gentleman who made the motion for the repeal ; in that 
 crisis, when the whole trading interest of this empire, crammed 
 into your lobbies, with a trembling and anxious expectation, waited 
 almost to a winter's return of light, their fate from your resolutions. 
 When, at length, you had determined in their favor, and your doors 
 thrown open, showed them the figure of their deliverer in the well- 
 earned triumph of his important victorj% from the whole of that 
 grave multitude there arose an involuntary burst of gratitude and 
 transport. They jumped upon him like children on a long absent 
 father. They clung about him as CMptives about their i-edeemer. 
 All England, all America, joined to his applause. Nor did he seem 
 insensible to the best of all earthly rewards, the love and admiration 
 of his fellow-citizens. Hope elevated and joy brightened his crest. 
 I stood near him, and his face, to use the expression of the Scrip- 
 ture of the first martyr, " his face was as if it had been the face of an 
 angel." I do not know how others feel, but if I had stood in that 
 situation, I never would have exchanged it for all that kings in their 
 
756 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 profusion could bestow. I did liope tliat tliat daj^'s danger and honor 
 would have been a bond to hold us all together for ever. But, alas ! 
 that, with other pleasing visions, is long since vanished. 
 
 Sir, this act of supreme magnanimity has been represented, as if 
 it had been a measure of an administration, that, having no scheme 
 of their own, took a middle line, pilfered a bit from one side and a 
 bit from the other. Sir, they took no middle line. They differed 
 fundamentally from the schemes of both parties ; but they preserved 
 the objects of both. They preserved the authority of Great Britain. 
 They preserved the equity of Great Britain. They made the decla- 
 ratory act, they repealed tlie stump act. The}' did both fully, be- 
 cause the declaratory act was without qualification ; and the repeal 
 of the stamp act total. This they did in the situation I have de- 
 scribed. 
 
 Now, Sir, what will the adversary say to both these acts? If the 
 principle of tiic declaratory act was not good, the principle we are 
 contending for this day is monstrous. If the principle of the repeal 
 was not good, why are we not at war for a real, substantial, efi'ectivo 
 revenue? If both were bad, why has this ministry incurred all the 
 inconveniencies of both and of all schemes? Why have they en- 
 acted, repealed, enforced, yielded, and now attempt to enforce 
 again ? 
 
 Sir, I think I may as well now, as at any other time, speak to a 
 certain matter of fact, not wholly unrelated to the question under 
 your consideration. We, who would persuade you to revert to tiio 
 ancient policy of this kingdom, labor under the effect of this short 
 current phrase which the court leaders have given out to all their 
 corps, in order to take away the credit of those who would prevent 
 you from that frantic war you are going to wage upon jour colonics. 
 Their cant is this, all the disturbances in America have been created 
 by the I'cpeal of the stamp-act. I suppress for a moment my indig- 
 nation at the falsehood, baseness, and absurdity of this most auda- 
 cious assertion. Instead of remarking on the motives and character 
 of those who have issued it for circulation, 1 will clearl}' lay before 
 you the state of America antccedenti}' to that repeal, after the re- 
 peal, and since the renewal of the schemes of American taxation. 
 
 It is said, that the disturbances, if there were any before the 
 repeal, were slight, and without difiiculty or inconvenience, might 
 
EDaiUND BURKE. 757 
 
 have been suppressed. For an answer to this assertion I will send 
 you to the great autlior and patron of the stamp-act, who certainly 
 meaning well to the authority of this country, and fully apprised of 
 the state oi that, made, before a repeal Avas so much as agitated in 
 this house, the motion which is on your journals ; and Avhich, to 
 save the clerk the trouble of turning to it, I will now read to you. 
 It was for an amendment to the address of the 17th of December, 
 1765: 
 
 "To express our just resentment and indignation at tlie outrageous tumults and 
 insurrections whicli liave Ijeen excited and carried on in Nortli America, and at tlio 
 resistance given by open and rebellious force to the execution of the laws in tliat 
 part of his majesty's dominions. And to assure his majestj', that his faithful com- 
 mons, animated with the warmest duty and attachment to his royal person and 
 government, will flrmly and effectually support his majesty in all such measures as 
 shall be necessary for preserving and supporting the legal dependence of the col- 
 onies on the mother country," &c. 
 
 Here was certainly a disturbance preceding the repeal ; such a 
 disturbance as Mr. Greuville thought neccssar}' to qualify by the 
 name of an insurrection, and the epithet of a rebellious force : 
 terms much stronger than any by Avhich those who then supported 
 his motion, have ever since thought proper to distinguish the subse- 
 quent disturbances in America. They were disturbances which 
 seemed to him and his friends to justify as strong a promise of 
 support, as hath been usual to give in the beginning of a war with 
 the most powerful and declared enemies. "When the accounts of 
 the American governors came before the house, they appeared 
 stronger even than the warmth of public imagination had painted 
 them; so much stronger that the papers on your table bear mo out 
 in saying, that all the late disturbances, which have been at one 
 time the minister's motives for the repeal of tive out of six of the 
 new court taxes, and are now his pretences for refusing to repeal 
 that sixth, did not amount — why do I compare them? — no, not to 
 a tenth part of the tumults and violence which prevailed long before 
 the repeal of that act. 
 
 Ministry cannot refuse the authority of the Commander-in-chief, 
 General Gage, who, in his letter of the 4th of November, from New 
 York, thus represents the state of things : 
 
 " It is difficult to say, from the highest to the lowest, who has not been accessory 
 to this insurrection, either by writing or mutual agreements to oppose the act, by 
 
758 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 what they are pleased to term all legal opposition to it. Nothing effectual has been 
 proposed, either to prevent or quell the tumult. The rest of the provinces are in 
 the same situation as to a positive refusal to take the stamps ; and threatening those 
 who shall take them, to plunder and murder them, and this affair stands in all the 
 provinces, that unless the act, from its own nature, enforce itself, nothing but a 
 very considerable military force can do it." 
 
 It is remarkable, sir, that the persons who formerly trumpeted 
 forth the most loudly the violent resolutions of assemblies ; the uni- 
 versal insuri'ections ; the seizina: and burning the stamped papers ; 
 the forcing stamp officers to resign their commissions under the gal- 
 lows ; the ritiing and pulling down of the houses of magistrates ; 
 and the expulsion from their country of all who dared to write or 
 speak a single word in defence of the powers of parliament ; these 
 very trumpeters are now the men that represent the whole as a mere 
 trifle ; and choose to date all the disturbances from the repeal of the 
 stamp act, which put an end to them. Hear your officers abroad, 
 and let them refute this shameless falsehood, who, in all their cor- 
 respondence, state the disturbances as owing to their true causes, 
 the discontent of the people, from the taxes. You have this evi- 
 dence in your own archives — and it will give you complete sat- 
 isfaction ; if you are not so far lost to all parliamentary ideas of 
 information, as rather to credit the lie of the day, than the records 
 of your own house. 
 
 Sir, this vermin of court reporters, when thcj^ are forced into day 
 upon one point, are sure to burrow in another ; but they shall have 
 no refuge ; I will make them bolt out of all their holes. Conscious 
 that they must be baffled, when they attribute a precedent disturb- 
 ance to a subsequent measure, they take other ground, almo.st as 
 absurd, but very common in modern practice, and very wicked ; 
 which is, to attribute the ill eifect of ill-judged conduct to the argu- 
 ments which had been used to dissuade us from it. They say, that 
 the opposition made in parliament to the stamp act at the time of 
 its passing, encouraged the Americans to their resistance. This has 
 even formally appeared in print in a regular volume, from an advo- 
 cate of that faction, a Dr. Tucker. This Dr. Tucker is already a 
 dean, and his earnest lal)ors in this vineyard will, I suppose, raise 
 him to a bishoprick. But this assertion too, just like the rest, is 
 false. In all the papers which have loaded your table ; in all the 
 vast crowd of verbal witnesses that appeared at your bar, witnesses 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 759 
 
 which were indiscriminately produced from both sides of the house ; 
 not the least hint of such a cause of disturbance has ever appeared. 
 As to the fact of a strenuous opposition to the stamp act, I sat as a 
 stranger in your gallery when the act was under consideration. Far 
 from anything inflammatory, I never heard a more languid debate in 
 this house. No more than two or three gentlemen, as I remember, 
 spoke against the act, and that with great reserve and remarkable 
 temper. There was but one division in the whole progress of the 
 bill; and the minority did not reach to more than thirty-nine or 
 forty. In the house of lords I do not recollect that there was any 
 debate or division at all. I am sure there was no protest. In fact, 
 the afiair passed with so very, very little noise, that in town they 
 scarcely knew the nature of what you were doing. The opposition 
 to the bill in England never could have done this mischief, because 
 there scarcely ever was less of opposition to a bill of consequence. 
 
 Sir, the agents and distributors of falsehoods have, with their 
 usual industry, circulated another lie of the same nature with the 
 former. It is this, that the disturbances arose from the account 
 which had been received in America of the change in the ministry. 
 No longer awed, it seems, with the spirit of the former rulers, they 
 thought themselves a match for what our calumniators choose to 
 qualify by the name of so feeble a ministry as succeeded. Feeble 
 in one sense these men certainly may be called ; for with all their 
 efforts, and they have made many, they have not been able to resist 
 the distempered vigor and insane alacrity with which you are rush- 
 ing to your ruin. But it does so happen, that the falsity of this cir- 
 culation is (lilje the rest) demonstrated by indisputable dates and 
 records. 
 
 So little was the change known in America, that the letters of 
 your governors, giving an account of these disturbances long after 
 they had arrived at their highest pitch, were all directed to the old 
 ministry, and particularly to the Earl of Halifax, the secretary of 
 state corresponding with the colonies, without once in the smallest 
 degree intimating the slightest suspicion of any ministerial revolu- 
 tion whatsoever. The ministry was not changed in England until 
 the 10th day of July, 1765. On the 14th of the preceding June, 
 Governor Fauquier from Virginia writes thus ; and writes thus to 
 the Earl of Halifax : " Government is set at defiance, not having 
 
7G0 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 strength enough in her hjinds to enforce obedience to the laws of 
 the community. The private distress, which every man feels, in- 
 creases the general dissatisfaction ut the duties laid by the stamp 
 act, which breaks out, and shows itself upon every trifling occasion." 
 The general dissatisfaction had produced some time before, that is, 
 on the 29th of May, several strong public resolves against the stamp 
 act ; and those resolves are assigned bj- Governor Bernard, as the 
 cause of the insurrections in Massachusettr? Bay, in his letter of the 
 15th of August, still addressed to the Earl of Halifnx ; and he con- 
 tinued to address such accounts to that minister quite to the 7th of 
 September of tlic same year. Similar accounts, and of as late a 
 date, were sent from other governors, and all directed to Lord Hali- 
 fax. Not one of these letters indicates the slightest idea of a change, 
 either known, or even apprehended. 
 
 Thus arc blown away the insect race of courtly falsehoods ! thus 
 perish the miserable inveiil ions of the wretched runners for a wretched 
 cause, which they have fly-blown into every weak and rotten part of 
 the country, in vain hopes that when their maggots had taken wing, 
 their importunate buzzing might sound something like the public 
 voice ! 
 
 Sir, I have troubled 3'ou sufficiently with the state of America be- 
 fore the repeal. Now I turn to the honorable gentlemen who so 
 stoutly challenges us, to tell, wliether after the repeal the provinces 
 were quiet? This is coming home to tlie point. Here I meet him 
 directly ; and answer most readily, they were quiet. And I, in my 
 turn, challenge him to prove when, and where, and by whom, and 
 in what numbers, and with what violence, the other laws of trade, 
 as gentlemen assert, were violated in consequence of your conces- 
 sion? or that even your other revenue laws were attacked? But I 
 quit the vantage ground on which I stand, and where I might leave 
 the burden of the proof upon him : I walk down into the open plain 
 and undertake to show that they were not only quiet, but showed 
 many unequivocal marks of acknowledgment and gratitude. And 
 to give him every advantage, I select the obnoxious colony of Mas- 
 sachusetts Bay, which at this time (but without hearing her) is so 
 heavily a culprit before parliament — I will select their proceedings 
 even under circumstances of no small irritation. For, a little im- 
 prudently, I must say. Governor Bernard mixed in the administration 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 761 
 
 of the Icnilive of the repeal no small acrimony arising from matters 
 of a separate nature. Yet see, sir, the eflect of that lenitive, 
 thongli mixed with these hitter ingredients; and how this rugged 
 pcoi)lc can express themselves on a measure of concession. 
 
 "If it is not in our power" (say they in their address to Governor 
 Bernard), "in so full a manner as will he expected, to show our re- 
 spectful gratitude to the mother country, or to make a dutiful and 
 allectionato return to tlic indulgence of the king and parliament, it 
 shall be no fault of ours; for this wc intend, and hope we shall be 
 able fully to eflect." 
 
 AVould to God that this temper had been cultivated, managed, and 
 set in action ! other efiects than those which wc have since felt would 
 have resulted from it. On the requisition for cdmpensation to those 
 who had suffered from the violence of the populace, in the same ad- 
 dress, they say : "The recommendation enjoined by Mr. Secrctarj'" 
 Conwaj^'s letter, and in consequence thereof made to us, wc will 
 embrace the tirst convenient opportunity to consider and act upon." 
 They did consider ; they did act upon it. They obeyed the requi- 
 sition. I know the mode has been chicaned upon, but it was sub- 
 stantiidly obeyed ; and much better obeyed, than I fear the parlia- 
 mentary requisition of this session will be, though enforced by all 
 your vigor, and backed with all your power. In a word, the damages 
 of popidar fury were compensated by legislative gravity. Almost 
 every other part of America in various waj's demonstrated their 
 gratitude. I am bold to say, that so sudden a calm recovered after 
 so violent a storm is without parallel in history. To say that no 
 other disturbance should happen from any other cause, is folly. But 
 as far as appearances went, by the judicious sacrifice of one law, you 
 procured the acquiescence in all that remained. After this experi- 
 ence, nobody shall persuade me, when a whole people arc concerned, 
 that acts of lenity are not means of conciliation. 
 
 I hope the honorable gentlemen has received a f:ur and full answer 
 to his question. 
 
 I have dune with the thii'd period of j-our policy ; that of your 
 repeal; and the retui-n of your ancient system, and your ancient 
 tranquillity and concord. Sir, this period was not as long as it was 
 ha))py. Another scene was opened, and other actors appeared on 
 the stage. The state, in the condition I have described it, was de- 
 
762 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 livered into the hands of Lord Chatham , a great and celebrated name ; 
 a name that keeps the name of this countiy respectable in every other 
 on the globe. It may be truly called, 
 
 Clarum et venerabile nonien 
 Gentibus, et multiim nostra; quodproderat urbi. 
 
 Sir, the venerable age of this great man, his merited rank, his 
 superior eloquence, his splendid qualities, his eminent services, the 
 vast space he fills in the eye of mankind ; and, more than all the rest, 
 his fall from power, which, like death, canonizes and sanctifies a 
 great character, will not sufi'er me to censure any part of his conduct. 
 I am afraid to flatter him ; I am sure I am not disposed to blame him. 
 Let those who have betrayed him by their adulation, insult him with 
 their malevolence. But what I do nqt presume to censure, I may 
 have leave to lament. For a wise man he seemed to me at that time, 
 to be governed too much by general maxims. I speak with the free- 
 dom of history, and I hope without offence. One or two of these 
 maxims, flowing from an opinion not the most indulgent to our un- 
 happy species, and surely a little too general, led him into measures 
 that were greatly mischievous to himself; and for that reason, among 
 others, perhaps fatal to his country ; measuras, the effects of which, 
 I am afraid, are for ever incurable. He made an administration, so 
 checkered and speckled ; he put together a piece of joinery, so crossly 
 indented and whimsically dovetailed ; a cabinet so variously inlaid ; 
 such a piece of diversified mosaic ; such a tessellated pavement with- 
 out cement; here a bit of black stone, and there a bit of white; 
 patriots and courtiers, king's friends and republicans; whigs and 
 tories ; treacherous friends and open enemies ; that it was indeed a 
 very curious show ; but utterly unsafe to touch, and unsure to stand 
 on. The colleagues whom he had assorted at the same boards, stared 
 at each other, and were obliged to ask : Sir, your name ? Sir, you 
 have the advantage of me — Mr. Such-a-one — I beg a thousand 
 pardons ! I venture to say, it did so happen that persons had a 
 single office divided between them, who had never spoken to each 
 other in their lives, until they found themselves, they knew not how, 
 pigging together, heads and points, in the same truckle-bed. 
 
 Sir, in consequence of this arrangement, having put so much the 
 larger part of his enemies and opposers into power, the confusion was 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 763 
 
 such, that his owu principles could not possibly have any effect or 
 influence in the conduct of affairs. If ever he fell into a fit of the 
 gout, or if any other cause withdrew him from public cares, princi- 
 ples directly the contrary were sure to predominate. When he had 
 executed his plan, he had not an inch of ground to stand upon. 
 When he had accomplished his scheme of administration, he was no 
 longer a minister. 
 
 When his face was hid but for a moment, his whole system was on 
 a wide sea, without chart or compass. The gentlemen, his particular 
 friends, who with the names of various departments of ministry, were 
 admitted, to seem as if they acted a part under him, with a modesty 
 that becomes all men, and with a confidence in him, which was jus- 
 tified even in its extravagance by his superior abilities, had never in 
 any instance presumed upon any opinion of their own. Deprived of 
 his guiding influence, they were whirled about, the sport of every 
 gust, and easily driven into any port ; and as those who joined with 
 them in manning the vessel were the most directly opposite to his 
 opinions, measures, and character, and far the most artful and pow- 
 erful of the set, they easily prevailed, so as to seize upon the vacant, 
 unoccupied, and derelict minds of his friends ; and instantly they 
 turned the vessel wholly out of the course of his policy. As if it 
 were to insult as well as to betray him, even long before the close of 
 the first session of his administration, when everything was publicly 
 transacted, and with great parade, in his name, they made an act, 
 declai ing it highly just and expedient to raise a i^evenue in America. 
 For even then, sir, even before this splendid orb was entirely set, 
 and while the western horizon was in a blaze with his descending 
 glory, on the opposite quarter of the heavens arose another luminary, 
 and, for his hour, became lord of the ascendant. 
 
 This light, too, is passed and set forever. You understand, to be 
 sure, that I speak of Charles Townshend, officially the reproducer of 
 this fatal scheme ; whom I cannot even now remember without some 
 degree of sensibility. In truth, sir, he was the delight and ornament 
 of this house, and the chai-m of every pi-ivate society which he honored 
 with his presence. Perhaps there never arose in this country, nor in 
 any country, a man of a more pointed and finished wit ; and (where 
 his passions were not concerned) of a more refined, exquisite, and 
 penetrating judgment. If he had not so great a stock, as some have 
 
764 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 had who floinislied formerly, of knowledge long treasured up, he 
 knew better by far, than any man I ever was acquainted with, how 
 to bring together within a short time, all that was necessary tO' 
 establish, to illustrate', and to decorate that side of the question he 
 supported. He stated his matter skilfully and powerfully. He par- 
 ticularly excelled in a most luminous explanation, and display of his 
 subject. His style of argument was neither trite nor vulgar, nor 
 subtle and abstruse. He hit the house just between wind and water. 
 And not being troubled with too anxious a zeal for any matter 
 in question, he was never more tedious, or more earnest, than the 
 preconceived opinions and present temper of his hearers required; 
 to whom he was always in perfect unison. He conformed exactly 
 to the temper of the house ; and he seemed to guide, because he was 
 always sure to follow it. 
 
 I beg pardon, sir, if when I speak of this and of other great men, 
 I appear to digress in saying something of their characters. In this 
 eventful history of the revolutions of America, the characters of such 
 men are of much importance. Great men arc the guide-posts and 
 landmarks in the state. The credit of such men at court, or in the 
 nation, is the sole cause of all the public measure-. It would be an 
 invidious thing (most foreign I trust to what you think my dispo- 
 tion) to remark the errors into which the authority of great names 
 has brought the nation, without doing justice at the same time to the 
 great qualities, whence that authority arose. The subject is instruc- 
 tive to those who wish to form themselves on whatever of excellence 
 has gone before them. There are many young members in the house 
 (such of late has been the rapid succession of public men) who never 
 saw that prodigy Charles Townshcnd ; nor of course know what a 
 ferment he was able to excite in everything by the vinlent ebullition 
 of his mixed virtues and failings. For failings he had undouljtedly 
 — many of us remember them ; we are this day considering the effect 
 of them. But he had no failings which were not owing to a noble 
 cause ; to an ardent, generous, perhaps an immoderate passion for 
 fame ; a passion which is the instinct of all great souls. He wor- 
 shipped that goddess wheresoever she appeared ; but he paid par- 
 ticular devotion to her in her favorite habitation, in her chosen temple, 
 the House of Commons. Besides the characters of the individuals 
 that compose our body, it is impossible, Mr. Speaker, not to obsei've 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 765 
 
 that this house has a collective character of its own. That character 
 too, however imperfect, is not unamiahle. Like all great public col- 
 lections of men, you possess a marked love of virtue, and an abhor- 
 rence of vice. Bat among vices, there is none, which the house 
 abhors in the same degree with obstinacy. Obstinacy, sir, is cer- 
 tainly a great vice ; and in tlie changeful state of political affairs it is 
 frequently the cause of great mischief. It happens, however, very 
 unfortunately, that almost the whole line of tlic great and masculine 
 "virtues, constancy, gravity, magnanimity, fortitude, fidelity, and 
 •firmness, are closely allied to this disagreeable quality, of which you 
 have so just an abhorrence ; and in their excess all these virtues very 
 easily fall into it. He, who paid such a punctillious attention to all 
 jour feelings, certainly took care not to shock them by that vice 
 which is the most disgustful to you. 
 
 That fear of displeasing those who ought most to be pleased, 
 betrayed him sometimes into the other extreme. He had voted, 
 and in the year 17G5, had been an advocate for the stamp act. 
 Things and the disposition of men's minds were changed. In short, 
 the stamp act began to ))e no favorite in this house. He therefore 
 attended at the private meeting, in which the resolutions moved by 
 a. I'igbt honorable gentleman were settled; resolutions leading to 
 the repeal. The next day he voted for that repeal ; and he would 
 have spoken for it, too, if an illness, (not as was then given out 
 a political, but to my knowledge,) a very real illness, had not pre- 
 vented it. 
 
 The very next session, as the fashion of this world passcth away, 
 the repeal began to be in as bad an odor in this house as the stamp 
 Jict had been in the session before. To eimform to the temper Mhich 
 began to prevail, and to prevail mostly amongst those most in 
 l^ower, he declared, very early in the winter, that a revenue must 
 be had out of America. Instantly he was tied down to his engage- 
 ments by some, who had no objection to such experiments, when 
 made at the cost of persons for whom they had no particubu- regard. 
 The whole body of courtiers drove hiui onward. They always talked 
 as if the king stood in a sort of humiliated state, until something of 
 the kind should be done. 
 
 Here this extraordinary man, then chancellor of the cxchecjuer, 
 found himself in great straits. To please universally was the object 
 
766 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 of his life ; but to tax and to please, no more than to love and to 
 be wise, is not given to men. However, he attempted it. To ren- 
 der the tax palatable to the partizans of American revenue, he made 
 a preamble stating the necessity of such a revenue. To close with 
 the American distinction, this revenue was external or port-duty ; 
 but again, to soften it to the other party, it was a duty of supply. 
 To gratify the colonists, it was laid on British manufactures ; to 
 satisfy the merchants of Britain, the duty was trivial, and (except 
 that on tea, which touched only the devoted East India Company) 
 on none of the grand objects of commerce. To counterwork the 
 American contraband, the duty on tea was reduced from a shilling 
 to threepence. But to secure the favor of those who would tax 
 America, the scene of collection was changed, and, with the rest, 
 it was levied in the colonies. What need I say more ? This fine- 
 spun scheme had the usual fate of all exquisite policy. But the 
 original plan of the duties, and the mode of executing that plan, 
 both arose singly and solely from a love of our applause. He w^as 
 truly the child of the house. He never thought, did, or said any- 
 thing but with a view to you. He every day adapted himself to 
 your disposition ; and adjusted himself before it as at a looking- 
 glass. 
 
 He had observed (indeed it could not escape him) that several per- 
 sons, infinitely his inferiors in all respects, had formerly rendered 
 themselves considerable in this house by one method alone. They 
 were a race of men (I hope in God the species is extinct) who, when 
 they rose in their place, no man living could divine, from any known 
 adherence to parties, to opinions, or to principles ; from any order 
 or system in their politics ; or from any sequel or connection in 
 their ideas, what part they were going to take in any debate. It is 
 astonishing how much this uncertainty, especially at critical times, 
 called the attention of all parties on such men. All eyes were fixed 
 on them, all ears open to hear them ; each party gaped and looked 
 alternately for their vote almost to the end of their speeches. While 
 the house hung in this uncertainty, now the hear-hims I'ose from this 
 side — now they rebellowed from the other ; and that party to whom 
 they fell at length from their tremulous and dancing balance, always 
 received them in a tempest of applause. The fortune of such men 
 was a temptation too great to be resisted by one, to whom a single 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 7(}7 
 
 whiff of incense withheld gave much greater pain, than he received 
 delight, ill the clouds of it, which daily rose about him from the pro- 
 digal superstition of innumerable admirers. He was a candidate for 
 contradictory honors ; and his great aim was to make those agree in 
 admiration of him who never agreed in anything else. 
 
 Hence arose this unfortunate act, the subject of this day's debate ; 
 from a disposition which, after making an American revenue to 
 please one, repealed it to please others, and again revived it in 
 hopes of pleasing a third, and of catching something in the ideas 
 of all. 
 
 This revenue act of 1767, formed the fourth period of American 
 policy. How we have fared since then — what woeful variety of 
 schemes have been adopted ; what enforcing, and what repealing ; 
 what bullying, and what submitting ; what doing, and undoing ; 
 what straining, and what relaxing ; what assemblies dissolved for 
 not obeying, and called again without obedience ; what troops sent 
 out to quell resistance, and on meeting that resistance, recalled; 
 what shiftings, and changings, and jumblings of all kinds of men at 
 home, which left no jjossibility of order, consistency, vigor, or even 
 so much as a decent unity of color in any one public measure. It is 
 a tedious, irksome task. My duty may call me to open it some other 
 time ; on a former occasion I tried 3'our temper on a part of it ; for 
 the present I shall forbear. 
 
 After all these changes and agitations, your immediate situation 
 upon the question on your paper is at length brought to this. You 
 have an act of parliament stating, that " it is expedient to raise a 
 revenue in America." By a partial repeal you annihilated the 
 greatest part of that revenue, which this preamble declares to be so 
 expedient. You have substituted no other in place of it. A secre- 
 tary of state has disclaimed, in the king's name, all thoughts of such 
 a substitution in future. The principle of this disclaimer goes to 
 what has been left, as well as what has been repealed. The tax 
 which lingers after its companions, (under a preamble declaring an 
 American revenue expedient, and for the sole purpose of support- 
 ing the theory of that preamble) militates with the assurance 
 authentically conveyed to the colonies ; and is an exhanstless source 
 of jealousy and animosity. On this state, which I take to be a fair 
 one ; not being able to discern any grounds of honor, advantage. 
 
768 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 peace, or power, for adhering, either to tlic act or to tlic preamble, 
 I shall vote for the question wiiich leads to the repeal of both. 
 
 If you do not fall in with this motion, then secure something to 
 fight for, consistent in theory and valuable in practice. If yon must 
 employ your strength, employ it to ui)liold you in some honoraljle 
 right or some profitable wrong. If you are apprehensive that tlic 
 concession reconnncnded to \'ou, though proper, should be a means 
 of drawing on you further but unreasonable claims, — why then 
 employ your force in supporting that reasonable concession against 
 those unreasonable demands. Yon will employ it with more grace ; 
 with better eflect ; and with great proi)al)Ie concurrence of all the 
 quiet and rational pco[)le in the provinces ; who arc now united 
 with, and hurried away by, the violent ; having indeed dillerent 
 dispositions, but a conmion interest. If you apprehend that on a 
 concession you shall be pushed I)y metaphysical process to the 
 extreme lines and argued out of your whole authority, my advice is 
 this : when 30U have recovered 3'our old, your strong, your tenal)lo 
 position, then face about — stop short — do nothing more — reason 
 not at all — oppose the ancient policy and practice of the empire, 
 as a rampart against the speculations of innovators on both sides of 
 the question ; and you will stand on great, manly, and siu-e gromid. 
 On this solid basis fix your machines, and they will draw worlds 
 towards you. 
 
 Your ministers, in their own and his majesty's name, have already 
 alopted the American distinction of internal and external duties. It 
 is a distinction, whatever merit it ma\' have, that was originally 
 moved by the Americans themselves ; and I think they will acquiesce 
 in it, if they are not pushed with too much logic and too little sense, 
 in all the consequences. That is, if external taxation be understood, 
 as they and you understand it when you please, to be not a distinc- 
 tion of geography, but of policy ; that it is a power for regulating 
 trade and not for supporting establishments. The distinction, which 
 is as nothing with regard to right, is of most weighty consideration 
 in practice. Kecover your old ground, and your old tranquillity — 
 try it — I am persuaded the Americans will compromise with you. 
 When confidence is once restored, the odious and suspicious "iim- 
 inum jus will perish of course. The spirit of praeticabilit}', of mod- 
 eration, and nmtual convenience will never call in geometrical 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 769 
 
 exactness as the arbitrator of an amicable settlement. Consult and 
 follow your experience. Let not the long story with which I have 
 exercised your patience prove fruitless to your interests. 
 
 For my part, I should choose (if I could have my wish) that the 
 proposition of the honorable gentleman for the repeal could go to 
 America without the attendance of the penal bills. Alone I could 
 almost answer for its success. I cannot be certain of its reception 
 in the bad company it may keep. In such heterogeneous assort- 
 ments the most innocent person will lose the efl'ect of his innocency. 
 Though yon should send out this angel of peace, yet you are sending 
 out a destroying angel too ; and what would be the effect of the 
 conflict of these two adverse spirits, or which would predominate 
 in the end, is what I dare not say ; whether the lenient measures 
 would cause American passion to subside, or the severe would 
 increase its fury. All this is in the hand of Providence ; yet now, 
 even now, I sliould confide in the prevailing virtue and efficacious 
 operation of lenity, though working in darkness and in chaos, in 
 the midst of all this unnatural and turbid combination. I should 
 hope it might produce order and beauty in the end. 
 
 Let us, sir, embrace some system or other before we end this 
 session. Do you mean to tax America, and to draw a productive 
 revenue from thence? If you do, speak out: name, fix, ascertain 
 this revenue ; settle its quantity ; define its objects ; provide for its 
 collection ; and then fight when you have something to fight for. If 
 you murder, rob ! If you kill, take possession : and do not appear 
 in the character of madmen, as well as assassins, violent, vindictive, 
 "bloody, and tyrannical, without an object. But may better counsels 
 guide you ! 
 
 Again, and again, revert to your old principles — seek peace and 
 ensue it — leave America, if she has taxable matter in her, to tax 
 herself. I am not here going into the distinctions of rights, nor 
 attempting to mark their boundaries. I do not enter into these 
 metaphysical distinctions ; I hate the very sound of them. Leave 
 the Americans as they anciently stood, and these distinctions, born 
 of our unhappy contest, will die along with it. They and we, and 
 their and our ancestors, have been happy under that system. Let 
 the memory of all actions, in contradiction to that good old mode, 
 on both sides, be extinguished forever. Be content to bind America 
 
770 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 by laws of trade ; you have' always done it. Let this be your rea- 
 son for binding their trade. Do not burthen them by taxes ; you 
 were not used to do so from the beginning. Let this be your reason 
 for not taxing. These are the arguments of states and kingdoms. 
 Leave the rest to the schools ; for there only they may be discussed 
 with safety. But if, intemperately, unwisely, fatally, you sophisti- 
 cate and poison the very source of government, by urging subtle 
 deductions, and consequences odious to those you govern, from the 
 unlimited and illimitable nature of supreme sovereignty, you will 
 teach them by these means to call that sovereignty itself in question. 
 When you drive him hard, the boar will surely turn upon the hunters. 
 If that sovereignty and their freedom cannot be reconciled, which 
 will they take? They will cast your sovereignty iu your face. No- 
 body will be argued into slavery. Sir, let the gentlemen on the 
 other side call forth all their ability, let the best of them get up and 
 tell me what one chai'acter of liberty the Americans have, and what 
 one brand of slavery they are free from, if they are bound in their 
 property and industry, by all the restraints you can imagine on com- 
 merce, and at the same time are made pack-horses of every tax you 
 choose to impose, without the least share iu granting them. When 
 they bear the burthens of unlimited monopoly, will you bring them 
 to bear the burthens of unlimited revenue too ? The Englishman in 
 America will feel that this is slavery — that it is legal slaveiy will 
 be no compensation, either to his feelings or his understanding. 
 
 A noble lord, who spoke some time ago, is full of the fire of 
 ingenuous youth ; and when he has modelled the ideas of a lively 
 imagination by further experience, he will be an ornament to his 
 country in either house. He has said, that the Americans are our 
 children, and how can they revolt against their parent? He says, 
 that if they are not free in their present state, England is not free ; 
 because Manchester, and other considerable places, are not repre- 
 sented. So then because some towns in England are not represented, 
 America is to have no representative at all. They are " our chil- 
 dren," but when children ask for bread, we are not to give a stone. 
 Is it because the natural resistance of things, and the various muta- 
 tions of time, hinders our government, or any scheme of govern- 
 ment, from being any more than a sort of approximation to the 
 right, is it therefore that the colonies are to recede from it infinitely? 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 771 
 
 When this child of ours wishes to assimilate to its parent, and to 
 reflect with a true filial resemblance the beauteous countenance of 
 British liberty ; are we to turn to them the shameful parts of our 
 constitution ? ai-e we to give them our weakness for their strength, 
 our opprobrium for their glory? and the slough of slavery, which we 
 are not able to work otf, to serve thom for their freedom ? 
 
 If this be the case, ask yourselves this question : Will they be 
 content in such a state of slavery ? If not, look to the consequences. 
 Keflect how you are to govern a people who think they ought to be 
 free, and think they are not. Your scheme yields no revenue, it 
 yields nothing but discontent, disorder, disobedience ; and such is 
 the state of America, that after wading up to your eyes in blood, you 
 could only end just where you begun ; that is, to tax where no rev- 
 enue is to be found, to — my voice fiiils me ; my inclination indeed 
 carries me no further — all is confusion beyoud it. 
 
 Well, sir, I have recovered a little, and before I sit down I must 
 say something to another point with which gentlemen urge us. What 
 is to become of the declaratory act asserting the entireness of Brit- 
 ish legislative authority, if we abandon the practice of taxation ? 
 
 For my part I look upon the rights stated in that act, exactly in 
 the manner in which I viewed them on its very first proposition, and 
 which I have often taken the liberty, with great humility, to lay 
 before j'ou. I look, I say, on the imperial rights of Great Britain, 
 and the privileges which the colonists ought to enjoy under these 
 rights, to be just the most reconciUdjle things in the world. The 
 Parliament of Great Britain sits at the head of her extensive emph'e 
 in two capacities : one as the local legislature of this island, provid- 
 ing for all things at home, immediately, and by no other instrument 
 than the executive power. The other, and 1 think her nobler capac- 
 ity, is what I call her imperial character; in which, as fi'om the 
 throne of heaven, she superintends all the several inferior legisla- 
 tures, and guides and controls them all without annihilating any. As 
 all these provincial legislatures are only co-oi'dinate to each other, 
 they ought all to be subordinate to her ; else they can neither pre- 
 serve mutual peace, nor hope for mutual justice, nor effectually 
 afibrd mutual assistance. It is necessary to coerce the negligent, to 
 restrain the violent, and to aid the weak and deficient by the over- 
 ruling plenitude of her power. She is never to intrude into the 
 
772 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 place of the others, whilst they are equal to the common ends of 
 their institution. But in order to enable Parliament to answer all 
 these ends of pi'ovident and beneficent superintendence, her powers 
 must be boundless. The gentlemen who think the powers of Par- 
 liament limited, may please themselves to talk of requisitions. But 
 suppose the requisitions are not obeyed ? What ! Shall there be 
 no reserved power in the empire to supply a deficiency which may 
 weaken, divide, and dissipate the whole? We are engaged in war 
 — the secretary of state calls upon the colonies to contribute — some 
 would do it, I think most would cheerfully furnish whatever is 
 demanded — one or two, suppose, hang back, and, easing them- 
 selves, let the stress of the draft lie on the others — surely it is 
 proper that some authority might legally saj' — Tax yourselves for 
 the common supply, or parliament will do it for 3'ou. This back- 
 wardness was, as I am told, actually the case of Pennsylvania for 
 some short time towards the beginning of the last war, owing to 
 some internal dissensions in the colony. But, whether the fact were 
 so, or otherwise, the case is equally to be provided for by a compe- 
 tent foreign power. But then this ought to be no ordinary power, 
 nor ever used in the first instance. This is what I meant, when I 
 have said at various times that I consider the power of taxing in 
 parliament as an instrument of empire, and not as a means of sup- 
 ply- 
 
 Such, sir, is my idea of the constitution of the British empire, as 
 distinguished from the constitution of Britain ; and on these grounds 
 I think subordination and liberty may be sufficiently reconciled 
 through the whole ; whether to serve a refining speculatist, or a fac- 
 tious demagogue, I know not, but enough surely for the ease and 
 happiness of man. 
 
 Sir, whilst you held this happy course, we drew more from the 
 colonies than all the impotent violence of despotism ever could 
 extort from them. We did this abundantly in the last war. It has 
 never been once denied — and what reason have we to imagine that 
 the colonies would not have proceeded in supplying government as 
 liberally, if you had not stepped in and hindered them from contri- 
 buting, by interrupting the channel in which their liberality flowed 
 with so strong a course ; by attempting to take, instead of being sat- 
 isfied to receive? Sir William Temple says, that Holland has loaded 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 773 
 
 itself with ten times the impositions which it revolted from Spain, 
 rather than submit to. He says true. Tyranny is a poor provider; 
 it knows neither how to accumulate nor ho^v to extract. 
 
 I charge, therefore, to this now and unfortunate system the loss 
 not only of peace, of union, and of commerce, but even of revenue, 
 which its friends are contending for. It is morally certain, that we 
 have lost at least a million of free grants since the peace. I think 
 we have lost a great deal more ; and that those who look for revenue 
 from the provinces, never could have pursued, even in that light, a 
 course more directly repugnant to their purposes. 
 
 Now, sir, I trust I have shown, first on that naiTow ground which 
 the honorable gentleman measured, that you are likely to lose noth- 
 ing by complying with the motion, except what you have lost 
 already. I have shown afterwards, that in time of peace you flour- 
 ished in commerce, and when war required it, had sufficient aid from 
 the colonies, while you pursued your ancient policy ; that you threw 
 evei-ything into confusion when you made the stamp act ; and that 
 you restored everything to peace and order when you repealed it. 
 I have shown that the revival of the system of taxation has produced 
 the very worst effects ; and that the partial repeal has produced 
 not partial good, but universal evil. Let these considerations, 
 founded on facts, not one of which can be denied, bring us back 
 to our reason by the road of our experience. 
 
 I cannot, as I have said, answer for mixed measures ; but surely 
 this mixture of lenity would give the whole a better chance of suc- 
 cess. When you once gain confidence, the way will be clear before 
 you. Then you may enforce the act of navigation when it ought 
 to be enforced. You will yourselves open it where it ought still 
 further to be opened. Proceed in what you do, whatever you do, 
 from policy, and not from rancor. Let us act like men, let us act 
 like statesmen. Let us hold some sort of consistent conduct. It is 
 agreed that a revenue is not to be had in America. If we lose the 
 profit, let us get rid of the odium. 
 
 On this business of America, I confess I am serious, even to sad- 
 ness. I have had but one opinion concerning it since I sat, and 
 before I sat in parliament. The noble lord will, as usual, probably, 
 attribute the part taken by me and my friends in this business, to a 
 desire of getting his places. Let him enjoy this happy and original 
 
774 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 idea. If I deprived him of it, I should take away most of his wit, 
 and all his argument. But I had rather bear the brunt of all his wit, 
 and indeed blows much heavier, than stand answerable to God for 
 embracing a system that tends to the destruction of some of the very 
 best and fairest of his works. But I know the map of England, as 
 well as the noble lord, or as any other person ; and I know that the 
 ■way I take is not the road to preferment. My excellent and hon. 
 friend under me on the floor (Mr. Dowdeswell) has trod that road 
 with great toil for upwards of twenty years together. He is not yet 
 arrived at the noble lord's destination. However, the tracks of my 
 worthy friend are those I have ever wished to follow ; because I 
 know the}"^ lead to honor. Long may we ti'ead the same road 
 together, whoever may accompany us, or whoever may laugh at us 
 on our journey ! I honestly and solemnly declare, I have in all 
 seasons adhered to the system of 1766, for no other reason, than 
 that I think it laid deep in your truest interests — and that, by limit- 
 ing the exercise, it fixes on the firmest foundations, a real, consistent, 
 well-grounded authority in parliament. Until you come back to 
 that system, there will be no peace for England. 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 775 
 
 Speech 
 
 On Taking Leave of the Electors of Bristol. 
 
 Although Burke entered on his canvass of the Bristol electors in September, 
 1780, with the support of the Mayor and several other leading citizens, he found the 
 tide of bigotry and prejudice too strong against him, and accordingly, on the morn- 
 ing on which the polling was to commence, he resigned. On this occasion he 
 delivered the following graceful speech, perhaps the best-tempered any unsuccessful 
 canvasser ever spoke. 
 
 ^^ENTLEMEN, — I decline the election. It has ever been my 
 ^^ rule through life to observe a proportion between my efforts 
 ^ and my objects. I have never been remarkable for a bold, 
 H active and sanguine pursuit of advantages that are personal to 
 myself. 
 
 I have not canvassed the whole of this city in form. But I have 
 taken such a view of it, as satisfies my own mind, that your choice 
 will not ultimately fall upon me. Your city, gentleman, is in a state 
 of miserable distraction : and I am resolved to withdra^v whatever 
 share my pretensions may have had in its unhappy divisions. I have 
 not been in haste ; I have tried all prudent means ; I have waited for 
 the effects of all contingencies. If I were fond of a contest, by the 
 jaartiality of my numerous friends (whom you know to be among the 
 most weighty and respectable people of the city) I have the means 
 of a sharp one in my hands. But I thought it far better, with my 
 strength unspent, and my reputation unimpaired, to do, early and 
 from foresight, that which I might be obliged to do from necessity at 
 last. 
 
 [Note. — Burke left Bristol immediately and proceeded to Malton (where he had 
 been elected in 1774), for which borough he was immediately returned. He sat for 
 Malton during the remainder of his parliamentary career.] 
 
776 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 I am not in the least surprised, nor in the least angry 'at this view 
 of things. I have read the book of life for a long time, and I have 
 read other books a little. Nothing has happened to me, but what 
 has happened to men much better than I, and in times and in nations 
 full as good as the age and country that we live in. To say that I 
 am no way concerned, would be neither decent nor true. The repre- 
 sentation of Bristol was an object on many accounts dear to me ; and 
 I certainly should very far prefer it to any other in the kingdom. 
 My habits are made to it ; and it is in general more unpleasant to be 
 rejected after long trial, than not to be chosen at all. 
 
 But, gentlemen, I will see nothing except 3-our former kindness, 
 and I will give way to no other sentiments than those of gratitude. 
 From the bottom of my heart I thank you for what you have done 
 for me. You have given mo a long term, which is now expired. I 
 have performed the conditions, and enjoyed all the profits to the full ; 
 and I now surrender your estate into your hands without being in a 
 single tile, or a single stone, impaired or wasted by my use. I have 
 served the public for fifteen years. I have served you in particular 
 for six. What is passed is well stored. It is safe and out of the 
 power of fortune. What is to come, is in wiser hands than ours ; 
 and He, in whose hands it is, best knows whether it is best for you 
 and mc, that I should be in parliament or even in the world. 
 
 Gentlemen, the melancholy event of j^esterday reads to us an 
 awful lesson against being too much troubled about any of the 
 objects of ordimuy ambition. The worthy gentleman, Mr. Coorabe, 
 the candidate who has died suddenly, and who has been snatched 
 from us at the moment of the election, and in the middle of the con- 
 test, whilst his desires were as warm, and his hopes as eager as ours, 
 has feelingly told us what sliadows we are, and what shadows we 
 pursue. 
 
 It has been usual for a candidate who declines to take his leave by 
 a letter to the sheriffs, but I received your trust in the face of day ; 
 and in the face of day I accept your dismission. I am not, — I am 
 not at all ashamed to look upon you ; nor can my presence discom- 
 pose the order of business here. I humbly and I'espectfully take my 
 leave of the sherifl^s, the candidates and the electors ; wishing heart- 
 ily that the choice may be for the best, at a time which calls, if ever 
 time did call, for service that is not nominal. It is no plaything you 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 777 
 
 are about. I tremble when I consider the trust I have presumed to 
 ask. I confided perhaps too much in my intentions. They were 
 really fair and upright ; and I am bold to say, that I ask no ill 
 thing for you, when on parting from this place I pray that whomso- 
 ever you choose to succeed me, he may resemble me exactly in all 
 things, except in my abilities to serve, and my fortune to please 
 you. 
 
778 TREASURSr OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Select Passages 
 
 From Burke's Speeches on the Impeachment of Warren 
 Hastings. 
 
 Burke spoke three times during tlie trial of Hastings. He opened the impeach- 
 ment in February, 1788, in a speech which lasted for several days, containing several 
 passages of surpassing power. He also spoke to one of the charges in 1789, and 
 replied to the defence in 1794. Our limits do not permit us to give to the reader 
 these orations, but we cannot refrain from presenting to his notice some of the most 
 striking passages. 
 
 The following passage in reply to Hastings' statement, that to govern Hindostan 
 properly it was necessary to make use of arbitrary power, is very fine. 
 
 ^i^ASTINGS, the lieutenant of a British monarch, claiming abse- 
 il lute dominion ! From whom, in the name of all that \tas 
 strange, could he derive, or how had he the audacity to 
 claim, such authority? He could not have derived it from 
 the East India Company, for they had it not to confer. He could 
 not have received it from his sovereign, for the sovereign had it not 
 to bestow. It could not have been given by either house of parlia- 
 ment, for it was unknown to the British constitution ! Yet Mr. 
 Hastings, acting under the assumption of this power, had avowed 
 his rejection of British acts of parliament, had gloried in the success 
 which he pretended to derive from their violation, and had on every 
 occasion attempted to justify the exercise of arbitrary power in its 
 greatest extent. Having thus .avowedly acted in opposition to the 
 laws of Great Britain, he sought a shield in vain, in other laws and 
 otiier usages. Would he appeal to the Mahomcdan law for his jus- 
 tificalion':' In the whole Koran there was not a single text which 
 could justify the powei- he had assumed. Would he appeal to the 
 Gentoo code ? Vain there the effort also ; a .system of stricter justice, 
 or more pure morality, did not exist. It was, therefore, equal whether 
 he fled for shelter to a British court of justice or a Gentoo pagoda ; 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 779 
 
 he in either instance stood convicted as a daring violator of the laws. 
 And what, my lords, is opposed to all this practice of tyrants and 
 usurpers, which Mr. Hastings takes for his i-ule and guidance? He 
 endeavors to find deviations from legal government, and then in- 
 structs his counsel to say that I have as.serted there is no such thing 
 as arbitrary power in the East. But, my lords, we all know that 
 there has been arbitrary power in India ; that tyrants have usurped 
 it ; and that in some instances princes, otherwise meritorious, have 
 violated the liberties of the people, and have been lawfully deposed 
 for such violation. I do not deny that there are robberies on Houns- 
 low Heath, that there are such things as forgeries, burglaries, and 
 murders ; but I say that these acts are against law, and whoever 
 commits them commits illegal acts. When a man is to defend him- 
 self against a charge of crime, it is not instances of similar violation 
 of law that are to be the standard of his defence. A man may as 
 •well say, "I robbed upon Hounslow Heath, but hundreds I'obbed 
 there before me ; " to Avhich I answer, " The law has forbidden you to 
 rob there, and I will hang you for having violated the law, notwith- 
 standing the long list of similar violations which you have produced 
 as precedents." No doubt princes have violated the laws of this 
 coiuitry ; they have suflered for it. Nobles have violated the law : 
 their privileges have not protected them from punishment. Common 
 people have violated the law ; they have hanged for it. I know no 
 human being exempt from the law. The law is a security of the 
 people of England ; it is the security of the people of India ; it is 
 the security of every person that is governed, and of every person 
 that governs. There is but one law for all, namely, that law which 
 governs all law, the law of our Creator, the law of humanity, jus- 
 tice, equity — the law of nature and of nations. So far as any laws 
 fortify this primeval law, and give it more precision, more energy, 
 more effect by their declarations, such laws enter into the sanctuarj^ 
 and participate in the sacredness of its character. But the man who 
 quotes as precedents the abuses of tj'rants and robbers, pollutes the 
 very fountain of justice, destro\'s tiie foundation of all law, and thereby 
 removes the only safeguard against evil men, whether governing or 
 governed — tlie guard which prevents governors from becoming 
 tyrants, and the govei'ued from becoming rebels. 
 
780 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 The following harrowing description of the cruelties perpetrated by Debi Sing, 
 one of Hastings' official servants, is perhaps without parallel in the language. It is 
 said that several ladies fainted at this part of Burke's oration. 
 
 Debi Sing and his instruments suspected — and in a few cases 
 they suspected justly — that the country people had purloined from 
 their own estates, and had hidden in secret places in the circumjacent 
 deserts, some small reserve of their own grain to maintain themselves, 
 during the unproductive months of the year, and to leave some hope 
 for a future season. But the under tyrants knew that the demands 
 of Mr. Hastings would admit no plea for dela}^ much less for sub- 
 tracti(m of his bribe, and that he would not abate a shilling of it to 
 the wants of the whole human race. These hoards, real or supposed, 
 not being discovered by menaces and imprisonment, they fell upou 
 the last resource, the naked bodies of the people. And here, my 
 lords, began such a scene of cruelties and tortures, as I believe no 
 history has ever presented to the indignation of the world ; such as I 
 am sure, in the most barbarous ages, no politic tyranny, no fanatic 
 persecution, has everyet exceeded. Mr. Pattei'son, the commissioner 
 appointed to inquire into the state of the country, makes his own 
 apology and mine for opening this scene of horrors to you in the fol- 
 lowing woi'ds : " That the punishments inflicted upon the r^'ots both 
 of Kungpore and Dinagepore for non-payment were in many instances 
 of such a nature, that I would rather wish to draw a veil over them 
 than shock 3-our feelings by the detail. But that, however disngree- 
 able the task may be to myself, it is absolutely necessary for the 
 sake of justice, humanity, and the honor of government, that they 
 should be exposed, to be prevented in future." 
 
 My lords, they began by winding cords round the fingers of the 
 unhappy freeholders of those provinces, until they clung to and 
 were almost incorporated with one another ; and then they hammered 
 wedges of iron between them, until, regardless of the cries of the 
 sufferers, they had bruised to pieces, and for ever crippled tliose poor, 
 honest, innocent, laborious hands, which had never been raised to 
 their mouths but with a penurious and scanty proportion of the fruits 
 of their own soil ; but those fruits (denied to the wants of their own 
 children) have for more than fifteen years past furnished tiie invest- 
 ment for our trade with China, and been sent annually out, and 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 73I 
 
 without recompense, to purchase for us that delicate meal, with 
 which your lordships, and all this auditory, and all this country have 
 begun every day for these fifteen years at their expense. To those 
 beneficent hands that labor for our benefit, the return of the British 
 government has been cords and wedges. But there is a place where 
 these crippled and disabled hands will act with resistless power. 
 What is it that they will not pull down, when they are lifted to 
 Heaven against their oppressors? Then what can withstand such 
 hands? Can the power that crushed and destroyed them? Power- 
 ful in prayer, let us at least deprecate, and thus endeavour to secure 
 ourselves from the vengeance which tiiese mashed and disabled 
 hands may pull down upon us. My lords, it is an awful considera- 
 tion. Let us think of it. 
 
 But to pursue this melancholy but necessary detail. I am next 
 to open to your lordships what I am hei'eafter to prove, that the 
 most substantial and leading yeomen, the responsible farmers, the 
 parochial magistrates and chiefs of villages, were tied two and two 
 by the legs together ; and their tormentors throwing them with their 
 beads downwards over a bar, beat them on the soles of the feet with 
 ratans, until the nails fell from their toes ; and then attacking them 
 nt their heads, as they hung downward, as before at their feet, they 
 beat them with sticks and other instruments of blind fury, until the 
 blood gushed out at their eyes, mouths, and noses. 
 
 Not thinking that the ordinary whips and cudgels, even so ad- 
 ministered, were sufficient, to others (and often also to the same, 
 who had suffered as I have stated) they applied, instead of ratan 
 and bamboo, whips made of the branches of the Bale-tree — a tree 
 full of sharp and strong thorns, which tear the skin and lacerate the 
 flesh far worse than ordinary scourges. 
 
 For others, exploiting with a searching and inquisitive malice, 
 stimulated by an insatiate rapacity, all the devious paths of nature 
 for whatever is most unfriendly to man, they made rods of a plant 
 highly caustic and poisonous, called Becheltea, every wound of which 
 festers and gangrenes, adds double and treble to the present torture, 
 leaves a crust of leprous sores upon the body, and often ends in the 
 destruction of life itself. 
 
 At night these poor innocent sufferers, those martyrs of avarice 
 and extortiou, were brought into dungeons ; and in the season when 
 
782 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 nature takes refuge in insensibility from all the miseries and cares 
 which wait on life, they were three times scourged, and made to 
 reckon the watches of the night by periods and intervals of torment. 
 They were then led out in the severe depth of winter — which there at 
 certain seasons would be severe to any, to the Indians is most severe 
 and almost intolerable — they were led out before break of day, and 
 stiff" and sore as they were with tiie bruises and wounds of the night, 
 were plunged into water; and whilst their jaws clung together with 
 the cold, and their bodies were rendered infinitely more sensible, the 
 blows and stripes were renewed upon their backs ; and then delivering 
 them over to soldiers, they were seat into their farms and villages to 
 discover where a few handfuls of grain might be found concealed, or to 
 extract some loan from the remnants of compassion and courage not 
 subdued in those who had reason to fear that their own turn of tor- 
 ment would be next, that they should succeed them in the same 
 punishment, and that their very humanity, being taken as a proof 
 of their wealth, would subject them (as it did in many cases subject 
 them) to the same inhuman tortures. After this circuit of the day 
 through their plundei'ed and ruined villages, they were remanded at 
 night to the same prison ; whipped as before at their return to the 
 dungeon, and at morning whipped at their leaving it ; and then sent 
 as before to purchase, by begging in the day, the reiteration of the 
 torture in the night. Days of menace, insult and extortion — nights 
 of bolts, fetters, and flagellation — succeeded to each other in the 
 same round, and for a long time made up all the vicissitudes of life 
 to these miserable people. 
 
 But there are persons whose fortitude could bear their own 
 suifering, there are men who are hardened by their very pains ; and 
 the mind strengthened even by the torments of the body, rises with 
 a strong defiance against its oppressor. They were assaulted on the 
 side of their sympathy. Children were scourged almost to death in 
 the presence of their parents. This was not enough. The son and 
 father wei'e bound close together, face to face, and body to body, 
 and in that situation cruelly lashed together, so that the blow which 
 escaped the father fell upon the son, and the blow which missed the 
 son wound over the back of the parent. The circumstances were 
 combined by so subtle a cruelty, that every stroke which did not 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 783 
 
 excruciate the sense should wound and lacei-ate the sentiments and 
 affections of nature. 
 
 On the same principle, and for the same ends, virgins who had 
 never seen tlie sun were dragged from the inmost sanctuaries of their 
 
 houses Wives were torn from the arms of their husbands, 
 
 and suffered the same flagitious wi'ongs, which were indeed hid in 
 the bottoms of the dungeons, in which their honor and their liberty 
 were buried together. 
 
 The women thus treated lost their caste. My Lords, we are not 
 here to commend or blame the institutions and prejudices of a whole 
 race of people, radicated in them by a long succession of ages, on 
 which no reason or argument, on which no vicissitude of things, no 
 mixture of men, or foreign conquests have been able to make the 
 smallest impression. The aboriginal Gentoo inhabitants are all dis- 
 persed into tribes or caste, each caste born to have an invariable 
 rank, rights, and descriptions of employment ; so that one caste can- 
 not by any means pass into another. With the Gentoos certain im- 
 purities or disgraces, though without any guilt of the party, infer 
 loss of caste ; and when the highest caste (that of the Brahmin, 
 which is not only noble but sacred,) is lost, the person who loses it 
 does not slide down into one lower but reputable — he is wholly 
 driven from all honest society. All the relations of life are at once 
 dissolved. His parents are no longer his parents, his wife is no 
 longer his wife, his children, no longer his, are no longer to regard 
 him as their father. It is something far worse than complete out- 
 lawry, complete attainder, and universal excommunication. It is a 
 pollution even to touch him, and if he touches any of his old caste 
 they are justified in putting him to death. Contagion, leprosy, 
 plague are not so much shunned. No honest occupation can be fol- 
 lowed. He becomes an Halichore, if (which is rare) he sui'vives 
 that miserable degradation. 
 
 Your lordships will not wonder that these monstrous and oppres- 
 sive demands, exacted with such tortures, threw the whole province 
 into despair. They abandoned their crops on the ground. The 
 people in a body would have fled out of its confines ; but bands of 
 soldiers invested the avenues of the province, and making a line of 
 circumvallation, drove back those Avretches, who sought exile as a 
 relief, into the prison of their native soil. Not suffered to quit the 
 
784 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 district, they fled to the many wild thickets which oppression had 
 scattered through it, and sought amongst the jungles and dens of 
 tigers a refuge from the tyranny of Warren Hastings. Not able long 
 to exist here, pressed at once by wild beasts and famine, the same 
 dcsi)air drove them back ; and seeking their last rcsDurce in arms, the 
 most quiet, the most passive, the most timid of the human race rose 
 up in an universal insurrection, and (what will always happen in 
 popular tumults) the effects of the fury of the people fell on the 
 meaner and sometimes the reluctant instruments of the tyranny, M'ho 
 in several places were massacred. The insurrection began in Kung- 
 pore, and soon spread its fire to the neighboring provinces, which 
 had been harassed by the same person with the same oppressions. 
 The English chief in that province had been the silent witness, most 
 probably the abettor and accomplice of all these horrors. He called 
 in first irregular and then regular troops, who, by dreadful and uni- 
 versal military execution, got the better of the impotent resistance of 
 unarmed and undisciplined despair. I am tired with the detail of the 
 cruelties of peace. I spare you those of a cruel and inhuman war, 
 and of the executions which, without law or process, or even the 
 shadow of authority, were ordered by the English revenue chief in 
 that province. 
 
 The following Is the peroration of Mr. Burke's wonderful effort on this great 
 occasion. 
 
 In the name of the Commons of England, I charge all this villainy 
 upon Warren Hastings, in this last moment of my application to 
 you. 
 
 My lords, what is it that we want here to a great act of national 
 justice? Do we want a cause, my lords? You have the cause of 
 oppressed princes, of undone women of the first rank, of desolated 
 provinces and of wasted kingdoms. 
 
 Do you want a criminal, my lords? When was there so much 
 iniquity ever laid to the charge of any one? No, my lords, you 
 must not look to punish any other such delinquent from India. 
 Warren Hastings has not left substance enough in India to nourish 
 such another delinquent. 
 
 My lords, is it a prosecutor you want? You have before you the 
 
EDMUND BUKKE. 735 
 
 Commons of Great Britain as prosecutors, and I believe, my lords, 
 that the sun in his beneficent progress round the world docs not 
 •behold a more glorious sight than that of men, separated from a 
 remote people by the material bonds and barriers of nature, united 
 by the bond of a social and moral community — all the Commons of 
 England resenting as their own the indignities and cruelties that aro 
 offered to all the people of India. 
 
 Do we want a tribunal? My lords, no example of antiquity, 
 notliiiig in the modern world, nothing in the range of human imao^i- 
 nation, can supply us with u tribunal like this. My lords, hero we 
 see virtually in the mind's eye that sacred majesty of the crown, 
 under whoso authority you sit, and whose power you exercise. We 
 sec in that invisible authority, what we all feel in reality and life, 
 the beneficent powers and protecting justice of his majesty. We 
 have here the heir-apparent to the crown, such as the fond wishes of 
 the people of England wish an heir-apparent to the crown to be. 
 We have here all the branches of the royal family in a situation be- 
 tween majesty and subjection, between the sovereign and the subject, 
 offering a pledge in that situation for the support of the rights of the 
 crown and the liberties of the people, both which extremities they 
 touch. My lords, we have a great hereditary peerage here — those 
 who have their own honor, the honor of their ancestors and of their 
 posterity to guard, and who will justify, as they always have justi- 
 fied, that provision in the constitution by which justice is made an 
 hereditary ofEce. My lords, we have here a new nobility, who have 
 risen and exalted themselves by various mci-its, by great military 
 services, which have extended the fame of this country from the 
 rising to the setting sun ; we have those who, by various civil 
 merits and various civil talents, have been exalted to a situation 
 which they well deserve, and in which they will justify the favor of 
 their sovereign and the good opinion of their fellow-subjects, and 
 make them rejoice to see those virtuous characters, that were the 
 other day upon a level with them, now exalted above them in rank, 
 but feeling with them in sympathy what they felt in common with 
 them before. We have persons exalted from the practice of the law 
 — from the place in which they administered high though subordi- 
 jiate justice — to a seat here, to enlighten with their knowledge and 
 
786 ^ TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to strengthen with their votes those principles which have distin- 
 guished the courts in which they have presided. 
 
 My lords, you have here also the lights of our religion ; j'ou have 
 the bishops of England. My lords, you have that true image of the 
 primitive church in its ancient form, in its ancient ordinances, puri- 
 tied from the superstitions and the vices which a long succession of 
 ages will bring upon the best institutions. You have the representa- 
 tives of that religion which says that their God is love, that the very- 
 vital spirit of their institution is charity — a religion which so much 
 hates oppression, that when the God whom we adore appeared in 
 human form, he did not appear in a form of greatness and majesty, 
 but in sympathy with the iow-est of the people, and thereby made it 
 a firm and ruling principle that their welfare was the object of all 
 govei'nment, since the person who was the master of nature chose to 
 ajjpear Himself in a subordinate situation. These are the considera- 
 tions which influence them, which animate them, and will animate 
 them, against all oppression, knowing that He who is called first 
 among them and first among us all, both of the flock that is fed and 
 of those who feed it, made Himself the servant of all. 
 
 My lords, these are the securities which we have in all the con- 
 stituent parts of the body of this house. We know them, we reckon, 
 rest upon them, and commit safely the interests of India and of 
 humanity into your hands. Therefore it is with confidence that, 
 ordered by the Commons, 
 
 I impeach Warren Hastings, Esq., of high crimes and misde- 
 meanors. 
 
 I impeach him in the name of all the Commons of Great Britain 
 in parliament assembled, whose parliamentary trust he has betrayed. 
 
 I impeach him in the name of the Commons of Great Britain, 
 whose national character he has dishonored. 
 
 I impeach him in the name of the people of India, whose laws, 
 rights, and liberties he has subverted, whose properties he has de- 
 stroyed, whose country he has laid waste and desolate. 
 
 I impeach him in the name and by virtue of those eternal laws of 
 justice which he has violated. 
 
 I impeach him in the name of human nature itself, which he has 
 cruelly outraged, injured, and oppressed in both sexes, in every age, 
 rank, situation, and condition of life. 
 
EDMUND BURKE. 787 
 
 In April, 1789, Burke delivered another speech against Hastings, in which he 
 opened the charge of having taken bribes from the native princes. On this occasion 
 the orator spolie for several days, and as usual in a fine strain of eloquence. Much, 
 however, of what lie said related to the minute details of the Anglo-Indian govern- 
 ment at that period, and therefore does not possess much interest for the readers 
 of the present day. 
 
 At the close of the trial Burke spoke for nine days, and his oration on this occa- 
 sion is said to have been one of the most splendid instances on record of combined 
 industry and oratory. He ranged over all Hastings' defence, and thus concluded. 
 
 My lords, I have done ; the part of the Commons is concluded. 
 "With a trembling solicitude we consign this product of our long, 
 long labors to your charge. Take it ; take it. It is a sacred trust. 
 Never before was a cause of such magnitude submitted to any human 
 tribunal. My lords, your house yet stands ; it stands as a great 
 edifice ; but let me say that it stands in the midst of ruins — in the 
 midst of the ruins that have been made by the greatest moral earth- 
 quake that ever convulsed and shattered this globe of ours (the 
 French Revolution). My lords, it has pleased Providence to place 
 us in such a state, that we appear every moment to be upon the 
 verge of some great mutations. There is one thing, and one thing 
 only, which defies all mutations — that which existed before the 
 world, and will survive the fabric of the world itself — I mean 
 justice ; that justice which, emanating from the Divinity, has a place 
 in the breast of every one of us, given us for our guide with regard 
 to ourselves and with regard to others, and which will stand, after 
 this globe is burned to ashes, our advocate or our accuser before the 
 great Judge, when he comes to call upon us for the tenor of a well- 
 spent life. My lords, if you must fall, may you so fall ; but if you 
 stand — and stand I trust you will, together with the fortune of this 
 ancient monarchy, together with the ancient laws and liberties of this 
 great and illustrious kingdom — may you stand as unimpeached in 
 honor as in power ; may you stand, not as a substitute for virtue, 
 but as an ornament of virtue, a security for virtue ; may you stand 
 long, and long stand the terror of tyrants ; may you stand the 
 refuge of afflicted nations ; may you stand a sacred temple for the 
 perpetual residence of an inviolable justice. 
 
LETTERS 
 
 ,-3 
 His Grace the Most Rev. Dr, 'McHale, 
 
 ARCHBISHOP OF TUAM. 
 
 [789] 
 
To THE Most Rev, Dr, MannerS; 
 
 Protestant Archbishop of Canterbury, and PRniAXE of all England. 
 
 The Question of the Divorce between George IV. and his 
 Queen. 
 
 Matnooth College, Dec. 2, 1820. 
 
 Fcecunda culpce serula, nnptias 
 Primum inquinavere, et genus, et domus, 
 Soc fonts derivata clades 
 In patriam populumque fliixit. — Horace. 
 
 Fruitful of crimes, tliis age first stained 
 
 Their liapless ofl'spring, and profaned 
 
 Tlie nuptial bed ; from whence the woes, 
 
 Which various and unnumbered rose; 
 
 From this polluted fountain head 
 
 0"er Rome, and o'er the nation spread. — Francis. 
 
 ^f*^Y LOED — During the late portentous proceedings which 
 have awed public curio.sity, j'our Grace and episcopal col- 
 
 |3|^°f leagues stood out in too prominent an attitude, not to 
 attract and fix observation. As the question of divorce 
 embraced much of ecclesiastical polity, it was naturally expected 
 that the faithful would be enlightened by the Avisdom and confirmed 
 by the accordance of the hierarchy. But, alas ! these anticipations 
 ihave been sadly frustrated, and the surprise and disedification that 
 were fccblj' murmured among the Lords have been long since loudly 
 re-echoed through the empire.* It has been a subject of regret to 
 some, of triumph to others, and of wonder to all, to see the heads 
 of a religion which hinges on the principle of the universal intel- 
 
 * Witness among others the speech of my Lord King, who sported a good deal of 
 mirth and raillery at the expense of the premier, until his seriousness was restored 
 by the shock which his faith had sustained in the collision of the prelacy. 
 
 <791) 
 
792 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 ligibility of the Scripture, arrayed in adverse ranks on a momentous 
 question, involving in its general tendency the best interests of man- 
 kind, and in this particular instance, the safety and the honor of the 
 empire ; disputing every inch of ground with Scripture authority, 
 and thereby demonstrating to the world the obscurity of the sacred 
 volume. For I will not — I cannot, my lord, suppose that any un- 
 worthjr bias or flexibility to power could warp the judgment of men 
 of such exalted station and sanctity. And hence, one cannot suffi- 
 ciently express his indignation against those rash advocates of the 
 Bible, who cannot defend its perspicuity without impeaching the 
 integrity of its expounders. Hitlicrto, whatever might be the 
 opinion of the prelates, thoy uniformly affected the language of 
 orthodox^' and concord, and like the ancient philosophers, though 
 they might inwardly disbelieve, they exteriorly reverenced the doc- 
 trines of the Church. But on this occasion they scandalized the 
 faithful, and edified the sectary, by sincerely revealing the mys- 
 teries of their own disunion. 
 
 I have heard, my lord, of the distinction of essentials, by which 
 the lovers of subtletj', more than of truth, have thought to elude 
 the arguments of their adversaries. It will not, doubtless, be re- 
 curred to on this occasion, nor will it be deemed presumption to 
 assert, that there is nothing essential in Scripture, if the doctrine 
 of marriage does not form an essential point of Christian morality. 
 It is not a speculative article, on which one could be supposed to 
 err without danger, and propagate his eiTors, without affecting the 
 public repose. It is a duty of every day's occurrence, connected 
 with the happiness of almost every individual ; nor have the min- 
 isters of the establishment themselves aspired to such unearthly 
 sanctity, as to be exempt from its obligations. It is, therefore, of 
 vast importance to know whether the marriage contract lasts for 
 life, or only during the discretion of the parties ; and whether we 
 are to believe, with his lordship of Clicster, that its ties are indis- 
 soluble, or, with your Grace of Canterbury, that adultery annuls its 
 engagements. 
 
 On reading the report of j'our Grace's speech, I Avas not a little 
 surprised to find a minister of Christ principally resting on the 
 obsolete laws of Moses. However, it may appear consistent 
 enough, that they who have a1)jured the living authority of the 
 
RLV. DR. McIlALE. 793 
 
 Church should appeal to the falleu power of the synagogue. Still, 
 I would expect from your Grace, that connected and enlightened 
 view of legislation which mounts to the origin, and catches the 
 spirit of the law, flinging aside its exceptions, and not the heavy 
 drudgery of a darkling critic, who fastens on a detached part, with- 
 out comparing its effect with the symmetry of the whole. It is 
 true, as appears from Deuteronomy,* that divorce was tolerated by 
 the law of Moses. But did this permission originally enter into 
 the views of the legislator ; or was it not rather extorted by the 
 stubborness of a people, whom it was necessary to conciliate by 
 indulgence to a compliance with the law? Hence the practice of 
 divorce was not so frequent among the Jews as it is generally, but 
 erroneously imagined. Hence it was uniformly marked as a licen- 
 tious advantage which was taken of the letter against the spii'it of 
 the law, and denounced by those who were raised up by the Al- 
 mighty, to enforce its observance or punish its infraction. 1 might 
 illustrate the truth of these assertions by a reference to the 
 purest period of the Jewish history. However, I shall content 
 myself with citing the following passage of Malachy, which marks 
 the indignation of the Almighty' against this odious practice : — 
 " And this again have you done ; j'ou have covered the altar of the 
 Lord with tears, with weeping, and bellowing, so that I have no 
 more a regard to sacrifice ; neither do I accept any atonement at 
 your hands. Because the Lord hath been witness between thee 
 and the wife of thy youth, whom thou hast despised; yet she was 
 thy partner, and the wife of thy covenant." j- It is true, indeed, 
 that towards the decline of the Hebrew republic the permission 
 given by Moses had grown into a pernicious practice. But this 
 relaxation may be traced to another cause. "When we consider that 
 the dispersion of the Jews introduced to their acquaintance the pro- 
 fane wisdom of the East ; and that hence they mingled moi-e freely 
 with the nations, it will not be surprising if the purity of the law 
 should have been adulterated by a mixture of exotic commentary. 
 Then arose the celebrated schools of Ilillel and Samaiah, of whom 
 the latter confined the privilege of divorce to adultery, while the 
 former abused the flexibility of the text to an indefinite latitude of 
 passion or caprice. The Sanhedrim was divided by the credit of 
 
 * Chap. ssiv. t Malachy, ii, 13, 14. 
 
794 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 these doctors ; * aud we are told that uutil the time of our Re- 
 deemer, the controversy still trembled between the alternations of 
 either party. 
 
 I have asserted that the liberty of divorce granted by Moses was 
 rather the effect of necessity than the spontaneous dictate of his wis- 
 dom. Such is the interpretation of Christ, who, while He explains 
 the law of Moses, unfolds and propagates His own. And the Phar- 
 isees coming to Him, asked Him, "Is it lawful for a man to put away 
 his wife ? tempting Him. But He answering them, saith to them, 
 What did Moses command you? And they said, Moses permitted 
 to write a bill of divorce and to put her away. And Jesus answer- 
 ing, said to them. Because of the hardness of the heart he wrote you 
 that precept. But from the beginning of the creation God made 
 them male and female. For this cause a man shall leave his father 
 and mother and shall cleave to his wife. And they shall be in one 
 flesh. Therefore, now, they are not two but one flesh. What, 
 therefore, God ha/Ii joined together let not man put asunder."^ I 
 should now appeal to the candor of the unprejudiced, and ask what 
 is the doctrine clearlj^ conveyed in this language. The Phai'isees 
 ask Christ whether it is lawful for one to send away his wife. To 
 obviate cavil and to defeat that hostile spirit which so often lurked 
 under a pretended reverence for the law. He asks what did Moses 
 command. Then, after showing that divorce was an imperfectiou 
 which originated in temporary circumstances. He ascends to the 
 origin and develops the primitive institution of matrimony, 
 showing its indissoluble connexion from the creation of only one 
 of either sex — a connexion, if we are to believe the apostle, f 
 which shadowed His own mystic union with His Church ; and con- 
 cludes by proposing this original compact, instead of the permission 
 of Moses, as the positive standard of His own law. 
 
 I should now ask if the solitary text of St. Matthew § be sufiicient 
 to weaken the force of this reasoning? "But I say to you, that 
 whosoever shall put away his wife, excepting the cause of fornica- 
 tion, causeth her to commit adultery : And he that shall marry her 
 that is put away committeth adultery." St. Luke|| agrees with St. 
 Mark, and what determines the controversy, the apostle, IT expressly 
 
 * Seidell Uxor Ebraica, Lib. Ill, ch. xviii, xx, xxii. t St. Mark, x. 
 
 X Ephes. V. § St. Matt. v. || St. Luke, xvi. ^ Cor. vii. 
 
REV. DR. McHALE. 795 
 
 lu the name of Christ, prohibits mai-riage even in case of separation. 
 What canon of criticism, then, can warrant us to bend the evidence 
 of three clear and consistent testimonies, mutually supporting and 
 illustrating each other, to an interpretation of an ambiguous passage 
 which is at war with the express principles of the legislator? But 
 if there is an apparent ambiguity, the Catholic interpretation makes 
 it accord with the tenor of the other evangelists. The Catholic 
 Church authorizes divorce, or rather repudiation, in case of adultery 
 — a practice evidently warranted by the first part of the text of St. 
 Matthew. Yet she teaches the indissolubility of marriage, a doc- 
 trine clearly deduced from the second part, compared with the other 
 evangelists ; nor shall I exhaust the patience nor insult the under- 
 standing of my reader by showing the violence that is offered to lan- 
 guage in qualifying an absolute member of a sentence with a forced 
 or fancied exception. 
 
 However, as if to satisfy the scruples and appease the pruriency of 
 the grammarian, we are told that after this discourse with the Phari- 
 sees, Christ was again consulted on the same point by His disciples, 
 to whom He was in the habit of clearly explaining what He denied 
 to the treacherous curiosity of His enemies, or only darkly delivered 
 in mystery and parable. To them He thus solemnly addresses him- 
 self: "Whosoever shall put away his wife, and marry another, com- 
 mitteth adultery against her. And if the wife shall put away her 
 husband, and be married to another, she committeth adultery."* 
 Such, my lord, is the conclusion of Christ himself upon that im- 
 portant occasion when He undertook to instruct the future teachers 
 of His Church. And hence I am justified in expressing my surprise 
 that the exception of an imperfect and abrogated law should be con- 
 verted by a Christian prelate into the rule and practice of a perfect 
 dispensation. 
 
 And now, my lord, permit me to lay before you another proof 
 of the truth of Catholic interpretation in the demoralizing effects of 
 the contrary doctrine. How different the idea of marriage in the 
 Catholic and Protestant religion. In the one we behold a contract 
 exposed to all the waywardness of inclination and caprice ; and in the 
 other a sacred connexion subsisting for life, exalted by religion, and 
 instead of being at the mercy of the passions, subduing and chasten- 
 
 * .St. Mark, x. 
 
796 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 inof their violence b}^ its salutary control. The facility of divorce 
 weakens the mutual desire of pleasing; a neglect of reciprocal atten- 
 tion soon creates indifference ; indifcrence may ripen into disgust 
 and rankle into enmity until the inihappy couple see no hope of re- 
 lease from a cruel bondage, except in mutual separation and the 
 prospect of new nuptials. Behold, then, the consequence : a divorce 
 must be effected ; adultery is a necessary step ; morality is sac- 
 rificed, the nature of law is reversed, and the apprehension, or 
 rather the hope of i^unishment, operates as an incentive to the com- 
 mission of the crime. What an unnatural state of society ! in which, 
 according to the strong language of Seneca,* people marry for the 
 sake of divorce, and divorce for the sake of marriage. 
 
 Witness the daily contracts, in which regular provision is made 
 for these disgraceful contingencies. I shall not speak of the wound 
 that is inflicted on national morals b}' the frequency of their recur- 
 rence. For such is now the facility of communication, that the tide 
 of immorality flows through a thousand channels, and soon pene- 
 trates from the highest region into the remotest creeks of society. 
 If we were to judge fi'om observation, we could not believe that we 
 lived in a Christian country. In the days of schoolboy innocence, 
 our belief and our delicacy are equally shocked at the pictures of the 
 Roman satirist, f Soon, however, the experience of age subdues the 
 virtuous scepticism of youth ; we see, in the licentiousness of the 
 times, the most faithful comment on his writings, and are taught to 
 absolve the heaviest strokes of his pencil from the chai'ge of exag- 
 geration. We behold the same shameful vicissitudes of marriage 
 and divorce which marked the degeneracy of Rome, and may con- 
 firm our opinion of the baneful influence of the Pi'otestant doctrine, 
 in the words of an eminent Protestant historian : "A specious theory 
 is confuted by this free and perfect experiment, which demonstrates 
 
 * Exeunt matrimonii causa, nubuut divortii. Seneca de benef. L. 3. 
 
 t As an instance of our retrocession to the good old times of Seneca and Juvenal, 
 I might mention the fantastic plan of Lady Mary Wortley Montague, who recom- 
 mended a bill in rarliament, septennial in its operation, for the benefit of married 
 persons. Your Grace will surely smile at the ludicrous licentiousness of the pro- 
 ject. However, I have no doubt but it would be as acceptable to many individuals 
 of the present day, as the law of Moses. See Spence's Anecdotes of Books and 
 Men : London, 1820. 
 
REV. DR. McHALE. 797 
 
 that the liberty of divorce does not contribute to happiness and 
 virtue." 
 
 What is then, my lord, the prolific source of these abuses? 
 
 Unde hfec monstra taraeii vel quo de fonte requiris? * 
 
 or what can stay the progress of immorality, while the doctrine of 
 divorce is unsettled, and abandoned to the licentiousness of every 
 interpreter? The Catholic doctrine on the indissolubility of mar- 
 riage is the only remedy — a doctrine that is already incorporated 
 with tbe common law of England. Startle not, my lord, at such a 
 jjroposition. Some of the ministers of the Establishment have gone 
 farther, and recommended a reconciliation with the Catholic Church. 
 Alarmed at the defection that is daily thinning the ranks of the 
 Establishment, they have seen no hopes of subordination except in 
 such an alliance. Nay, the union of the Churches occupied much 
 of the attention of your predecessor, Archbishop Wake, who, had 
 he lived to witness the dreadful progress of sectarianism, would 
 doubtless have pushed his overtures with greater zeal, and perhaps 
 with greater success. You may dread that the archiepiscopal throne 
 of Cautei'bury would be overshadowed by the amplitude of Saint 
 Peter's, and gradually shorn of its splendors. No, my lord; it 
 would borrow fresh lustre from such a junction. Such were here- 
 tofore the fears of some aspiring prelates, whose ambition made 
 them impatient of the supremacy of Rome. But scarcely did they 
 try the fatal experiment of separation, when they found that the 
 eft'ulgence of their thrones was only reflected. This train of thought 
 naturally reminds me of Bishop Butler, another ornament of the 
 Establishment. You know with what ingenuity he traced the anal- 
 ogy between natural and revealed religion, and discovered I'esem- 
 blances between physical and moral truth. However, had not his 
 prejudices arrested his speculations, he might have discovered in the 
 condition of his own Church another illustration of this striking 
 analogy. Loosened from the centre of unity, her motions are 
 capricious and irregular : unfed by any accession of light from the 
 fountain, her original stock is constantly diminishing ; and like a 
 distant star, still receding from the centre, she casts her lone and 
 
 ♦ Whence those grim monsters? from what source they spring? 
 
798 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 waning splendor, gradually deepening into that sort of twilight which 
 teems with wayward phantoms more than utter obscurity, and which, 
 though too feeble to light the way, is still sufficient to make the 
 darkness visible.* 
 
 HiEROPHILOS. 
 
 * It is consoling to witness tlie effect of this triitli on the men of Oxford, who 
 have courage enough to quit the regions of those spectral shadows which they 
 encounter in their inquiries, and are again returning to enjoy the light or the 
 Catholic Church. 
 
REV. DR. McUALE. 799 
 
 To THE Most Rev, William Magee, D, D„ etc, 
 
 Protestant Archbishop or Dublin. 
 
 Maynooth College, 1823. 
 
 A deceitful balance is an abomination before the Lord, and a just weight is his 
 ■will. — Proverbs. 
 
 ^^SpY LORD : Your Charge to your clergy has excited a becom- 
 ^^^« ing interest ; and if you were ambitious of celebrity, your 
 ^§SS^ labors are amply repaid, and your hopes are realized. My 
 
 °T" former letter was a reply to your address, such as it was 
 delivered or published. This will embrace your authorized edition, 
 improved by the slow retouchings of time, and enriched by further 
 illustrations. Though your Charge provoked the just resentment of 
 those whose feelings were insulted, I still entertained hopes that 
 your grace would explain what was liable to misconstruction, and 
 soften what was offensive. You had it still in your power to retrace 
 your steps with dignity ; and the forgiving generosity of your coun- 
 try would have put the obnoxious passages to the account of hasty 
 and inaccurate publication, or to the zeal of an ardent mind, hurried 
 by its own strength beyond the boundaries of discretion. But no : 
 the heaviness of the Charge is still aggravated by the severer harsh- 
 ness of the commentary ; and deeming it weakness to recede, with 
 the exception of a solitary word, you gloiy in being consistent. 
 Had you been content with publishing the Charge, such as it was 
 delivered, you would have been spared the second notice of "Hiero- 
 philos." But since you have presented yourself to the public iu 
 another form, we will now examine whether the hasty zeal of the 
 preacher has been corrected and improved by the cautious laboi-s of 
 the commentator. 
 
 In delaying my reply to this stage of the controversy, I have obvi- 
 ated the plea put forth by your Grace, of the necessity of " consulting 
 
800 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 for a name aud station that should be respected, by refusing to come 
 into familiar association" with what you are pleased to call the 
 "scurrilities of a degenerate press." On the style and temper of 
 your Grace's production I shall make no remark ; but on a compari- 
 son, the public will pronounce whether " Hierophilos " has not de- 
 prived you of that convenient subterfuge, by which exalted church- 
 men have often contrived to hide their weakness under the mask of 
 their dignity. 
 
 Your Grace's attempt to strip us of the ancient and envied name 
 of Calliolic, and to share in its honors, are almost unworthy of seri- 
 ous refutation. Never in so short a comjpass have I witnessed so 
 much of that happy ingenuity which labors to reconcile contradic- 
 tions. In one page you speak as a " sincere Protestant, and glory 
 in giving utterance to those sentiments which a Protestant bishop 
 should never compromise ; " and in the next, Avith wonderful ver- 
 satility, you would fain transform yourself into a Catholic ! Thus 
 your Grace becomes at once a Protestant and a Catholic — blending 
 in your own person those attributes which were hitherto deemed 
 irreconcilable. On one occasion, j'our style rises to a tone of indig- 
 nation against those politicians who have of late years appropriated 
 the name of Catholics to a certain class of his Majesty's subjects, and 
 familiarized the public ear to its injurious misapplication. In your 
 next address I would respectfully caution you to speak in more 
 measured language of the religion of politicians, lest, irritated by 
 such ingratitude, they might be disposed to prove how much you 
 are indebted to their services for the establishment of your own. 
 
 It is not to the courtesy of parliamentary language that we are 
 beholden for the name and honors of Catholic : it is derived to us 
 from a higher source, and rests on more permanent authority. It is 
 a name that is inscribed on the Creed of the Apostles, and which 
 attached Saint Augustine to the faith which we profess — a name 
 which, in every age, marked the rights of primogeniture, distinguish- 
 ing the lawful heirs from those who were excluded from the divine 
 inheritance — a name which has survived the ravages of time, and 
 has never been lost by the true believers, nor usurped by the 
 sectaries. Those who were conscious of the invalidity of their 
 claims, have often attempted to impose on the credulity of mankind 
 by the assumption of the genuine appellation, and by affixing on 
 
REV. DR. McHALE. gQl 
 
 the rightful heir.s some opprobriou,s epithet. Thus it was that we 
 were branded in this country with names which were intended to 
 obscure our title. They, however, last no longer than the force iu 
 which they originate ; and as soon as the laws that imposed the 
 obnoxious epithets are relaxed, the most bigoted acquiesce in the 
 justice of our pretensions. To deny us, therefore, the title of 
 Catholics, is to deny the just connection between the name and 
 nature of things, and to resist the current of thought and language 
 by which each one is unconsciously borne along, as soon as the pre- 
 judice which resisted it subsides. 
 
 Non aliter quam qui adverse vix flumine cymbam 
 Remigiis subigiit : si brachia forte reraisit 
 Atque ilium in prsceps prono rapit alveus amni.* 
 
 You acknowledge that the Roman Catholics are a branch of the 
 Catholic Church, but that their religion is so incrusted with rust, 
 that Protestants are obliged to exclude them from their communion ! ! 
 While we admire your scrupulous piety, we must feel grateful for 
 the chanty of your concession. If the Roman Catholics ai-e only a 
 branch, I should wish to learn where is the trunk. Not, surely, the 
 Protestant Church, since it would be an unnatural metaphor to con- 
 vert a recent and divided religion into the trunk, and to characterize 
 the most ancient one that professes Christianity as one of the 
 branches. Unable, however, to deny its antiquity, you associate 
 it with rust to depreciate its value. It is, my Lord, an old religion ; 
 nor shall it ever boast of any ornament to its simplicity, by courting 
 any connection with the fashionable doctrines of modern times. The 
 value of the genuine coin was sufficient to keep alive in every age 
 the vigilance of those to whose care it was entrusted ; and if they 
 were inclined to suffer it to rust, it has been kept polished by con- 
 tinual agitation. Like other precious jewels, it is gathering richness 
 from time ; and it will always preserve sufficient value to provoke 
 the hostility of those who are excluded from its possession. Its 
 antiquity then is its pi'otection ; and what would have rusted baser 
 metals, has, in reality, only brightened its splendor. 
 
 * So the boat's brawny crew the current stem, 
 And slow advancing struggle with the stream ; 
 But if they slack their hands or cease to strive, 
 Then down the tlood with headlong haste they drive. 
 
802 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Do not attempt, tlion, to separate the Catholic Church and the 
 Catholic religion ; they are really inseparable terms. If we are a 
 branch of the former, we are in possession of the latter ; and if yon 
 are excluded from the pale of the one, you are likewise shut out 
 from the inheritance of the other. How precious is the title of Cath- 
 olic, when it is sought even hy those who have abjured the Catholic 
 faith ! How fondly do you cling to its relics, and with what com- 
 placency do you repeat its venerable name ! But it is only the name ; 
 and while you arc amused with the unsubstantial shadow of the Estab- 
 lishment, you remind me of the Trojan chief, who solaced his oxii& 
 by feasting his eyes with the image of which the reality was gone. 
 
 Atque aninuim pictura pascit inaui.* 
 
 Content, yourself, then, with the name and dignity of a Protest- 
 ant bishop, nor associate with it a name which will only expose the 
 absurdity of your pretentions. Do not attempt at the sann; time to 
 be a Catholic and a Protestant bishop ; for they are two things so 
 different in substance, as well as in name, that no chemistry can 
 combine qualities so I'epulsive in their nature, nor logic associate 
 terms of such different signification. Should you, however, persist 
 in your pretensions to the name and prerogatives of Catholic, I 
 would beg leave to remind you of the fate of the wit, who affected 
 the dress and manners of the lord of the foi'est. But nature spoke 
 through the disguise, and the ill grace with which he wore his new 
 dignity quickly revealed the deceit to the ridicule of his companions, 
 and earned for the cheat the just retribution of his imposture. The 
 apologue was, doubtless, familiar to 3'our earlier years, and your 
 memory will readily catch the recollection; nor shall " Hierophilos" 
 descend to expound the moral. 
 
 To support your arguments in favor of the right of Catholics, 
 you quote the authorities of Cranmer and Cromwell. It is rially 
 eurprising that Protestants can speak of Cranmer with respect, 
 whose name and character, in mercy to their cause, they ought to 
 consign to oblivion — a man whose pliant faith, ever obedient to his 
 interests, successively jnelded to the most opposite impressions — 
 who shamefully practised incontinence while he professed celibacy — 
 who would sanction a system of morality that once excited the vir- 
 
 * And with the shadowy portrait feasts his mind. 
 
REV. DR. McIIALE. 803 
 
 tuous indignation of a Pagan audience, while bis heart alijurcd the 
 vows his lips had uttered — and who, like the two-foced Janus, 
 presented opposite characters to the Protestants and Catholics of his 
 time. As for Cromwell, most willingly do I make him over to your 
 Grace ; nor do I envy you all the support you can derive from the 
 name of the licentious favorite of Henry, whose disgrace and death 
 were attested by the joy of the whole nation as the just punishment 
 of his crimes. 
 
 I cannot dismiss this subject without adverting to the note iii 
 which your Grace insinuates two heavy charges against the Catholic 
 Church, by stating, that " that cannot be a true religion which pro- 
 hibits the free use of the Scripture, and subjects the word of Godta 
 the authority of man." I shall not stop my reader with any com- 
 plaints against the usual artifices of polemical disingenuity. The- 
 ignorance of others might be endured, and their misrepresentation, 
 disregarded ; but the qualifications of a bishop should place hiiru 
 equally above the influence of both. If I were not determined tc 
 give a full refutation of every part of your Grace's Charge, I would 
 refer you to the former letters of " Hierophilos," in which the cal- 
 umnies against the Catholic Church regarding the use of the Scrip- 
 tures, were refuted to the satisfaction, or, at least, to the silence, of 
 one of the most strenuous and talented advocates of the Bible. 
 But as you will doubtless feel more pleasure in being referred to 
 your own than to any other productions, allow me to place before 
 your eyes the following sentence, taken from your Grace's Charge : — 
 " We, my brethren, are to keep clear of both extremes ; and holding 
 the Scriptures as our great charter, whilst wo maintain the liberty 
 with which Christ has made us free, we are to submit ourselves to 
 the authority to which he has made us subject."* After this sen- 
 tence what becomes of the free use of the Scripture, which yon 
 hold essential to the true religion? If by the "free use" of the 
 Scriptui'e you only mean a " (en^pered freedom " regulated by the 
 authority of the Church in the use and interpretation of Scripture, 
 then you adopt the doctrine of the Catholic Church, and we will hail 
 your conversion. But if by "free use" you mean an uncontrolled 
 license of regulating one's belief I)y the Scripture and his own 
 caprices — and, mark, there is no other alternative — why, in the 
 
 * Charge, page 22. 
 
804 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 name of consistency, inveigh against the sectaries for asserting that 
 " liberty with which Christ has made them free ? " If the authority 
 with Avhich you endeavor to recall the Dissenters, subjects not the 
 word of God to the authorit}^ of man, Avhy has the more consistent 
 authority of the Catholic Church a different effect? If the judge 
 who expounds the law and corrects the abuse of its licentious appli- 
 cation, can justly spurn the imputation of invading the authority 
 of the legislature, why will the Church, not claiming more than the 
 authority of a judge, be said to usurji the rights of the legislature 
 of heaven? 
 
 The truth is, my lord, you stand not in need of argument. The 
 sentence I have just quoted, of which the want of sense breaks out 
 through the clumsy artifice of a labored and perplexed construction, 
 is the best evidence that you are conscious of your own embarrass- 
 ment. Knowing that you could not maintain your station without 
 the exercise of an authority, of whose inconsistency you arc con- 
 vinced, you endeavor lo soften it by keeping up the language of the 
 Keformation, like the crafty Augustus, who, whilst he exercised a 
 silent despotism over the Eoman people, still affected the language 
 of freedom, to amuse the prejudices of those who chei-ished the 
 memory of the ancient coiumon wealth. 
 
 You tell us that the Scriptures are the boasted charter of the faith 
 of Protestants, until we are wearied with tiie repetition ; nor is the 
 ludicrous spectacle of the shattered fragments of that faith which the 
 sectaries hurl against each other, sufScient to cure their infatuation. 
 We, too, appeal to the Scripture as the great charter of our faith, 
 but we appeal to it with reverence. We grasp no detached pas- 
 sages, which might appear more striking to our contracted view; 
 but we reverence the whole as the dictates of divine inspiration; 
 and lest we should err in adjusting the complex system of our duties 
 by its standard, we listen with respectful docility to that guide, 
 which after minutely surveying the whole, can best reconcile its 
 apparent inconsistencies and construct a balanced system of morality 
 by regulating the proper limits of our obligations and assigning to 
 the different virtues their respective proportions. 
 
 To conclude — and I entreat the attention of every thinking Pro- 
 testant to the reflection, as it obviates that delusion which has taken 
 strongest possession of their minds. The Scriptures were never 
 
KEV. DR. McilALE. 805 
 
 intended to be made the instrument of every blasphemer, who would 
 fain conceal his extrav.igance and impiety under the mask of respect 
 for religion. The indecent levity with which the awful concerns of 
 religion are often treated by polemics, and the flippancy with which 
 they abuse the Scripture, would almost make one think that the 
 Scriptures wei'e written for the vain and irreligious as a matter of 
 idle disputation. But the Scriptures are too sacred for familiarity ; 
 nor ought the mysteries of heaven be profanely agitated between 
 the vain contentions of men. Placed in the sanctuary of the Catho- 
 lic Church, the Scripture is the monument of God's covenant with 
 his people ; it afibrds a pi'oof of his presence, and a pledge of 
 bis protection. But when it is dragged out of that sanctuary by 
 the impiety of the sectaries, and sacrilegiously carried out to battle, 
 it becomes like the same ark of the covenant in the hands of the 
 hypocritical sons of Heli : it provokes the vengeance of heaven — 
 it becomes the signal of their shame — and the instrument of their 
 discomfiture. * 
 
 HiEROPHILOS. 
 
 * And the ark of God was taken ; and the two sons of Heli, Ophni and Phinees, 
 were slain. — I. Kinys, iv. 11. 
 
806 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Dr, McHale's Letter to Lord Bexley, 
 
 Ballixa, November, 1828, 
 
 ^^^Y LORD — These are strange times ; nor is it the least strange 
 of the features which characterize them to see with what 
 recklessness of their dignity the peers of the realm are rush- 
 ing into print, and becoming ambitious candidates of ridicule. 
 Heretofore they seemed to have adopted the Persian maxim of in- 
 vesting themselves with I'everence, by keeping aloof from the ranks 
 of the people. If they wei"e not great men, the secret of their little- 
 ness was only known to their ua to dechambre; nor did they rashly ex- 
 hibit themselves abroad, if they did not possess those hardy qualities 
 which are proof against public collisions. Eely on it, my lord, the 
 people take delight in those exhibitions of aristocratic intellect, as 
 it gives them an opportunity of measuring the relative distance be- 
 tween it and their own. "The JNIorning Chronicle," which conveyed 
 to me Loi'cl Bexley's letter, contained another of William Cobbett's on 
 the opposite side, and surely no reader has failed to remark how the 
 puny production of the peer shrinks before the sti'ong and simple 
 energy of the man of the people. With the Duke of Newcastle and 
 Lord Kenyon, your lordship fills up the triumvirate of literature. 
 Lords Farnham, and Lorton, and Winchiisea, are doubtless panting 
 for the honor of digesting in plates of brass, the laws of the Consti- 
 tution. Lords W^icklow and Rodcn must contribute their share to 
 the labor, nor shall they cease to associate to their body all the writ- 
 ing- peeis of the land, until they complete the number of Decemvirs 
 — a combination equally ominous to the liberties of the country. 
 
 It is difficult to compress within appropriate limits the refutation 
 of your address, since, with a lofty disi'egard of all the unities of 
 time, and place, and persons, your lordship's excursive fancy ranged 
 over every topic that could minister to the prejudices of the public 
 mind. 
 
REV. DR. McHALE. 807 
 
 The Catholic Association is the first object that provokes your rage. 
 I am not surprised. It is too nn'ghtj an object to escape notice, and 
 it is every day assuming a more imposing attitude, and larger dimen- 
 sions. To annihilate or dissolve such a formidable body, is the 
 problem by which the great council of the nation has been singulai'ly 
 l^erplexcd. There are only two ways — force or conciliation. The 
 first, has been already tried, as if to read a lecture of wisdom to the 
 advocates of coercion. But scarce was it dissolved, when its sullen 
 and mutinous elements again rushed to the same centre, and consti- 
 tuted another association, which has exceeded the former, as well in 
 the closer compactness of nil its 'parts, as in the more extensive 
 •sphere of its attraction. Force can have no other eflect than that of 
 binding the mombci's of the association more firmly together. It is 
 only the warmth of legislative favor alone that can so dissolve them 
 as to defy their future coalition. 
 
 The college of Slaynooth next comes in for the honor of your 
 enmity. The classification shows that jour mind is not utterly 
 destitute of arrangement, us the Catholic clergy are strenuous advo- 
 cates for the final pacification of the country. But what is the amount 
 of the ofiending of the college? Why, ti'uly, that it continues to 
 teach the unchangeable doctrines of the Catholic Church ! The great 
 political sin of its professors consists in this, that a sense of gratitude 
 for a sum of money, which is but a paltry pittance in the Govern- 
 ment expenditure, has not so subdued their minds, as to make them 
 traitors to the rights and religion of the Catholic people. In becom- 
 ing members of the college of Maynooth, its students never cove- 
 nanted to surrender the pure faith of their fathers. Indeed, your 
 lordship does not mean to insinuate that the college grant should be 
 Avithhcid on account of the report of the Commissioners of Education. 
 Surely, we ought to thank you for such a sentiment ; nor are we 
 sorry that Mr. Vansittart is no longer the dispenser of the public 
 treasury. 
 
 It is not from a compliment to the Catholic people, the Govern- 
 ment has ever granted money for Catholic purposes. It is from 
 policy — and it is to this policy we shall be indebted for the continu- 
 ance of such grants, if not for their augmentation. It is not the 
 -interest of Government to throw back the peasantry into the igno- 
 rance from which they are rescued by the labors of the Catholic 
 
808 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 clergy. It is not the interest of Government to let those passions- 
 loose npon society which are restrained by the control of the Catholic 
 priesthood. It is wiser, as well as more economical to expend a few 
 thousand pounds upon the men who are keeping the people quiet, 
 than millions upon those who are striving to intlame them with a re- 
 ligious and political frenzy. And, my lord, I assert without fear 
 of contradiction, that the Maynooth grant does more in the moral 
 improvement of Ireland, than the enormous mass of money which is 
 swallowed up by the Army, the Church Establishment, and the 
 countless Bible and Vice-Suppressing societies all together. 
 
 But still the people of Englan(? are taxed to the amount of nine or 
 ten thousand pounds a year, for the purpose of maintaining pi'ofes- 
 sors to teach the Roman Catholics of Ireland, that in some cases a 
 priest, in others a bishop, and in all the Pope, can release them from 
 their sins, their vows, their oaths ! And then you add, or rather 
 premise, such is the doctrine laid down in the class book of the 
 college. But why, my lord, did 3'ou not condescend to inform the 
 honest freeholders of Kent, under what circumstances, and with what 
 qualifications, could such a power be legitimately exercised. No; 
 it did not suit your purpose. It was enough if your lordship could 
 frighten John Bull into a horror for popery, by an ugly phantom of 
 your own creation. Could your lordship not lay before them the 
 following sentence of the report* alluded to in your address, and 
 which is extracted from a Catholic prayer-book, now before me, en- 
 titled "True Piety"? — " It is a fundamental truth in our religion, 
 that no power on earth can license men to lie, to forswear, or perjure 
 themselves, to massacre their neighbors, or destroy their native 
 country, in pretence of promoting the Catholic cause or religion. 
 Furthermore, all pardons or dispensations granted or pretended to 
 be granted, in order to any such ends or designs, could have no 
 other validity or effect than to add sacrilege and blasphemy to the 
 above-menticmed crimes." Here is an extract from a popular and 
 an extensively-read prayer-book, compiled by one of the most ven- 
 erable prelates of the Irish Church, and approved by the adoption of 
 the rest ; and yet, instead of exibiting it to enlighten the ignorance, 
 and conciliate the good will of the English people, you draw some- 
 dark and imperfect outlines of your own, leaving the rest to be filled- 
 * Page 228. 
 
REV. DR. McIIALE. §09' 
 
 up by their furious prejudices. Why not put in juxtajjositiou our 
 doctrine on oaths with that of Sanderson, a Protestant professor ia 
 the Univer.sity at Oxford, and afterwards bishop of Lincoln ? No: 
 the resembkiuce between both would disabuse the men of Kent of 
 their eiTors, and make them conclude that they were imposed upon 
 by the interested views of lords who labor to divide the people 
 in order to profit by their dissensions. The Catholics of these 
 times are still doomed to the same savage treatment which was in- 
 flicted on the Catholics in the time of Tacitus. Now, through the 
 calumnies of their enemies, as then through the fury of their perse- 
 cutors, they must be clothed in the skins of wild beasts ; now, as well 
 as then, must they be covered with pitch, not only to blacken them 
 before the public, but to make them fit objects for the brand to be 
 flung at, and now as well as then must they be exhibited with this 
 hideous caricature, in order to be hunted down by the public 
 execration. 
 
 Of all the topics of reproach which are urged by Protestants 
 against Catholics, none has surpri.sed me more than that regarding 
 oaths and dispensations. Is it because numbers swear a religion to 
 be damnable and idolatrous, of which they never studied an iota, we 
 must give them credit for a mo.st sensitive reverence for <iaths? Be 
 assured of it, my lord, that of those who intrepidly swear to the 
 idolatry of the Catholic religion, there are some who Avoukl curse 
 with -a similar oath the thirty-nine articles, if the orthodox loaves 
 and fishes of the mosque of Mahomet were to reward the seasonable 
 change in their religious convictions. You are not ignorant how 
 little of religion animated the great actors in what is called the Re- 
 formation. Your lordship is not ignorant with what dexterity they 
 accommodated their fluctuating creeds to the incessant shiftings of 
 the political fortunes of England ; and how the same persons were 
 prepared with the same lips to bless as orthodox, or to stigmatize as 
 heretical, the same identical opinions. While the Catholics of Ire- 
 land have cheerfully submitted to the slow tortures of a political 
 ordeal, on account of the reverence which they feel for an oath, no 
 doubt some of the lookers on were as much surprised at the prodigy 
 of their fortitude or their folly, as the Carthagenians, who secretly 
 mocked the suflerings of Regulus. To sound, then, this mysterious 
 subject to the bottom, the apprehension is not that the Catholics feel 
 
810 TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 no reverence for an oath ; but the apjjrehension of the Briuiswickers, 
 and the boroughmongers, and the monopolists of all classes, is lest 
 the Catholics should lose that reverence, and thus share in the spoil 
 from which they are excluded. There is, then, a sentiment which 
 may be appropriately added to those which are already so loudly 
 toasted amidst the Orange orgies, and which, no doubt, will be 
 rapturously cheered by every loyal supporter of the Protestant 
 constitution ! ! 
 
 May all the Papists of Ireland continue to be as much the dupes 
 to their reverence for an oath, as were their Popish ancestors ! 
 
 But though such a sentiment might be echoed by the hypocrites 
 who turn religion into an instrument of faction, it will not be 
 relished by that sound portion of the Protestant community, who 
 can view the most hard-hearted selfishness lurking under the guise 
 of a regard for the constitution. The people of England are begin- 
 ning to be sensible how often they have been imposed upon by such 
 hollow pretensions. As liberty was often the stalking-horse of the 
 little tyrants of Greece, religious liberty is become the stalking- 
 horse of the aristocratic faction of Britain. But the eyes of the 
 I^eople are almost opened to these delusions. They know how 
 the unprincii:)led Somerset could erect palaces out of the ruins of 
 churches, under pretence of abolisliing every vestige of idolatiy ; — 
 they know how Henry kept a succession of concubines, while the 
 people were persuaded that all this was done in order to protect the 
 purity of the Levitical law against the abominations of the Scarlet 
 Lady of Rome ; — they know how their ancestors were burdened 
 "with poor rates, while the lords, who were frightening them with 
 the terrors of Popery, were, at Ihe same time, pocketing the wealth 
 of the monasteries. They know all this, nor will they suffer them- 
 selves to be cajoled any longer by saintly lords, who would burthen 
 them with fresh imposts, whi'st they amuse them with the shadow 
 of a constitution, of which they reserve the benefits to them- 
 selves. 
 
 Another article of impeachment against the Catholics of Ireland 
 is, tliat Dr. Crotty justified the Council of Constance in the execu- 
 tion of John Huss, and that Dr. McHale M'rote a series of letters 
 against the Protestant Establishment. I am at a loss to know why 
 the Catholics of Ireland should sutler for such hiijh misdemeanors. 
 
KEV. DR. McHALE. 811 
 
 But Dr. Crotty holds his place, though guilty, by his sanction of 
 the sentence, of the murder of John Huss ; and Dr. McHale, in- 
 stead of being removed from the College, as he deserved, for daring 
 to attack the majesty of the Established Church, was rewarded with 
 a bishopric. Why, really, those letters contained the very milk of 
 human kindness, compared to the burning lava which has been since 
 poured upon the devoted heads of the parsons and the Establish- 
 ment. Instead, therefore, of censure, I ought to have been thanked 
 for the charity of m}^ forbearance. But the great crime was, that 
 the professor of theology ■vvjas attacking the Established Church 
 behind the masked battery of "Ilierophiios." In vindication, he 
 must say, that none of those masked assaults were half so serious 
 as those which were avowed with his name ; and, again, that the 
 signature of " Hici'ophilos " became like a German mask, which is 
 worn b}^ known personages, in order to avoid the inconvenience of 
 recognition. A Rev. Mr. Philpot, or the Quarterly Reviewer, pre- 
 tends not to understand any distinction between a real and an as- 
 sumed signature. Perhaps, I may furnish them with an appropriate 
 illustration. The Fellows of Trinity College were forbidden to 
 marry under the pain of expulsion. However, they interpreted 
 Genesis like Luther, and defied the laws of the College. Were 
 tliey removed? No; because no lady assumed the name of the 
 Fellow to whom she was allied. It was a matter of notoriety that 
 such a one was the Avife of such a Fellow ; but he eluded the 
 requisition of the law, on account of her anonymous, or, rather, 
 heteronymous, appellation. Until of late this serious and import- 
 ant statute was constantly violated. With your lordship, I will 
 ask, were these Fellows expelled? And, with your lordship, I 
 shall answer — No. But one of them was raised to a bisliopric, 
 to insult the faith and exasperate the feelings of millions, who are 
 taxed to minister to the pride, and pomp, and luxury of men, who, 
 under the blasphemed name of the God of peace are shaking the 
 country by their political fanaticism. 
 
 To conclude this letter, I admit with your lordship that the 
 ■question is — whether the Catholics are equally entitled with the 
 Protestants to all the benefits of the constitution? On this one 
 point, then, we come to close issue. For me, though nurtured in 
 the schools of arbitrary and Popish doctrines, I have learned that 
 
812 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 no human authority has a right to coutrol the dictates of conscience, 
 or to punish, by penal enactments, religious sentiments, which war 
 not with our obligations to the state. These are the sentiments I 
 have been taught, and these are the sentiments by which our fitness 
 for civil offices ought to be estimated. We are not to bo judged 
 by the criterion fixed by your lordship, namely, the doctrines that 
 Avere considered hostile to the Government — doctrines that 
 are considered hostile ! ! We must protest against this criterion, 
 whilst it is left to every monopolizing peer to fix its fluctuating 
 meaning. 
 
 Your lordship, no doubt, would consider the Pope's purely spir- 
 itual supremacy an hostile doctrine. The Duke of Newcastle would 
 consider the belief of the real presence a most formidable tenet. 
 The invocation of saints would make Lord Lorton consider that we 
 were invoking legions fi-om heaven to dispossess him of his estates ; 
 and, ill short, every principle of the Roman Catholics would be con- 
 sidered dangerous, whilst it was known that the monopoly of the few 
 was to be shared among the many. 
 
 It is high time that the empyrics in politics should resign their 
 trade, and that Ireland should be at length subjected to a process 
 that will restore her to soundness and to strength. Without Eman- 
 cipation, she will be feeble, and a burden to the empire. Not that 
 Emancipation will heal all her evils — assuredly no. It is only the 
 first step in the process of her regeneration. Other measures for 
 her relief must I'ollow in due course, until some powerful minister, 
 backed l)y the co-operation of the entire country, shall arise, and 
 apply his Herculean strength to the pinging and re-forming of the 
 Establishment. 
 
 In the meantime, Emancipation must be obtained. It must be 
 generously given, in order to be thankfully received. It is not to 
 be encumbered with any conditions that may be considered as nets 
 for the religion of the people. The people of England are jealous 
 of their civil and religious liberty. The Catholics of Ireland are 
 equally jealous of theirs. Your lordship talks of concordats, and 
 introduces the difl'erent states of Europe. There is no necessity for 
 such a remote reference. England wants strength; Ireland requires 
 tranquillity. Let the negotiation be, therefore, carried on Avith & 
 view to their mutual political advantages, without any insidious at- 
 
REV. DR. McHALE. 813 
 
 tempts on the religion of either. The Catholic religion can be made 
 a useful ally to the state ; but it is only when its profession is un- 
 shackled, and its .ministers are beyond the reach of any sinister 
 political control. 
 
 I have the honor to be, your lordship's obedient servant. 
 
 ^ John, Bishop or Maronia. 
 
814 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 To THE Protestant Archbishop of Tuam. 
 
 Ballina, February 10, 1830. 
 
 ^^^pY LORD — It ap[)ears from the public prints tliat your Grace 
 i^l^^ has been lately exercising yoixv pastoral zeal, in writing^ 
 ^^^P to your clergy, to carry on a mission among the Roman 
 
 '^' Catholics ; and if the copy of the circular be genuine, it 
 is a production that evinces no ordinary spirit. It was fondly im- 
 agiaed that a benevolent legislature had succeeded in stilling the 
 angry spirit of controversy by which the land was so long shaken, 
 and the appearance of the olive branch was hailed as a presage of 
 mutual conciliation. But, whilst the Government brings peace, 
 your Grace seems to imagine that the sword is a more befitting 
 badge for the ministers of I'eligion ; and hence you seize once 
 more your theological trumpet, to arouse the sentinels of Israel 
 to vigilance and war. 
 
 At any time the letter to which I allude would be considered the 
 production of a mind under the most potent preternatural influences. 
 At present, and with all the difficulties that stare the Establishment 
 in the face, it exhibits the calmest indiflorence to all earthly consid- 
 eration. There is no alloy of worldly prudence about your zeal ; no 
 cold calculations of the dangers to which the Church is exposed can 
 chill the ardor of j-our charity. No ; Avhilst the Establislimcnt is 
 now deliberately weighed in the balance, and (he other prelates are 
 watching tlie legislature with trembling anxiety for what may come 
 to pass ; — whilst Lord JNIountcashel, with a warning voice, is turn- 
 ing the public attention to the decayed state of the walls, and wisJies 
 to exchange some vain and gilded decoiations for Doric pillars, to 
 sustain the tottering edifice; — whilst Sir John Newport is giving 
 notice that he will subinit this important subject to the wisdom of 
 the assembled senate of the empire; — whilst the pressure of tithes 
 and church-rates is the theme of every theorist, of whatever creed. 
 
REV. UR. McHALE. 815 
 
 •who reasons on the national distress ; — whilst the Protestant Bishop 
 of Ferns frankly owns that, -without the rich harvest of its tempor- 
 alities, no minister of talent would think it wortli while to labor in 
 the vine^'ard of the Lord ; — whilst, in short, all are under the con- 
 viction that the public would be benefited by a mere general distri- 
 bution of the wealth that is confined in the temple ; — whilst, thus, 
 the temporalities of the Church are the only portion of it in which 
 its friends as well as its foes confess they feel an interest, your 
 Grace is happily free from any disquietude on this subject. No 
 such sordid cares can reach the elevation on which your spiritual 
 abstractions have fixed you. Your heart has no griefs but for the 
 spiritual blindness of the poor Catholics ; and were the Establish 
 meut to-morrow shorn of all temporal honors, your Grace would, 
 no doubt, be overwhelmed with joy, could you but extend to the 
 benighted Catholics its spiritual consolations ! 
 
 But, my lord, perhaps I do 3'ou wrong in thus attributing to yoa 
 an utter indifference to the world, which might only suit one of the 
 anchorites of old, and to which the sober and sensible spirit of the. 
 Protestant religion deems it no merit to aspire. Others of more 
 rational and practical views will be disposed to correct the mistake 
 into which I have fallen, and will probably perceive the deepest 
 craft lurking under the simple guise of religious enthusiasm. Yes ; 
 the Earl of Mountcashel has attracted universal attention to the gor- 
 geous temporalities of the Church, as well as to the enormous dis- 
 proportion by which they are applied. 
 
 Hence your Grace's polemical missive, sent foiih at this season- 
 able juncture as a decoy to divert the public from the substantial 
 game that has been started, to follow in the pursuit of shadowy 
 phantoms. Such artifices will, however, no longer do. Your brand 
 has been flung too late ; the pile has been extinguished ere your 
 torch has reached it ; and its materials, once so fiery and inflammatory, 
 have lost their qualities of combustion. You may now send foilh 
 your missionaries to set Catholics and Protestants against each other. 
 The Catholics and Protestants are too much alive to their own inter- 
 est to be the victims of such delusion. There was a time when every 
 town had its missionary menageries — when some controversial 
 curiosity was imported from afar, and carried round the kingdom to 
 amuse the old women of either sex, who thronged together to feast 
 
SIQ TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 their ears with a foreign dialect and their eyes witli a strange appa- 
 rition. There was a lime when the most ignorant mountebank w^ho 
 raved against Popery could fix the public attention. But the spell 
 that bound the hearers has been at length broken ; the film that fas- 
 cinated their eyes has at length been rubbed oiF. Ko illusions of 
 stage effect can blind men any longer to the fully and the mischief 
 of such exhibitions, and so completely palled is the people's taste 
 by their repetition that if a public advertisement were to announce 
 that your Grace himself, at the head of your missionaries, were to 
 ap2oear striding in stately pomp to the theological theatre, I ques- 
 tion whether you could command a sufficient audience to laugh at 
 the solemn mockery. 
 
 Making full allowance for the readiness with which your clergy are 
 disposed to obey your Grace's orders, I doubt not but they would 
 prefer staying at home to take care of their tithes and their wives 
 and children rather than risk all the odium of a controversial cru- 
 sade. They know it is sufficiently burdensome to Catholics to pay 
 them the tenth portion of the fruits of their industry ; nor should 
 they like to aggravate the burden by additional reproaches on their 
 religion. Let them, however, go forth ; and in putting the two 
 religions in juxtaposition, let them not fail in addressing the Catholics 
 — who are often without a church to shelter thorn — to exhibit the 
 blessings of the Law Church, which piousl}' transferred to the wives 
 and daughters of its ministers that wealth which the old Church of 
 Christ had superstitiously expended in the repair and erection of 
 churches, as well as the relief of the poor. Let them go to some 
 of the parishes of your Grace's diocese, in which snug churches have 
 been raised at the expense of an exclusively Catholic population, 
 and let them pei'suade that population of the advantage of a pci-petual 
 church cess entailed on them for the purpose of providing salaries 
 for a clerk and sexton — perhaps the only relics of the ortliodox 
 faith iti the whole parish, and who are still deemed so valuable as to 
 require a golden anchorage to keep them from being drifted away 
 to Popery. Let them, on meeting large flocks kneeling before the 
 divine mysteries, with their ample foreheads bared to all the rain 
 and winds of heaven, invite them to fill their own little conventicles, 
 ■where, in spite of the threatened woesof Ezekiel,* their elbows may 
 ♦Ezekiel, xiii, 18. 
 
nSV. DR. McHALE. , §17 
 
 repose oii cushions and their devotions may be warmed by the com- 
 fortable efi'usions of a stove. But, my lord, the parsons will not 
 thus expose themselves to the bitter irony of a people perhaps more 
 famed than any other for an exhaustless strain of sarcastic intelli- 
 gence ; they will not, for their own sakes, be marked exceptions to 
 the good sense that is pervading all classes of society. There is now 
 no further controversy about the purity of the Protestant Chiu-ch ; it 
 is all turning on the permanence of its temporalities. All are now 
 agreed that the Establishment is a political machine originally framed 
 by political artificers, since kept together for political motives, and 
 which, like every other machine, as soon as the expense of keeping 
 it in repair shall overbalance its benefits, must be abandoned to a 
 quiet and natural decay. 
 
 On this topic there is no room for further disputation, now that a 
 controversy altogether of a different kind lias started up in tbe coun- 
 try ; which is the most cfiectual method of promoting the prosperity 
 of Ireland, and of uniting more closely all classes of the long-dis- 
 tracted people. Who sh;dl be foremost in exploring its resources? 
 in giving vigor to its trade? in opening new avenues of industry, 
 and consigning to merited contempt all the leaden lore of malignant 
 bigotry by which the minds of the people were so long poisoned? 
 Yes ; the apostles of discord must at length retire. There is now a 
 livalry of benevolence — an emulation in laboring for the public good 
 — a contention for advancing a nation's happiness, which :dl the arts 
 of narrow-minded individuals will not be able to suspend. There is, 
 in short, a great anxiety to bury, by recent acts of kindness, the 
 memory of ancient strife ; and a flow of mutual good feeling, silently 
 working through the country, which all the odium llieologicum 
 poured forth from your Grace's episcopal vial shall not be able to 
 embitter. 
 
 I am your Grace's obedient servant, 
 
 ^JoHN, Bishop op Maeonia. 
 
818 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Christmas Day at the Vatican. 
 
 Feast of St. STEPaEX, Rome, 1831. 
 
 ^^^NWILLING to interrupt the series of observations suggestecJ 
 s^^ by the contcmphition of the seven hills of the ancient city, I 
 /^p have not as yet made any reference to the Vatican. Yet no 
 it part of Rome possesses stronger claims on the affections of 
 the Christian. It was not one of the seven hills on which the city 
 was seated, yet it is the object which generally challenges the first 
 visit from the piety of the pilgrim or the curiosity of the mere trav- 
 eller. I was scarcely an hour arrived, when I hastened to Saint 
 Peter's, to offer up my cold and imperfect prayers in unison with the 
 incense of prayer and sacrifice that is daily ascending from that 
 magnificent and holy temple, to the throne of the Almighty. Its 
 precincts were worthy of the majesty of the temple. The obelisk in 
 front proclaimed the homage of the conquered arts and wealth of 
 Paganism to the spirit of Catholicity ; its refreshing fountains, con- 
 tinually playing in the sunbeams, were an emblem of its pure and 
 perennial doctrine flowing from the shrine of the apostles ; and its 
 curved colonnades, stretching out on either side, most significantly 
 represented the ardent and affectionate eagerness with which the 
 Catholic Church greets her children and cherishes them in her bosom. 
 No sooner did I cross the threshold of the church than I felt, what 
 others are said to feel, the illusion of its folded perspective. As I 
 advanced, it appeared to be gradually unrolled, adjusting the har- 
 monious position and size of the surrounding objects, until I stood 
 under the stupendous dome, of which I had just seen the original 
 model in the Pantheon : the one reposing on the earth, the master- 
 piece of Pagan temples, and the other resting on lofty pillars, pene- 
 trating to the heavens — the ■wondrous trophy of the Christian artist 
 by whose skill and energy it was raised. 
 
REV. DR. McHALE. 819 
 
 Though the capital is rich in works of art, ancient and modern, 
 it is distanced in competition by the splendor of the Vatican. To 
 the chui'ch of St. Peter was it first indebted for the varied aggregate 
 of unrivalled treasures which have been gradually gathered round it. 
 The residence of the Popes, transferi'cd from the palace of Lateran, 
 led to the erection of its palaces, its galleries, and magnificent 
 saloons, in which were deposited the relics of ancient art, disinterred 
 by the zeal of antiquarians, encouraged and animated by the munifi- 
 cent patronage of its Pontiffs. Poets and sculptor's studied with 
 assiduity those elegant models, and labored to rival their excellence 
 by similar creations of their own. The relation that Rome holds to 
 the world, collecting within its precincts more of historical and 
 classical monuments than are spread over the earth, the Vatican 
 museum may be said to hold to Rome, condensing within its sanctu- 
 aries such a rare variety of exquisite treasures as might be said tO' 
 rival, if not in number, at least in value, all the other collections of 
 this city. Without neglecting them, it is no wonder if my visits to 
 the Vatican were more frequent than to any of the other churches or 
 palaces of Rome ; nor is it until after repeated visits that you can 
 find a clue through the labyrinths of their apartments, and become 
 familiar with those mastei'pieces, which must be frequently seen in 
 order to be duly valued. 
 
 When travei'sing the saloon of the relics of ancient monuments, 
 with its cinerary urns and antiquated inscriptions, such as might give 
 occupation for years to a Mabillon or a Muratori, you fancy you are 
 walking through some ancient necropolis ; and I felt — to avail m}^- 
 selfof an anticipated incident — as I afterwards felt when walking 
 over the subterraneous city of Pompeii, that, of names once re- 
 nowned, and of achievements that conferred cotemporary fame, not 
 a memorial now remained but a misshapen fragment of marble, of 
 which the orthography might puzzle the most practised decipherer 
 of the eai-lier forms of the characters of Tuscany or Rome. Yet 
 even those fragments have their value. It was partly by their aid 
 (because a stone recorded every event) that such light has been 
 thrown over the early history of the city,- and I have often lamented, 
 that in Ireland, where it may be now done with safety, more atten- 
 tion is not paid to the recording of national events, in the more dur- 
 able materials of monuments of stone. From the excavations that 
 
820 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 arc occasionally carried on in the city and neighborhood, those mon- 
 uments are multiplying fast, and, notwithstanding the vast apart- 
 ments of the Vatican, arc requiring more extensive and appropriate 
 accommodation. 
 
 To the four successive Popes, bearing the names of Clement and 
 Pius, the Vatican is justly indebted for its extension, and their 
 names are in a special manner associated with its magnificent mu- 
 seum. Accordingly, the saloons bearing their names, and appropri- 
 ated to the representation of the chief events of their reigns, stretch 
 out (such is the fate of all history), and occupy a larger space as 
 you come down. Still, whether the apartments be small or spacious, 
 these objects, whether of painting or of sculpture, will always 
 attract particular attention, which have already secured the suffrages 
 of mankind. Such, amidst the monuments of ancient sculpture, are 
 the Nile with its attendant Nereids; the Laocoon, writhing in inex- 
 pressible agon}' amidst the coiling and venomous embraces of tiie 
 serpent; and, in fine, the Apollo, that may be admired Ijut cannot 
 be rivalled, combining all the energy of the one sex with the graces 
 of the other, and appropriately fixed in one of the farthest niches of 
 the museum, as an object for attracting fresh admiration. Such, 
 among the paintings, are the immortal frescoes of Raphael, still dis- 
 playing the chief events of the inspired history on the ceilings of the 
 galleries of the Vatican. Such the other chambers, appropriated by 
 Julius II. exclusively to his pencil, and known by his name. Such, 
 too, his fiinciful arabesques, borrowed from the baths of Titus, with 
 ■which the walls of the galleries are decorated; and such, in fiue, 
 the awful picture, or rather group of pictures, of Michael Angelo, in 
 the Sixtine Chapel, portraying — a boldness from which a less dar- 
 ing spirit would have shrunk — the terril)le scene of the last judg- 
 ment, of the reality of which an idea may be formed, when its empty 
 and shadowy representation cannot be contemplated without awe. 
 
 No doubt the peculiar circumstances of time and solenmity under 
 •which this singular picture is contemplated, impart to it an additional 
 effect. The chapel opens on the first Sunday of Advent — the day 
 peculiarly consecrated to the commemoration of the Last Judgment. 
 .During the four Sundays of that penitential season, solemn mass is 
 celebrated within the walls of the chapel, on which this awful scene 
 is delineated, and at which the Pope attends, together with the car- 
 
REV. DR. McHALE. 82X 
 
 dinalii, robed in their penitential attire. Without indulging in the 
 language of cxaggei-ation, it is an assembly such as seldom can be 
 witnessed. You have a meeting composed of men eminent for piety, 
 or science, or age, or long and arduous habits of business, and often 
 conspicuous for a combination of all these qualities ; and if the 
 ancient Gaul was tempted to stroke the beard of one of the Roman 
 senators, to try whether the god-like assembly was composed of 
 mortals, none need fear the imputation of that awe which ignorance 
 or bail)arism inspires, in pronouncing the senate of the Roman car- 
 dinals the most venerable and majestic assembly in the world. 
 
 The magnificent ceremonies of Christmas day formed an appropri- 
 ate close for the preceding functions of Advent. At an early hour 
 in the morning I went to St. Peter's, and had the great consolation 
 of celebrating three Masses in the subterranean chapel over the tomb 
 of tlie Apostles. Afterwards I attended at the solemn iMass sung 
 by his Holiness. At nine o'clock the cardinals, with their appropri- 
 ate ti'ains, together with the bishops, prelates, and clergy, were to 
 be seen crossing the nave from the sacristy to a chapel on the right 
 hand, near the great entrance-door from which the procession coni- 
 menced. At this time the scene became animated by the crowds 
 that were thronging to be present at the august sacrifice ; the bustle, 
 however, was hushed on their entrance, for, though some on moving 
 up the nave seemed in the attitude of conversation, not a whisper 
 was heard in the distance, and their little figures seemed to disap- 
 pear, as thoy spread in various directions, to t)rocure the most con- 
 venient view of the ceremonies. Still the city continued to [lour in 
 its fresh multitudes, yet the crowds were comparatively unnoticed 
 in its vastness. 
 
 The nave was lined by two files of Swiss guards, whose singular 
 equipment in arms and costume contributed to iieighten the cft'cct of 
 the solemn scene. Behind the high altar a magnificent screen was 
 erected, covering the tribune of the church,' and leaving the inter- 
 mediate space for the performance of the ceremonies. Against tliis 
 screen, which was tastcfcdly hung with richly embroidered scai'let, a 
 platform was raised, ascended by seven steps, with a m.ignificcnt 
 pontifical throne, elevated in the centre. Benches for the cardinals, 
 bishops, and other ecclesiastics were tastefully fitted up on either 
 side, and temporary galleries erected, for the accommodation of 
 
g22 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 many of the inimense congregation. After nine o'clock the proces- 
 sion began to move ; first the different ecclesiastics in their respect- 
 ive robes, next the bishops, and then the cardinals, sweeping, in a 
 lengthened and varied train, over the church, while the Roman Pon- 
 tiff, seated on his throne, and borne aloft by the nobles of the city, 
 formed a suitable close to the gorgeous spectacle. The liturgy was 
 then sung with all the power and harmonious variety of intonation 
 for which the Pope's choir is justly celebrated. The epistle and 
 gospel were sung in the Greek and Latin tongues. The impressive 
 solemnity with which the divine mysteries were celebrated tixcd the 
 attention ; but when the sudden clangor of trumpets, mingling with 
 the explosion of cannons from St. Angelo's, announced the elevation, 
 the effect was truly electric, and there was not a heart, that was not 
 a rebel to its own feelings, that was not prostrate in gratitude to 
 adore that God, who then, as in Bethlehem, came under a myste- 
 rious form — a sacrifice of peace and of propitiation. Christmas day 
 has everywhere its peculiar claims to devotion. There are, from the 
 humble huts in Ireland, as pure and precious orisons offered to the 
 Almighty, as fi'om any temple on the globe. There ai-e hearts in 
 ■which God kindles the sacrifice of his love, without any remote or 
 intermediate incentives. There is, however, no other place Avhich 
 furnishes so much of fuel to enkindle the flames of devotion, as this 
 temple. The august sacrifice of Melchisedeck ofiered on the anni- 
 versary of our Redeemer's birth, by one who exemplifies not only 
 tlie rite but the person of the royal patriaix'h, in the circumstance of 
 being at once a king and pontiff in a city which is the cemetery of 
 ancient Paganism, and the centre of the Christian world ; on the 
 spot beneath which, with the kindred ashes of St. Paul, repose those 
 of the Prince of the Apostles, whose spirit still animates and sus- 
 tains his successors, realizing the promises of the divine Founder of 
 the Church, whilst they survive the shifting dynasties of the world — 
 perpetuating the oblation of the sacrifice of love, and that under a 
 dome whose lofty roof draws up the soul to heaven — these wei-e 
 circumstances calculated to awaken feelings which cannot be forgot- 
 ten ; whilst the vastness of the edifice reminds you that it cannot be 
 the temple of any one country that you arc treading ; but as you 
 walk along, with the sanctuary still receding from before you, and 
 view the tribunals of mercy, with their inscriptions in various Ian- 
 
REV. DR. McHALE. 823 
 
 guages, inviting Greek and Hebrew, you are struck with the hidden 
 and mysterious immensity of the place — an emblem of Him to whom 
 it is dedicated — and forced silently to exclaim that this is no " other 
 but the house of God," into which "the nations should bo continually 
 flowing from the four winds of heaven." 
 
 >h John, Bishop of Maeonia. 
 
824 TREASUEY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Letter from Rome. 
 
 Mr Visit to the Pope. — A Manuscript Letter of Mart Queeh 
 OF Scots. — The Tombs of O'A'^eil .\nd O'Donnell, etc. 
 
 Rome, March 27, 1832. 
 
 ||i^^HE first of my visits to manifest the homage of my dtitiful rever- 
 ^S^ eiice to the Holy Father, was a few 6iiys after my arrival. 
 ^|j It was to a Cathiilie bishop from Ireland a visit fraught with 
 i consolation. Ndtwithstaiiding all the efl'orts, which an impi- 
 ous policy had recourse to, to sever our connexion with the chair of 
 Peter, etlbrts far more ingenious in their cruelty than those of the 
 earlier persecutions that hunted the Christians into the catacombs, it 
 was a gladsome introduction to be presented to tlie good Father of 
 the Faithful, and to receive at his feet the Apostolical benediction. 
 He is worthy of the elevation to which he has been raised. Eenevo- 
 lence ! — it is too weak a word; — affectionate charily beams in 
 every feature of the good Pontiff, nor is tiicre wanting that visible 
 indication of a stern and unbending intrepidity* of character, which 
 will not fail, whenever it may be necessary, to vindicate the dearest 
 interests of religion. 
 
 The interval between Christmas and Easter was occupied in visit- 
 ing the most conspicuous churches, galleries, colleges, and libraries 
 of Rome, together with occasional excursions to the remarkable 
 places in the vicinity, which history and fable have so much asso- 
 ciated with the early fortunes of Rome. On the feast of the 
 Epiphany, it was a rare and interesting spectacle to see priests 
 from the different Eastern Churches, Armenians, Greeks, and Mar- 
 onites, celebrating mass in their own peculiar rites, and in their owa 
 
 * His fortitude in supporting tlie illustrious Arclibishop of Cologne against the- 
 persecuting policy of the King of Prussia, as well as his Apostolical rebuke of the- 
 atrocious tyranny of the Russian autocrat, justify this view of his character 
 
REV. DR. McHALE. §25 
 
 respective tongues. The Sunday within its octave witnessed one of 
 the most gratifying exhibitions which any country could exhibit, the 
 young students, to tlie number of about iifly, delivering compositions 
 before the assembled dignitaries of Rome, in the varied languages 
 of their respective countries. It was a scene wiiich bore attestation 
 to the Catholics of the faith of Rome, as well as to the union which 
 links its most distant members, to see a number of young men, 
 brought up in adverse national prejudices, and speaking from their 
 infancy different languages, now assembled together, and moulded 
 into one intellectual mass, animated by one spirit, and like their 
 predecessors of old, in the day of Pentecost, all understanding 
 through their different dialects the voice and faith of Peter, conveyed 
 in one single language, is a continuance of the gift of tongues still 
 perpetuated in tiie Church, and which cannot fail to make its im- 
 pression on a reflecting and religious mind. In the evening, a large 
 and selected society of some of the most distinguislied strangers in 
 Rome, as well as the natives, enjoyed the elegant and princely hos- 
 pitality of the Cardinal Prefect of the Propaganda. On that occa- 
 sion, Monseignore Mezophanti* addressed a large number of the 
 guests in their respective European or oriental dialects, with ease, if 
 not with elegance. His acquirements as a linguist are rare and 
 extraordinary ; Crassus and others acquired great celebrity for their 
 ready talent in conversing with strangers in their own language : it 
 is not, I am sure, any exaggerated praise to assert, that in variety of 
 languages, or readiness in speaking them, they could not have 
 reached the excellence of Mezophanti. 
 
 Among the numerous and richly assorted libraries with which Rome 
 abounds, the Vatican is far the first in the number and variety of 
 its volumes. It may be, therefore, easily inferred, that far beyond 
 competition, it is the first in the world. Its majestic entrance is 
 worthy of such a library, as well as of tlio celebrated Pope, Sixtus 
 Quintus, who contributed so nuich to its literary treasures, as well 
 as to the embellishment of its architecture. A magnificent picture, 
 seen as ,you enter, exhibits Fontana, the architect, unfolding his plan 
 to the Pontiff: then you behold on one side, a series of the most 
 celebrated libraries in the world, and on the other, a succession of 
 the General Councils, by which the faith of the Catholic Church was- 
 * He has been since, and deservedly, honored with the purple. 
 
^6 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 illustrated. The library has been generally entrusted to men of vast 
 erudition, who Mere a])le to profit of its treasures, and again to 
 return them with interest, cnrichiug them with valuable productions 
 of their own. Such was Assemani whose oriental researches con- 
 ferred additional celebrity on the library of the Vatican. And such 
 is the Monseignore Mai,* the present librarian, distinguished for his 
 valuable literary labors in restoring manuscripts, which were thought 
 to have been lost. His courtesy and kindness in affording the 
 easiest access to this treasury of science and of literature, 1 feel 
 much pleasure in acknowledging, for it earned a claim to my 
 gratitude. 
 
 But, indeed, courtesy has been the characteristic quality of all the 
 librarians in Eome, in affording to visitors every facility of study 
 and research. Such I experienced at the great libraries of Ai'a 
 Cceli, and the Minerva, and such too at St. Isidore's, and the Bar- 
 berini library, in which documents and manuscripts connected with 
 Irish history abound. To that at St. Isidore, my visits were fre- 
 quent, as I found there a number of Irish manuscripts. Besides, I 
 loved to contemplate the portraits of celebrated Irishmen which 
 decorate its walls, especially those of two of the most illtistrious men 
 of their age aud nation — Luke Wadding, ihe learned author of the 
 Annals of the Franciscans, and Florence O'Mul Corny, Archbishop 
 of Tuam, to whose zeal and labors Ave are indebted for the founda- 
 tion of Louvain, and the education of many eminent men, who con- 
 ferred honor on their country. When one thinks of the dark and 
 diiScult times in which those men lived, and the mighty things they 
 achieved for their country and their religion, he feels confirmed still 
 more in his holy faith, since they must have been endued with more 
 than human fortitude, in achieving such great enterprises. I met 
 but one solitary exception to this general disposition to accommo- 
 date, in the keepers of the literary establishments in the Eternal 
 City. This exception was in the archives of the Vatican, — a 
 department quite distinct from its library. It is an immense collec- 
 tion of documentary papers and instruments, bulls, letters, and 
 rescripts from the earlier ages to the present time. I was anxious 
 to look for some documents that would throw some light upon our 
 
 * He, too, has been, as a reward of his' merits, associated to the College of Car- 
 dinals. 
 
REV. DR. McHALE. 827 
 
 ecclesiastical history, and enable me to fill up some chasms in the suc- 
 cession of our Ijishops during the persecutions. To my great sur- 
 prise, delay succeeded to delay, in such manner as to make it evident 
 that the keeper wished to deny me all access to the records which 
 I sought. On animadverting on conduct which appeared to me so 
 unaccountable, I found that the reverend gentleman was a pensioner 
 of the British government, employed to send them such extracts of 
 State papei's, as would elucidate the public transactions connected 
 with the history of England. Hei-e, in this solitary instance, I 
 found tlie perverse influence of British money, and drew my conclu- 
 sion on tlie misfortune that would come over Ireland, if ever the gov- 
 erimient should succeed in pensioning the Catholic hierarchy. This 
 man's sympathies, duties, feelings, seemed to be all absorbed by his 
 gratitude for British money. To our oppressors, as far as he was 
 concerned, the archives were open ; to the Catholic victims of their 
 persecution alone, they were inaccessible. However, a gentle hint 
 that I would look for redress from the pontifical government, nay, 
 that his conduct should be reported to the House of Commons, who 
 might take this reverend pensioner to task, wrought in him a kinder 
 tone of feeling, and procured for me a sullen and reluctant admit- 
 tance. Amidst the huge mass of documents, I could not succeed in 
 th*e object of my search. However, I lighted on many rare and curi- 
 ous letters, that well recompensed me for my loss. Among others I 
 ■was shown one of Mary Queen of Scots, written to the Pope in her 
 own hand, on the day preceding her execution. It was a precious 
 relic, which had the appearance of being discolored by tears. It is 
 no wonder ; such a letter could not be written or read without deep 
 emotion. It led to a long train of thought on the chequered life and 
 tragic death of. a woman, of whom her age was not worthy. Nay, 
 the bitter prejudices of her time, seem to have descended to pos- 
 terity. There Mas no chivalry, then, in justice, to guard her life, 
 nor chivalry in history to vindicate her fame. But time will avenge 
 her wrongs, and I could cheerfully encounter more of the suUenness 
 of the pensioned INIarini, to have the gratification of reading such an 
 autograph belonging to this illustrious and ill-used Queen, whose 
 misfortunes created a sympathy, which the misdeeds of the perfidi- 
 ous monarchs of her race were not able to obliterate. 
 
 Not far from the Vatican, on the Janiculum, the southern brow of 
 
828 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the same hill is a monument, which will fail not to tell the Irish 
 travellers, of what their ancestors suffered from the offs[)ring of 
 Mary Stuart. The small church of St. Peter, designed by Bram- 
 ante, and which reminds you of the temple of Vesta, on the hanks 
 of the Tiber, or of the Arno, at Tivoli, contains this melancholy 
 monument. A slal) of marljle in the middle of the floor, with the 
 names of O'Neil and O'Donnell, recalls to memory the flight of those 
 no!>le chieftains on a pretended conspiracy, set on foot to enable the 
 ungrateful James to partition among a horde of English and Scottish 
 Calvinists, their hereditary domains, together with six counties of 
 the I'rovince of Ulster. Few, whatever may be their opinions or 
 feelings on the justice of those ancient quarrels, or the policy that 
 dictated such cruel confiscations, could refuse a sigh or a tear to the 
 memory of the gallant Tyrone, the hero of Bealanathl)uide, who had 
 sustained so long and so bravely the sinking fortunes of his country 
 against the combined ainiies of Elizabeth. It was difiicult to resist 
 the rush of feeling which was called forth by the contemplation of 
 the close of his career, as well as by the ingratitude of his own 
 degenerate countrymen. Here, bowed down by misfortune, and 
 blind through age and iiiSrmity, this gallant warrior closed his life 
 like another Bclisarius, outlawed and attainted even by the suffrages 
 of those Catholics, whom he saved from utter ruin, without their 
 interposing one solitary vote for his protection. It is well that 
 Christendom has a home for the fallen and the broken-hearted. It is 
 well that there should bo some healing asylum where one can find 
 refuge from the ingratitude and perfidy of the world. That home 
 has been, and shall ever be found in the city of the successors of St. 
 Peter, and I close this sad and soothing train of reflections, by 
 oflViiug up a hearlfelt prayer for the devoted patriot, who, I trust, 
 has found that lasting home, " where sorrow and grief shall be no 
 more." 
 
 Jvly excursions through Ostia, All)ani, Frescati, and Tivoli, &c., 
 during which I sojourned chiefly in the convents that are scattered 
 throughout those districts, afforded much of instructive and agree- 
 able relaxation. The curiosities of those classic territories are as 
 famili.ar as the territories themselves are far famed, nor shall I 
 occupy the readei-'s time by their repetition. The lives of the soli- 
 tary anchorets of Camaldoli would appear too tame a narrative to 
 
REV. DR. McIIALE. 829 
 
 some who might reli.sh better more varied and stirring scenes. 
 Yet among those monks and su<,h other recluses, is to be found a 
 cheerfulness and lightness of heart to which the world is an utter 
 stranger, and which it can never imagine to be the inhabitant of such 
 abodes. There was one convent in particular, which I felt peculiar 
 gratification in visiting — that of St. Benedict, at Subiaco. Here, 
 near (he brink of the Arno, and under a line of frowning rocks, 
 parallel to the stream, is situated the monastery of the holy and 
 celebrated founder of the Benedictines. Near, is another, dedicated 
 to his sister St. Scholastica. I spent some days in this holy retreat, 
 enjoying the kind hospitality of the good abbot. In the chapel, 
 partlj' formed out of the cave in which the saint lay concealed for 
 three years, fed by an intimate friend, I offered up the sacrifice of 
 the Mass. A beautiful marble statue of the saint under the rock, 
 together with the leaves, bearing the impress of the serpent, by 
 which he was so tempted, that he rolled himself amidst the thorns to 
 extinguish the flames of concupiscence, still recall the memory of his 
 early combats and his early triumphs. 
 
 I returned to Rome before Palm Sunday, remaining there during 
 the ceremonies of Holy AVeek. It was a week that embodied more 
 of the impressive lessons and pi'actice of religion than many other 
 weeks put together. Many visit Rome from afar, though unable to 
 remain longer than during those few days, and well do they find 
 their toil and piety rewarded. The solemn tones of the Miserere 
 in the Sixtine Chapel, make them forget all their cares and fatigues, 
 and transport the soul to heaven. The kind and charitable attention 
 paid to the pilgrims, in the establishment set apart for that purpose, 
 makes such an impression on strangers, that I have heard yoimg 
 Americans exclaim with wonder and delight, that if there was true 
 religion in the world, it was to be found in the charity of Rome. 
 The washing of the feet by the Holy Father, is another tender and 
 affecting office, which fails not to exhibit, in the minds of the aston- 
 ished spectators, the connection between him and the Founder of the 
 Church, whose humility and charity he thus imitates. In my 
 observations on Christmas day, I have already given some faint idea 
 of the Pontifical Mass. The Pontifical Mass of Easter Sunday 
 brings an additional ceremony of most imposing solemnity — the 
 benediction from the balcony of St. Peter's : one cannot witness a 
 
830 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 more touching or magnificent ceremony. The Holy Father, accom- 
 panied by the cardinals, bishops, prelates and other ecclesiastics^ 
 who formed the procession, ascended to the centi-e of the balcony; 
 the vast square was thronged with the moving multitudes below ; 
 doubtless, there were among them foreigners who differed in faith 
 from the vast body of the people. The Pontiff lifted his ai'm, waved 
 his hand in the form of a cross ; no sooner did he pronounce the 
 blessing, than all knelt, and, as if under the influence of the same 
 mysterious spirit that subdued St. Paul, I think there was not one 
 that was not prostrate to receive, through the person of his Vicar 
 upon earth, the benediction of the Redeemer of the world. 
 
 ^ John, Bishop op IMakonia. 
 
Address in His Own Defence. 
 
 A, M. Sullivan, M.P. 
 
 [831] 
 
IRELAND, FAREWELL! 
 
Address 
 
 Delivered by A. M. Sullivan, M. P., in His Own Defence, 
 
 IN Green Street Court House, Dublin, Feb. 20, 1868. 
 
 ^iS^Y Lords and Gentlemen of the Jury, — I rise to address 
 gK^^^ yon under circimistances of cmhaiTiissment which will, I 
 '^JkS hope, secure for me a little consideration and indulgence at 
 your hands. I have to ask you at the outset to banish any prejudice 
 that iniglit arise in your minds against a man who adopts the singular 
 course — who undertakes the serious responsibility — of pleading his 
 own defence. Such a proceeding might l)c thought to be dictated 
 cither by disparagement of the ordinary legal advocacy, by some 
 poor idea of personal vanity, or by way of reflection on the tribunal 
 before which the defence is made. jMy conduct is dictated b)- neither 
 of these considerations or influences. Last of all men living should 
 I reflect upon the ability, zeal, and fidelity of the Bar of Ireland, 
 represented as it has been in my own behalf, within the past two 
 days, by a man whose heart and genius are, thank God, still left to 
 the service of our country, and represented, too, as it has been here 
 this day by that gifted young advocate, the echoes of whose elo- 
 quence still resound in this court, and place me at disadvantage in 
 immediately following him. And, assuredly, I design no disrespect 
 to this court; either to tribunal in the abstract or to the individual 
 judges who preside, from one of whom I heard two dsiys ago, deliv- 
 ered in my own case, a cliarge of which I shall say — though followed 
 by a verdict which alread}' consigns me to prison — that it was, judg- 
 ing it as a whole, the fairest, the clearest, the most just and impar- 
 tial ever given, to my knowledge, in a political case of this kind in 
 Ireland between the subject and the Crown. No; I stand here in 
 my own defence to-day, because long since I formed the opinion 
 
 (S33) 
 
834 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 that on many grounds, in such a prosecution as this, such a course 
 ■would he the most fair and most consistent for a man like mo. That 
 resolution I was, for the sake of others, induced to depart from on 
 Saturday last, in the first prosecution against me. When it came to 
 be seen that I was the first to be tried out of two jouruaiists prose- 
 cuted, it was strongly urged on me that my course and the result of 
 my trial might largely affect the case of the other journalists to be 
 tried after me ; and that I ought to waive my individual views and 
 feelings, and have the utmost legal ability brought to bear in behalf 
 of the case of the national press at the first point of conflict. I did 
 so. I was defended by a bar not to be surpassed in the kingdom for 
 ability and earnest zeal ; yet the result was what I anticipated. For 
 I knew, as I had held all along, that in a case like this, where law 
 and fact are left to the jur}^, legal ability is of no avail if tlie Crown 
 comes in with its arbitrary power of moulding the jurj'. In that case, 
 as in this one, I openly, publicly, and distinctly announced that I for 
 my part would challenge no one, whether with cause or without cause. 
 Yet the Crown, in the face of this fact, and in a case where they knew 
 that, at least, the accused had no like power of peremptory chal- 
 lenge, did not venture to meet me on equal footing ; did not venture 
 to abstain from their practice of absolute challenge ; in fine, did not 
 dare to trust their case to twelve men "indifferently chosen," as the 
 constitution supposes a jury to be. Now, gentlemen, before I enter 
 further upon this jury question, let me say that with me this is no 
 complaint merely against "the Tories." On this, as well as on nu- 
 merous other subjects, it is well known that it has been my unfortu- 
 nate lot to arraign both Whigs and Tories. I say further, that I 
 care not a jot whether the twelve men selected or permitted by the 
 Crown to try me, or rather to convict me, be twelve of my own co- 
 religionists and political compatriots, or twelve Protestants, Con- 
 servatives, Tories or " Orangemen." Understand me clearly on this. 
 My objection is not to the individuals comprising the jury. You may 
 be all Catholics, or you maybe all Protestants, for aught that affects 
 my protest, which is against the mode by which you are selected — 
 selected by the Crown — their choice for their own ends — smd not 
 "indift'crently chosen " between the Crown and the accused. You 
 may disappoint or you may justify the calculations of the Crown 
 official who has picked you out from the panel, by negative or posi- 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. 835 
 
 tive choice (I being silent and powerless) — you may or may not be 
 all he supposes ; the outrage on the spirit of the constitution is the 
 same. I say, by such a system of picking a jury by the Crown, I 
 am not put upon my country. 
 
 Gentlemen, from the first moment these proceedings were com- 
 menced against me, I think it will be admitted that I endeavored 
 to meet them fairly and squarely, promptly and directly. I have 
 never once turned to the right or to the left, but gone straight to 
 the issue. I have from the outset declared my perfect readiness to 
 meet the charges of the Crown. I did not care when or where they 
 tried me. I said I would avail of no technicality — that I would 
 object to no juror — Catholic, Protestant, or Dissenter. All I 
 asked — - all I demanded — was to be " put upon my country " in the 
 real, fair, and full sense and spirit of the constitution. All I asked 
 was that the Crown would keep its hand off the panel, as I would 
 lieep off mine. I had lived fifteen years iu this city ; and I should 
 have lived in vain if, amongst the men that knew me in that time, 
 whatever might be their political or religious creed, I feared to have 
 my acts, my conduct, or principles tried. It is the first and most 
 original condition of society that a man shall subordinate his pub- 
 lic acts to the welfiire of the community, or, at least, acknowledge 
 the right of those amongst whom his lot is cast, to judge him on 
 such an issue as this. Freely 1 acknowledged that right. Readily 
 have I responded to the call to submit to the judgment of my 
 country the question whether, in demonstrating my sorrow .and 
 sympathy for misfortune, my admiration for fortitude, my vehement 
 indignation against what I considered to be injustice, I had gone 
 too far and invaded the rights of the community. Gentlemen, I 
 desire, in all that I have to say, to keep or to be kept within what is 
 regular and seemly, and above all to utter nothing wanting in 
 resjiect for the court ; but I do say, and I do protest, that I have not 
 got trial by jury according to the spirit and meaning of the consti- 
 tution. It is as representatives of the general community, not as 
 representatives of the crown officials, the constitution supposes 
 you to sit in tliat box. If you do not fah-ly represent the commu- 
 nity, and if you are not empanelled indifferently in that sense, yon 
 are no jury in the spirit of the constitution. I care not how the 
 crown practice may be within the technical letter of the law, it 
 
83G TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 violates the intent and meaning of the constitution, and it is not 
 " trial by jury." Let us suppose the scene removed, say, to France. 
 A hundred names are returned on what is called a panel by a state 
 functionary for the trial of a journalist charged uith sedition. The 
 accused is powerloss to I'cmove any name from the list unless for 
 over-age or non-residence . But the Imperial prosecutor has tlie 
 arbitrary power of ordering as many as he pleases to "stand aside." 
 By liiis means he puts or allows on tho jury only whomsoever he 
 pleases. lie can, beforehand, select the twelve, and, l)y wij)ing 
 out, if it suits him, the eighty-eight other names, put the twelve of 
 his own choosing into the box. Can this be called trial by jury? 
 "Would not it be the same thing, in a more straightforward way, to 
 let the Crown Solicitor send out a policeman and collect twelve 
 well-accredited persons of liis own mind and opinion? For my own 
 part, I would prefer this plain dealing, and consider far preferable 
 the more rude but honest hostility of a drumhead court-martial. 
 [Applause in the court.] Again I say, understand me well, I am 
 objecting to the principle, tho system, the practice, and not to the 
 twelve gentlemen now before me as individuals. Personally, I am 
 contident that, being citizens of Dublin, whatever your views or 
 opinions, you are honorable and conscientious men. You may have 
 strong prejudices against me or my principles in public life — very 
 likely you have ; but I doubt not that, though these may uncon- 
 sciously tinge your judgment and influence your verdict, you Mill 
 not consciously violate the obligations of j-our oath. And I care 
 not whether the Crown, in permitting you to be the twelve, ordered 
 three, or thirteen, or thirty others to " stand by " — or whether those 
 thus arbitrarily put aside were Catholics or Protestants, Liberals, 
 Conservatives, or Nationalists — the moment the Crown puts its 
 finger at all on the panel, in a case where the accused has no equal 
 right, the essential character of the jury was changed, and the spirit 
 of the constitution was outraged. And now, what is the charge 
 against my fellow-traversers and myself? The Solicitor-General 
 put it very pithily awhile ago when he said our crime was, ''glori- 
 fying the cause of murder." The story of the Crown is a very terri- 
 ble, a very startling one. It alleges a state of things which could 
 hardly be supposed to exist amongst the Thugs of India. It depicts 
 a population so hideously depraved that thirty thousand of them in 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. §37 
 
 one place, and tens of tlioiisands of them in various other places, 
 arrayed themselves puhliciy in procession to honor and glorify mur- 
 der — to sympatliize Avith murderers as murderers. Yes, gentle- 
 men, that is the Crown ease, or they have no case at all — that the 
 funeral procession in Dul)lin, on the 8th December last, was a 
 demonslration of sympathy wilh nuirder as murder. For j'ou will 
 have ni)te;I that never once, in his smart narration of the Crown 
 story, did ilr. Harrison allow even the faintest glimmer to appear 
 of any other possililc complexion or construction of our conduct. 
 "Why, I could have imagined it easy for him not merely to state his 
 own case, but to state ours too, and show where we failed, and 
 where his own side prevailed. I could easily imagine Mr. Harrison 
 stating our view of the matter — and combating it. But he never 
 once dared to even mention our case. His whole aim was to hide 
 it from you, and to fasten, as best such efforts of bis could fasten, 
 in }-our minds this one miserable ri'frain — " They glorified the cause 
 of murder and assassination." But this is no new trick. It is the 
 old story of the nialigncrs of our people. They call the Irish a 
 turbulent, riotous, crime-loving, law-hating race. They arc forever 
 pointing to the unhappy fact — for, gentlemen, it is a fac't — that, 
 between the Irish peojole nnd the laws under which they now live, 
 there is little or no .sympathy, liut bitter estrangement and hostility 
 of feeling or of action. Bear with me if I examine this charge, since 
 an understanding of it is necessary in order to judge our conduct on 
 the 8th December last. I am driven upon this extent of defonci by 
 the singular conduct of the Solicitor-General, who, with a temerity 
 Avhich he will repent, actually opened the page of Irish history, 
 going back upon it just .so far as it served his own purpose, and no 
 farther. Ah ! fatal hour for my prosecutors when they appealed to 
 history ! For, assuredly, that is the tril>unal that Avill vindicate the 
 Irish people,- and confound those who malign them as sympathizers 
 with assassination and glorifiers of murder — • 
 
 Solicitor-General — ■ Jly lord, I must really call upon you — I deny 
 that I ever — 
 
 Mr. Justice Fitzgerald — Proceed, ilr. Sullivan. 
 
 Mr. Sullivan — My lord, I took down the Solicitor-General's 
 words. I quote them accurately as he spoke them, and he cannot 
 get rid of them now. "Glorifiers of the cause of murder" was his 
 
838 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 designation of my fellow-traversers and myself, and our fifty thou- 
 sand fellow-mourners in the funeral procession ; and before I sit 
 down I will make him rue the utterance. Gentlemen of the jury, if 
 British law be held in " disesteem " — as the crown prosecutors plu-ase 
 it — here in Ireland, there is an explanation for that fact other than 
 that supplied by the Solicitor-General, namely, the wickedness of 
 seditious persons like myself, and the criminal sympathies of a peo- 
 ple ever ready to "glorify the cause of murder." Mournful, most 
 mournful, is the lot of that land where the laws are not respected — 
 nay, revered by the jieople. No greater curse could befall a country 
 than to have the laws estranged from popular esteem, or in antago- 
 nism with the national sentiment. Everything goes wrong under 
 such a state of things. The ivy will cling to the oak, and the ten- 
 drils of the vine reach forth towards strong support. But moi-e 
 anxiously and naturally still does the human heart iustinctively seek 
 an object of reverence and love, as well as of j^rotection and support, 
 in law, authority, sovereignty. At least, among a virtuous people 
 like ours, there is ever a yearning for those relations which are, and 
 ought to be, as natural between a people and their government as 
 between the children and the parent. I sa}' for myself, and I firmly 
 believe I speak the sentiments of most Irishmen when I say, that, so 
 far from experiencing satisfaction, we experience pain in our present 
 relations with the law and governing power ; and we long for the 
 day when happier relations may be restored between the laws and 
 the national sentiment iu Ireland. We Irish are no race of assassins 
 or "glorifiers of murder." From the most remote ages, in all cen- 
 turies, it has l^een told of our people that they were pre-eminently 
 a justice-loving people. Two hundred and lift}' years ago tiie prede- 
 cessor of the Solicitor-General — an English Attorney-General — it 
 maj'^ be necessary to tell the learned gentleman that his name was 
 Sir John Davis (for historical as well as geographical * knowledge 
 seems to be rather scarce amongst the present law-ofEccrs of the 
 Crown) [laughtei-] — held a veiy diiferent opinion of them from that 
 
 * On Mr. Sullivan's first trial, the Solicitor-General, until stopped and corrected 
 by the court, was suggesting to the jury that there was no such place as Kuock- 
 rochery, and that a Fenian proclamation which had been published in the " Weeltly 
 News" as having been posted at that place, was, iu fiict, composed in Mr. Sullivan's 
 office. Mr. Justice Dcasy, however, pointedly corrected and reproved this blunder 
 on the part of Mr. Harrison. 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. 839 
 
 put forth to-day by the Solicitor-General. Sir John Davis said no 
 people in the world loved equal justice more than the Irish, even 
 where the decision was against themselves. That character the 
 Irish have ever borne and bear still. But, if you want the explana- 
 tion of this " disesteem " and hostility for British law, you must trace 
 effect to cause. It will not do to stand by the river side near where 
 it flows into the sea, and wonder why the water continues to I'un by. 
 N(it I, not my fellow traversers, not my fellow countrymen, are ac- 
 countable for the antagonism between law and popular sentiment in 
 this country. Take up the sad story where you will, yesteixlay, 
 last month, last year, last century, two centuries ago, three centu- 
 ries, five centuries, six centuries, and what will you find? English 
 law presenting itself to the Irish people in a guise forbidding sym- 
 pathy or respect, and evoking fear and resentment. Take it at its 
 birth in this country. Shake your minds free of legal theories and 
 legal fictions, and deal with facts. This court where I now stand is 
 the legal and political heir, descendant, and representative of the 
 first law-court of the Pale six or seven centuries ago. Within that 
 Pale were a few thousand English settlers, and of them alone did 
 the law take cognizance. The Irish nation — the millions outside 
 the Pale — were known only as " the King's Irish enemies." The 
 law classed them with the wild beasts of nature whom it was lawful 
 to s\viy. Later on in our history, we find the Irish near the Pale 
 sometimes asking to be admitted to the benefits of English law, since 
 they were forbidden to have any of their own; but their petitions 
 were refused. Gentlemen, this was English law as it stood towards 
 the Irish people for ceutui'ies ; and wonder, if you will, that the 
 Irish people held it in " disesteem " : — 
 
 " The Insh were denied the right of bringing actions In any of the English courts 
 in Ireland for trespasses to their lands, or for assaults and batteries to their per- 
 sons. Accordingly, it was answer enough to the action in such a case to say that 
 the plaintiff was an Irishman, unless he could produce a special charter giving him 
 the rights of an Englishman. If he sought damage against an Englishman for turn- 
 ing him out of his land, for the seduction of his daughter Nora, or for the beating 
 of his wife Devorgil, or for the driving off of his cattle, it was a good defence to say 
 lie was a mere Irishman. And if an Englishman was indicted for manslaughter, if 
 the man slain was an Irishman, he pleaded that the deceased was of the Irish nation, 
 and that it was no felony to kill an Irishman. For this, however, there was a fine 
 of five marlis payable to the King ; but mostly they killed us for nothing. If it hap- 
 pened that the man killed was a servant of an Englishman, he added to the plea of 
 
840 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the dpceascd being an Irisliman, tliat, if tiic master slionld ever demand damages, 
 ho wonid be ready to satisfy him." 
 
 That w;is the eirg of Flngiibh luw in Ireland. That was the seed — 
 that was the plant — do yvui Monder it' the tree is not now esteemed 
 and loved? It you poison a stream at its source, will you marvel if 
 down throuuli all its ct)urscs the deadly element is present? Now 
 trace from this, its !>irtli, English law in Ireland — trace down to 
 this honr — and examine when or where it ever set itself to a recon- 
 ciliation with the Irish people. Observe the plain relevancy of this 
 to my case. 1 and men like me are held accountable for !)ringing 
 law into hatred and coniempt in Ireland, and, in presenting this 
 charge against me, the Solicit(n--Gcneral appealed to history. I re- 
 tort the ch;uge on my accusers, and I will trace down to our own 
 day the relatinns of hostility which English law itself established 
 between itself and the people of Iichind. Gentlemen, for four hun- 
 dred years — down to 1G07 — the Irish people had no existence in 
 the eye of the law ; or rather, much worse, were viewed by it as 
 "the King's Irish enemic." But even within the Pale, how did it 
 reconmiend itself to [jojiular reverence and affection ? Ah ! gentle- 
 men, I will show that in those days, just as there have been in our 
 own, there were executions and scaffold-scenes which evoked popu- 
 lar horror and resentment, tho\igh they were all "according to law," 
 and not to be questioned unless by " seditionists." 1 he scaffold 
 streamed with the blood of those whom the i)coi)le loved and re- 
 vered — how could they love and revere the scaffold? Yet, 'twas 
 all "according to law." The sanctuary was profaned and rifled ; the 
 priest was slain or banished: 'twas all "according to law," no doubt, 
 and to hold law in "disesteem" is "sedition." Men were convicted 
 and executed "according to law;" yet the people demonstrated 
 sympathy for them, and resentment against their executioners — 
 most perversely, as a Solicitor-General, doubtless, would say. And, 
 indeed, the state papers contain accounts of those demonstrations 
 written by Crown officials, which sound very like the Solicitor- 
 General's speech to-day. Take, for instance, the execution — "ac- 
 cording to law" — of the "popish bishop " O'tlurley. Here is the 
 letter of a state functionary on the subject: — 
 
 " I could not before now so impart to her Majesty as to Icnow her mind touching- 
 the same for your lordship's direction. Wherefore she having at length resolved, i 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. 841 
 
 have, accordingly, by licr commandment, to signify her Majesty's pleasure unto you 
 touciiing Hurley, which is this : That the man being so notorious and ill a subject, 
 as appearcth by all the circumstances of his cause ho is, you proceed, if it may be, 
 to his execution by ordinary trial of hira for it. How bo it, in case you shall fini.1 
 the effect of his course doubtful by reason of the affection of such as shall be on 
 his jury, and Ijy reason of the supposal conceived by the lawyers of that country, 
 that he can hardly be found guilty for his treason committed in foreign parts against 
 her Majesty: then her pleasure is you take A suoi:tku way wnu iii.M by martial 
 law. So, as you may see, it is referred to your discretion, whether of those two 
 ways your lordship will take with him, aud the man being so resolute to reveal no 
 more matter, it is thought best to have no fuktiier toutures used against him, but 
 that you proceed forthwith to his execution in manner aforesaid. As for her 
 Majesty's good acceptation of your careful travail in this matter of Ilurlej', you 
 need nothing to doubt, and, for your better assurance thereof, she has commanded 
 me to let your lordship understand tliat, as well as in all others the like, as in the 
 case of Hurley, she cannot but greatly allow and commend your doings." 
 
 Well, tbcy put hi.s feet into tin boots filled v.ilh oil, and thou 
 placed him standing in the fire. Eventually they cut off his head, 
 tofe out his bowels, and cut the limbs from his body. Gentlemen, 
 'twas all ''according to law ; " and to demonstrate sympathy for him 
 and "disesteem" of that law was "sedition." But do you wonder 
 greatly that law of that complexion failed to secure popular sym- 
 pathy and respect? One more illustration, gentlemen, taken from 
 a period somewhat later on. It is the execution — "according to 
 law," gentlemen, entirely "according to law" — of another popish 
 bishop named O'Devany. The account is that of a Crown official of 
 the time — some most worthy predecessor of the Solicitor-General. 
 I read it from the recently published work of the Rev. C. P. Mce- 
 han : "On the 28th of January, the bishop and priest, being 
 arraigned at the King's Bench, were each condemned of treason, 
 and adjudged to be executed the Saturday following ; which day 
 being come, a priest or two of the Pope's brood, with holy water 
 and other holy stufis" — (no sneer was that, at ail, gentlemen ; no 
 sneer at Catholic practices, for a Crown official never sneers 
 at Catholic practices) — "were sent to sanctify the gallows where- 
 on they were to die. About two o'clock P. M., the traitors were 
 delivered to the sherifls of Dublin, who placed them in a small 
 car, which was followed by a great multitude. As the car j)ro- 
 gresscd the spectators knelt down, but the bishop, sitting still like 
 a block, would not vouchsafe them a word, or turn his head aside. 
 The multitude, however, following the car, made such a dole and 
 
g-t2 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 lamentation after him, as the heavens themselves resounded the 
 echoes of their outcries." (Actually a seditious funeral proces- 
 sion — made up of the ancestors of those thirty thousand men, 
 women, and children, who, according to the Solicitor-General, 
 glorified the cause of murder on the 8th of last December.) "Being 
 come to the gallows, whither they Avere followed by troops of the 
 citizens, men and women of all classes, most of the best being pres- 
 ent, the latter kept up such a shrieking, such a howling, and such a 
 hallooing, as if St. Patrick himself had been gone to the gallows, 
 could not have made greater signs of grief; but when they saw him 
 turned from off the gallows, they raised the whobub with such a 
 mainc cry, as if the rebels had come to rifle the city. Being ready 
 to mount the ladder, when he was pressed by some of the bystand- 
 ers to s^jeak, he repeated fi-equentl}'. Sine me quceiio. The execu- 
 tioners had no sooner taken off the bishop's head, but the townsmen 
 of Dublin began to flock about him, some taking up the head with 
 pitying aspect, accompanied with sobs and sighs ; some kissed it 
 with as religious an appetite as ever they kissed the Pax ; some cut 
 away all the hair from the head, which they pi'eserved for a relic ; 
 some others were practisers to steal the head away, but the execu- 
 tioner gave notice to the sheriffs. Now, when ho began to quarter 
 the body, the women thronged about him, and happy was she that 
 could get but her handkerchief dipped in the blood of the traitor ; 
 and the body being once dissevered in four quarters, they neither 
 left finger nor toe, but they cut them ofl' and carried them away ; and 
 some others that could get no holy monuments that appertained to 
 his person, with their knives they shaved off chips from the hallowed 
 gallows ; neither could they omit the halter wherewith he was hanged, 
 but it was rescued for holy uses. The same night after the execu- 
 tion, a great crowd flocked about the gallows, and there spent the 
 fore part of the night in heathenish howling, and performing many 
 popish ceremonies ; and after midnight, being then Candlemas-day, 
 in the morning having their priest present in readiness, they had 
 Mass after Mass till, daylight being come, they departed to their 
 own houses." 
 
 There was "sympathy with sedition" for j'ou, gentlemen. No 
 wonder the Crown official who tells the story — some worthy prede- 
 cessor of Mr. Harrison — should be horrified at such a demonstra- 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. 843 
 
 tion. I will sadden you with no further illustrations of English law, 
 but I think it would be admitted that, after centuries of such law, 
 one need not wonder if the people hold it in "hatred and contempt." 
 With the opening of the seventeenth century, however, came a 
 golden and glorious opportunity for ending that melancholy — that 
 terrible state of things. In the I'eign of James I. English law, for 
 the first time, extended to every corner of this kingdom. The Irish 
 ■came into the new order of things frankly and in good faith ; and if 
 wise counsels prevailed then amongst our rulers, oh, what a blessed 
 ending there might have been to the bloody feud of centuries ! The 
 Irish submitted to the Gaelic king, to whom had come the English 
 crown. In their eyes he was of a friendly, nay, of a kindred race. 
 He was of a line of Gaelic kings that had often befriended Ireland. 
 Submitting to.him was not yielding to the brutal Tudor. Yes, that 
 was the hour, the blessed opportunity for laying the foundation of a 
 real union between the three kingdoms — annion.of equal national 
 rights under the one crown. This was what the Irish expected, and 
 in this sense they, in that hour, accepted the new dynasty. And it 
 is remarkable that, from that day to this, though England has seen 
 bloody revolutions and violent changes of rulers, Ireland has ever 
 held faithfully — too faithfully — to the sovereignty thus adopted. 
 But how were they received ? How were their expectations met? 
 By persecution, proscription, and wholesale plunder, even by that 
 miserable Stuart. His son came to the throne. Disaflection broke 
 out in England and Scotland. Scottish Protestant Fenians, called 
 "Covenanters," took the field against him, because of the attempt to 
 establish Episcopalian Protestanism as a state church. By armed 
 rebellion against their lawful king — I regret to say it — they won 
 rights which now most largely tend to make Scotland contented and 
 loyal. I say it is to be regretted that those rights were thus won ; 
 for I say that, even at best, it is a good largely mixed with evil where 
 rights are won by resort to violence or revolution. His concessions 
 to the Calvinist Fenians in Scotland did not save Charles. The 
 English Fenians, under their Head Centre Cromwell, drove him from 
 the throne, and murdered him on a scaffold in London. How did 
 the Irish meanwhile act? They stood true to their allegiance ; they 
 took the field for the king. "What was the result ? They were given 
 over to slaughter and plunder by the brutal soldieiy of the English 
 
814 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Fenians. Their nobles and gentry were lieggared and proscribed ; 
 their children were sold as white slaves to West Indian planters ; 
 and their gallant struggles for the king, their S3inpatliy for the roy- 
 alist cause, was actually denounced by the English Fenians as 
 "sedition," "rebellion," "lawlessness," "sj'nipath}' with crime." 
 Ah ! gentlemen, the evils thus planted in our midst will survive and 
 work their influence ; yet some men wonder the English law is held 
 in " disL'stocni " in Ireland ! Time went on, gentlemen ; time Ment 
 on. Another James sat on the throne ; and again Englis!) Frotestant 
 Feniunism conspired for the overthrow of their sovereign. They 
 invited "foreign emissaries" to come over from Holland and Sweden 
 to begin the revolution for them. They drove their legitimate 
 king from the throne — never more to return. How did the Iiish 
 act in thit hour? Alas! Ever too loyal — ever only too ready to 
 stand by the throne and laws, if only treated with justice or kindli- 
 ness — they took the field for the king, not against him. He landed 
 on our shores ; and had the English Fenians rested content Avith 
 rcl)elling themselves, and allowed us to remain loyal as we desired 
 to 1)0, we might now l)o a neighboring but friendly and independent 
 kingdom under the ancient Stuart line. King James came here and 
 opened his Irish parliament in person. Oh, who will say in that 
 brief hotu-, at least, the Irish nation was not reconciled to the throne 
 and laws? King, parliament and people, were blended in one ele- 
 ment of enthusiasm, joy and hope, the first time for ages Ireland had 
 known such a joy. Yes — 
 
 " Wo, too, IkkI our day — it was brief, it is ended — 
 
 When !i King dwelt among us — no strange King — but omss; 
 "Wlicn tlio .sliout of a people delivered ascended, 
 
 And shook the green banner that hung on yon towers. 
 "We saw it like leaves in the snminer-tinie shiver; 
 AVo read the gold legend that blazoned it o'er — 
 ' To-day — now or never; to-day and forever' — 
 O Gpd ! have we seen it to see it no more? " 
 
 [Applause in court.] Once more the Irish people bled and sacri- 
 ficed for their loyalty to the throne and laws. Once more confis- 
 cation devastated the land, and the blood of the loyal and true was 
 poured like rain. The English Fenians and the foreign emissaries 
 triumphed, aided by the brave Frotestant rebels of Ulster. King 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. 845 
 
 William carac to the throne — a prince whose character is greatly 
 misiindcrstood in Ireland : a brave, courageous soldier, and a toler- 
 ant man, could he have had his way. The Irish who had fought and 
 lost, submitted on terms ; and had law even now been just or toler- 
 ant, it was open to the revolutionary regime to have made the Irish 
 good sulijects. But what took place? Tlic penal code came, in all 
 its horror, to fill the Irish heart with hitred and resistance. I will 
 I'cad for you what a Protestant historian — a man of ieai-ning and 
 ability — who is now listening to me in this court — has written 
 of that code. I quote " Godkin's History," published by CasscU of 
 London : — 
 
 " Tiio eighteenth century," says Mr. Godkin, "was the era of persecution, in 
 whicli the law did the worlc of tlie sword more effectnally and more .safely. Then 
 was established a code framed with almost diabolical ingenuity to extinguish nat- 
 ural affection — to foster perfidy and hypocrisy — to petrify conscience — to perpet- 
 uate brutal ignorance — to facilitate the work of tyranny — by rendering tlic vices 
 of slavery inherent and natural in the Irish character, and to make Protestantism 
 almost irredeemably odious as the monstrous incarnation of all moral perversions." 
 
 Gentlemen, in that fell spirit English law addressed itself to a 
 dreadful purpose here in Ireland; and, mark you, that code pre- 
 vailed down to our own time ; down to this very generation. 
 "Law" called on the son to sell his father; called on the (lock to 
 betray the pastor. "Law" forbade us to educate — forbade us to 
 worship God in the faith of our fathers. " Law " made us outcasts, 
 scourged us, trampled us, plundered us — do you marvel that, 
 amongst the Irish people, law has been held in "disesteem?" Do 
 you think this feeling arises from " sympathy with assassination or 
 murder?" Yet, if we had been let alone, I doubt not that time 
 ■would have fused the conquerors and the conquered, here in Ireland as 
 elsewhere. Even while the millions of the people were kept outside 
 the con.stitution, the spirit of nationality began to appear, and under 
 its blessed influence toleration touched the heart of the Irish-born 
 Protestant. Yes, thank God — thank God, for the sake of our poor 
 country, where sectarian bitternsss has wrought such wrong — it 
 was an Irish Protestant parliament that struck off the first link of the 
 penal chain. And lo ! once more, for a bright, brief day, Irish 
 national sentiment was in warm sympathy and heart-felt accord with 
 the laws. "Eighty-two "came. Irish Protestant patriotism, backed 
 
84G TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 by the hearty sympathy of the Catholic millions, raised up Ireland 
 to a proud and glorious position ; lifted our country from the ground, 
 where she \ay pvostrtde under the sword of England — but what do 
 I say? This is "sedition." It has this week been decreed sedition 
 to picture Ireland thus.* Well, then they rescued her from what I 
 will call the loving embrace of her dear sister Britannia, and en- 
 throned her in her rightful place, a queen among the nations. Had 
 the brightness of that era been prolonged — picture it, think of it^ 
 what a country would ours be now ! Think of it ! And contrast 
 what we arc with what we might he ! Comjiare a jjopulation, filled 
 with burning memories — disafiected, sullen, hostile, vengeful — 
 with a people, loyal, devoted, happy, contented ; and England, too, 
 all the happier, the more secure, the more great and free. But sad 
 is the story. Our independent national legislature was torn from us 
 by means, the iniquity of which, even among English writers, is now 
 proclaimed and execrated. By fraud and by force that outrage on 
 law, on right, and justice, Avas consummated. In speaking thus I 
 sj^cak " sedition." No one can write the facts of Irish history with- 
 out committing sedition. Yet every writer and speaker now will 
 tell you that the overthrow of our national constitution, sixty-seven 
 years ago, was an iniquitous and revolting scheme. But do you,, 
 then, marvel that the laws imposed on us by the power that perpe- 
 trated that deed are not revered, loved and respected? Do you 
 believe that that want of respect arises from the " seditions " of men 
 like my fellow-traversers and myself? Is it wonderful to see 
 estrangement between a people and laws imposed on them by the 
 overruling influence of another nation ? Look at the lessons — 
 unhappy lessons — taught our people by that London legislature 
 where their own will is ovei'borne. Concessions refused and resisted 
 as long as they durst be withheld ; and when granted at all, granted 
 only after passion has been aroused and the whole nation been 
 embittered. The Irish people sought Emancipation. Their great 
 leader was dogged at every step by hostile government proclama- 
 tiiins and crown prosecutions.- Coercion act over coercion act was 
 rained upon us ; yet O'Connell triumphed. But how and in what 
 
 * For publishing an illustration in the " Weekly News " thus picturing England's 
 policy of coercion, Mr. Sullivan had been found guilty of seditious libel on the pre- 
 vious trial. 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. 347 
 
 spirit was Emancipation gi'aiited ? Ah ! tliere never was a speech 
 more pregnant with mischief, with sedition, with revohitionary 
 teaching — never words tended more to bring law and government 
 into contempt — than tlie words of the English premier when he 
 declared Emancipation must, sorely against his Avill, be granted if 
 England M^oiild not face a civil war. That was a bad lesson to teach 
 Irishmen. Worse still was taught them. O'Connell, the great 
 constitutional leader, a man with whom loyalty and respect for the 
 laws was a fundamental principle of action, led the people towai'ds 
 further liberation — the liberation, not of a creed, but a nation. What 
 did he seek ? To bring once more the laws and the national will 
 into accord ; to reconcile the people and laws by restoring the con- 
 stitution of Queen, Lords and Commons. How was he met by the 
 government ? By the flourish of the sword ; by the drawn sabre and 
 the shotted gun, in the market-place and the highway. " Law " 
 finally grasped him as a conspirator, and a picked jury gave the 
 Crown then, as now, such verdict as was required. The venerable 
 apostle of constitutional doctrine was consigned to prison, while a 
 sorrowing, aye, a maddened nation wept for him outside. Do you 
 marvel that they held in "disesteem " the law and government that 
 acted thus? Do you marvel that to-day, in Ireland, as in every 
 century of all those through which I have traced this state of things^ 
 the people -and the law scowl upon each other ? 
 
 Gentlemen, do not misunderstand the purport of my argument. 
 It is not for the purpose — it would be censurable — of merely open- 
 ing the wounds of the past that I have gone back upon history some- 
 what farther than the Solicitor-General found it advantageous to go. 
 I have done it to demonstrate that there is a ti'uer reason than that 
 alleged by the Crown in this case for the state of war — for, unhappily, 
 that is what it is — which prevails between the people of Ireland and 
 the laws under which they now live. And now apply all this to the 
 present case, and judge you my guilt — judge you the guilt of those 
 whose crime, indeed, is that they do not love and respect law and 
 government as they are now administered in Ireland. Gentlemen the 
 present prosecution arises directly out of what is known as the Man- 
 chester tragedy. The Solicitor-General gave you his version, his 
 fanciful sketch, of that sad affair ; but it will be my duty to give you 
 the true facts, which differ considerably from the Crown story. The 
 
Sj[8 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Solicitor-General began with tolling us iibout " the broad summer's 
 sun of the 18th of September." [Laughter.] Gentlemen, it seems 
 very clear that the summer goes far into the }ear for those who enjoy 
 the sweets of office : nay, I am sure it is summer " all the year round " 
 Avith the Solicitor-General while the present ministry remain in. A 
 goodly goldin harvest he and his colleagues are making in this sum- 
 mer of pi'osccutions ; and they seem very well inclined to get up 
 enough of them. [Laughter.] Well, gentlemen, I'm not complain- 
 ing of that, but I will tell you who complain loudly — the "outs," 
 "with whom it is midwinter, while the Solicitor-General and his 
 friends are enjoying this summer. [Renewed laughter.] Well, 
 gentlemen, some time last September, two prominent leaders of the 
 Fenian movement — alleged to be so at least — named Kelly and 
 Dcasy, were arrested in Manchester. In Manchester there is a con- 
 siderable Irish population, and amongst them it was known those 
 men had sympathizers. They wore broi:ght up at the police court ; 
 and now, gentlemen, pray attentively mark this. The Irish execu- 
 tive that morning telegraphed to the Manchester authorilies a strong 
 warning of an attempted rescue. The Manchester police had full 
 notice ; how did they treat the timely warning, a warning, which, if 
 heeded, would have averted all this sad and terrible business which 
 followed upon that day ? Gentlemen, the Jlanchester police authori- 
 ties scoffed at the warning. They derided it as a "Ilirish" alarm. 
 Wiiat ! The idea of low "Hirish" hodmen or laborers rescuing 
 prisoners from them, the valiant and the brave! Why, gentlemen, 
 the Seth Bromleys of the " force " in Manchester waxed hilarious and 
 derisive over the idea. They would not ask even a truncheon to put 
 to flight even a thousand of those despised " Hirish ; " and so, despite 
 specific warning from Dublin, the van containing the two Fenian 
 leaders, guarded by eleven police officers, set out from the police 
 office to the jail. Now, gentlemen, I charge on the stolid vainglo- 
 riousness in the first instance, and the contemptible pusillanimity 
 in the second instance, of the Manchester police — the valiant Seth 
 Bromleys — all that followed. On the skirts of the city the van was 
 attacked by some eighteen Irish youths, having throe revolvers — 
 three revolvers, gentlemen, and no more — amongst Hiem. The 
 valor of the Manch<?stcr eleven vanished at the sight of those three 
 revolvers — some of them, it seems, loaded with blank cartridge! 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. 849 
 
 The Soth Bromleys took to their heels. They abandoned the van. 
 Now, gentlemen, do not understand me to call those policemen cow- 
 ards. It is hard to blame an unarmed man who runs away from a 
 pointed revolver, which, whether loaded or unloaded, is a powerful 
 persuasion — to depart. But I do say that I believe in my soul that, 
 if that had occurred here in Dublin, eleven men of our metropolitan 
 police would have taken those three revolvers or perished in the 
 attempt. [Applause.] Oh, if eleven Irish policemen had run away 
 like that from a few poor English lads with barely three revolvers, 
 how the press of England would yell in fierce denunciation ; why, 
 they would trample to scorn the name of Irishman. [Applause in 
 the court, which the officials vainly tried to silence.] 
 
 Mr. Justice Fitzgerald — If these interruptions continue, the 
 parties so offending must be removed. 
 
 Mr. Sullivan^ I am sorry my lord, for the interruption; though 
 not sorry the people should cndoi'se my estimate of the police. Well, 
 gentlemen, the van was abandoned by its valiant guard ; but there 
 remained inside one brave and faithful fellow, Brett by name. I am 
 now giving you the facts as I in my conscience and soul believe they 
 occurred; and as millions of my countrymen, aye, and thousands of 
 Englishmen , too, solemnly believe them to have occurred, though they 
 differ in one item widely from the Crown version. Brett refused to 
 give up the key of the van which he held ; and the attacking party 
 commenced various endeavors to break it open. At length one of 
 them called out to fire a pistol into the lock and thus burst it open. 
 The unfortunate Brett at that moment was looking through the key- 
 hole, endeavoring to get a view of the inexplicable scene outside, 
 when he received the bullet and fell dead. Gentlemen, that may be 
 the true, or it may be the mistaken version. You may hold to the 
 other, or you may hold to this. But whether I be mistaken therein 
 or otherwise, I say here, as I would say if I stood now before my 
 eternal Judge on the last day, I solemnly believe the mournful 
 episode to have happened thus — I solenmly believe that the man 
 Brett was shot by accident, and not by design. But even suppose 
 your view differs sincerely from mine, will you, can you, hold 
 that I, thus conscientiously persuaded, sympathize with murder, be- 
 cause I sympathize with men hanged for that which I contend was 
 accident, and not murder? That is exactly the issue in this case. 
 
850 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Well, the rescued Fenian leaders got away ; and then, when all was 
 over — when the danger was passed — valor tremendous returned to 
 the fleet-of-foot Manchester police. Oh, but they wreaked their ven- 
 geance that night on the houses of the poor Irish in Manchester ! 
 By a savage razzia they soon filled the jails with our poor country- 
 men seized on suspicion. And then broke forth all over England 
 that shout of anger and passion which none of us will ever forget. 
 The national pride had been sorely wounded ; the national power 
 had been openly and humiliatingly defied ; the national fury ^'as^ 
 aroused. On all sides resounded the hoarse shout for vengeance, 
 swift and strong. Then was seen a sight the most shameful of its 
 kind that this century has exhibited — a sight at thought of which 
 Englishmen yet will hang their heads for shame, and which the 
 English historian will chronicle with reddened cheek — those poor 
 and humble Irish youths led into the Manchester dock in chains ! In 
 chains ! Yes ; iron fetters festering wrist and ankle ! Oh ! gentle- 
 men, it was a fearful sight ; for no one can pretend that in the heart 
 of powerful England there could be danger those poor Irish youths 
 would overcome the authorities and capture Manchester. For what, 
 then, were those chains put on untried prisoners? Gentlemen, it 
 was at this point exactly that Irish sympathy came to the side of 
 those prisoners. It was when we saw them thus used, and saw that, 
 innocent or guilty, they would be immolated — sacrificed to glut the 
 passion of the hour — that our feelings rose high and strong in their 
 behalf. Even in England there were men — noble-hearted English- 
 men, for England is never without such men — who saw that, if tried 
 in the midst of this national frenzy, those victims would be sacrificed ; 
 and accordingly efforts wei-e made for a postponement of the trial. 
 But the roar of passion carried its way. Not even till the ordinary 
 assizes would the trial be postponed. A special commission was 
 sped to do the work while Manchester jurors were in a white heat of 
 panic, indignation and fury. 
 
 Then came the trial, which was just what might be expected. 
 Witnesses swore ahead without compunction, and jurors be- 
 lieved them without hesitation. Five men arraigned together as 
 principals — Allen, Larkin, O'Brien, Shore, and Maguire — were found 
 guilty, and, the judge concurring in the verdict, were sentenced to 
 death. Five men — not three men, gentlemen — five men in the one 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. 851 
 
 verdict, not five separate verdicts. Five men by the same evidence 
 and the same jury in the same verdict. AVas that a just verdict? 
 The case of the Crown here to-day is that it was ; that it is " sedi- 
 tion " to impeach that verdict. A copy of that conviction is handed 
 in here as evidence to convict me of sedition for charging, as I do, 
 that that was a wrong verdict, a bad verdict, a rotten and a 
 false verdict. But what is the fact ! That her Majesty's ministers 
 themselves admit and proclaim that it was a wrong verdict, a false 
 verdict. The very evening those men were sentenced, thirty news- 
 pa^Der reporters sent up to the Home Secretary a petition protesting 
 that— the evidence of the witnesses and the verdict of the jury not- 
 withstanding — there was at least one innocent man thus marked for 
 execution. The government felt that the reporters were right and 
 the jurors wrong. They pardoned Maguire as an innocent man — 
 that same Maguire whose legal conviction is here put in as evidence 
 that he and four others were truly murderers, to sympathize with 
 whom is to commit sedition — nay, "to glorify the cause of murder." 
 Well, after that our minds were easy. We considered it out of the 
 question any man would be hanged on a verdict thus mined, blasted, 
 and abandoned ; and believing those men innocent of murder, though 
 guilty of another most serious legal crime — rescue with violence, and 
 incidental, though not intentional loss of life — we rejoiced that a 
 terrible mistake was, as we thought, averted. But now arose in 
 redoubled fury the savage cry for blood. In vain, good men, noble 
 and humane men, in England tried to save the national honor by 
 breasting this horrible outburst of passion. They were overborne. 
 Petitioners for mercy were mobbed and hooted in the streets. We 
 saw all this ; we saw all this ; and think you it did not sink into our 
 hearts? Fanc}', if you can, our feelings when we heard that yet 
 another man out of five was respited — ah ! he was an American gen- 
 tleman—an American, not an Irishman — but that the three Irishmen, 
 Allen, Larkin, and O'Brien, were to die — were to be put to death 
 on M verdict and on evidence that would not hang a dog in England - 
 AVe refused to the last to credit it ; and thus incredulous, deemed it 
 idle to make any efibrt to save their lives. But it was true ; it was 
 deadly true. And then, gentlemen, the doomed three appeared in a 
 new character. Then they rose into the dignity and hei'oisni of 
 mart3'rs. The manner in Vvhich they bore themselves through the 
 
852 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 dreadful ordeal cnn.ol)Ied them forever. It was tlien we all learned 
 to love and revere tliem as patriots and Christians. Oh ! gentlemen, 
 it is only at this point I feel my difBculty in addressing you whose 
 religious faith is not that which is mine. For it is only Catholics who 
 can understand the emotions aroused in Catholic hearts by conduct 
 such as theii's in that dreadful hour. Catholics alone can understand 
 how the last solemn declarations of such men, after receiving the 
 last sacraments of the Church, and about to meet their great Judge 
 face to face, can outweigh the reckless evidence of Manchester 
 thieves and pickpockets. Yes ; in that hour they told us they were 
 innocent, but were ready to die ; and wc believed them. We believe 
 them still. Aye, do we ! They did not go to meet their God with 
 a falsehood on their lips. On that night before their execution, oh, 
 what a scene ! AVhat a picture did England present at the foot of 
 the Manchester scalTold ! The brutal populace thronged tbither in 
 tens of thousands. They danced ; tliey sang ; they blasphemed ; 
 they chorused "Rule Britannia" and "God Save the Queen" by way 
 of taunt and defiance of the men whose death agonies they had come 
 to see ! Their shouts and brutal cries disturbed the doomed victims 
 inside the prison as in their cells they prepared in prayer and medi- 
 tation to meet their Creator and their God. Twice the police had 
 to remove the crowd from around that wing of the prison, so that 
 our poor brothers might in peace go through their last preparations 
 for eternity, undisturbed by the yells of the multitude outside. Oh, 
 gentlemen, gentlemen — that scene ! That scene in the grey cold 
 morning when those innocent men were led out to die — to die an 
 ignominious death before the wolfish mob ! With blood on fire, 
 with bursting hearts, we read the dreadful story here in Ireland. 
 We knew that these men would never have been thus sacrificed had 
 not their offence been political, and had it not been that in their own 
 way they represented the old struggle of the Irish race. We felt 
 that, if time had but been permitted for English passion to cool 
 down, English good feeling and right justice would have prevailed; 
 and they never would have been put to death on such a verdict. 
 All this we felt ; yet we were silent till we heard the press, that had 
 hounded those men to death, falsely declaring that our silence was 
 acquiescence in the deed that consigned them to murderers' graves. 
 Of this I have personal knowledge, that, here in Dublin at least, 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. 853 
 
 nothing" was done or intended until the " Evening Mail " declared 
 that popular feeling, which had had ample time to declare itself if it 
 felt otherwise, quite recognized the justice of the execution. Then 
 we resolved to make answer. Then Ireland made answer. For 
 what monarch, the loftiest in the world, would such demonstrations 
 be made, the voluntary oiferings of a people's grief? Think you it 
 was "sympathy for mui'der" called us forth, or caused the priests of 
 the Catholic Church to drape their churches? It is a libel to utter 
 the base charge. No, no. Of the acts of those men at that rescue 
 we had naught to say. Of their innocence of murder we were con- 
 vinced. Their patriotic feelings, their religious devotion, we saw 
 proved in the noble, the edifying manner of their death. We be- 
 lieved them to have been unjustly sacrificed in a moment of national 
 passion ; and we resolved to rescue their memory from the foul 
 stains of their maligners, and make it a proud one forever with 
 Irishmen. Sympathy with murder, indeed? What I am about to 
 say will be believed, for I think I have shown no fear of consequences 
 in standing by my acts and principles. I say for myself, and for the 
 priests and people of Ireland, ^vho are affected by this case, that 
 sooner would we burn our right hands to cinders than express, 
 directly or indirectly, sympathy with murder ; and that our sym- 
 pathy for Allen, Larkin, and O'Brien, is based upon the conviction 
 that they were innocent of any such crime. Gentlemen, having re- 
 gard to all the circumstances of this sad business, having regard to 
 the feelings under which we acted, think you, is it a true charge that 
 we had for our intent and object the bi'inging of the administration 
 of justice into contempt ? Does a man, by protesting ever so ve- 
 hemently against an act of a jiot infallible tribunal, incur the charge 
 of attempting its overthi'ow ? What evidence can be shown to you 
 that we uttered a word against the general character of the adminis- 
 tration of justice in this country, while denouncing this particular 
 proceeding, which we say was a fearful failure of justice — a horrible 
 blunder, a terrible act of passion ! None, — none. I say, for myself, 
 I sincerely believe that in this country of ours justice is administered 
 by the judges of the Irish Bench with a purity and impartiality be- 
 tween man and man not to be surpassed in the universal world. Let 
 me not be thought to cast reflection on this court, or the learned 
 judges before whom I now stand, if I except in a certain sense, and 
 
g54 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 on some occasions, political trials between the subject and the Crown. 
 Apart from this, I fearlessly say the bench of justice inlrehmd fully 
 enjoj's, and is worthy of, respect and homage. I care not from 
 what political party its members be drawn, I say that, with hardly 
 an exception, when robed with the ermine, they become dead to the 
 world of politics, and sink the politician in the loftier character of 
 representative of sacred Justice. 
 
 Yet, gentlemen, holding those views, I would, nevertheless, pro- 
 test against and denounce such a trial as that in Manchester, if it 
 had taken place in Ireland. For, what we contend is that the men 
 in Manchester would never have been found guilty on such evidence, 
 would never have been executed on such a verdict, if time had been 
 given to let panic and passion pass away ; time to let English good 
 sense and calm reason and sense of justice have sway. Now, gentle- 
 men, judge ye me on this whole case ; for I have done. I have spoken 
 at great length, but I plead not merely my own cause, but the cause 
 of my country. For myself I care little. I stand before you here with 
 the manacles, I might say, on my hands. Already a prison cell 
 awaits me in Kilmainham. My doom, in any event, is sealed. Al- 
 ready a conviction has been obtained against me for my opinions on 
 this same event ; for it is not one arrow alone that has been shot 
 from the Crown-ofEce quiver at me, at my reputation, my property, 
 my liberty. In a few hours more my voice will be silenced ; but, 
 before the world is shut out from me for a term, I appeal to your 
 verdict, to the verdict of my fellow citizens, of my fellow country- 
 men, to judge my life, my conduct, my acts, my principles, and say, 
 am I a criminal. Sedition, in a rightly ordered community, is in- 
 deed a crime. But who is it that challenges me ? Who is it that 
 demands my loyalty ? Who is it that calls out to me, " O ingrate 
 son ! where is the filial affection, the respect, the obedience, the sup- 
 port that is my due? Unnatural, seditious, and rebellious child, a 
 dungeon shall punish your crime ! " I look in the face of my accuser, 
 who thus holds me to the duty of a son. I turn to see if there I can 
 recognize the features of that mother, whom indeed I love, my own 
 dear Ireland. I look into that accusing face, and there I see a scowl, 
 and not a smile. I miss the soft, fond voice, the tender clasp, the 
 loving word. I look upon the hands reached out to gi-asp me — to 
 punish me ; and lo ! great stains, blood-red, upon those hands ; and 
 
A. M. SULLIVAN. 855 
 
 my sad heart tells me it is the blood of my widowed mother, Ireland. 
 Then I answer to my accuser : " You have no claim on me ; on my 
 love, my duty, my allegiance. You are not my mother. You sit 
 indeed in the place where she should reign. You wear the regal 
 garments torn from her limbs, while she now sits in the dust, un- 
 crowned and overthrown, and bleeding from many a wound. But 
 my heart is with her still. Her claim alone is recognized by me. 
 She still commands my love, my duty, my allegiance ; and whatever 
 the penalty may be, be it pi-ison, chains, be it exile or death, to her 
 I will be true." [Applause.] But, gentlemen of the jury, what is 
 that Irish nation to which my allegiance turns? Do I thereby mean 
 a party, or a class or creed? Do I mean only those who think and 
 feel as I do on public questions? Oh, no. It is the whole people 
 of this land ; the nobles, the peasants, the clergy, the merchants, the 
 gentry, the traders, the professions, the Catholic, the Protestant, 
 the Dissenter. Yes, I am loyal to all that a good and patriotic citi- 
 zen should be loyal to ; I am ready, not merely to obey, but to sup- 
 port with heartfelt allegiance, the constitution of my own country — 
 the Queen, as Queen of Ireland, and the fi-ee parliament of Ireland 
 once more reconstituted in our national senate-house in College-green. 
 And reconstituted once more it will be. In that hour the laws will 
 again be reconciled with the national feeling and popular reverence. 
 In that hour there will be no more disesteem, or hatred, or contempt 
 for the laws : for, howsoever a people may dislike and resent laws 
 imposed upon them against their will by a subjugating power, no 
 nation disesteems the laws of its own making. That day, that 
 blessed day, of peace and reconciliation, and joy, and liberty, I hope 
 to see. And when it comes, as conie it will, in that hour it will be 
 remembered for me that I stood hci'c to face the trying ordeal, ready 
 to suffer for my country ; walking with bared feet over red-hot 
 ploughshares like the victims of old. Yes; in that day it will be 
 remembered for me, though a prison awaits me now, that I was one 
 of those journalists of the people who, through constant sacrifice and 
 self-jmmolation, fought the battle of the people, and won eveiy ves- 
 tige of liberty remaining in the land. [As INIr. Sullivan resumed 
 his seat, the entire audience burst into applause, again and again re- 
 newed, despite all efforts at repression.] 
 
SPEECH 
 
 ^w-*.^ \ 
 
 
 
 Richard Brinsley Sheridan, 
 
 [857] 
 
HON. RICHARD BRINSLEY SHERIDAN, 
 
Speech 
 
 In the House of Commons, in Opposition to Pitt's First 
 Income Tax. 
 
 WISE man, sir, it is said, should doubt of everything. It 
 was this maxim, probably, that dictated the amiable diffi- 
 dence of the learned gentleman,* who addressed himself to 
 the chair in these remarkable words : "I rise, Mr. Speaker, 
 if I have risen." Now, to remove all doubts, I can assure the 
 learned gentlemanf that he actually did rise ; and not only rose, but 
 pronounced an able, long, and elaborate discourse, a considerable 
 portion of which was employed in an erudite dissertation on the 
 histories of Rome and Carthage. He further informed the House, 
 ui:)on the authority of Scipio, that we could never conquer the 
 enemy until we were first conquered oui'selves. It was when Han- 
 nibal was at the gates of Rome, that Scipio had thought the proper 
 moment for the invasion of Carthage, — what a pity it is that the 
 learned gentleman does not go with this consolation and the 
 authority of Scipio to the lord mayor and aldermen of the city of 
 London! Let him say, "Rejoice, my friends! Bonaparte is 
 encamped at Blackheath ! What happy tidings ! " For here Scipio 
 tells us, you may every moment expect to hear of Lord Hawkes- 
 bury making his triumphal entry into Paris. | It would be vvhiui- 
 sical to observe how they would receive such joyful news. I should 
 like to see such faces as they would make on that occasion. Though 
 
 * Dr. Lawrence. 
 
 t Mr. Perceval, afterwards Chancellor of the Exchequer, and. In 1809, Prime 
 Minister. He was assassinated in the lobby of the House of Commons, May U, 
 1812, by a man named Bellingham. 
 
 X Alludes to a boast of his lordship, at an early period of the war against France. 
 
 (859) 
 
860 TREASURr OF ]-:loquence. 
 
 I doubt not of the erudition of the learned gentleman, he seems to 
 me to have somehow eonfounded the stories of Hanno and Hanni- 
 bal, of Scipio and the Romans. He told us that Carthage was lost 
 by the parsimony or envy of Haimo, in preventing the necessary 
 supplies for the war being sent to Hannibal ; but he neglected to go 
 a little furlher, and to relate that Hanno accused the latter of having^ 
 been ambitious — 
 
 " Jiiveuum furentem cupidine regni ; " 
 
 and assured the senate that Hannibal, though at the gates of Rome, 
 was no less dangerous to Hanno. Be this, however, as it may, is 
 there any Hanno in the British senate? If there is, nothing can be 
 more certain than that all the efl'orts and remonstrances of the- 
 British Hanno could not prevent a single man, or a single guinea, 
 being sent for the supply of any Hannibal our ministers might 
 choose. The learned gcntlen)an added, after the defeat of Hanni- 
 bal, Hanno laughed at the senate ; but he did not tell us what he 
 laughed at. The advice of Hannibal has all the appearance of being 
 a good one : — 
 
 " Carthagiuis nioBnia Roma; raunerata." 
 
 If they did not follow his advice, they had themselves to blame 
 for it. 
 
 From the strain of declamation in which the learned gentleman 
 launched out, it seems as if he came to this House as executor to a 
 man whose genius was scarcely equalled Ijy the eccentricities he 
 sometimes indulged. He appears to come as executor, and in the 
 House of Commons, to administer to Mr. Burke's fury without any 
 of his fire. It is, however, in vain for him to attempt any imitatioa 
 of those declamatory harangues and Avritings of the transcendent 
 author, which, towards the latter part of his life, were, as I think, 
 unfoi'tunately too much applauded. When not embellished with 
 those ornaments which Mr. Burke was so capable of adding to all 
 he either spoke or wrote, the iul)ject of such declamations could 
 only claim the admiration of a school-boy. The circumstance of a 
 great, extensive and victorious republic, breathing nothing but war 
 in the long exercise of its most successful operations, surrounded 
 ■with triumphs, and panting for fresh laurels, to be compared, much 
 
R. B. SHERIDAN. QQl 
 
 less represented as inferior, to the military power of England, is 
 childish and ridiculous. What similitude is there between us and 
 the great Roman republic in the height of its fame and glory? Did 
 you, sir, ever hear it slated, that the Roman bulwark was a naval 
 force? And if not, what comparison can there he drawn betweea 
 their efforts and power? This kind of rhodomontade declamation 
 is finely described in the language of one of the Roman poets — 
 
 " I Clemens, curre per Alpes, 
 XJt pueris placcas, et declajiatio fias." * 
 
 JuvEXAL, Sat. X., 1G6. 
 
 The proper ground, sir, upon which this bill should bo opposed, 
 I conceive to be neither the uncertainty of the criterion, nor the 
 injustice of the retro^^pect, though they would be sufficient. The 
 tax itself will be found to defeat its own purposes. The amount 
 •which an individual paid to the assessed taxes last year can be no rule 
 for what he shall pay in future. All the articles by which the gi'a- 
 dations rose must be laid aside, and never resumed again. Circum- 
 stanced as the country is, there can be no hope, no chance whatever, 
 that, if the tax succeeds, it ever will be repealed. Each individual, 
 therefore, instead of putting down this article or that, will make a 
 final and general retrenchment ; so that the minister cannot get at 
 bim in the same way again, by any outward sign which nn'ght be 
 used as a criterion of his wealth. These retrenchments cannot fail 
 of depriving thousands of their bread ; and it is vain to hold out 
 the delusion of modification or indemnity to the lower orders. 
 Every burthen imposed upon the rich in the articles which give the 
 poor employment, affects them not the less for affecting them cir- 
 cuitously. A coachmaker, for instance, would willingly compromise 
 with the minister, to give him a hundred guineas not to lay the tax 
 upon coaches ; for though the hundred guineas would be much more 
 than his proportion of the new tax, yet it would be much better for 
 him to pay the larger contribution, than, by the la^'ing down of 
 coaches, be deprived of those orders by which he got his bread. 
 The same is the case with watchmakers, which I had lately an oppor- 
 tunity of witnessing, who, by the tax imposed last year, are reduced 
 
 * Go, fight, to please school-boy statesmen, and furnish a declamation for a 
 Doctor, learned in the law. 
 
862 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 to a state of ruin, starvation, and misery ; yet, in jiroposing that 
 tax, the minister alleged, that the poor journeymen could not be 
 affected, as the tax would only operate on the gentlemen by whom 
 the watches were worn. It is as much cant, therefore, to say, that 
 by bearing heavily on the rich, wc are saving the lower orders, as it is- 
 folly to suppose we can come at real income by arbitrary assessment, 
 or by symptoms of opulence. There are three ways of raising large 
 sums of money in a State : First, by voluntary contributions ; sec- 
 ondly, by a great addition of new taxes ; and thirdly, by forced 
 contributions, which is the worst of all, and which I aver the pres- 
 ent plan to be. I am at present so partial to the fii'st mode, that I 
 recommend the further consideration of this measure to be postponed 
 for a month, in order to make an experiment of what might be 
 effected by it. For this purpose let a bill be brought in, authorizing 
 the proper persons to receive voluntary contributions ; and I should 
 not care if it were read a third time to-night.' I confess, however, 
 that there are many powerful reasons which forbid us to be too san- 
 guine in the success even of this measure. To awaken a spirit in 
 the nation, the example should come from the first authority, and 
 the higher departments of the State. It is, indeed, seriously to be 
 lamented, that whatever may be the burdens or distresses of the 
 people, the government has hitherto never shown a disposition to con- 
 tribute anything ; and this conduct must hold out a poor encourage- 
 ment to others. Heretofore all the public contributions were made 
 for the benefit and profit of the contributors, in a manner inconceivable 
 to more simple nations. If a native inhabitant of Bengal or China 
 were to be informed, that in the west of Europe there was a small 
 island, which in the course of one hundred years contributed four 
 hundred and fifty millions to the exigencies of the State, and that 
 every individual, on the making of a demand, vied with his neighbor 
 in alacrity to subscribe, he would immediatel}' exclaim, "Magnani- 
 mous nation ! you must surely be invincible." But far different 
 would be his sentiments, if informed of the tricks and jobs attend- 
 ing these transactions, where even loyalty was seen cringing for its 
 bonus ! If the first example were given from the highest authority, 
 there would at least be some hopes of its being followed by other 
 great men, who received largo revenues from the government. I 
 would instance particularly the teller of the exchequer, and another 
 
R. B. SHERIDAN. 8(33 
 
 person of high rank, who receive from their offices £13,000 a yeiw 
 more in ^yar than they do in peace. The last noble lord (Lord 
 Grenville) had openly declared for perpetual war, and could not 
 bring his mind to think of anything like a peace with the French. 
 Without meaning any personal disrespect, it was the nature of the 
 human mind to receive a bias from such circumstances. So niucli 
 was this acknowledged in the rules of this House, that any person 
 receiving a pension or high employment from his Majesty, thereby 
 vacated his seat. It was not, therefore, unreasonable to expect that 
 the noble lord would contribute his proportion, and that a consider- 
 able one, to carry on the war, in order to show the world his freedom 
 from such a bias. In respect to a near relative of that noble lord, I 
 mean the noble marquis (Marquis of Buckingham), there could be 
 no doubt of his coming forward liberally. 
 
 I remember, when I was Secretary to the Treasury, the noble 
 marquis sent a letter there, requesting that his office might, in point 
 of fees and emoluments, be put under the same economical regula- 
 tions as the others. The reason he assigned for it was, "the 
 emoluments were so much greater in time of war than peace, 
 that his conscience would be hurt by feeling that he received them 
 from the distresses of his country." No retrenchment, however, 
 took place in that office. If, therefore, the marquis thouglit proper 
 to bring the arrears since that time also from his conscience, the 
 public would be at least £40,000 the better for it. By a calcu- 
 lation I have made, which I believe cannot be controverted, it 
 appears, from the vast increase of our burdens during the war, that 
 if peace were to be concluded to-morrow, we sh(juld have to pi'ovide 
 taxes annually to the amount of £28,000,000. To this is further to 
 be added, the expense of that system, by which Ireland is not gov- 
 erned, but ground, insulted, and oppressed. To find a remedy fur 
 all these incumbrances, the first thing to be done is, to restore the 
 credit of the bank, which has failed, as well in credit as in honor. 
 Let it no longer, in the minister's hands, remain the slave of politi- 
 cal circumstances. It must continue insolvent till the connection is 
 broken ofi". I remember, in consequence of expressions made use of 
 in this House, upon former discussions, when it was thought the 
 minister would relinquish that unnatural and ruinous alliance, the 
 newspapers sported a good deal with the idea that the House of 
 
SGi TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Commons bad forbid the bans between him and the old lady.* Her 
 friends had interfered, it was said, to prevent the union, as it was 
 •U'cU known that it was her dower he sought, and not her person nor 
 the charms of her society. The old lady herself, however, when 
 wooed, was quickly won, and nothing could be more indelicate than 
 to observe her soon afterwards ogling her swain, and wantonly court- 
 ing that violence she at first com25lained of. In the first instance it 
 might be no more than a case of seduction ; but from her subse- 
 quent conduct, it became arrant prostitution 
 
 " I swear I could not see the clear betrayer 
 Kneel at my feet, and sigh to be forgiven ; 
 But my relenting heart would pardon all, 
 And quite forget 'twas ho that had undone me." 
 
 It is, sir, highly offensive to the decency and sense of a commer- 
 cial people, to observe the juggle, between the minister and the 
 Bank. The latter vauntingly boasted itself ready and able to pay ; 
 but that the minister kindly prevented, and put a lock and key upon 
 it. There is a liberality in the British nation which always makes 
 allowance for inability of payment. Commerce requires enterprise, 
 and enterprise is subject to losses. But I believe no indulgence was 
 ever shown to a creditor, saying, "I can, but will not pay you." 
 Such was the real condition of the Bank, together with its accounts, 
 when they were laid before tlic House of Commons ; and the chair- 
 manf reported from the committee, staling its prosperity, and the 
 great increase of its cash and bullion. The minister, however, took 
 care to verify the old saying, " Brag is a good dog, but Holdfast is 
 better." "Ah!" said he, "my worthy chairman, this is excellent 
 news, but I will take care to secure it." He kept his word, took 
 the money, gave exchequer bills for it, which were no security, and 
 there was then an end to all our public credit. It is singular 
 enough, sir, that the report upon this bill stated that it was meant 
 to secure our public credit from the avowed intentions of the French 
 to make war upon it. This was done most effectually. Let the 
 French come when they please, they cannot touch our public credit 
 
 * " Old lady of Threadneedle Street," is In England a common expression to mean 
 the Bank of England. 
 
 t Mr. Bragge was chairman of the Committee, and this gave Sheridan the liint 
 Tor his punning allusion. 
 
R. B. SHERIDAN. 865 
 
 at least. The minister has wisely provided against it, for he has 
 previously destroyed it. The only consolation besides that remains 
 to us, is his assurance that all will return again to its former state at 
 the conclusion of the war. Thus we are to hope, that though Ihe 
 Bank now presents a meagre spectre, as soon as peace is restored, 
 the golden bust will make its reappearance. This, however, is far 
 from being the way to inspii'it the nation or intimidate the enemy. 
 Ministers have long taught the people of the inferior order, that 
 they can expect nothing from them but by coercion, and nothing 
 from the great but by corruption. The highest encouragement to 
 the French will be to observe the public supineness. Can they have 
 any apprehension of national energy or spirit in a people whose 
 minister is eternally oppressing them? 
 
 Though, sir, I have opposed the present tax, I am still conscious 
 that our existing situation requires great sacrifices to be made, and 
 that a foreign enemy must at all events be resisted. I behold in the 
 measures of the minister nothing except the most glaring incapacity, 
 and the most determined hostility to our liberties ; but we must be 
 content, if necessary for preserving our independence from foreign 
 attack, to strip to the skin. " It is an established maxim," we are 
 told, "that men must give up a part for the preservation of the re- 
 mainder." I do not dispute the justice of the maxim. But this is 
 the constant language of the gentleman opposite to me. We have 
 already given up part after part, nearly till the whole is swallowed 
 up. If I had a pound, and a person asked me for a shilling, to 
 preserve the rest I should willingly comply, and think myself 
 obliged to him. But if he repeated that demand till he cam© to 
 my twentieth shilling, I should ask him, " Where is the re- 
 mainder? Where is my pound now? Why, my friend, that is 
 no joke at all." Upon the whole, sir, I see no salvation for the 
 country but in the conclusion of a peace, and the removal of the 
 present ministers. 
 
ADDRESS. 
 
 Robert Emmet, -- -.a. v\ \ 
 
 [867] 
 
Powerful Address of Robert Emmet, 
 
 Deliveked at his Trial before Lord Norburt, Sept. 19, 1803. 
 
 ^^Fp^Y Lords — I am asked what have I to say -why sentence of 
 ^V.k^ death should not be pronounced on me, accoixling to law. 
 if,, J jj I have nothing to say tliat can alter your predetermhiation, 
 'V' nor that it will become me to say, with any view to the 
 mitigation of that sentence which you arc to pronounce, and I must 
 abide by. But I have that to say which interests me more than life, 
 and which you have labored to destroy. I have much to say why 
 my reputation should be rescued from the load of false accusation 
 and calumny which has been cast upon it. I do not imagine that, 
 seated where you are, your mind can be so free from prejudice as to 
 receive the least impression from Avhat I am going to utter. I have 
 no hopes that I can anchor my character in the breast of a coui't 
 constituted and trammelled as this is. I only wish, and that is the 
 utmost that I expect, that your lordships may suffer it to float down 
 your memories untainted by the foul breath of prejudice, until it 
 finds some more hospitable harbor to shelter it from the storms by 
 which it is bufi'eted. Was I only to suffer death, after being ad- 
 judged guilty by your tribunal, I should bow in silence, and meet 
 the fate that awaits me without a murmur; but the sentence of the 
 law which delivers my body to the executioner will, through the 
 ministry of the law, labor in its own vindication to consign my char- 
 acter to obloquy ; for there must be guilt somewhere ; whether in 
 the sentence of the court, or in the catastrophe, time must deter- 
 mine. A man in my situation has not only to encounter the diflicul- 
 ties of fortune, and the force of power over minds which it has 
 corrupted or subjugated, but the difEculties of established prejudice. 
 
 (8C9) 
 
870 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 The man dies, but his memory lives. That mine may not perish, 
 that it may live in (he respect of my countrymen, I seize upun this 
 opportunity to vindicate myself from some of the charges alleged 
 against me. When my spirit shall be wafted to a more friendly port 
 — when my shade shall have joined the bands of those martyred he- 
 roes who have shed their blood on the scafi'old and in the field in the 
 defence of their country and of virtue, this is my hope — I wish that 
 my memory and my name may animate those who survive me, while 
 I look down M'ith complacency on the destruction of that perfidious 
 government which upholds its domination by blasphemy of the 
 Most High — which displays its power overman, as over the l)easts 
 of the forest — which sets man upon his brother, and lifts his hand, 
 in the name of God, against the throat of his fellow who believes or 
 doubts a little more or a little less than the government standard — 
 a government which is steeled to barbarity by the cries of the or- 
 phans and the tears of the widows it has made. 
 
 Here Lord Norbury interrupted Mr. Emmet, saying, " tliat the mean and wicked 
 entliusiasts who felt as he did, were not equal to the accomplishment of their wild 
 •designs." 
 
 I appeal to the immaculate God — I swear by the throne of 
 Heaven, before which I must shortly appear — by the blood of the 
 murdered patriots who have gone before me — that my conduct has 
 beeu, through all this peril, and through all my purposes, governed 
 only by the conviction which I have uttered, and by no other view 
 than that of the emancipation of my country from the supcriulunnan 
 oppression under which she has so long and too patiently travailed ; 
 and I confidently hope that, wild and chimerical as it may appear, 
 there is still union and strength in Ireland to accomplish (his noblest 
 of enterprises. Of this I speak with confidence of intimate knowl- 
 edge, and with the consolation that appertains to that confidence. 
 Think not, my lords, I say this for the petty gratification of giving 
 you a transitoiy uneasiness. A man who never yet raised his voice 
 to assert a lie, will not hazard his character with posterity by assert- 
 ing a falsehood on a subject so important to his country, and on an 
 occasion like this. Yes, my lords, a man who does not wish to have 
 his epitaph written until his countrj' is liberated, will not leave a 
 weapon in the power of envy, or a pretence to impeach the probity 
 
ROBERT EMMET. 871 
 
 "which he means to preserve, even in the grave to which tyranny con- 
 signs him. 
 
 Here he was again interrupted by tlie court. 
 
 Again I say, that what I have spoken was not intended for your 
 lordship, whose situation I commiserate rather than envy — my 
 expressions were for my countrymen. If there is a true Irishman 
 present let my last words cheer liim in the hour of his afiliction. 
 
 Here lie was again interrupted. Lord Norbury said he did not sit there to hear 
 treason. 
 
 I have always understood it to be the duty of a judge, when a 
 prisoner has been convicted, to pronounce the sentence of the law. 
 I have also understood that judges sometimes think it their duty to 
 bear with patience and to speak with humanity ; to exhort the victim 
 of the laws, and to ofler, with tender benignity, their opinions of 
 the motives by which he was actuated in the crime of which he was 
 adjudged guilty. That a judge has thought it his duty so to have 
 done, I have no doubt ; but where is the boasted freedom of your 
 institutions — Avhere is the vaunted impartiality, clemency and mild- 
 ness of your courts of justice, if an unfortunate prisoner, whom your 
 policy, and not justice, is about to deliver into the hands of the 
 executioner, is not suffered to explain his motives sincerely and 
 truly, and to vindicate the principles by which he was actuated? 
 My lords, it may be a part of the system of angry justice to bow a 
 man's mind by humiliation to the purposed ignominy of the scaffold ; 
 but worse to me than the purposed shame or the scaffold's terrors, 
 would be the shame of such foul and unfounded imputations as have 
 been laid against me in this court. You, my lord, are a judge; I 
 am the supposed culprit. I am a man ; you are a man also. THy a 
 revolution of power we might change places, though we never could 
 change characters. If I stand at the bar of this court and dare not 
 vindicate my character, what a farce is your justice ! If I stand at 
 this bar and dare not vindicate my character, how dare you calum- 
 niate it? Does the sentence of death, which your unhallowed policy 
 inflicts on my body, condemn my tongue to silence and my reputa- 
 tion to reproach ? Your executioner may abridge the period of ray 
 ■existence ; but while I exist, 1 shall not forbear to vindicate my 
 
872 TREASUllY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 character and motives from your aspersions ; and, as a man, to whom 
 ftime is dearer than life, I will make the last use of that life in doing 
 •justice to that reputation which is to live after me, and which is the 
 only legacy I can leave to those I honor and love, and forAvhom I am. 
 jDroud to perish. As men, my lords, we must appear on the great 
 day at one common tribunal ; and it will then remain for the Searcher 
 of all Hearts to show a collective universe, who was engaged in the 
 most virtuous actions, or swayed hy the purest motive — my coun- 
 try's oppressors, or — 
 
 Here he was internipted, and told to listen to the sentence of the law. 
 
 My lords, will a dying man be denied the legal privilege of excul- 
 pating himself in the eyes of the community from an undeserved 
 reproach, thrown upon him during his trial, by charging him with 
 ambition, and attempting to cast away for a paltry consideration the 
 liberties of his country? Why did your lordships insult me? Or 
 rather, why insult justice, in demanding of me why sentence of 
 death should not be pronounced against me ? I know, my lords, that 
 form prescribes that you should ask the question. The form also 
 presents tiie right of answering. This, no doubt, may be dispensed 
 with, and so might the whole ceremony of the trial, since sentence 
 was alread}^ pronounced at the Castle before the jury were empan- 
 elled. Your lordships are but the priests of the oracle, and I insist 
 on the whole of the forms. 
 
 Here Mr. Emmet paused, and the court desired him to proceed. 
 
 I am charged with being an emissary of France. An emissary of 
 France ! and for what end ? It is alleged that I wish to sell tlie 
 independence of my country ; and for what end ? Was this the 
 object of my ambition? And is this the mode by which a tribunal 
 of justice reconciles conti-adiction? No ; I am no emissary ; and my 
 ambition was to hold a place among the deliverers of my country, 
 not in power nor in profit, but in the glory of the achievement. 
 Sell my country's independence to Franco! and for what? Was it 
 a change of masters? No, but for ambition. Oh, my country ! was 
 it pers(mal ambition that could influence me? Had it been the soul 
 of my actions, could I not, by my education and fortune, by the 
 
ROBERT EMMET. 873 
 
 rank and consideration of my family, have placed myself amongst 
 the proudest of your oppressors ? M}' country was my idol ! To it 
 I sacrificed every selfish, every endearing sentiment; and for it I 
 now offer up myself, O God ! No, my loi'ds ; I acted as an Irish- 
 man, determined on delivering my country from the yoke of a foreign 
 and unrelenting tyranny, and the more galling yoke of a domestic 
 faction, which is its joint partner and perpetrator in the patricide, 
 from the ignominy existing with an exterior of splendor and a con- 
 scious depravity. It was the wish of my heart to extricate my coun- 
 try from this doubly riveted despotism — I wished to place her 
 independence beyond the reach of any power on earth. I wished to 
 exalt her to that proud station in the world. Connection with 
 France was, indeed, intended, but only as far as mutual interest 
 would sanction or require. Wei-e the French to assume any author- 
 ity inconsistent with the purest independence, it would be the signal 
 for their destructiou. We sought their aid — and we sought it as 
 we had assurance we should obtain it — as auxiliaries in war, and 
 allies in peace. Were the French to come as invaders or enemies, 
 uninvited by the wishes of the people, I should oppose them to the 
 utmost of my strength. Yes ! my countrymen, I should advise j^ou 
 to meet them upon the beach with a sword in one hand, and a torch 
 in the other. I would meet them with all the destructive fury of 
 war. I would animate my countr^'men to immolate them in their 
 boats, before they had contaminated the soil of my country. If they 
 succeeded in landing, and if forced to retire before superior dis- 
 cipline, I would dispute every inch of ground, burn every blade of 
 grass, and the last entrenchment of liljerty should be my grave. 
 What I could not do myself, if I should fall, I should leave as a last 
 cliarge to my countrymen to accomplish ; because I should feel con- 
 scious that life, any more than death, is unprofitable when a foreign 
 nation holds my country in subjection. But it was not as an enemy 
 that the succors of France were to land. I looked, indeed, for the 
 assistance of France ; but I wished to prove to France and to the 
 wcu'ld that Irishmen deserved to be assisted ; that they were indig- 
 nant at slavery, and ready to assert the independence and liberty of 
 their country; I wished to procure for my country the guarantee 
 which Washington procured for America ; to procure an aid which, 
 by its example, would be as important as its valor ; disciplined, gal- 
 
874 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 lant, pregnant with science and experience ; tlmt of a people who 
 "would perceive the good, and polish the rough points of our charac- 
 ter. They would come to us as strangers, and leave us as friends, 
 after sharing in our perils and elevating our destiny. These were 
 my objects : not to receive new taskmasters, but to expel old tyrants. 
 It was for these ends I sought aid from France ; because France, 
 even as an enemy, could not be more implacable than the enemy 
 already in the bosom of my country. 
 
 Here lie was iutenniptcd b}' the court. 
 
 I have been charged with that importance in the emancipation of 
 my country as to be considered the keystone of the combination of 
 Irishmen; or, as your lordship expressed it, "the life and l>lood of 
 the conspiracy." You do me honor over much : you have given 
 to the subaltein all the credit of a superior. There are men en- 
 gaged in this conspiracy w^ho are not only superior to me, but even 
 to your own conceptions of yourself, my lord — men before the 
 splendor of whose genius and virtues I should bow with respect- 
 ful deference, and who would think themselves disgraced by shaking 
 your blood-stained hand. 
 
 Here be was interrupted. 
 
 What, my lord, shall yon tell me, on the passage to the scaf- 
 fold, which that tyranny (of wliich you are only the intermediary 
 executioner) has erected for my murder, that I am accountable for 
 all the blood that has and will be shed in this struggle of the op- 
 pi'essed against the oppressor — shall you tell me this, and must I 
 be so very a slave as not to repel it? I do not fear to approach the 
 Omnipotent Judge to answer for the conduct of my whole life ; and 
 am I to be appalled and falsified by a mere remnant of mortality 
 here? By you, too, although, if it were possible to collect all the 
 innocent blood that you have shed in your unhallowed ministry in 
 one great reservoir, your lordship might swim in it. 
 
 Here the judge interfered. 
 
EGBERT EMMET. , 875 
 
 Let no man dare, when I am dead, to charge me with dishonor; 
 let no man attaint my memory, by believing that I could have en- 
 gaged in any cause but that of my country's liberty and indepen- 
 dence ; or that I could have become the pliant minion of power, in 
 the oppression and misery of my country. The pi'oclamation of the 
 Provisional Government speaks for our views ; no inference can be 
 tortured from it to countenance barbarity or debasement at home, or 
 subjection, humiliation, or treachery from abroad. I would not 
 have submitted to a foreign oppressor, for the same reason that I 
 would resist the foreign and domestic oppressor. In the dignity of 
 freedom, I would have fought upon the threshold of my country, 
 and its enemy should enter only by passing over my lifeless corpse. 
 And am I, who lived but for my country, and who have subjected 
 myself to the dangers of the jealous and watchful oppressor, and 
 the bondage of the grave, only to give my countrymen their rights, 
 and my country her independence, — am I to be loaded with cal- 
 umny, and not suflered to resent it? No ; God forbid ! 
 
 Hero Lord Norbury told Mr. Emmet that his sentiments and language disgraced 
 his family and his education, but more particularly his father, Dr. Emmet, who was 
 a man, if alive, that would not countenance such opinions. To which Mr. Emmet 
 replied : — 
 
 If the spirits of the illustrious dead participate in the concerns 
 and cares of those who were dear to them in this transitory life, O 
 ever dear and venerated shade of my departed father ! look down 
 ■with scrutiny upon the conduct of your suffering son, and see if I 
 have, even for a moment, deviated from those principles of morality 
 and patriotism which it was your care to instil into my youthful 
 mind, and for which I am now about to offer up my life. My lords, 
 you are impatient for the sacrifice. The blood which you seek is 
 not congealed by the artificial terrors which surround your victim — 
 it circulates warmly and unrufllcd through the chaimels which God 
 created for noble purposes, but which you are now bent to destroy 
 for purposes so grievous that they cry to heaven. Be yet patient ! 
 I have but a few more words to say — I am going to my cold and 
 silent grave — my lamp of life is nearly extinguished — my race is 
 run — the grave opens to receive me, and I sink into its bosom. I 
 
876 
 
 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 have but one request to aak at my departure from this world : it 
 is — THE CHAKiTY OF ITS SILENCE. Let 110 man write my epitaph; 
 for, as no man who knows my motives dare now vindicate them, let 
 not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let them and me rest in 
 obscurity and peace ; and my tomb remain uninscribed, and my 
 memory in oblivion, until other times and other men can do justice 
 to my character. When my country takes her place among the 
 nations of the earth, then and not till then, let my epitaph be 
 written. I have done. 
 
ADDRESS, 
 
 -X-.,. 
 
 ^^ 
 
 
 Michael Davitt, 
 
 [ 877 ] 
 

Future Policy of Irish Nationalists. 
 
 The following masterly address on the " Future Policy of Irish Nationalists," 
 ■wliid) lie delivered in Mechanic's Hall, Boston, on December 8, 1878, before his 
 departure for Ireland, being his first great efl'ort in oratory, and a clear exposition 
 of the reasons for unity of action amongst all classes of Irishmen, we give in 
 full : — 
 
 ^«T would be diiBcult to conceive a position more unenviable than 
 ^1 that in which an Irish Nationalist places himself when he 
 f"- attempts to review the past of his party in order to point out 
 •L what be believes to have been rash or impolitic in its career. 
 A criticism of the wisdom of an action that has failed or a line of 
 conduct which has been injudicious, is at once construed into dis- 
 loyalty to the principles or party which may have prompted such 
 action by a sincere but imprudent resolve. But when ho expresses 
 himself dissatisfied with the narrow sphere of a policy Avhich tends 
 to exclude from National labor every one but a pronounced Separa- 
 tist, and adds his belief that a change of tactics would turn the 
 exertions of sincere Irishmen, though now pronounced Separatists, 
 into the National cause, he is at once assumed to have "forfeited his 
 principles," and to be on the high road to AVcst-Britonisni. 
 
 In consequence of this proncness of the Irish mind to hasty and 
 uncharitable deductions, men (who t/tink while working in Ireland's 
 cause) are deterred from condemning what they know to be inju- 
 dicious, lest they should find themselves ostracized from its ranks 
 for their anxiety to see it directed the surest way to success. In 
 my humble opinion, a want of moral courage belittles a man far 
 more than a deficiency in the physical article, and that real coward- 
 ice consists in dreading the sentimental consequences of an upright, 
 honest action. It has ever been the practice to pander to the popu- 
 lar prejudices of our country, by hyperbolical eulogies on everything 
 
880 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Irisli, and wc have thus become tlie spoiled childvcn of struggling 
 nationalities, and, as a necessary consequence, backward in our 
 political education as a people, as well as behind the progressive 
 march of the age. Holding these opinions, I will endeavor to-night 
 to show you how we ourselves are to blame for past failures, and 
 how essential it is, that the causes which led to such failures be 
 guarded against in the future. The indestructibility of Irish nation- 
 ality is no more its distinguishing characteristic, than is its past 
 inapplicability to the working out of its own success, or the winning 
 of an advanced social and political position for the people who pro- 
 fess it. We can boast that hundreds of years of the worst rule that 
 ever cursed a country has failed to crush it ; but can we say that 
 Ireland is to-day in a condition connnensurate with the struggles 
 and sacrifices of her sons on her behalf during the past seven cen- 
 turies? I think not ; and the "why and wherefore " of this fact is 
 what should ibcus upon it the thought and studies of practical 
 Nationalists of the present. That there has been an unmethodical 
 application of energies, or rather, a reckless waste of national 
 strength in this long contest, is but too patent from a comparison 
 between the position, social and political, of our country to-day, 
 and that of other peoples who have struggled successfully against 
 the same enemy. The very strength of our purpose and determina- 
 tion of our resolves were the means which invited defeat. We 
 grasped at liberty in the intoxication of sincerity, and blindly dis- 
 carded every other practical consideration. We " resolved," and 
 " swore," and "determined" to avenge Ireland's lorongsl but took no 
 essential method to win her liberty. We were actuated as much 
 by revenge as by patriotism, and received the penalty which follows 
 the obeying of a passion instead of the dictates of a virtue. While 
 recognizing that it was a war of races, Saxon against Celtic, we 
 refused to shelter ourselves behind the ramparts of expediency or 
 employ any of the many justifiable means by which a weak people 
 might utilize their strength ; and we therefore marched into the 
 open i)lain inviting destruction. Instead of watching our enemy 
 from l)ehind the Torres Vedras of Ireland's imperishable national 
 principles, and determining our action by his weakness or strength 
 according to the powers arrayed against him, we left our position 
 exposed in order to challenge him to single combat, and we never 
 
MICHAEL DAVITT. 881 
 
 xaarcbed t<j the Paris of the British Empire to see him relinquish his 
 spoils or surrender his conquests. 
 
 No greater mistake could be made by Fenianism than the draw- 
 ing of but a single line of distinction between a West Briton and the 
 Irishman wlio accepted its programme of actinn as the safe, cei-tain, 
 and only means of winning independence. The assumption that all 
 Irish Nationalists were included in the Feniiui organization was a 
 piece of disastrous folly, as it engendered a bitter hostility to earnest 
 Irishmen who only refused to follow a leader whom they did not 
 know in a movement which confined itself to a single class of their 
 countrymen. Thus, a host of enemies were created where the 
 reserve force of a real national movement should find strength and 
 support. 
 
 Now, a fault-finder or critic has no claim to a fair hearing, unless 
 he has something i-easonable to sulistitiite for or amend in what he 
 condemns. I will, therefore, with your iiididgence, attempt to 
 23oint out what, in my opinion, would place our national cause upon 
 ■a stronger footing, and multiply its chances of success in the near 
 future. 
 
 As I have freely censured the past policy of my own party, it 
 may have created a suspicion in. your minds that it was the part!/ 
 itself or its principles which I attacked under cover of a review of 
 its past history. I trust it will not need my assurance to convince 
 you of my belief in and adherence to the doctrine of physical force, 
 tmd that wliatever other agencies, expedient, moral, or diplomatic, 
 T\'hich I ma}' desire to see added to the factors at work in the 
 national Ciuise, I am convinced, that it is only the manhood strength 
 •of Ireland which can give the coxip-de-grace to her enemy's rule 
 over her. This belief does not exclude the employment of any of 
 the other means I have just alluded to as an auxiliary to the final 
 (/enuer res.sorl as being unjustifiable or antagonistic to the principles 
 involved in the contest; and it is on this ground I rest a claim for 
 tin; utilizing of every safe and justifiable expedient in the working 
 out of our country's social and political redemption. It is well, 
 tlierefore, to look outside the National party in Ireland, to recon- 
 noitre our friends or enemies, and see how far the one can be count- 
 ■ed upon and how much the other is to be dreaded. 
 
 The Ireland of the present may be divided into four distinct 
 
882 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 sections of political strife, presumably in her interest: the Nation- 
 alist or party of action. "National "Constitutional, West British, and 
 neutral, or rather non-participant, Irishmen. 
 
 Take the first of these parties, which, on account of its being the 
 custotlian of Ireland's non-forfeited right to independence, should 
 necessarily be the most powerful in numbers and inlluenco ; yet we 
 must admit that it is not so, when it is looked at either in the light 
 of its recent past endeavors or from its present hold on the public 
 mind of Ireland. But let it be disassociated from the consequences 
 of sincere but injudicious or premature action, and pitted against 
 anti-national feeling in Ireland, and it possesses at once the imques- 
 tioned representative sentiment of the Irish people, and outnumbei-s 
 in its adherents all the other parties combined. The position which 
 we occupy in the political world is, therefore, a singularly anomal- 
 ous one ; for while our people are unquestionably national in their 
 inward convictions, they exhibit in their external or public aspect a 
 contradiction to that very fact. Hence the world either misunder- 
 stands or discredits our political aspirations. Now how is it that 
 the Nationalist party is numerically the strongest in sentiment and 
 sympathy, Avhilc not so in action? And wh3' does external opinion 
 remain sceptical as to Ireland's real desire for separation? 
 
 To answer the first question, I will crave permission to place my- 
 self in the position of a tiller of tlie soil in Ireland, — say one of 
 Patten Bridge's victims, on the barren slopes of the Galtces. I will 
 assume I have just reached the level of my mud-walled cabin, on 
 the mountain side, after carrying a load of manure on my back from 
 the plains below. I have seen the short-horns, and black-faced 
 sheep, from England and Scotland, grazing upon the rich land ait 
 the foot of the mountains, — the land w-iiich formerly belonged to 
 my ancestors, and the produce of which is now fattening brute 
 beasts while my six children arc starving with hunger. I might be 
 supposed to say, " How is it that I, who have done no wrong to 
 God, my country, or s;)ciety, should be doomed to a penal existence 
 like this? Who are they that stand by and see the beasts of the 
 field preferred before me and my family ? I am powcrle>s to do 
 anything but provide for the cravings of those whom God has sent 
 to my care, and to relax my labor for a day might be a day's starva- 
 tion to my little ones. If I go down to the castle and avenge my 
 
MICHAEL DAVITT. 883 
 
 ■wrongs on the heud of Patten Bridge, I am but injuring him, and 
 not the sj'stem which enables him to iDluuder me. I naist therefore 
 refrain from an act which would see 7ne die on the scaffold, and ray 
 children in the workhonse. If no one else will assist me, I am con- 
 dcunicd to tliis miserable existence for the remainder of my life. 
 "Who are they that have time and energy to take part in tlio politi- 
 cal strife of the day, and say they are working for Ireland and 
 me? The Nationalist party tells me that when independence is won, 
 I will no longer be at the mercy of an English landlord. That is 
 like feeding my children with a mind's-eye-view of the dinner that 
 will Ije served in Galtee Castle to-day. Yellow meal porridge is a 
 more substantial meal than visionary plenty, and if the Nationalists 
 want me to believe in, and labor a little for, independence, they 
 must first show themselves desirous and strong enough to Kland be- 
 tween me and (he power which a single En'jlisliman wields over me. 
 If they show ihey can do that, and thereby better my condition, 
 they will convince me of their strength in Ireland, aud earnestness 
 in my behalf; and it is not in Irish nature to refuse a helping hand 
 to those who assist another. Let them show that the social well- 
 being of our people is the motive of their actions, and aim of their 
 endeavors, while striving for the grand object ahead, and then the 
 farming classes in Ireland will rally round them to assist in reaching 
 that object. They look upon a man's existence in an absti'act light, 
 and think he should be moved in their cause without consulting th;it 
 selfishness which is invariably the mainspring of human actions. 
 God only knows how much I would like to fight for Ireland to- 
 morrow if I could only see a chance of success, or had my wife and 
 children in a similar position to that in which I am told the farmers 
 of France and Belgium have theirs; but every former attempt at 
 success has failed, me and mine are still at the mercy of liie land- 
 lord, and therefore I can only give the Nationalists my sympathy 
 and well-wishes, for my labor, time, and life, is necessary to the 
 feeding of little Nora and the other children. The Parliamentarians 
 promise to do more for me than any other party, but tliey break 
 their promises in Westminster, and show as great an interest in 
 Turkey as in Ireland. They are also at war with the Nationalists, 
 and consequently the government and the West Britons ha\c it all 
 their own Avay over the vast majority of tlie Irish people, ile and 
 
884 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 the likes of me are told we have friends in all parties ; but we never 
 iire made to feel anything but the power and influence of our ene- 
 mies, — the landlords. I must bring up another creel of dung from 
 the bottom of the mountain before mid-day, and then share my 
 bowl of stirabout with my little ones. God's will be done, but it 
 is a hard life to lead in the nineteenth century ! " 
 
 This is no exaggeration of tiic thoughts or attitude of the people 
 who arc compelled to stand aloof from political strife in Ireland ; 
 and this vast class, recruited alike from the one instanced as well as 
 from all those whose avocations and actions have their root in the 
 virtue of the hoiiefit, seljixli carets of social life, are within reach of 
 the party of action, if the necessary steps are taken to enlist their 
 assistance and co-operation. 
 
 Turning to the political aspect of Irish nationality as it is viewed 
 from abroad, it is easy to show how we have been, and are still, 
 discredited with practical earnestness in our opposition to English 
 rule. We have flattered ourselves too long with the belief that we 
 were assured of French and American sympathy in our contest with 
 the enemy of our race, and that these and other countries would 
 acctptof our spasmodic struggles against a dominant power as prov- 
 ing the disafl'ection and determined opposition of a whole people, 
 while "representatives," municipalities, I'eligious and other bodies, 
 public men and public writers, were convincing them to the direct 
 contrary. 'Tis true that periodical attempts at insurrection have 
 shown that though our country is subjugated it is not reconciled to 
 alien government, willing to forfeit its national birthright ; but, con- 
 vincing as all this may bo to Irishmen, others will look upon our 
 repeated' risings in the light of past events, and speak of them in 
 proportion to their importance as looked at from an external point 
 of view, while weighing us in the political balance of nationalities 
 in exact accordance with the public spirit and political tendencies of 
 our people of the present. The collective opinions of foreign na- 
 tions, in sympathy with or indifl'erence towards the Irish question, 
 will be formed from its present phases, and not, as toe would desire, 
 from past occurrences ; and therefore the less our national aspirations 
 and convincing opposition to alien rule are manifested to the world 
 by the public tone and attitude of our people, the less interest there 
 will be taken and sympathy felt by the world in our cause. Oiu* 
 
MICHAEL DAVITT. 885 
 
 couuecttou with the past of Ireland — the inspiration we draw from 
 its history, and the events therein recorded — must influence, of 
 course, our line of action in the working out of the political destiny 
 of our fatherland ; but our glorious past w^il not win for us one iota 
 of sympathy from outside the Irish race beyond what is demanded 
 hy the consistency of such actions with the object aimed at, and the 
 practical manner in which the national desire for the attainment of 
 that object is manifested. 
 
 When we appeal to mankind for tlie justice of our cause, we must 
 assume the attitude of a united, because an earnest, people, and 
 show reason why we refuse to accept of our political annihilation. 
 We can only do this by the thoroughness of purpose which should 
 actuate, and the sj^stematic exertions which alone can justify, us in 
 claiming the recognition due to a country which has never once' 
 acquiesced in its subjugation, nor abandoned its resolve to be free. 
 Viewing that country then, as she presents herself to-day, the prob- 
 lem of her redemption may be put in this formula: Given the present 
 social and political condition of Ireland, with vhe spirit, national 
 tendencies, physical and moral ftn-ccs of her people — together with 
 the power, influence, and policy arrayed against them — to indicate 
 what should be the i)lans pursued, and action adopted, ■whereby the 
 condition of our people could be materially improved, in eflforts 
 tending to raise them to their rightful position as a Nation. 
 
 I confess to th(; difficult}' of solving such a problem, but not so 
 much as to the putting it into practice if theoretically demonstrated ; 
 but 
 
 " Eight endeavor's not in vniu • — 
 
 Its rew:inl is in tlie doing; 
 
 And the rapture of pursuing, 
 Is the prize the vanqiiislied gain." 
 
 Let US see if we can discover a key to the difiiculty of the Irish 
 question. I will assume that thei'c are certain matters or contingen- 
 cies important to or alfccli ng the Irish race which are of equal in- 
 terest to its people (irrespecti\'e of what diircrcnces of opinion there 
 may be amongst them on various other concerns), — such as the 
 preservation of the distinctive individuality of the race itself among 
 peoples ; the earning for it that resjiect and prestige to which 
 it is by right and inheritance entitled, by striving for its improve- 
 
836 TREASUEY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 mcnt, physically ami movall}', and its intellectual and social advance- 
 ment, revival of its ancient language, etc; and that there arc past 
 occurrences and sectional animosities which all cl;isses must reasona- 
 bly desire to prevent in future, for the hoiwr and Avelfare of 
 themselves and country, — such as religious feuds and provincial 
 antipathies. I will also assume that the raising of our peasant pop- 
 ulation from the depths of social misery to which it has been sunk by 
 an unjust land system, would meet with the approval of most classes 
 in Ireland, and receive the moral co-operatiun of Irishmen aln-oad, 
 as would also the improvement of the dwellings of our agricultural 
 population, which project, I also assume, would be acccjitcd ai:d sup- 
 ported by all parties in Irish political life. AVithout particularizing 
 any further measures for the common good of our people, for which 
 political parties cannot i-efuse to mutually co-operate, if consistent 
 Avith their raison d'efre as striving for their country's welfare, I think 
 it will be granted that Nationalists (pronounced or quiescent). Ob- 
 structionists, Home Eulers, li-'pealers, and others, could unite in 
 ohtaining the reforms already enumerated by concerted action on 
 jind by whatever means the present existing state of afi'airs in Ire- 
 land can place within their reach. Such concerted action for the 
 general good would necessitate a centripetal platform, as represent- 
 ing tliat central priucijjle or motive which constitutes the hold and 
 supplies the influence that a country's government has upon the peo- 
 ple governed. 
 
 A race of people, to preserve itself from destruction by an hostile 
 race, or by partisan spirit and factious strife internally, or absorption 
 by n people among which it may be scattered, absolutely requires 
 some central idea, principle, or platform of motives of action, by 
 •which to exercise its national, or race-individuality, strength, with a 
 view to its improvement and preservation. A people's own estab- 
 lished government supplies this need, of course, but where, as in 
 Ireland, there is no government of or by the people, and the domi- 
 nant power is but a strong executive faction, the national strength is 
 wasted, — 1. By the divide et impera policy of that dominant Eng- 
 lish faction ; 2. By desperate attempts to overthrow that power ; 
 and 3. By hitherto fruitless agitation to win a just rule, or force 
 remedial legislation from an alien assembly by means repugnant to 
 the pride of the largest portion of our people ; while here, in this 
 
MICHAEL DAVITT. 8S7 
 
 great shelter-land of peoples, the Irish race itself is fast disappear- 
 ing in the composite American. If, therefore, a platform be put 
 fortli embodying' rewistance to every hostile element pitted, or ad- 
 verse influence at work, against the individuality of Ireland and its 
 people, and a programme of national labor for the general welfare 
 of our country I)c adopted, resting upon those wants and desires 
 ■which have a first claim upon the consideration of Irishmen, — such 
 a platform, if put forth, not to suit a particular party, but to em- 
 brace all that is earnest and desirous among our people for labor in 
 the vineyard of Ireland's common good, a great national desire 
 would be gratified, and an immense stride be taken towards the 
 goal of each Irishman's hopes. 
 
 Such a centre-composite platform would not necessarily require 
 any control over the oi'ganization of its respective party-adherents, 
 nor need the resources of the party of action except when the final 
 appeal for self-government should be made. All that it would 
 tlcmand from its individual elements would be such support as 
 should make it superior in influence over the public life of Ire- 
 land to that which the English faction wields to our disgrace and 
 disadvantage to-day. Apart from the material good which would 
 assuredly follow from such a platform being adopted, how inesti- 
 mable would be the collateral advantages that would accrue from 
 Irishmen adinrf logellier at last for some tangible common benefit to 
 \)Q conferred upon themselves and their country ! The gradual but 
 certain sweeping away of West-British ideas before the advance of 
 11 united national Irish sentiment ; the harmonizing of the hitherto 
 conflicting elements in political parties ; the developing of our peo- 
 ple's political education; the creation of a healthy and vigorous 
 puldic spirit which would at once attract and challenge the attention 
 of foreign opinion, and concentrate upon Ireland an international 
 interest in a renaissanf people, who can exert a powerful influence 
 over the destiny of a declining empire, the prestige and power of 
 which arc obnoxious to rival nations. Then the immense impetus 
 which would be given to the national cause by the moral suppmt of 
 a sympathetic participation in it by the vast Irish and Irish-Ameri- 
 can element in this country, by far the greater part of which has 
 heretofore stood aloof from Ireland's straggles, in consequence of 
 
888 TREASURY OF ELOriUENCE. 
 
 having no feasible plan laid liefore it, whereby its assistance and 
 influence conkl be profitably employed in the same. 
 
 The difficulties in the way of such an united Irish public move- 
 ment :rc to be found in the unreasonable prejudice and suicidal an- 
 tagonism which exists between the two parties who each assunn^ to 
 bo Ireland's benefactor, — tlio Nationalist and the Irish-Constitu- 
 tion:il bodies. This mutual op})osition has weakened both, diflnscd 
 b'.id l)io(id among the commuriily, increased the number of non- 
 parlicinants in the political life of the country, and sirengthcned the 
 position of the coercive faction. Condemnation of Nationalist actiou' 
 by Irish Constitutionals is jiermissible only within the limits of a 
 censure upon desperate, untimely resolves on insurrection, as their 
 opposition is unjustifiable upon any otlicr ground. 
 
 The Nationalist party is the guardian of their country's inalienable 
 right to be unstress of her own destinies ; its records are those which 
 tell of a nation's fight against the extertninatiou of its people : its 
 martyrology is that of Ireland ; and all of which we can justly be 
 most proud in her history — her seven centuries' struggle against 
 overwhelming odds for the highest ambition of a nation (indepen- 
 dence) — is the platform of the party of action. Its very defeats 
 have won victories for the Constitutionalists ; and the intensity of 
 its earnestness has compelled remedial measures to be conceded to 
 Ireland. As the Irishman w ho believes that his country could not 
 govern herself if politically isolated is too contem[)tible to be 
 noticed, the objection against the Nationalist party by its Consti- 
 tutional opponent is belief in the improbability of final success, — 
 and not antagonism to the object aimed at. 
 
 On the other side, the prejudice existing among Nationalists 
 against Constitutional action is in proporti(ni to the anti-National 
 complexion which it assumes ; hence. Home Rule, from its being so 
 much more un-Irish in essence and scope, is looked upon with 
 greater antipathy than Repeal. Giving the Constitutionals credit, 
 as in charity bound, for the best intentions, we must assume that 
 they are actuati d by the following reasons and motives : Believ- 
 ing in the impossibilit}- of separation, they rely upon moral force as 
 a means of advancing the interests of the country, and that they 
 employ this means in the conviction that it is the safest and most 
 efficient plan by which an improvement of the people can I)e effected. 
 
MICHAEL DAVITT. 880 
 
 and their country benefited. When the acts of Constitutionals lielie 
 these motives, they become reprehensible ; but in their honesty of 
 conduct within the lines of their good intents, they are deserxinc: of, 
 and entitled to, recognition and tolerance as laborers in behalf of Ire- 
 land and its people. They are as prominent in the political arena as 
 the Nationalists, — more so, in fact, as the}' have a public policy to 
 catch the public ear and eye. They have a following in Ireland 
 which is at once powerful and influential, and cannot, therefore, l)e 
 ignored. They have enlisted the support of the Catholic c!erg\ , 
 and count the middle class of the country as belonging to their 
 party. Since the passing of the ballot-bill they can appeal with 
 more force to Irish voters, who no longer run the risk of eviction 
 for opposing landlord nominees. This freedom from restraint in the 
 exercise of the franchise among a remedy-seeking people must logi- 
 cally impel them to look for redress, and men to champion their 
 cause, in the safest, and, to them, most efiectual means within 
 their reach. 
 
 To these facts must bo added still stronger ones, namely, that, 
 whether we Nationalists like it or not, Irish voters, as well as non- 
 electors, will participate in elections, and interest themselves in tlieir 
 results. So long as the infamous Act of Union lasts, men will be 
 sent to Westminster to represent or betray their country, in exact 
 proportions to the interest or indifference with which the whole Irish 
 people look upon Parliamentarianism. An indication of a natinnal 
 resolve to minimize the disgrace of a traitor-representation in an hos- 
 tile assembly would curb the self-seeking place-hunters in the auc- 
 tion of their "patriotism," and themselves in St. Stephen's political 
 mart. Hostility towards, or complete isolation from, parliamentary 
 action by the Nationalists, will engender and encourage Wrst-Briton- 
 ism in Irish representation, and the world, which persists in looking 
 at the Irish question through the medium of the House of Commons, 
 will form its opinions on the wants and political tendencies of Ire- 
 land from the conduct and utterances of her " representatives," 'I he 
 amount of national sentiment and hostility to alien rule exhil«ited in 
 Westminster by Irish members of Parliament will be to Knssia, 
 France, and America the gauge of the same sentiment and hostility 
 in Ireland, where such members are elected. With the puMic ear 
 in Ireland, and the eye and attention of the world in the world's most 
 
890 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 conspicuous assembly, how are the Conslilutionalists Jiandicapped in 
 a contest for parti/ influence with the Nationalists, who have neither J 
 Suppose the positions and advantages reversed in tlie last respect, at 
 least, would the Nationalists be weaker and the cause of Ireland 
 worse situated? I think not. 
 
 Having defined the relative positions and strength of the two great 
 parties in Irish politics, no other conclusion can be come to but this : 
 that initil an understanding, base of public union, or common pnl)lic 
 platform, is established between them, the Executive faction, alias 
 Castle government, will influence, direct, and domineer tlic official 
 and public life of Ireland, and her people "may whistle to the ivinds 
 for self-government, or escape from the Saxon's control." 
 
 Now let us put prejudices one side and honestl}' look at facts, and 
 ■we will find that parliamentary action during the past few years has 
 been trying to clothe itself in the garb of honesty, notwithstanding 
 numerous instances of betrayal of trust. Mr. Isaac Butt, in giving 
 a Federal complexion to Ireland's constitutional holiday garment for 
 Westminster parade, was endeavoring to make Imperial broadcloth, 
 out of Irish frieze, and he has become politically bankrupt, in con- 
 sequence of failure. Abstract this disagreeable feature, together 
 with the un-Irish conduct and treachery of some of Mr. Butt's sup- 
 porters, from the action of Irish members in the House of Commons 
 during the past few years, and we will find a more national and de- 
 termined stand taken for Ireland and against the government than at 
 any former period in that assembly. Seeing this, finding large 
 classes of our people boasting of it, and recognizing the fact that 
 the centre figui'e of this stubborn attitude in an hostile assembly, 
 has, in the small space of four years, become the most popular and 
 most trusted of Irishmen, is there not something good can come out 
 of Nazareth, after all? If so, let us see how it can bo increased. 
 
 For the present good of Ireland, and as a polic}' of expediency, I, 
 as a Nationalist, could support the following programme consistently 
 with my own principles and Ireland's present wants : — 
 
 1st. The first and indispensable requisite in a representative of Ireland in the 
 Parliament of England to be a public profession of his belief in the inalienable right 
 of the Irish people to self-government, and recognition of the fact that the want of 
 fielf-govornmcnt is the chief want of Ireland. 
 
 2d. Au exclusive Irish representation, with the view of exhibiting Ireland to the 
 
MICHAEL DAVITT. S91 
 
 world in the liglit of lipr people's opinions and national aspirations, togctlicr with 
 an uncorapromisiug opposition to tlic government upon every prejudiced or coercive 
 policy. 
 
 3d. A demand for tlio immediate improvement of the land system by sucli a 
 thorough change as would prevent the peasantry of Ireland fronH)eing its victims 
 in the future. This change to form tlic preamble of a system of small proprietor- 
 ships similar to what at present obtains in France, Belgium and I'rnssia. Such land 
 to bo purchased or held directly from tlio state. To ground this demand upon the 
 reasonable fact that, as tlie land of Ireland formerly belonged to tlic people (being but 
 nominally held in trust for them Ijy cliiefs or heads of clans elected for that among 
 other purposes) it is the duty of the government to give compensation to the land- 
 lords for taking back that wliicli was bestowed upon their progenitors after being 
 stolen from the people, in order that the state can again become the custodian of 
 the land for the people-owners. 
 
 4th. Legislation for the encouragement of Irish industries, development of Ire- 
 laud's natural resources; substitution, as niueli as practicable, of cultivation for 
 grazing; reclamation of waste lands; protection of Irish fisheries, and improve- 
 ment of peasant dwellings. 
 
 5th. Assimilation of the county to the borough franchise, and reform of the 
 grand jury laws, as also those afl'ecting convention in Ireland. 
 
 Gth. A national solicitude on the question of educatjon by vigorous efforts for 
 improving and advancing the same, together with every precaution t.o be taken 
 .against it being made an anli-nulional one. 
 
 7th. The right of the Irlsli people to carry arms. 
 
 It will be objected by some, that to meddle in parliamentary 
 action, no matter how honest, i.s contrary to Nationalist principles, 
 and therefore censurable. No man likes to put his hands in pitch; 
 but if he is tarred and feathered for no fault of his own, and against 
 his will, he must clean himself as best he can. The pitch of English 
 rule on Ireland will not be removed by kid-gloycd indifference and 
 straight-laced, lofty patriotic consistency ; it is better to commence 
 scrubbing it otT wherever more can be otherwise added. It will bo 
 again objected that if a strong National party were sent to Parlia- 
 ment, and it succeeded in obtaining some remedial measures, the 
 people of Ireland would be contented with what they would thus 
 obtain, and cease to strive for separation. Granted that a portion 
 of our people would "rest and be thankful " for a better condition 
 of affairs than they live under at present ; but would the Nationalist 
 party be so? If it would, it is not the real representative of 
 Ireland's past ; if it would not, there is no earthly justification for 
 an abstention from endeavoring to benefit even those that would 
 accept the situation, when side by side with their social and political 
 
892 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 advancement would be that of those who would not take it as a final 
 settlement of the question. 
 
 . It is showing a strange want of knowledge of England's hatred 
 and jealousy of Ireland to suppose that a government formed from 
 any of the English parties would ever concede all that could satisfy 
 the desires of the Irish peojale ; and to ground an apprehension 
 upon such an improbable contingency is a mistake. 
 
 Again, the supposition that the spirit of Irish nationality, which 
 has combated against destruction for seven centuries, only awaits a 
 few concessions from its baffled enemy to be snuifed out thereby, 
 does not speak highly for those who hold that opinion of its frailty. 
 In my opinion, we may expect to hear no more of " the cause " when 
 the genius of Tippei'ary shall carve the Rock of Cashel into a statue 
 of Judge Keogh, and Croagh Patrick shall walk to London to ren- 
 der homage to the Duke of Connaught. Every chapter of our 
 history, eveiy ensanguined field upon which our forefathers died in 
 defence of that cause, every name in the martyrology of Ireland, 
 from Fitzgerald to Charles McCarthy, proclaim the truth of 
 Meagher's impassioned words : " From the Irish mind the inspiring- 
 thought that there once was an Irish Nation self-chartered and self- 
 ruled can never be effaced ; the burning hope that there will be one 
 again can never be extinguished." 
 
 With these convictions, and the consummation of such hopes pre- 
 destined by an indestructible cause and imperishable national princi- 
 ples, Irish Nationalists can, M'ithout fear of compromising such 
 principles, grapple with West-Britonism on its own ground, and 
 strangle its efforts to imperialize Ireland. The popular party in 
 Ireland has a right to participate in everything concerning the social 
 and political condition of the country ; to compete with the consti- 
 tutional and other parties who cater for public support, and stamp in 
 this manner its Nationalist convictions and principles upon every- 
 thing Irish, from a local board of poor-law guardians to a (by cir- 
 cumstances compulsory) representation in an alien parliament. 
 
 No party has a right to call itself National, which neglects resort- 
 ing to all and every justifiable means to end the frightful misery 
 under which our land-crushed people groan. It is exhibiting a 
 callous indifference to the state of social degradation to which the 
 power of the landlords of Ireland has sunk our peasantry to ask 
 
MICHAEL DAVITT. 893 
 
 them to " plod on in slugsyish misery from sire to son, from age to 
 age," until we, by force of party and party selfishness, shall free the 
 country. It is playing the part of the Levite who passed by the 
 man plundered by thieves. It is seeing a helpless creature strug- 
 gling against suffocation in a ditch, and making no immediate effort 
 to save him. If we refuse to play the part of the Good Samaritan 
 to those who have fallen among robber landlords, other Irishmen 
 "will not. The cry has gone forth, " Down with the land system that 
 has cursed and depopulated Ireland ; " and this slogan cry of war 
 has come from the Constitutionalists. 
 
 In the name of the common good of our country, its honor, 
 interests, social and political, let the two great Irish parties agree to 
 differ on party principles, while emulating each other in service to 
 our impoverished people. Let each endeavor to find points upon 
 ■which they can agree, instead of trying to discover quibbles whereon 
 to differ. Let a centre platform be adopted, resting on a broad, 
 generous, and comprehensive Nationalism, which will invite every 
 earnest Irishman upon it. The manhood strength of Ireland could 
 then become an irresistible power, standing ready at its post, while 
 the whole Irish race, rallying to the supijort of such a platform, 
 vould cry — 
 
 " Wc want the laM that bore tis! 
 We'll make that want our chorus; 
 
 And we'll have it yet, tho' hard to get, 
 By the heavens bending o'er us." 
 
SPEECH. 
 
 BY ^— 
 
 \ \^ V ""-^a -c 
 
 Thomas Francis Meagher. 
 
 [895 ] 
 
Speech 
 
 At Conciliation ILvll, Dublin, July 28, 1846.. 
 
 ^F^Y Lord Mayou — I will commence as IMr. Mitchell con- 
 ^ eluded, with an alhision to tiie Whigs. 
 
 I fully concur with my friend, that the most comprehensive 
 measures which the AVhig minister may propose, will fail to 
 lift this coimtry up to that position which she has the right to 
 occupy, and the pcjwer to maintain. A Whig minister, I admit, 
 may impi'ovc the pi'ovince — he will not restore the nation. Fran- 
 <;hi£es, tenant compensation bills, liberal appointments may ameli- 
 orate, they will not exalt ; they may meet the necessities, they ^vill 
 not call forth the abilities of the coimtry. The errors of the past 
 may be repaired — the hopes of the future will not be fnltiUed. 
 With a vote in one pocket, a lease in the other, and "full justice" 
 before him at the petty sessions, in the shape of a "restored magis- 
 trate," the humblest peasant may be told that he is free ; trust me, my 
 lord, he will not have the chai-acter of a freeman, his spirit to d.ire, 
 his energy to act. From the stateliest mansion down to the poorest 
 cottage in the land, the inactivity, the meanness, the debasement, 
 which provincialism engenders, will be perceptible. 
 
 These are not the crude sentiments of youth, though the mei-e 
 commercial politician, who has deduced his ideas of self-govern- 
 ment from the table of imports and exports, may satii-izc them as 
 such. Age has uttered them, my lord, and the experience of eight 
 jiars has preached them to the people. 
 
 A few weeks since, and there stood up in the eouit of Queen's 
 Bench an old and venerable man to teach the country the lessons he 
 had learned in his youth, beneath the portico of the Irish Senate 
 House, and which during a long life he had treasured in his heart, 
 
898 TREASCllY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 as the costliest legacy a true citi^iea could bequeath to the land that 
 gave him birth. 
 
 What said this aged orator? 
 
 " National iiidepciulciice docs not necessarily lead to national virtue and happi- 
 ness ; but reason and experience demonstrate that public spirit and general happi- 
 ness arc loolced for in vain under the withering influence of provincial subjection. 
 The very consciousness of being dependent on another povrer for advancement in 
 the scale of national being, weighs down the spirit, of a people, manacles the efforts 
 of genius, depresses the energies of virtue, blunts the sense of common glory and 
 common good, and produces an insulated selfishness of character, the surest mark 
 of debasement in the individual, and mortality in the state." 
 
 My lord, it was once said by an eminent citizen of Eome, the 
 elder Pliny, that "wc owe our youth and manhood to our country, 
 but our declining age to ourselves." This may have been the maxim 
 of the Roman — it is not the maxim of the Irish patriot. One might 
 have thought that the anxieties, the labors, the vicissitudes of a 
 long career, had dimmed the fire which burned in the heart of the 
 illustrious Roman whose words I have cited ; but now, almost from 
 the shadow of death, he comes forth with the vigor of youth, and 
 the authority of age, to serve the country in the defence of which 
 he once bore arms, by an example, iny lord, that must shame the 
 coward, rouse the sluggard, and stimulate the bold. These senti- 
 ments have sunk det p into the public mind ; they are recited as the 
 national creed. Whilst these sentiments inspire the people, I have 
 no fear for the national cause. I do not dread the venal influeuce of 
 the Whigs. 
 
 Inspired by such sentiments, the people of this country will look 
 beyond the mere redress of existing WTong, and strive for the 
 attainment of future power. 
 
 A good government may, indeed, redress the grievances of an 
 injured people, but a strong people alone can build up a great 
 nation. To be strong, a people must be self-reliant, self-ruled, self- 
 sustained. The dependence of one people upon another, even for 
 the bcnelits of legislation, is the deepest source of national weak- 
 ness. By an unnatural law it exempts a people from their just 
 duties — their just responsibilities. When you exempt a people 
 from these duties, from these responsibilities, you generate in them 
 a distrust in their own powers. Thus you enervate, if you do not 
 
THOMAS FUANCIS MEAGHER. 899 
 
 utterly desti'oy that spirit whicli a sense of these responsibilities is 
 sure to inspire, and which the fulfillment of these duties never fails 
 to invigorate. Where this spirit does not actuate, the country may 
 be tranquil — it will not be prosperous. It may exist, it will not 
 thrive. It may hold together, it will not advance. Peace it may 
 enjoy — for peace and freedom are compatible. But, my lord, it 
 will neither accumulate wealth nor win a character ; it will neither 
 benefit mankind by the enterprise of its merchants nor instruct man- 
 kind by the example of its statesmen. 
 
 I make these observations, for it is the custom of some moderate 
 politicians to say, that when the Whigs have accomplished the 
 "pacification" of the country, there will be little or no necessity for 
 Ecpeal. My loi'd, there is something else, there is everything else 
 to be done when the work of " pacification " has been accomplished 
 — and here it is hardly necessary to observe that the prosperity of a 
 country is perhaps the sole guarantee for its tranquillity, and that 
 the more universal the prosperity, the more permanent will be the 
 I'epose. 
 
 But the Whigs will enrich as well as pacify. Grant it, my lord. 
 Then do I conceive that the necessity for Repeal will augment. 
 Great interests demand great safeguards. The prosperity of a 
 mition requires due protection of a senate. Hei'eafter a national 
 senate may require the protection of a national army. 
 
 So much for the extraordinary aifluence with which we arc threat- 
 ened, and whitfh, it is said by gentlemen on the opposite shore of 
 the Irisli Sea, will crush this Association, and bury the enthusiasts 
 who clamor for Irish nationality in a sepulchre of gold. This pre- 
 diction, however, is feebly sustained by the ministerial pi-ogranime 
 that has lately appeared. 
 
 On the evening of the 16th, the Whig premier, in answer to a 
 question that was put to him by the member for Finsbury, Mr. Duu- 
 combe, is reported to have made this consolatory announcement: 
 
 " yVc consider that the social grievances of Ireland are those wlijcli arc most 
 prominent, and to ^vhich it is most lil^ely to be in our power to alTord, not a com- 
 plete and immediate remedy, but some remedy, some land of improvement, so that 
 some liind of hope may be entertained that, some ten or twelve years hence, the 
 conutry will, by the measures v/c undertalce, be in a far better state with respect to 
 the friditful dcstitntion and misery which now prevail in that country. W'c have 
 that practical object in view." 
 
900 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 After that most consoLitory announcement, my lord, let those 
 who have the patience of Job and the poverty of Lazarus, continue, 
 in good faith, "to wait on Providence and the Whigs ;" continue to 
 entertain ''some kind of hope," that if not "a complete and imme- 
 diate remedy," at least " some remedy," " some improvement," will 
 place this coautry " in a far Ijctter state " tlian it is at present, " some 
 ten or twelve years hence." After that let those who prefer the 
 periodical boons of a Whig government, to that which would be 
 the al)iding blessing of an Irish parliament ; let those who deny to 
 li'cland what they assert for Poland ; let those who would inflict, 
 as Ilcnry Grattan said, "an eternal disability upon this country," to 
 which Providence has assigned the largest facilities for poAvcr ; let 
 those who would ratify the "base swap," as Mr. Shell once stigma- 
 tized the Act of Union, and who would stamp perfection upon that 
 deed of perfidy, — let such men 
 
 " Plod, led on iu sluggish misery, 
 Eotteu from sire to son, from ago to age, 
 Proud of their trampled nature." 
 
 But we, my lord, who are assembled in this hall, and in whose 
 hearts the Union has not bred the slave's disease — Ave who have 
 not been imperialized — we are here with the hope to undo that 
 work, which forty- six years ago dishonored the ancient peerage and 
 subjugated the people of our country. 
 
 My lord, to assist the people of Ireland to undo that work I came 
 to this hall. I came here to repeal the Act of Union — I came here 
 for nothing else. Upon every other question I feel mj-sclf at per- 
 fect liberty to differ from each and every one of you. Upon ques- 
 tions of finance — questions of a religious character — questions of 
 an educational character — questions of municipal policy — ques- 
 tions that may arise from the proceedings of the legislature — upon 
 all these questions I feel myself at perfect liberty to differ from 
 each and every one of you. Yet more, my lord ; I maintain that it 
 is my right to express my opinion upon each of these questions, if 
 necessary. The right of free discussion I have here upheld. In 
 the exercise of that riglit I hare differed sometimes from the leader 
 of this Association, and would do so again. That right I will nut 
 abandon — I shall maintain it to the last. 
 
THOMAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 901 
 
 Til doing so, let me not be told that I seek to undei-mine the influ- 
 ence of the leader of the Association, and am insensible to his 
 services. My lord, I am grateful for his services, and will uphold 
 his just influence. 
 
 This is the first time I have spoken in these terms of that illus- 
 trious Irishman in this hall. I did not do so before — I felt it was 
 unnecessary. I hate unnecessary praise — I scorn to receive it — I 
 scorn ever to bestow it. 
 
 No, my lord, I am not ungrateful to the man who struck the fetters 
 oflT my arms, whilst I was yet a child, and by whose influence my 
 father — the first Catholic who did so for two hundred years — sat 
 for the last two years in the civic chair of an ancient city. But, my 
 lord, the same God who gave to that great man the power to strike 
 down an odious ascendancy in this country, and enabled hiui to« 
 institute in this land the glorious law of religious equality — the 
 same God gave to me a mind that is my own — a mind that has not 
 been mortgaged to the opinions of any man or any set of men — a 
 mind that I was to use, and not suri'ender. 
 
 My lord, in the exercise of that right, which I have here endeav- 
 ored to uphold — a right which this Association should preserve 
 inviolate, if it desires not to become a despotism — in the exercise 
 of that right, I have difiered from Mr. O'Conncll on previous occa- 
 sions, and differ from him now. I do not agree with him in tlie 
 oi)inion he entertains of my friend, Charles Gavan Duffy — that 
 man whom I am proud indeed to call my friend, though ho is i\ 
 " convicted conspirator," and suffered for you in Richmond prison. 
 I do not think he is a "maligner." I do not think he has lost, or 
 deserves to lose, the public favor. 
 
 I have no more connection with the "Nation "than I have Avitli the 
 "Times." I therefore feel no delicacy on appearing here this day in 
 defence of its principles, with which I avow myself identiiied. 
 
 Mj' lord, it is to me a source of true delight and honest pride to 
 speak this day in defence of that great journal. I do nnt fear to 
 assume the position ; exalted though it be, it is easy to maintain it. 
 The character of that journal is above reproach. The ability (hat 
 sustains it has won an European fame. The genius of which it is 
 the cflspring, the truth of which it is the oracle, have been recog- 
 uized, my lord, by friends and foes. I care not how it may bo 
 
902 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 assailed — I care not howsoever great may be the taleut, howsoever 
 high may he the position, of those whonow consider it their duty to 
 impeach its writings — I do think it has won too splendid a repu- 
 tation to lose the influence it has acquired. The people whose 
 enthusiasm has been kindled by the impetuous fire of its verse, and 
 whose sentiments have been ennobled by the earnest purity of its 
 teachings, will not ratify the censure that has been pronounced upon 
 it in this hall. Truth will have its day of triumph as well as its day 
 of trial ; and I foresee that the fearless patriotism, which, in those 
 pages, has braved the prejudices of the day, to enunciate grand 
 truths, will triumi)h in the end. 
 
 My lord, such do I believe to be the character, such do I antici- 
 pate will be the fate of the principles that are now impeached. 
 
 This brings me to what may be called the "question of the day." 
 
 Before I enter upon that question, however, I will allude to one 
 observation which fell from the honorable member for Kilkenny, and 
 ■which may be said to refer to those who expressed an opinion that 
 has been construed into a declaration of war. 
 
 The honorable gentlemen said — in reference, I presume, to those 
 who dissented from the resolutions of Monday — that those who 
 ■were loudest in their declarations of war, were usually the most 
 backward in acting up to those declarations. My lord, I do not 
 find fault with the honorable gentleman for giving expression to a 
 very ordinary saying, but this I will state, that I did not volunteer 
 the opinion he condemns — to the declaration of that opinion I was 
 forced. You left me no alternative — I should compromise my 
 opinion, or avow it. To be honest, I avowed it. I did not do so 
 to brag, as they say ; we have had too much of that "bragging " in 
 Ireland. I would be the last man to emulate the custom. 
 
 Well, I dissented from those peace resolutions, as they are called. 
 Why so? In the first place, my lord, I conceive that there was not 
 the least necessity for them. 
 
 No member of this Association suggested an appeal to arms. No 
 member of this Association advised it. No member of the Associa- 
 tion would be so infatuated as to do so. In the existing circum- 
 stances of the country, an excitement to arms would be senseless 
 and wicked, because irrational. To talk, in our days, of repealing 
 the Act of Union by force of arms, would be to rhapsodize. If the 
 
TIIOilAS FRANCIS MEAGHER. 903 
 
 attempt were made, it would be a decided failure. There might be 
 riot in the street ; there wouhl be no revolution in the coinitry. 
 
 The Secretary will far more effectually promote the cause of 
 Repeal by registering votes in Greene Street than registering fire- 
 arms in the head police office. Conciliation Hall, on Burgh Quay, 
 is more impregnable than a rebel camp on Vinegar Hill. The hust- 
 ings at Dundalk will be more successfully stormed than the maga- 
 zine in the Park. The Registry club, the reading room, the polling 
 booths, these are the only positions iu the country we can occupy. 
 Voters' certificates, books, pamphlets, newspapers, these are the 
 only weapons we can employ. 
 
 Therefore, my lord, I cast my vote in favor of the peaceful policy 
 of this Association. It is the only policy we can adopt. If that 
 policy be pursued with truth, with courage, with fixed determination 
 of purpose, I firmly believe it will succeed. 
 
 But, my lord, I dissented from the resolutions before us for other 
 reasons. I stated the first ; I will now come to the second : 
 
 I dissented from them, for I felt that, by assenting to them, I 
 should have pledged myself to the unqualified repudiation of physical 
 foree, in all countries, at all times, and under every circumstance. 
 This I could not do ; for, my lord, I do not abhor the use of arms 
 in the vindication of national rights. There are times when arms 
 will alone suffice, and when political ameliorations call for a drop of 
 blood, and many thousand drops of blood. 
 
 Opinion, I admit, will operate against opinion ; but, as the honor- 
 able member for Kilkenny has observed, force must be used against 
 force. The soldier is proof against an argument, but he is not 
 proof against a bullet. The man that will listen to reason, let him 
 be reasoned with. But it is the weaponed arm of the patriot that 
 can alone prevail against battalioned despotism. 
 
 Then, my lord, I do not condemn the use of arms as immoral ; 
 nor do I conceive it profane to say that the King of Heaven — the 
 Lord of Hosts — the God of battles — bestows His benediction upon 
 those who unsheathe the sword in the hour of a nation's peril. 
 
 From that evening on which in the valley of Bethulia, He nerved 
 the arm of the Jewish girl to smite the drunken tyrant in his tent, 
 down to this, our day, on which he has blessed the insurgent 
 chivalry of the Belgian priest. His Almighty hand hath ever been 
 
90-J: TKBASUEY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 stretched forth from Ilis Throne of Light to consecrate t!ic fl;ig of 
 freedom — to bless the patriot's sword. Be it in the defence, or be 
 it in the assertion of a people's lil)erty, I hail the sword as a sacred 
 weapon ; and if, my lord, it has sometimes taken the shape of the 
 serpent and reddened the shrond of the oppressor wi(h too deep a 
 dye, like the anointed rod of the High Priest, it has at other limes, 
 and as often, blossomed into celestial flowers to deck the frceman'.s 
 brow. 
 
 Abhor the sword — stigmatize the sword! No, my lord, for in 
 the passes of the Tyrol it cut to pieces the banner of the liavarians, 
 and through those cragged passes struck a jiath to lame i'or the 
 peasant insurrectionists of Innspriuk. 
 
 Abhor the sword — stigmatize the sword I No, ni}^ lord, for at 
 its blow, a grand nation started from the waters of the Atlantic; 
 and by its redeeming magic, and in the quivering of its crimscin 
 light, the crippled Colony sprang into the attitude of a pioiid 
 Kepublic, — prosperous, limitless, and invincil)le. 
 
 Abhor the sword — stigmatize the sword! No, my lord, for it 
 swept the Dutch marauders out of the tine old towns of I'eigium — 
 scourged them back to their own phlegmatic swamps — and knocki d 
 their flag and sceptre, their law.s and bayonets, into the sluggish 
 waters of the Scheldt. 
 
 My lord, I learmd that it was the right of a nation to govern her- 
 self, not in this Hall, but upon the ramparts of Antwerp. " his, the 
 fii'st article of a nation's creed, I leai^ned upon those raniparfs, 
 "where freedom was justly estimated, and the possession of the 
 precious gift was purchased by the effusion of generous blood. 
 
 M-y lord, 1 honor the Belgians, I admire the Belgians, 1 love the 
 Belgians for their enthusiasm, their courage, their success ; and I, 
 for one, will not stigmatize, for 1 do not abhor, the means by which 
 thev obtained a Citizen King, a Chamber of Deputies. 
 
SPEECH 
 
 BY V 
 
 Thomas D'Arcy McGee, 
 
 [005] 
 
YOUGHAL ABBEY, COUNTY CORK. 
 
Speech 
 
 Before the Irish Protestant Benevolent Societt, Quebec, 
 May, 1862. 
 
 p^ RECEIVED some time ago a warm invitation from my friend, 
 ^^ Captain Anderson, tlie secretary of this society, asking me to 
 ^ be present and take part in tlie proceedings of tliis evening, 
 i It was an invitation given with great cordiality, for an Irish 
 society's benefit, and the object was to enable the society to assist 
 the friendless emigrant and the inifortunate resident. It seems to 
 one to be incident to our state of society, where we have no legal 
 provision for the poor, no organized system of relief of any public 
 general kind, that there should be a division of charitable labor 
 among our different voluntary societies ; and as I look upon them 
 all, whether under the auspices of Saint Patrick or any other patron 
 saint, as being themselves but members of one vast society — the 
 society of Canada — I did not feel that I could, either on Irish or 
 on Canadian grounds, decline the invitation. It is very true, Mr. 
 President, that you and I will not be found to-morrow worshipping 
 under the same roof; but is that any reason why we should not be 
 united here to-night in a common work of charity? With me it is 
 no reason ; such differences exist in the first elements of our popu- 
 lation ; and it is the duty of every man, especially of every man 
 undergoing the education of a statesman, to endeavor to mitigate 
 instead of inflaming religious animosities. No prejudices lie nearer 
 the surface than those which plead the sanction of religion ; any 
 idiot may arouse them, to the wise man's consternation, and the 
 peaceful man's deep regret. If, in times past, they have been too 
 often and too easily aroused, we must all deeply deplore it ; but for 
 the future — in these new and eventful days, when it is so essential 
 that there shall be complete harmony within our ranks, — let us all 
 agree to brand the propagandist of bigotry as the most dangerous of 
 
 (907) 
 
908 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 our enemies, because his work is to divide us among (jurselves, and 
 thereliy render us incapable of common defence. 
 
 It is upon this subject of the public spirit to be cultivated among 
 us — of the S2:)irit which can alone make Canada safe and secure, 
 rich and renowned — which can alone attract population and aug- 
 ment capital, that I desire to say a few words with which I must 
 endeavor to fulfil your expectations. I feel that it is a serious sub- 
 ject for a popular festival — but these are serious times, and they 
 bring upon their wings most serious reflections. That shot fired at 
 Fort Sumpter on the 12th of April, 1861, had a message for the 
 North as well as for the South; and here, in Quebec, if anywhere, 
 by the light which history lends us, we should find those who can 
 correctly read that eventful message. Here, from this rock, for 
 which the immortals have contended ; here, from this I'ock, over 
 which Richelieu's wisdom and Chatham's genius, and the memory of 
 heroic men, the glory of three great nations has hung its halo, we 
 should look forth upon a continent convulsed, and ask of a ruler: 
 "Watchman, ivhat of the night?" 
 
 That shot fired at Fort Sumpter was the signal gun of a new epoch 
 for North America, which told the people of Canada, more plainly 
 than human speech can ever express it, to sleep no more except on 
 their arms ; unless in their sleep they desire to be overtaken and 
 subjugated. For one, Mr. President, I can safely say, that, if I 
 know myself, I have not a particle of prejudice against the United 
 States ; on the contraiy, I am bound to declare that many things in 
 the constitution and the people, I sincerely esteem and admire. 
 What I contend for with myself, and what I would impress upon 
 others, is, tlmt the lesson of the last few months, furnished by 
 America to the world, should not be thrown away upon the inhabi- 
 tants of Canada. 
 
 I do not believe that it is our destiny to be engulfed into a Repub- 
 lican union, renovated and inflamed with the wine of victory, of 
 which she now drinks so freely ; it seems to me we h:ivc tiicatre 
 enough midcr our feet to act another and a worthier part ; wc can 
 hardly win the Americans on our own terms, and we never ought to 
 join them on theirs. A Canadian nationality — not French Cana- 
 (^i:ui, nor British Canadian, nor Irish Canadian — patriotism rejects 
 the prefix, — is, in my opinion, what we should look forward to, — 
 
THOMAS D'ARCY McGEE. 909 
 
 that is what we ought to labor for, that i.s what .we ought to be pre- 
 pared to defend to the death. Heirs of one-seventh of the contin- 
 ent, inheritors of a long ancestral story, and no part of it dearer to 
 us than the glorious tale of this last century —warned not by cold 
 chronicles only, but by living scenes passing before our eyes, of the 
 dano-ers of an unmixed democracy — we are here to vindicate our 
 capacity by the test of a new political creation. 
 
 AVhat wc most immediately want, Mr. President, to carry on that 
 work, is men ; more men, and still more men ! The ladies, I dare 
 say, will not object to that doctrine. We may not want more law- 
 yers and doctors, but we want more men in the town and country. 
 "VVo want the signs of youth and growth in our young and growing 
 ■country. One of our maxims should be, "Early marriages, and 
 death to old bachelors." I have long entertained a project of a spec- 
 ial tax upon that most undesirable class of the population, an4 our 
 friend, the Finance jNIinister, may perhaps have something of the 
 kind among the agreeable surprises of his next Budget. Seriously, 
 Mr. President, what I chiefly wanted to say on coming here, is this, 
 that if we would made Canada safe and secure, rich and renowned, 
 we must all liberalize — locally, sectionally, religiously, nationally. 
 
 There is room enough in this country for one great free people ; 
 but there is not room enough under the same flag and the same laws, 
 for tw^o or three angry, suspicious, obstructive " nationalities." 
 
 Dear, most justly dear to every land beneath the sun, arc the 
 children Ijorn in her bosom, and nursed upon her breast, but when 
 the man of another country, wherever born, speaking whatever 
 speech, holding whatever creed, seeks out a country to serve, and 
 honor, and cleave to, in weal or in woe, — when he heaves up the 
 anchor of his heart from its old moorings, and lays at the feet of the 
 mistress of his choice, his new country, all the hopes of his ripe 
 manhood, he establishes, by such devotion, a claim to consideration, 
 not second even to that of the children of the soil. He is their 
 brother, delivered by a new birth from the dark-wombed Atlantic 
 ship that ushers him into existence in the new world — he stands by 
 his own election among the children of the household, and narrow 
 and most unwise is that species of public spirit, which, in the per- 
 verted name of patriotism, would refuse him all he asks, "a fair 
 iield and no favor." 
 
910 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 I am not aljout to tiilk politics, Mr. President, though these are 
 grand politics. I reserve all else fur what is usually called " an- 
 other place," — and I may add, for another time. But I am so 
 thoroughly convinced and assured that we are gliding along the cur- 
 rents of a new epoch, that if I break silence at all iu the presence 
 of my fellow subjects, I cannot choose but speak of the immense 
 issues which devolve upon us, at this moment, in this country. 
 
 I may be pardoned, perhaps, if I refer to another matter that 
 comes home to you, Mr. President, and to myself. Though we are 
 alike opposed to all invidious national distinctions on this soil, we 
 are not opposed, I hope, to giving full credit to all the elements 
 which at the present day compose our population. In this respect, 
 it is a source of gratification to learn that among j'our invited 
 guests to-night there are twelve or thirteen members of the House 
 to which I iiave the honor to belong — gentlemen from both sides of 
 the House — who drew their native breath in our own dearly be- 
 loved ancestral island. It takes three-quarters of the world in these 
 days to hold an Irish family, and it is pleasant to know that some of 
 the elder sons of the family are considered, by their discriminating 
 fellow citizens, worthy to be entrusted with the liberties and for- 
 tunes of their adopted country. We have here men of Irish birth 
 who have led, and who still lead the Parliament of Canada, and who 
 arc determined to lead it in a spirit of genuine libei-ality. 
 
 We, Irishmen, Protestant and Catholic, born and bred in a land 
 of religious controversy, should never forget that we now live and 
 act in a Imid of the fullest religious and civil liberty. All we have 
 to do, is, each for himself, to keep down dissensions, which can only 
 weaken, impoverish and retard the country ; each for himself, do all 
 he can to increase its wealth, its strength and its reputation ; each 
 for himself, you and you, gentlemen, and all of us — to welcome 
 every talent, to hail every invention, to cherish every gem of art, 
 to foster every gleam of authorship, to honor every acquirement 
 and every natural gift, to lift ourselves to the level of our destinies, 
 to rise above all low limitations and narrow circumscriptions, to cul- 
 tivate that true catholicity of spirit, which embraces all creeds, all 
 classes, and all races, in order to make of our boundless province, so 
 rich in known and unknown resources, a great new Northern nation. 
 
LETTER 
 
 Bishop Nulty. 
 
 £911] 
 

 
 RIGHT REV. T. NULTY, BISHOP OF MEATH. 
 
To Joseph Cowen, M, P., Newcastle-on-Tyne, 
 
 fpY Dear Sir, — I have neither leisure nor inclincation to take 
 any part in politics, and it was only in exceptional circum- 
 stances that I ever meddled in them at all. I have not 
 often obtruded on the attention of the public except under 
 the pressure of a public necessity or when I could not help it. But 
 now that the excitement caused by the late extraordinary action of 
 the Government has subsided considerably, and that the results of 
 that policy can be calmly and dispassionately examined, it becomes 
 the sacred duty of every man who has anything to say in defence 
 of his country not to withhold it. The situation of affairs which the 
 Government has so suddenly and so unexpectedly created in Ireland, 
 has no parallel or precedent even in her own melancholy history ; 
 and it has no existing counterpart (except, perhaps, in Eussia) in 
 any other country on the globe. The people of this nation now live 
 under the sway of coercion, and of force, and of arbitrary arrests 
 and imprisonment, and not under the rule of constitutional law and 
 free government. Our liberties have been forfeited de jure by the 
 disastrous Coercion Bill of last year, and they are now simply anni- 
 hilated de facto by the excessive severity with which the Govern- 
 ment exercises the exceptional powers given them by that Act. By 
 the strange and extraordinary use they have made of these uncon- 
 stitutional powers, they have profoundly shocked public feeling 
 with a succession of sudden and painful surprises. For months 
 past we heard every day with bewildered astonishment of the arrest 
 and imprisonment of innocent, educated, and highly-gifted Irishmen, 
 who in the estimation of their countrymen were above even the sus- 
 picion of anything that could be regarded as criminal or dishonor- 
 able. Although the people's patience had thus been sorely tried, 
 they still hoped on. But the sudden and unexpected arrest of 
 Messrs. Parnell, Sexton, and Dillon; the total suppression of the 
 
914 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Land League organization ; the dispersion by force of peaceful 
 public meetings, and the violent and unnatural silence and restraint 
 jout on freedom of speech, all occurring as tbey did in rapid succes- 
 sion, spread terror and dismay. 
 
 During the passing of the Coercion Act, the Government had 
 solemnly but perfidiously pledged itself to Parliament that the fact 
 of being a member of the Land League organization would be no 
 ground for arresting a man as a " reasonable suspect," and yet emi- 
 nent and distinguished Land Leaguei-s were, as a matter of fact, the 
 only persons actually arrested under it. On the other hand, you 
 would search in vain, among the actual Suspects, for the " dissolute 
 rufHans and village tyrants " to whom alone it was solemnly 
 promised the operations of the Act would be restricted. No man, 
 therefore, being able to make even a rational guess at the principles 
 by which the Government was guided in forming its estimate of a 
 " Suspect," every man now feels that his liberty is not safe for the 
 space of a single hour. Your innocence and immunity from everjr 
 form of crime; your punctual observance of every law, human as 
 well as divine ; the irreproachable testimony of your own conscience, 
 afford you no guarantee against arbitrary arrest and imprisonment. 
 You are forced, therefore, to infer that every hour you are left ia 
 the enjo^'ment of your freedom ; every hour you are allowed to live 
 in your house ; in the bosom of your family, and not in the prison 
 cell, confronted and watched by warders and jailers, is a free gift 
 to which you really have no right or legal claim, and which you 
 enjoy from, and during the good will and pleasure of the Govern- 
 ment. And as the youth and manhood of the nation, the most 
 gifted, the most intelligent, and the most highly educated — in fact, 
 the very flower of the agricultural, the industrial, and the com- 
 mercial classes — were all once members of the now proscribed 
 Land League organization, so every man you meet is in fear and 
 trembling for his personal freedom. Many have deserted their 
 business, their families, and their homes, and as all feel the sword of 
 Damocles suspended over their heads, so no one can apply himself 
 with his usual earnestness and skill to the calling in which he earned 
 his living. You feel yourself instinctively under the baleful influence 
 of a reign of lei'ror. 
 
 You cannot help mistrusting and suspecting those whom you 
 
BISHOP NULTY. 915 
 
 never doubted before ; and no matter how sternly your reason may 
 rebuke the groundlessness of your fears, you still fancy yourself 
 surrounded by spies and informers, ready and eager to misinterpret 
 and misrepresent your most thoughtless and innocent actions. And 
 fresh grounds for alarm hSve recently arisen from the decidedly 
 altered tone and bearing of the police force throughout the kingdom. 
 A strange and extraordinary spirit of brutality and insolence 
 seems to have seized on this force, and displays itself ostentatiously 
 on every occasion that offers. It is true they never possessed the 
 moderation, the patience, and forbearance of a force that seemed 
 impressed with the responsibility of respecting the rights of citi- 
 zens, even at the time that it became their duty to act with firmness 
 and vigor against them as offenders, but now they have shaken ofT 
 even the semblance of moderation, and they scornfully and defiantly 
 irritate and threaten the people, as if they had no right to be re- 
 garded as anything better than rebels or slaves. They appear tO' 
 think that they have a right to do just what they please, to be amenable 
 to no tribunal, and to have relieved themselves from every sense of 
 responsibility. I know of one instance, at least, in which a large 
 body of police, with a resident magistrate at their head, deemed 
 chagrined and disappointed because the peaceable and orderly de- 
 meanor of the people deprived them even of a pretext for firing at 
 them, as they had threatened. Under the guidance of men, whose 
 conduct has more than hnce excited a well-grounded suspicion that 
 they were under an artificial excitement, which, in them, would be 
 highly criminal, this force now assails with wanton and indiscrimi- 
 nate brutality the innocent and the peaceable, as well as the disorderly 
 and the riotous. They fire volleys into crowds of unai-med men, at the 
 very time they are actually running for their lives ; and even the 
 dignity and helplessness of woman, which render her personal 
 safety sacred in every nation on earth that is civilized as well as 
 brave, afford her no protection from these warriors, for they shoot 
 down women as well as men ; and, accoi-ding to sworn accounts, 
 they bayonet to death young girls even when they are down. Three 
 coi'oners' juries, on their solemn oaths and on sworn testimony, have 
 found and recorded verdicts of wilful murder against them, and yet 
 the accused appear to be still at large, and do not seem to have been 
 in the least disconcerted by such insignificant incidents. And if 
 
916 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 any one, like myself, ventures to raise his voice and give vent to his 
 feelings in a i^iercing cry of anguish and of pain over the ruins of 
 the liberties of his country, he is liable to be arrested and thrown 
 into prison, to add one more to the three hundred and forty high- 
 spirited, intelligent, and educated mea who are now, like so many 
 wild beasts, caged within bars of iron, deprived of their liberty, 
 their freedom, and every other gift that makes life agreeable, or 
 even endurable. And yet these men have not been convicted of 
 any crime ; let them clamor as they may, they will not be 1)rought 
 to trial, and no opportunity given them for proving their innocence. 
 They are subjected to the indignities, to the solitude and the hor- 
 rors of prison life, simply because the Prime Minister and the Chief 
 Secretary wish it : and they must remain there during their good 
 will and pleasure. This system of arbitrary arrests — of cruel and 
 indefinite imprisonment, for purely political crimes, which are only 
 " susjjected" — whilst it continued merely a Continental institution, 
 shocked and scandalized Mr. Gladstone immensely, and he denounced 
 it in burning words that set all Europe in a blaze. But oh ! shade 
 of King Bomba, you have now your revenge ! The system that 
 had then been reprobated in words that will live forever, that had 
 then been relegated into eternal infamy, oblivion, and shame, has 
 quite recently been discovered among the "resources of civiliza- 
 tion " ; has been revived, in its own proper living individuality and 
 identity, by the very man who had then so fiercel}' decried it. It is 
 now one of the ilourishing social institutions of fi'ee England, and 
 is actually in full swing this moment, plaguing her majesty's subjects 
 throughout the jails of Ireland with forms of physical sutfering and 
 mental anguish that to them are all but intolerable, and from which, 
 before the winter shall have passed, some shall very likely escape 
 by going mad, and others by becoming totally ruined in health, and- 
 rendered utterly worthless for the rest of their lives. 
 
 Surely, then, Mr. Gladstone might have spared that galling phrase 
 with which he mocks and insults us, when he assures the world that 
 to annihilate a nation's liberties, to crowd her prisons and her jails 
 with the best and noblest of her sous, to silence freedom of speech, 
 and to make eveiy man in the community dependent for his per- 
 sonal freedom on his sole, arbitrary will, are all but departments in 
 the high and accomplished art of governing on principles derived 
 
BISHOP NULTY. 917 
 
 from the "resources of civilization." Government by force, by ar- 
 bitrary arrests, by wholesale imprisonment, without judge or jury, 
 by silencing freedom of speech and the right to complain of injus- 
 tice and wrong, used to be regarded as a hateful despotism which 
 would not be tolerated for one week in any civilized country, and 
 which could not exist at all except in communities that were uncivilized 
 and barbarous. But when men apply themselves to the odious task 
 of oppressing or enslaving their fellow-creatures, they are wonder- 
 fully ready in devising smart incisive phrases with which, in defiance 
 of decency and truth, they endeavor to palliate and pass off on the 
 thoughtless forbearance of the pul)lic, excesses to which they would 
 not venture to direct attention by professedly justifying or defend- 
 ing them. 
 
 History abounds with phrases of this kind, and they are associ- 
 ated with memories of which Mr. Gladstone would feel ashamed. 
 I think it was Cromwell that characterized " as a great mercy of 
 God " the wholesale slaughter of innocent and unarmed citizens ; 
 and the Eussian tyrant announced to the world " that order reigned 
 at Warsaw " at the veiy time that Warsaw ran red with the blood of 
 Poland's noblest and bravest defenders. Not to talk, then, of the 
 insult wantonly flung at a spirited and sensitive people, an ordin- 
 ary sense of self-respect and a decent regard for his own character 
 ought to have induced Mr. Gladstone to hold his hand here at any 
 rate. 
 
 I have deliberately misstated nothing. I do not deny that a Tory 
 Government could be found which would do exactly the same thing, 
 if it were allowed freely to follow its naturally tyrannical instincts ; 
 but I do den}' that any Tory Government would have the power or 
 would dare to set up such a form of Government whilst the Liberal 
 party sat on the Opposition benches. A Liberal administration, like 
 the present Government, is then about the greatest misfortune that 
 could happen to our country. 
 
 An old Roman said that no one but a fool would argue with the 
 master of twenty legions. Mr. Parnell had the rashness, at Wex- 
 ford, to reply to the Prime Minister's speech at Leeds. Further, 
 he had the misfortune, in clear, logical and irresistible argument, 
 fairly to vanquish him. Mr. Dillon's singular haste to repudiate 
 Mr. Gladstone's questionable compliments, and Mr. Shaw's famous 
 
918 TREASUKY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 linchpin process for ridding the world of civil-hill servers, furnished 
 Mr. Parnell with a retort whicli was simply crushing, and whioli 
 must have wounded the Prime Minister deeply. Now, all the world 
 knows that Mr. Gladstone is an intellectual giant ; but as he is not 
 infallible, he sometimes makes mistakes, and if challenged and van- 
 quished on these mistakes, he bears his defeat very badly. When 
 smarting under the defeat and fall of his former administration, 
 chiefly through the action taken by the Irish bishops, in the vast, 
 varied, and almost boundless grasp of his intellectual powers, he 
 sought relief for his wounded feelings in the various departments of 
 ancient and modern literature, and even of Theology. Everybody 
 remembers how he applied himself to the study of Theology ; had a 
 fling at the Syllabus, at the infallibility of the Pope, and at the 
 degrading influence which the Catholic religion exercised on all who 
 had the misfortune to belong to it. And everybody remembers, 
 too, how powerfully and how scathingly his rash and ignorant accu- 
 sations were exposed and refuted in about the most beautiful and 
 eloquent brochure that ever emanated even from the pen of Cardjinal 
 Newman. In the soreness and irritation then created by Parnell's 
 intellectual victory, lies the source of that impetuous, precipitate, 
 and impassioned policy which Mr. Gladstone then suddenly inaugu- 
 rated, and to which he has since steadily adhered. Incidents have 
 cropped up from time to time as adjuncts of that policy, such as 
 Parnell's dismissal from a magistracy which he did not prize ; Dr. 
 Kenny's dismissal by a sealed order ; the threatening notices served 
 on the telegraph boys, etc. ; all of which seem so low, so petty, and 
 so mean that any man in his senses, and not in a passion, would 
 scorn to stoop to them. Now, sir, it appears to me that a man who 
 holds in one hand the absolute disposal of the libei'ties of a nation, 
 and in the other the tremendous responsibilities of his position, has 
 no right to lay himself fairly open to the imputation of irritation or 
 feeling in the exercise of the exceptional and dangerous powers 
 entrusted to him. For passion and feeling blind every man who 
 allows himself to be influenced or governed by them ; and some- 
 thing has blinded Mr. Gladstone certainly. 
 
 He rests the whole justification of his sudden and extraordinary 
 policy on the fact that Mr. Parnell was preventing by intimidation 
 and otlier unlawful means, the tenantry of Ireland from availing 
 
BISHOP NULTY. 919 
 
 "themselves of the benefits of the Land Bill. That accusation has 
 never been proved, and in m}' judgment it never can be proved, 
 simply because it is not true. That Mr. Parnell advised and warmly 
 exhorted the Irish tenantry to hold their hands off the Laud Bill till 
 he had the decision on the test cases, no one will deny. Therefore, 
 infers Mr. Gladstone, he unlawfully prevented them from appropri- 
 ating any of the advantages which the Bill held out. Now, any one 
 will at once see that this is a " non sequilur " which must be sup- 
 ported by proof, and as far as we know, at least, no such proof is 
 as jet forthcoming. For might not the Irish tenantry hold aloof 
 for a time from the Land Court (and they might not be advised to 
 do so) for another far more rational and important pui'pose, viz., to 
 facilitate and expedite the progress of business in the Court, and at 
 the same time to draw from tlie Land Bill the largest possible 
 amount of gain it was capable of yielding. That these were the 
 objects really underlying Mr. ParncU's advice to the tenantry can 
 very easily be made clear. 
 
 Owing to the extraordinary character of the jiowers vested in the 
 Land Commission, its first decisions became matters of vital impor- 
 tance. This is by no means an ordinary Commission, authorized 
 simply to interpret and administer an Act of Parliament. It seems 
 ratlier an extraordinary Commission, vested in certain contingencies 
 which will frequently arise under the Act, with quasi legislative 
 powers, virtually to enact new laws as well as to administer them. 
 
 The settlement, therefore, of the Irish Land Question has only 
 commenced with the passing of the Land Act ; it is, as it were, still 
 before Parliament ; it is as yet under the consideration of the Legis- 
 ture in all the vast and varied comprehensiveness of its jjraciical 
 details. Very many of the great principles of justice, equity, and 
 right, are as yet to be determined, defined, and declared, and have 
 as 3'et to receive, thi'ough the judgments of this Court, the sanction 
 and approval of the Legislature. 
 
 To enable the Court, therefore, to discharge its duties witli delib- 
 eration and dignity, and, on the other hand, not to weary and dis- 
 gust its suitors with intolerable procrastination and delay, Mr. 
 Parnell, with the deep practical sagacity for which he is remarkable, 
 devised the scheme of submitting at the onset his test cases, the 
 leading feature of which was, that they were essentially tyjiical and 
 
920 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 representative of classes numerous enough to be counted by hun- 
 dreds and thousands. 
 
 [Bishop Nulty then goes into the discussion in detail of the course 
 the Court was bound in justice to pursue under the conditions of its 
 appointment, and the diiHculty of ascertaining that tiling called 
 "fair" rent.] 
 
 Assuming that the prices of products range at a certain average, 
 the value of any holding will entirely depend on its productiveness. 
 The productiveness of a holding is a fact of great importance to 
 its owner, and it affects, directly or indirectly, the interests of many 
 others in its vicinity. The productiveness, therefore, cannot be sat- 
 isfactorily proved except by the testimony of such witnesses, and 
 their testimony proves it beyond all reasonable doubt. Now, if Mr. 
 Parnell demanded accurate information, he would have all the local 
 knowledge existing on the subject absolutely at his disposal, and 
 dozens of trustworthy witnesses would A^oluntarily come forward. 
 
 The Land League was about the most perfect and the most highly- 
 disciplined organization that ever existed in any country. It was 
 everywhere present, active, intelligent and discriminating. The 
 local branches were, as it were, so many deliberative assemblies, 
 which absorbed all the talent, the experience, and knowledge of 
 every kind in the various districts in Avhich they were situated. 
 Their members were, for far the greater part, the very flower of 
 the industrial classes of the locality. Each branch possessed Avithin 
 itself all the local knowledge existing on the productiveness of the 
 land, on the value of the land, and on every circumstance of imjoor 
 tance connected with the laud of the holdings. 
 
 Further, in the conferences that were held, and in the discussions 
 and debates that were carried on by the members, that knowledge 
 Tvas systematized and arranged, so as to be ready for use at a 
 moment's notice when called on. 
 
 After these preliminary preparations had been made, Mr. Parnell 
 would submit the land of Ireland to the arbitrament of the Land 
 Court, not in isolated solitary holdings, but in large lots of holdings 
 of the same kind. The Court could examine tlie test cases that he 
 submitted, and subject them to the most rigorous judicial inquiry;, 
 or it could take any individual case of its own. Whatever judg- 
 ment it pronounced on any of the test cases would have virtually 
 
BISHOP NULTY. 921 
 
 been pronounced on all the cases of the class to which it belonged. 
 After the test cases had been decided, the subsequent proceedings- 
 of the Court would simply be practical applications of the principles 
 that were sanctioned and accepted on the decision of the test cases. 
 
 And thus the very circumstance on which Mr. Parnell relied to 
 furnish the tenant with the means of drawing from the Land Act 
 the lai'gest amount of gain, is the very ground on which Mr. Glad- 
 stone accuses him of the crime of preventing him from drawing any 
 benefit at all from it. I have wearied you not only with the out- 
 lines, but with the details of Mr. Parnell's policj' ; and I have to 
 ask, is there anything in it immoral, obstructive, or criminal to the 
 degree of deserving the punishment of imprisonment in IGlmainham ! 
 
 [Bishop Nulty here refers to the large number of nominal land- 
 lords whoSe places really belonged to money lenders, but who still 
 manage to live sumptuously upon the poor, whoso extinction was, 
 and justly so, the first step in Mr. Parnell's policy. In the course 
 of the reference Dr. Nulty declares that the whole strength and 
 vitality, the irresistible energy and activity of the Land League 
 organization, were all derived from the enormous injustice and cru- 
 elty of the land system, which had created it, and which it assailed, 
 and that a great enthusiastic movement, in which a whole people 
 combines, is an impossibility where some great social grievance does 
 not lie at the root of it.] 
 
 But the Government would not allow Mr. Parnell to use Mr. 
 Gladstone's Bill as a great remedial measure. In their impatience 
 and irritation they had recourse to force, which is no remedy at all 
 for stifling the discontent which springs from injustice. Anyone can 
 see, in the lawlessness and dism-der that now prevail and which 
 every good man reprobates and deplores, the folly as well as the 
 failure of that remedy. And yet the magistrates of the various 
 Irish counties (from Dublin to Westmeath) now loudly applaud this 
 suicidal policy of the Government, and audaciously call on it for 
 fresh and still more repressive coercion. But as nearly all of these 
 magistrates are landlords, their promises of sympathy and support 
 carry with them no moral weight. They really amount to no more 
 than a last effort to sustain their own expiring influence and power. 
 The class prejudices and passions that characterized these magiste- 
 rial meetings, may be estimated from the fact that a. man like Lord 
 
<)32 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Monck has been so hlinded and infiituated by them as to make state- 
 ments against Mr. Parnell and the Land League that were so scan- 
 dalously nntrue that one feels a difficulty in comprehending how 
 they were not (as I am sure they were not) wilful and deliberate. 
 But if it was safe for Lord Monck, it was very nngenerous of him 
 to attack a man who could not, as he was aware, reply in his de- 
 fence. 
 
 The moderation, and, indeed, I might add, the magnanimity of 
 the magistrates of Westmeath in not calling for, in accordance with 
 a time-honored custom,- a Coercion Act exclusively for themselves, 
 are edifying in the highest degree. But the excessive severity of 
 the Coercion Act now existing, especially in its administration, 
 counterbalances its non-exclusiveness, and so these hereditary coer- 
 cionists are satisfied to let things stand as they ai-e. 
 
 [Dr. Nulty then further goes on to show how, while Mr. Parnell 
 recognized the Bill as not all he wanted, he still intended to get all 
 the good he really conld out of it — a thing that the Commissioners, 
 judging frofti what they have already done, do not mean, it being 
 next to impossible to know anything about the lands they are called 
 to pass upon without local knowledge. Speaking of the vast expen- 
 ditures and failures of the imported Scotch scientific, and tlie "model 
 farm " enterprises to increase productiveness, he asks : — ] 
 
 And how is it that the illiterate, unscientific farmer, hy following 
 the old system of husbandry, is able to draw from his farm what is 
 sufficient to keep himself and his family alive at any rate, and at the 
 same time pay a rack-rent to the landlord ? 
 
 [Speaking of the decisions so far rendered, he notes it as a curious 
 fact that the Government's own valuation was never taken as a 
 guide. They always managed to hover over the line of Griffith's 
 valuation, but rarely or never to descend — facts that of themselves 
 will inevitably create a feeling of strong, reasonable, and wide- 
 spi'ead discontent, which will resuscitate the Land League organiza- 
 tion, and infuse into it such fresh vitality and strength as, when the 
 coercion shall have expired, will make it simply irresistil)]e.] 
 
 But Mr. Gladstone says that the Land Question has been finally 
 settled, and that he will listen to no further argument or discussion 
 on it. But he said the same before, still the Land League agitation 
 compelled him to take the question up, and pass his bill. But the 
 
BISHOP NULTT. ' 023 
 
 truth is that finalitij.m legislation on any question is an absurdity ; 
 4ind with the widespread and unprecedented privations and suffer- 
 ings of the agricultural classes in England and Scotland, on the one 
 hand, and American and Australian competition on the other, final- 
 ity in legislating on land is the most glaring of all absurdities. 
 "Why ? Legislation on the Land Question is at its commencement, 
 and in another year or two it will be in full swing in England and 
 Scotland as well as here. 
 
 Two years ago they had only the haziest ideas of their constitu- 
 tional rights to assemble together, to look each other in the face, 
 and talk freely and frankly with each other over their common 
 grievances. But now they are practically, as well as theoretically^, 
 convinced that by coming to a common, clear understanding, by 
 harmonious action, and by combining all their energies and ef- 
 forts, they can become a power that is almost irresistible. And 
 they have actually come to that common understanding ; they have 
 legally and constitutionally united and combined, and created about 
 the greatest and most thoroughly disciplined oi-ganization that has 
 «ver arisen in any country. The justice and legality of the organ- 
 ization itself, and the reasonableness of the reforms at which it 
 aimed, were acknowledged and recognized in Parliament, and out 
 of it, by the highest legal authorities in the land. The Government 
 itself, thougji it always hated and feared, yet never ventured till 
 quite recently to question it, and then onh' on a few points, which are 
 mere accidental changes in the oi-ganization, and which can be easily 
 eliminated. Now, sir, I confess I find it hard to have patience with 
 some educated men whom you will hear from time to time awarding 
 to Mr. Gladstone the whole merit of having passed the Land Act. 
 Why, sir, you yourself have made it as clear as light that Mr. 
 Gladstone, in taking up the Land Question, only yielded to an 
 inevitable necessity which he resisted as long as he was able, and 
 which would have shattered his Government to atoms if he contin- 
 ued to resist it much longer. 
 
 It was the Land League organization that dragged the tenants' 
 wrongs into light ; held them up to the gaze of the empire in a blaze 
 of oratory and eloquence ; that made every honest man indignant 
 and ashamed of them, and thus created a strong, outspoken public 
 opinion, which made it a necessity for Mr. Gladstone to pass his 
 
924 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 Land Bill. This bill being thus the hard-earned fruit of our own 
 labor, why should we not appropriate the gaiu as well as the glorj^ 
 of having passed it? 
 
 That Mr. Gladstone should punish and degrade an honorable and 
 a distinguished rival on grounds such as these ; that he should con- 
 sign him, without judge or jury, to imprisonment and to chains ; 
 that he should extort from him, in the indignation which such injus- 
 tice naturally provoked, a pretext for suiDpressing an organization 
 whose justice and legality he never questioned, appear to me an ar- 
 bitrary exercise of power which Liberal and Radical statesmen are 
 bound by their own principles to disown. 
 
 The effete, and I suppose I may add the now expiring sj^stem of 
 L"ish Landlordism, was the great central social evil of our country 
 for ages. A single class, numerically not large, kept a whole nation 
 steeped in indescribable misery by exacting rents which in instances 
 without number, nearly equalled the value of the whole produce of 
 the land, and consequently it was all but impossible to meet them. 
 Under this unjust sj'stem the people of a whole nation were kept 
 continually on the verge of starvation, and hence the smallest unftxv- 
 orablc change in seasons, the slightest failure of their crops, partic- 
 ularly of the potato crop, slaughtered them wholesale, and sent 
 them to premature graves. The landlords were further armed with 
 the arbitrar}- power of evicting on any scale they thought proper, 
 and they did exercise that power on a gigantic scale. I was mj'self 
 an eye-witness of some of these clearances ; and when I venture to 
 look back at them, the very memory of what I saw makes me shud- 
 der even still. In one county in this diocese there are at this mo- 
 ment 3(59,000 acres of tJie finest land in the world laid down in grass 
 and pasture. That immense tract of country was cleai-ed substan- 
 tially since the beginning of the present century. Of that vast, vir- 
 tuous and industrious population that had been driven off these lands, 
 those who had the courage and the means fled to foreign lands, and 
 those who could not perished in the ditches or in the poorhouses. 
 
 A sentence of eviction is equivalent to a sentence of death in 
 a country where, if you are to live at all, you must live by your in- 
 dustry on the land. A mortal fear of such eviction, then, was the 
 only motive that could have influenced the people of a nation to sub- 
 mit to any rack-rents which robbed them of the fruits of their own 
 
BISHOP NULTY. 925 
 
 improvements and kept them perpetually on the border line of star- 
 vation. Mr. Gladstone's own Land Commission, although only in 
 its infancy, is letting in a flood of light on the huge and ghastly 
 proportions of the great social evil which for years past preyed on 
 the vitals and drank up the life's blood of the nation. A system under 
 which landlords exacted twenty, thirty, forty, and in some cases 
 one hundred per cent, in excess of the real value cannot but be re- 
 garded as a system of legalized injustice ; for it has challenged theo- 
 retically our I'ight to live in the country in which we were born, and 
 it has practically driven our people as exiles in hundreds of thous- 
 ands into foreign lands. Irishmen icould be more than human if they 
 cherished for such a system anything less than the fiercest hatred. 
 And 3^et this embodiment of injustice and cruelty has been fostered 
 and protected with as much paternal tenderness and care as if it had 
 been an essential requirement, not only for the good government, 
 but for the very existence of the British Empire. The unjust and 
 irrational partiality of British statesmen for Irish landlordism, 
 coupled with the implacable severity with which they pimished any 
 one who dared to interfere with it, has been beyond all doubt, the 
 main cause of the unpopulai'ity and practical failure of British rule 
 at all times in Ireland. Were it not for the l)aleful effects of this 
 one cause, Ireland, without merging its nationality for a moment, 
 would be as peaceful, and as orderly as Scotland. We oflTered suc- 
 cessive governments, a hundred times over, a generous loyalty, a 
 cheerful submission to their laws, a co-operation in everything calcu- 
 lated to advance the interests of England as well as our own, if they 
 would only remove the injustice of this great social grievance which 
 threatened our very existence. But they would not accept our loy- 
 alty on these conditions. They regarded the estrangement, the dis- 
 content, and even the avowed hatred of a nation as mere petty evils, 
 when compared to the irreparable disaster of putting Irish landlords 
 in bad humor. And the same unjust and irrational partiality infat- 
 uates British statesmen still. When the tyrannical injustice of Irish 
 Landlordism had, quite lately, become intolerable, and when the 
 unanimous voice of the country had called on Mr. Gladstone to grap- 
 ple with it, and place some restraint on its excesses, why did he begin 
 by placating it, by appeasing it, and by actually immolating to it the 
 liberty and freedom of the nation he M'as directed to rescue from its 
 
926 TREASURY OF ELO(;;UENCE. 
 
 cruelty and injustice? And was it because he had imposed some 
 restraints on its rack-renting injustice and its exterminating cruelty 
 that he has since felt himself called on to make full and ample repa- 
 ration and atonement, by punishing and imprisoning the men who 
 were guilty of the crime of having compelled him to interfere with 
 it at all. A policy based on a principle like this, does not merit 
 either gratitude or approval. As a matter of fact, the whole Liberal 
 pai'ty, and Mr. Gladstone's government in particular, can hardly be 
 lower than it actually is with the Irish people abroad, as well as at 
 home. If we Irishmen at home, cordially detest the Irish system of 
 land tenure, our countrymen abroad simply execrate and abhor it.. 
 The millions of Irishmen in America, England, Scotland, Canada, 
 and Australia, look back on the land of their bii'th with a depth and 
 tenderness of feeling, of interest, of attachment, and of love which 
 an Englishman can hardly comprehend. To the deep, keen, undy- 
 ing interest which these exiles feel in the welfare of the dear old 
 land, and to the longing love with which they yearn and sigh to get 
 one last look at it before they tlie, are associated a fierce execration 
 and hatred of the system of land tenure which had cruelly and 
 unjustly banished them away from it forever The strongest and 
 deepest desire in the hearts of these Irish exiles would be to lend a 
 hand and share their last shilling in any fair effort to extirpate and 
 destroy the injustice of a system which they regarded as the respon- 
 sible cause of their expatriation. 
 
 The inti'epidity with which Mr. Parnell denounced this system 
 before hostile majorities ; the practical skill with which he devel- 
 oped to the highest pitch of efficiency the Land League organiza- 
 tion ; his splendid eftbi'ts to emancipate the land from the thraldom 
 of Landlordism, realized to the fullest all these exiles longed for and 
 desired. He won at once all the confidence and the attachment 
 that generous hearts can bestow. Their generous sympathies soon 
 assumed a practical and substantial form. Thousands of Land 
 League organizations sprang up, as it were, by magic in every part 
 of the world. There is not a city, town or village throughout the 
 vast extent of the United States, Canada, Australia, as well as in 
 England and Scotland, in which there are not found flourishing 
 Land League branches, thoroughly organized and disciplined, all in 
 communication with the great central (though now suppressed) 
 
BISHOP MJLTY. 927 
 
 organization at home, and contributing to it a moral and a pecuniarj' 
 support that makes it a power almost irresistible. Streams of gold 
 still flow from these innumerable sources abundantly into its treas- 
 ury. Mr. Parnell on the day of his arrest was regarded as the 
 greatest, the most trusted, and the most popular Irishmen of this 
 century, or perhaps of any other. The very day of his arrest IMr. 
 Gladstone addressed a meeting, composed princij)ally of aldermen, 
 at the Guildhall in London, and his theme, of course, was the ex- 
 cited state of Ireland. Mr. Parnell had been arrested some hours 
 before the meeting, and Mr. Gladstone was, of course, fully cog- 
 nizant of the fact. At the very height, however, of a fierce, 
 impassioned, and scathing philippic, in which Mr. Gladstone has 
 no rival, and by which he can drive an auditory into all but absolute 
 frenzy, a telegram arrives. The messenger presents himself exactly 
 at the proper moment, forces his way to the place I'rom which Mr. 
 Gladstone is speaking, and presents the telegram amid the breatli- 
 less silence. Mr. Gladstone reads it, and, with the solemnity of an 
 accomplished actor, announces that the first act of the drama is 
 opened — Mr. Parnell is ari'ested, and is now safely lodged in Kil- 
 mainham. 
 
 The announcement brought the meeting, to a man, to their feet^ 
 and it was hailed witli loud, ringing, and prolonged cheers, and with 
 the most extravagant demonstration of exultation. In reading 
 this, it would strike any one that Mr. Gladstone might have re- 
 mained satisfied with the victory he had fairly, or imfairly, won over 
 his great rival, and that this wild, indecent ebullition of feeling 
 over a falling foe looked very like striking him when he ■was down. 
 I have no doubt that the enthusiastic applause that Mr. Gladstone 
 had evoked afforded him the higliest delight, but it did not excite 
 the same feelings in the minds of millions of Irishmen who read of 
 it with the neM's of Mr. Parnell's arrest the next morning. The 
 ■wild, enthusiastic outburst of triumph and joy which hailed the 
 announcement of Mr. Pai-nell's imprisonment caused them greater 
 pain, irritated and exasperated them more, than a similar outburst 
 of the fiercest hatred and contempt if levelled directly at themselves. 
 But the most painful feature of this Guildhall meeting was that, as 
 Mr. Gladstone fairly enough insinuated, it was representative in its 
 character. The great Liberal and Eadical parties spoke and acted 
 
928 TREASURY OF ELOQUENCE. 
 
 through it, and emphatically expressed their opinions and feelings 
 through its proceedings. The Radical party had to do violence to 
 their convictions and principles in assisting Mr. Gladstonn to pass 
 the most oppressive Coercion Bill ever enacted ; and yet, with his 
 promises broken before their eyes, they never yet condemned, or 
 even complained of, the use he had made of the dangerous and un- 
 constitutional powers which that Act gave him. But as we are now 
 striving for our ver}'^ lives, the time has come when they must speak 
 out, and openly take a side for or against us. If they do not com- 
 pel Mr. Gladstone to reverse his policy, and set Mr. Parnell and the 
 other Suspects at lilierty, on what reasonable groiuids, may I ask, 
 can they claim the loyalty, the allegiance, the political sympathy 
 and support with which the Irish nation invariably flivored them ? 
 In that event it would become our duty, as well as our interest, to 
 assume an attitude of antagonism, and even of avowed, active, and 
 aggressive hostility towards them. Any escape at all from Mr. 
 Gladstone's government would not only be a relief, but a positive 
 improvement of our condition. The great distinctive features that 
 had long distinguished and characterized Liberal and Tory adminis- 
 trations are now obliterated. They do not now differ even in degree, 
 and where they do differ, the balance of evil is on the Liberal side. 
 I would, therefore, respectfully submit to these gi-eat parties to 
 pause and gauge exactly our influence and strength before they 
 finally reject us. The Irish race in Ireland, England, and Scotland, 
 and all over the world, is united as one man, and with the .sincerity 
 and loyalty of brothers, in the great struggle in which we are now 
 engaged. Although we are numerous enough to be counted by mil- 
 lions, yet we are thoroughly organized and disciplined ; we are, more- 
 over, sensitively attentive and obedient to the instructions issued for 
 our guidance by the leaders whom we know and have confidence in. 
 We can throw our united energy and strength into one great, com- 
 bined movement ; we can direct that movement to any point we 
 please, and act and vote solid there against the common enemy. 
 
 I have the honor to be, faithfully yours, 
 
 >b T. NULTY. 
 
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